Late last year Aileen joined Team Glow (a womens cycling club), and this last week has been their trip to Mallorca. Thankfully I was able to go too (yay!) and join in on the rides. Also strapped to my noggin was my trusty GoPro Hero camera for recording going down big hills very fast 🙂

And this is what I’d like to post here 🙂 In a rough order of when they occurred 🙂

First up, the descent from Col d Orient, this was on our 4th day, and was part of a 72 mile ish loop with 4000ft of climbing 🙂

There were two descents, the first being from the top of Col d Orient trough the town of Orient and then climbing up to Col d Honor.

I much prefered the climb to Col d Honor to the one of the Orient, felt faster for some reason!

After climbing that, next thing to do was to descend into Bunyola! 😀 Really enjoyed this descent, just wish I could have gotten past the guy in the BASF jersey towards the end :/ ah well next year perhaps 🙂

Day 5 was a rest day, so just a 16 mile jaunt along to Alcudia for lunch with Aileen, saving our legs ready for Day 6, which was Sa Colabra!

Unfortunetly my Garmin had a funny (possibly heat releated?) and mislogged some of the points on the climb so I didn’t get a time from top to bottom 🙁 my first ever cat 1 climb and part of my data is messed up! typical.. next year I guess :), thankfully the GoPro didn’t fail to record my descent. Probably could have got a better time down if it weren’t for all the damn Armchair warriors sat in this airconditioned bloody coaches.. bloody tourists ;D

After climbing back up there was the ride back, which also meant a descent of Familla which I missed recording on our Lluc climbing day. Possibly my fave descent glad I got to do it twice, and this time record it, and race along with team Glow 🙂

Our last day cycling, so why not go for a nice easy ride along to the Cap d Formentor (Lighthouse)… easy… sure… 🙂 And we even added in some extra climbing too, you know.. because :/ 😀

Had another sprint along on the way back towards Pollenca too.

These are my video’s so far, I’ll add a few more as I get them processed and uploaded 🙂

Seems that the ride on Monday has had a lasting effect on me.. I enjoyed it so much I have a hankering for more of the same.  To fuel my newfound addiction I went and looked on bike-events.co.uk for more fun things to do… So I have signed up for the Manchester to Blackpool ride, and have intentions of also signing up for the Manchester to Chester and Manchester 100 rides too.. Just need to decide which (if any) charity I am going to do fund rasing for…

Whilst these are steps in the right direction, they lacked a certain something, I wanted something a bit more.  So in an attempt to find this I had a mooch around on the British Cycling website.. and have now applied for a racing License! hoping to take part in some national races and see how I do in the rankings 🙂

My plan is to go to see a a race on Tuesday after work, and if possible to take part in it myself the following week :)  I’ll post here following that I think.

Exciting times!

Popped out for an ‘easy’ ride with my lady yesterday.  I say ‘easy’ that’s her deffinition, her easy is more like my moderate, but I am improving at least.  Decided to try the Fallowfield loop out, to see how tandem friendly it would be, only looking to ride for an hour and half.  This soon highlighted my own improvements to me, last time I rode this was a couple of months ago and riding its length and back again was pushing my abilities.  However this time, I found the 10 miles out rather easy, the route however was less tandem friendly than I hoped.  Stopping for lights on main roads is a lot more preferable than having to get off the bike to hoist it over gates etc.  Also playing in traffic (even on a tandem) whilst playing the ‘dodge the pothole’ game is a lot more fun and less risky than dodging kids/dogs and muppets wandering along cycle paths 🙂

After an hour and half of cycling although a bit tired I still had some left in me, so I am certainly improving :)  I think I am going to have to do a fair bit more on my solo bike to get ready for the Great Manchester Cycle (I have entered myself for the 52 mile time limited version!!).. I think I few 50 mile routes will need to be completed.. I think it should be do-able however.  Will be interesting to see how I do against other riders.

Not a new years resolutions, more an organic desire driven by the number of cycling related friends I have and watching the Revolution highlights on Monday.  Revolution wasn’t as bad as I thought but still not my thing, to give an example of what is more appealing to me (I don’t typically do spectator sports) I found two YouTube links Street Descent in Brazil, and Street descent in Chillie  (the Chillie one is my fave).  Neither of these are my riding style or skill level I must add! 😀

But watching those clips stirred the long slumbering desire to ride my bike again!  As she has been unused so much since having my original bike stolen in 2006, which really killed my buzz, I have decided to give her a full service and shock maintenance.  Extra handy as Evans are only across the road and the ONLY authorized Scott shock maintainer in the UK (license to print money? at £95 a shock, I think so 🙁 ).

Last night I started the bike service of 2012 and have removed the shocks ready to take over to Evans tonight after work, during the 2 weeks that should take before I get them back I am hoping to have a good go at cleaning up the rest of the bike, ready for riding in 2012 :D  Going to be uploading pics to the gallery here for anyone interested in pictures of a bike being tinkered with and cleaned 😀

I am mostly pleased with my alternative solution to pad spreaders (which I forgot to buy when in Evans).. cone spanners & cable ties! 🙂

With living in my flat, storing my bike was a bit of an issue.  I was a little excited when I bought the place to find out that they had bike sheds planned out in the carpark.  I envisioned some sturdy locakable box type things.  Alas no, just the crappiest of crappy bits of metal bolted to the floor with some tin roofed wood thing around them :/  If you didn’t end up with your wheels bent to buggery by them I am sure anyone wanting your bike would just unbolt the bike mount from the floor and carry it off.

So my bike has lived in my spare room since I moved here.  Which is less than optimal given it pretty much renders the spare room less than functional if I have more than one guest (and I hate giving up my bed!)

Thankfully a visit to Evans Cycles gave me an answer.. a TopPeak OneUp!  I have had it for a while but usual lack of motivation meant it has sat in its rather nice box for a long time.  With an impending visit from a couple of friends I need to get the room sorted.  Armed with my stud/metalwork/mains cable finder I set about putting it up.. not too difficult and it seems to hold the bike quite well.. was surprised mike bike actually weighs in at 15KGs, the OneUp states no more than 16KG so I am just in the clear 🙂

Anyone looking to get one they are not too expensive and are very well built.

Just hope my drilling holds 🙂