Category Archives: Uncategorised

Twisties!

L to R: Ross, Nick (who was riding a Yeti 575 test bike!), me, MWG, Brad.

Me on Jing’s Cannondale.

And again (PS: the Fox Sargeant shorts are the best shorts I’ve owned so far).

Group shot out in the open.

Mad skids!

Honda crew packing for home.

Young Cliffy made to do the dirty work.

Had an early night and met up with Zi, Jing, Clifton, Andy and 1st timer David at 7.30AM. We hit the M5 to M7 and got the Yellowmundee at 9AM. MWG rocked up as soon as we arrived (the Soap guys: Matt, Ross, Nick and Brad had just finished half a lap) and Felix soon after. David forgot to bring water, freaked out and drove to get some, this kinda slowed us all down as we had to wait for him to get back, once he pulled into the driveway the Soap guys were itching to hit the trail (some of them had other committments booked for later in the day) and once we did hit the trail we soon realised that David’s off road bike skills were pretty much non-existant. We lost him 10 minutes in and at that stage no one was willing to go back for him so we forged on (all the while feeling really bad about it!).

David was back at the carpark (we thought he would be) and wanted to go home. Perhaps it was the pressure of having too many people, a lot of it was nerves too poor guy, but we kinda forced him to stay to at least have another go, and we did another lap minus the Soap guys (the hardcore crew!) who all had to go home. Zi was sure to keep him company this time around.

Yellowmundee: It’s all single trail and it’s quite pretty and the trail flows really well too. I’d watched a few videos of the trail, and read a thread on Farkin where people were discussing 2 hard parts which they walk up (I saw a lot of people walking it in the videos too). I have to admit after seeing the vids I had a giggle as it all looked too easy, but having said that I know that things ALWAYS look easier on a picture, or video than in real life, so I tried my best to bite my tounge and not say a thing until I gave it a go first hand. Fair enough I didn’t make it up the 2 technical climbs 1st go, but I got them both the 2nd go and they’re both easy for me in comparisson to some parts of Manly Dam.

I also had a good go at Jing’s Cannondale. The gearing (no granny gear and a road cassette on the back) is definitely not great for technical stuff. I failed to get up either tech climb with his bike. On the other hand I had a go at Andy’s heavy Giant Yukon (Giant’s entry level dually) and got up it no worries (perhaps a combination of plushness, easy gears and weight for traction?).

Highlight of the day was just chilling out at the tech climb after the bridge and just egging everyone on to have a good go at it. We made a lot of noise and had a lot of laughs. Good times. I feel bad for David, he would have been much better of going to Lady Carrington Drive for his 1st trail experience. I only hope he’s not freaked out by the whole thing. I also managed to snap my chain (that felt strange!) and have to praise SRAM’s powerlink as it got me going again in a matter of minutes.

PS: All pics by Jing. I left my camera at home doh.

PPS: The Yeti Nick was riding didn’t look as porn as I thought it would look, maybe because the componentry was a lot lower spec than what I’ve got on my Reign. Whilst I didn’t have a go on it we did talk about the bike at different times during the ride and I’ve come to the concusion that it’s a very similar bike to the Reign. It can make it up climbs, just not as fast as the hardtail guys. It’s slow and painful on gradual uphills but it leaves you grinning ear to ear on the downhill stuff. At this stage I can’t justify buying one when my Reign does the job as is.

PPPS: Fuck MWG is fast!

It’s been raining all week and Zi and I couldn’t stand it anymore (he says he’s feeling fat lol) so we went for a ride despite the on and off rain and thunderstorm forecast. We thought we’d check out Appin as Jing, Clifton and Timmy checked it out last week and said it was awesome.

Appin’s a very quick 30min drive from JDMyard just off the M5. Somehow Zi and I got quite severely lost in there and ended up on a lot of 4WD fire trails. The ground was really mushy from all the rain which made it really hard to pedal on (great training I say!) and 2 hours in we knew we had to back track as we were in amongst frightened kangaroos and rabbits! We did so and found the trail again (which is market by hazzard ribbons and pink arrows) but the skies opened up on us and it started pouring down. Still, we’re glad we found the juicy single trail bits, which were marked quite clearly with an “A Line” and an easier “B Line”. Of-course we took the A line!

Got to JDMyard to meet Zi and found that he’d bought a little skate ramp. What better a way to get warmed up pre-ride!

EG Civic – JDM YO!

We found this sexy rock which I really wanted to huck off, but balls were not big enough on the day so we just rolled down it instead.

Zi rolling down.

Me rolling down.

Zi crossing.

Bike wash time. Zi’s pimp hose reel at JDMyard.

On a bad note: Last week I felt a pain in my left calf muscle and thought nothing much of it. It’s been a week since I last rode and half way through this ride the pain came back. It forced me to push a little harder with my right leg, which could be a good thing. I’ve had some advice to rest it for at least 2 weeks. I’ll do just that after tomorrows epic ride at Yellowmundee (which I’m so looking forward to!).

Council has almost approved the plans to rennovate the house (it’s only taken them a good part of the year) and so Mum and I went to order tiles for the 2 new bathrooms, as well as paving for the paths outside the house.

We dropped in to see a friend of Mums Michael at Stoneworld, all the way out at Girraween. Their warehouse is ridiculously massive (I dream of owning one of those hangers to store collector cars in!).

Choosing tiles was super hard. Initially I felt like giving up before even trying but with a bit of persistance I managed to find stuff I was happy with.

The showers will not have glass boxes around them, instead they will be open walk in showers with mosaic feature walls.

