Chichester to Southease..

Did a solo mission ride from Chichester to Southease at the weekend - The short version is as follows:

• Distance: 46.9 miles
• Average speed: 6.8 mph
• Near-death experiences: 1

For the full version, check out the South Downs Way Randonnee training record page..

Downs Link Trail ride..

Just a quick update - Alex and myself rode from Shoreham to Guildford and back, using about 90% of the Downs Link Trail, before accidentally deviating slightly (OK, getting lost). More to come soon - I'm in the midst of fixing an incredibly troublesome server failure at the moment! Total distance, 78 miles (including the Lancing to Shoreham leg each way), 73 from Shoreham to Guildford and back. 8.4mph average - this would have been much closer to 10 or even more, our target, had we not stopped in Guildford for food, and then later to help a damsel in distress with a puncture, which took about 40 mins (doh!). Full write-up to follow.

Web site tidy-up

As a bit of a house-keeping task, I've decided to move product specific blog posts to the reviews section - as they're not always in the form of a review, I'll edit each post accordingly - I want to get them in there quickly for now so I've got something to work from. First to go are the Garmin Edge 205 GPS and the Specialized Sonoma MTB shoes.

Sunday Friston Forest ride

Went for that relaxed ride I'd promised myself - I'll include approximate ride stats below, but I haven't included it in the SDW Randonnee training ride section, as it doesn't really qualify as a training ride. Dayna, Alex and Tom and myself met at Brighton Station at 9:00 Sunday to get the 9:17 to Eastbourne. Dayna had got a flat on the way to the station, so we fixed that on the train. The ride to Friston from Eastbourne is longer than I thought, at about 6 miles, but the distance went pretty quickly. Tom had said from the beginning that he might decide to ride back to Brighton rather than go for a jaunt around the forest which Dayna and myself were planning to do, and even the superb singletrack couldn't change his mind; he and Alex left after around a mile, heading for the carpark in the southwest corner before continuing to Alfriston and home.

D and myself continued around the MTB trail at a fairly sedate pace, riding round once rather than twice, and then riding back up to the South East corner before continuing the route back to Eastbourne.

Along the way, I started noticing another annoying creaking noise coming from my drivetrain, and also that whenever I put the power down, the chain started to slip. Having had the cassette, derailleur and chain replaced recently, I was somewhat perplexed, thinking that although the chain wheels were the only component of the drivetrain that hadn't been replaced in the two years I'd owned the bike, surely it would have been picked up by Evans during the recent service? It turns out not. I'd already decided not to take the bike there again, choosing Freedom Bikes instead due to a recommendation by Alex, some great reviews I'd read, and the fact that they are very close to my office. I took it in there this morning and straight away the guy noticed the incredibly worn chainwheel. So that, along with the inner gear cable are to be replaced, along with anything else they find.

Ride stats as follows (cheers to D for the use of his speedo stats - my GPS wasn't charged for long enough to last the whole day)

• Distance: 23 miles
• Max Speed: 33.3 mph (riding on the road)
• Average Speed: 7.1 mph

These only take in to account the average speed whilst actually moving; I keep my GPS recording even when stopped, as it can be quite misleading to think that an average speed whilst moving is the actual average speed, because even relatively short stops can make a huge difference to the actual average speed.

Update to the reviews section..

Went riding at the weekend - I'll write that up ASAP - in the meantime, I've written a review of the Kona Hydration pack.

Rear Derailleur fitted.. and a new chain..

Got home on Friday raring to go with fitting my new XT derailleur - I think I've fitted one before, to my Fire Mountain, but conveniently forgot that it didn't go that well, and that I had to take it to a shop to get it sorted. So, with only one spare pin for the Shimano chain, I removed the old LX derailleur, and fitted the new one. I fitted the chain, and using the wall-mounted bike rack in the garage, attempted to tune the gears. I had a strange clicking noise coming from somewhere in the drive train, and realised that I'd not threaded the chain through one of the guides on the derailleur properly.. doh! I'd just used my only pin.In desparation, I decided that I could use the chain tool to push the pin out to within a mm or so, so that it stayed in the link but still split the chain. I successfully achieved this on my second go, driving the pin back in and through the other side (leaving the pin in by just enough is a bit of a bitch) but this actually left the chain too short to go in to the largest chainwheel / largest sprocket. This is not a gear I use often, due to the excess wear on the drivetrain it causes (when I was 10, the manual for my first mountain bike described this as a "crossover gear", but an indicator that something was wrong.

I proceeded to adjust the gears (I'd watched my Fundamentals video before attempting this), and got them all working pretty much perfectly - smooth, direct changes, no chattering, and went out for a small ride - I often find that when a drivetrain is weighted, gears that are perfectly tuned when the bike is on a rack are not so perfectly tuned.

Even so, they held up, and worked really well. Even for the 26 mile off-road ride that me and Coatsy completed the next day, so I was pretty chuffed. The thing is, I didn't have a crimp for the end of the gear cable, so it'll fray, meaning that I'm probably going to have to get a shop to sort it anyway ; (

But that chain would still have proved a potential problem - I'd never have had faith in it due to the fact that it hadn't been re-joined in the recommended way, so I decided to buy a new chain. I popped in to Halfords in Shoreham on the way in to the office, and picked up a SRAM chain with a powerlink - already sold on this, much better than having to have spare pins.

Still, it was good practise and I'm sure it'll be fine for a few rides.

South Downs Way Randonnee Challenge Posts..