I still love it, of course, a deep seated affection established over more than 8500kms. It's still beautiful, still excites me when I ride it, still does all the jobs I need it to do.
But no longer do I find myself staring at it lustfully whenever I see it. No longer am I obsessive about washing it down after every ride, lubing and polishing it. No longer do I get buterflies when I walk into its room and see it lounging against the wall.
Our relationship has developed now. I've spotted the occasional blemish, heard the occasional nagging creak, felt the slight movement in the cranks when before there was none. I've applied varnish to a stone chip, changed the brake lever reach, replaced the odd worn part. We've grown together over the past couple of years - I'm a better rider and able to take the Orca to places I couldn't have done before, handled it more deftly and brought it to the top of more exciting peaks with astonishing rewards.
And all this without falling off once.
So, I love it, but I'm not in love with it.
Time to start a new affair?
Sunday, 23 October 2011
Saturday, 15 October 2011
A Magical Discovery
I learnt something yesterday. Something magical, brilliant, useful and unexpected. However, telling you now would only be half the story, so you can either read on or cheat and skip to the end.
Where does the story start? In Afan Argoed? On the drive down there? In Cirencester the night before? No, it starts several months ago when Jon suggested a trip to the Afan trail centre (in South Wales, for non-UK readers). We'd been there a few years ago as part of a Welsh road-trip and it seemed as if Jon's stellar performance in the Twentyfour12 had re-ignited his mountain biking fire. Needless to say I was mildly ambivalent due to not having done much MTB this year and an underlying nervousness about crashing and breaking. Still, after a Jon repeatedly suggesting dates and me repeatedly avoiding the issue Jon finally came up with a day that I had no valid reason to decline. It was nearly scuppered at the last minute due to various work-y things but kidnapping his manager and locking him in my cellar suddenly solved the issue.
The night before I travelled down to Jon's in Cirencester. He lives half an hour nearer to Afan than I do, so it made sense to get everything sorted at his the night before and leave early in the morning. The evening was spent eating pasta, drinking beer and wine and playing with small children. There was also some toenail cutting but I don't really want to expand on that.
We were up at seven (06:20 for Jon, using the toddler alarm), coffee, toast, arse-lard, bike clothes and into the car by 07:30. Little traffic, more coffee and bacon roll at the services (Jon: "I don't think I've been to these services before". Me: "We stayed here for the Dragon Ride") and in the Afan car park for 10:00. Some minor faffing and we were riding by 10:15.
"Skyline" is the big long trail at Afan and the only one I've not done before. It starts with the same climb as "White's Level", which I have done, but then heads off into the slightly-more-wilderness than the other trails. At 47km it's also a good 3-4 hour ride (4-7 according to the trail guide...ha!). The climb is sort of interesting, in that there a various rocky sections - loose, steppy, nadgery - that kind of thing. It's not particularly steep though, so more of an exercise in power management for the technical bits than an outright lung-burster. I do find these trails tediously repetative - hey, we've built a rocky feature on the climb, let's do it every 20 metres! I think that's at the heart of my dislike of trail centres, and what distinguishes them from natural routes.
So, where were we? Ah, yes, getting lost on Skyline. I say lost - we knew we were on the trail at all times but somehow managed to miss a 25km loop, suddenly finding ourselves at the final descent. Another exercise in repetition - roll down a bit, rocky feature, roll down a bit, rocky feature - times twenty-five.
After the aborted attempt at Skyline we did "The Wall" (much more natural feeling - definitely my thing), rode back to the Glyncorrwg centre for lasagne, chips and Coke and tried to fix my brakes. Did I mention my back brake lever was squishing to the bars before biting? That really helped my crash induced nervousness. I fact, most of the descents involved Jon zipping off into the distance and me being much more cautious - merely terror rather than hysteria. It's all relative though - I was still going quicker than previous visits.
We decided that we were both a little tired by now so we were never going to attempt Skyline. White's Level it was. My fixed brake became unfixed, we rode up the same initial climb and bimbled round.
On the spin back to the car we discussed how battered we were feeling - four and a half hours of rocky trails uses very different muscles to six hours of road riding. I could feel my core, my hamstrings, my calves were burning from all the standing and my shoulders were stiff from all bar control. Either we need to do more MTBing or stick to being wimpy roadies.