I tried to avoid all the creams. Grey floor tiles and white wall tiles are a little cold but these little mosaic tiles add that tiny bit of warmth I was looking for. Chrome fittings, towel rails, charcoal basin drawers and doors, wooden bench, red towels. It’s all in my head.

Inspired by watching Road to Roubaix I’ve ended up deciding to pave the outside paths in cobble stone!

Didn’t get to ride today due to crappy weather, so instead Zi and went for a bowl of Ramen at Ichi-ban Boshi (Tan tan men FTW!), we dropped in to a small cake cafe called 85 Degrees Coffee in Kingsford on the way home. A few months ago Charles and Zi had a hankering for this shit after an exxy meal at Prime. We walked all the way from Prime to Chinatown for it. No seats, just a tiny shop selling cakes and Coffee served at an apparently perfect 85 degree tempterature. I’d seen crowds of people in front of this new shop in Kingsford on my way through for the past week and now I know why.

People were stopping to see what other people were looking at (the cake display) and then reading the signs people were reading out loud “85% off!”. Zi lined up and ordered away, even saying to the lady “and um, one more surprise cake, choose whatever!” thinking hey at 85% off that’s only cost me $4 all up, to his shock then it was $15 all up and when asked what about the 85% off discount she said “85% OF”! Now that’s great marketing lol!

Cakes in the window facing the street.

Rumour has it the cake’s are imported (is that a good thing?!).

I smell chain store explosion. Like any other trend food store (Easyway anyone?) it’ll explode, then most likely dissapear just as fast. OK I’m off to have 85% of my Chocolate Valentine slice… it better be good.

Jazz get’s a 20,000km service. Deddy’s the man at Top One and he’s looked after my daily drivers for a while now. He’s fast, very thorough and just an excellent guy.

Top One.

Deddy using an air compressor to dry off the Jazz’s engine bay after a degrease and wash.

Advan RS rims = yum.

Flush Aerocatch bonnet pins on Eddy’s Jazz.

Stack dash unit + cage in Eddy’s Jazz (hardcore much?!).

I scored this amazing NOS (new old stock) set of Dia-Compe Aero Gran Compe brake levers off eBay for my whiteout Paino road bike for $50. What a steal! They even come with plastic cable guides (which go under your bar tape) which will allow the brake cable outters under the bar tape to move (ie: smoother braking). I couldn’t resist buying a pair of matching old skool Adidas Samba’s too, only to be worn when riding the Paino of-course!

Bye bye Talon.

We sold Christina’s Giant Talon on eBay this weekend. It went for $1025 which is great and it’ll help to fund her road bike (which is on order and will be here in Feb 09), and potentially also this bike. :)

Suga and I were invited to our next door neighbors party (3 birthdays under the one roof). I’m not usually a fan of dress up parties but this one was literally next door so Suga and I went to town with it!

We dropped into the Costume Shop on Cleveland Street (check the speed racer helmet!).

Pretty funny.

This is next door’s back yard from our lounge room.

All dressed up and ready to go lol.

This is a shot of our wild jungle of a yard from next door’s party. So strange to see our house from this perspective. I couldn’t stop staring at my own place for a while. Great people (some who haved lived on this street for over 20 years), great conversations, never ending champagne, great party!

It was raining Saturday morning, huge shame as the Deus Ex Machina bicycle swap meet was on. They started at 7AM, super early for a weekend but I love the spirit of it, getting in there before everybody else to pick up the best stuff is what great markets are all about. Shame then that Suga and I got there at 10.30 (lol), but even so we spotted some beautiful metallic blue alloy mudguards on the ground at one of the stalls, and upon closer inspection we just had to have them. The stall owner said they’re from the 70’s and let us have the set for a mere $20. They’re so pretty we’re going to build a ladies bike around them!

Obligatory name dropping: I ran into Tom who runs Hell on Wheels (be sure to check out the store, it’s killer) and Carby who runs Deus (I’m sure I’ve mentioned it before but I used to work along side Carby when I was a design junior, he’s just one of those guys that has “it” and has only gone from strength to strength).

Rained out, and we were late, but it was still such a cool place to be. I can confirm that there will be more future bike swap meets in 09!

Stalls were free. I have to admit I was tempted to set up and sell/swap the shitload of gear I’ve got lying around.

See those shiny blue things?

They’re mine!!!

Lovely aren’t they?

Can’t go wrong with baby blue + white.

Fang it!

God Speed.

So many nice bikes in such a small space.

Surfboard carrier (so cool).

For sale in Broadway.

Crumpler shopfront.

Suga and I dropped into the ZanziBar for a drink before heading across the road to the Bank Hotel for Thai. Both venues were haunts of mine in the early to mid 90’s but back then they were the seediest, grungiest rock’n’roll punk venues around. How things have changed! (PS: the Thai food was awesome despite being 3 times the price).

Valet bike parking!

What a sight.

Newtown RPRSNT!

Win a Surly!

Grant from MC Cyclery on the mic.

The Sydney Bicycle Film Festival started last week. Christina and I checked out the opening session on Friday night with a mate Ben who I hadn’t caught up with in 9 months (he’s a running and cycling nutter!). Grant from MC Cyclery was sponsoring the first session, and giving away a Surly bicycle to one lucky punter.

There were 3 films: Standing start was an arty (tried a bit too hard I thought) short film on Olympian and World Champion Track Sprinter Craig MacLean. Millar’s Tale was a short film on a Tour de France cyclist’s confession (and thoughts) on doping and the feature film was Road to Roubaix which was great (if a little long).

What was cooler was just being there, in Newtown and seeing how many people that live there ride bicycles as transport. BMX riders, fixies, commuters on junk bikes… ALL of them taking ownership of the road in peak hour traffic. The valet bicycle parking outside the Dendy was a nice touch too :)