Darlington Loop

A loop round the town, using bike paths and bits of off-road and taking in a few laps of the pump and 4xtracks.

Distance: 31 km (map)
Surface: Some off-road, bike paths, bits of road
Time: 1 hour 52 minutes
Weather: Nice and warm, sunny
Bike: Inbred SS (with 2.4" tyres, 32:17)

Fixing Teesdale and Swaledale

I needed to get out on a decent bike ride and I needed to pick up my tickets for Dales Bike Centre's Ride the Divide cinema night. Getting them by the shortest and easiest route would be a bit silly, right?

So, with only four non-commute rides in my legs in the last 7 months, riding fixed gear via the highest pub in Britain was the obvious choice.

Home to Barnard Castle to Bowes to Tan Hill to Reeth and then home again. 73 miles, with some off-road built in. Hills. And no freewheeling.

It was a lovely day so I had an espresso and a pastry in Barnard Castle.

The climb from Bowes to Tan Hill pub is long and bumpy.

But there's beer at the end of it.

The road home has its share of bumps too, in places.

Ace day out. My longest fixed ride ever, off the back of very little riding.

I hurt now.

Distance: 73 miles (map)
Surface: Road and easy off-road
Time: 9 hour 30 minutes
Weather: Nice and warm, sunny
Bike: Solitude fixie (with 28c tyres, 34:16)

Fixing Darlington - another short local ride

Another quickie.



Distance: 21km (map)
Surface: Road and off-road
Time: 1 hour 18 minutes
Weather: Nice and warm, sunny
Bike: Solitude fixie (with 28c tyres, 34:16)

Fixing Darlington - short local ride

Quick post-work spin.

Distance: 12km (map)
Surface: Road and off-road
Time: 45 minutes
Weather: Nice and warm, sunny
Bike: Solitude fixie (with 28c tyres, 34:16)

The Inbred is no more

After only two rides as Project Gnarr, the Inbred got nicked from my garage last weekend.

Project Budget Endurance Machine is go...

Project Gnarr’s second outing - Swaledale with gears and boinginess

Another lovely ride from dales Bike Centre with Simon. Swaledale is still ace. My second ride on the Inbred with suspension and gears proved that they're quite good fun, really. It still feels like cheating to get to/from a ride in a car, but bad things can be good, right?



Distance: 31km?
Time: 4 hours?
Surface: off-road
Weather: Very windy, misty, drizzly
Bike: Geared Inbred (1x9, with suspension fork and 2.4″ tyres)

Project Gnarr's first outing - Swaledale with gears and boinginess

I had my first ride on Project Gnarr (my SS Inbred, rebuilt with 1x9 gearing and suspension forks) on Friday. About 30km in Swaledale: along the valley bottom from Dales Bike Centre, up the valley side from somewhere between Gunnerside and Low Row onto Great Pinseat, then down Surrender Moor and over Low Moor. Swaledale is still awesome.



This was my first ever ride with both gears and suspension (only my second ever ride with suspension and first with gears in a couple of years). What I learned: gears make it easier to ride up hills; suspension makes it easier to ride down hills. So, they really are strength compensators and skill compensators

32:32 is plenty low enough as a bottom gear. It's the same ratio I rode round there as a beginning MTBer 18 years ago (28:28 in them days), and that was on on a heavier bike with weaker legs. 32:12 is plenty tall enough for a top gear. 1x9 is definitely the way forward.

The fork isn't set up properly yet, but I quite liked it not doing too much until I hit something bigger/harder and it doesn't bob about too much when climbing. It'd be interesting to have a go on a modern fork with clever lockout things as a comparison.

I think I like it. But, it's heavier and complicated, so I think I'll be sticking with rigid forks and non-variable gears for proper rides and save boing and variable gears for shorter/group rides.

I think I might even have done a little bit of a jump. Stoked, dude!

Distance: 31km?
Time: 4 hours?
Surface: off-road
Weather: Warm and dry for the time of year - so, a bit drizzly and very windy
Bike: Geared Inbred (1x9, with suspension fork and 2.4" tyres)