This must be the most rubbish mtb winter I can remember

Looking back at winter photos taken in the last 10 or 12 years show a fair bit of snow, rain and wind but nothing to compare to this winter and it’s not even finished yet! The snow here this year has been wet and slushy not the sort you can enjoy biking in and the wind has just been mental!

Out this afternoon with Dougie and true to form the weather changed from reasonably pleasant to downright diabolical in a few minutes forcing us to cut short the ride and scarper back home through the odd flooded road and arrive back soaked. 2019/2020 winter isn’t going to be remembered fondly!

Even on an ebike, wet snow is hard going!

Admittedly not very deep but pedalling through wet snow is like swimming through treacle!

This weekend looks like a write off with heavy rain and strong wind in the shape of Storm Denis about to hit us, Spring can’t come quick enough!

And if wet snow wasn’t enough I had to cycle through about 12inches of water on the way back home!

Barries bike still in repair shop awaiting a part that’s presently held up for some reason in Amsterdam, at least he’s not missing much due to the weather just now 

Storm Ciara came and went, waiting on bloody Storm Denis now!

So we’ve had Storm Ciara which caused my riding to be interrupted as well as causing a leak in my house roof. I’ve managed to repair the leak with my usual brand of crudeness which appears to be working so I’ve saved a bit of money by not having to call in a tradesman.

Horrible wet snow accompanied by gale force winds, not a good mixture. Now apart from tomorrow, the next four or five days look pretty bleak as well, but I suppose that’s winter for you!

Waiting for Storm Ciara to hit us

Out with Dougie yesterday and the weather was positively spring like but we’ve been warned Storm Ciara is coming across the Atlantic to hit us on Saturday night/Sunday morning so it’s a case of wait and see what happens.

Dougie did his signature jump of the final bridge and it was more or less downhill all the way home from here, it’s looking like it could be midweek till the weather clears for more riding

Is it any wonder our drivetrains suffer in a wet Scottish winter

The weather this year in Scotland has been more wet than anything else, with little snow so far but plenty of mud which any mountain bike struggles to cope with.

This photo was taken this afternoon when I was out in the Pentland Hills and was typical of much of the ride.

This is the result of the assault on my freehub by rainwater and mud, the freehub just slowly gave up the ghost and had to be replaced. On a brighter note at least I got over 5k out of it which when you think of the conditions it’s been exposed to is pretty good!

Freehub on the ebike playing up, not good....

We reached the mast at Glentress on Sunday morning in freezing wet snow with my freehub moaning even more than we were in the horrendous weather conditions!

Things brightened up a bit on the descent back down to Peebles but the noise from my back hub was increasing so today I took the rear wheel to a local bike shop for some love and attention which I was unable to administer due to lack of tools and now await news, hopefully it’ll be a quick and relatively cheap repair....( some hope)!