Once in the car I really started to feel the ride. The seats were hard, my glutes (=arse) ached, my legs ached... it wasn't comfortable. Thankfully all the traffic and accidents were going the other way so we had a clear run back to Cirencester. We transferred my stuff to my car and I started the drive home.
I then made my magical discovery.
When you are tired, battered, aching and stiff: Heated seats are awesome. It's like taking a long, hot bath whilst having a nagging feeling that you've wee'd yourself.
Now, that was worth the read wasn't it?
Where does the story start? In Afan Argoed? On the drive down there? In Cirencester the night before? No, it starts several months ago when Jon suggested a trip to the Afan trail centre (in South Wales, for non-UK readers). We'd been there a few years ago as part of a Welsh road-trip and it seemed as if Jon's stellar performance in the Twentyfour12 had re-ignited his mountain biking fire. Needless to say I was mildly ambivalent due to not having done much MTB this year and an underlying nervousness about crashing and breaking. Still, after a Jon repeatedly suggesting dates and me repeatedly avoiding the issue Jon finally came up with a day that I had no valid reason to decline. It was nearly scuppered at the last minute due to various work-y things but kidnapping his manager and locking him in my cellar suddenly solved the issue.
The night before I travelled down to Jon's in Cirencester. He lives half an hour nearer to Afan than I do, so it made sense to get everything sorted at his the night before and leave early in the morning. The evening was spent eating pasta, drinking beer and wine and playing with small children. There was also some toenail cutting but I don't really want to expand on that.
We were up at seven (06:20 for Jon, using the toddler alarm), coffee, toast, arse-lard, bike clothes and into the car by 07:30. Little traffic, more coffee and bacon roll at the services (Jon: "I don't think I've been to these services before". Me: "We stayed here for the Dragon Ride") and in the Afan car park for 10:00. Some minor faffing and we were riding by 10:15.
"Skyline" is the big long trail at Afan and the only one I've not done before. It starts with the same climb as "White's Level", which I have done, but then heads off into the slightly-more-wilderness than the other trails. At 47km it's also a good 3-4 hour ride (4-7 according to the trail guide...ha!). The climb is sort of interesting, in that there a various rocky sections - loose, steppy, nadgery - that kind of thing. It's not particularly steep though, so more of an exercise in power management for the technical bits than an outright lung-burster. I do find these trails tediously repetative - hey, we've built a rocky feature on the climb, let's do it every 20 metres! I think that's at the heart of my dislike of trail centres, and what distinguishes them from natural routes.
So, where were we? Ah, yes, getting lost on Skyline. I say lost - we knew we were on the trail at all times but somehow managed to miss a 25km loop, suddenly finding ourselves at the final descent. Another exercise in repetition - roll down a bit, rocky feature, roll down a bit, rocky feature - times twenty-five.
After the aborted attempt at Skyline we did "The Wall" (much more natural feeling - definitely my thing), rode back to the Glyncorrwg centre for lasagne, chips and Coke and tried to fix my brakes. Did I mention my back brake lever was squishing to the bars before biting? That really helped my crash induced nervousness. I fact, most of the descents involved Jon zipping off into the distance and me being much more cautious - merely terror rather than hysteria. It's all relative though - I was still going quicker than previous visits.
We decided that we were both a little tired by now so we were never going to attempt Skyline. White's Level it was. My fixed brake became unfixed, we rode up the same initial climb and bimbled round.
On the spin back to the car we discussed how battered we were feeling - four and a half hours of rocky trails uses very different muscles to six hours of road riding. I could feel my core, my hamstrings, my calves were burning from all the standing and my shoulders were stiff from all bar control. Either we need to do more MTBing or stick to being wimpy roadies.
Once in the car I really started to feel the ride. The seats were hard, my glutes (=arse) ached, my legs ached... it wasn't comfortable. Thankfully all the traffic and accidents were going the other way so we had a clear run back to Cirencester. We transferred my stuff to my car and I started the drive home.
I then made my magical discovery.
When you are tired, battered, aching and stiff: Heated seats are awesome. It's like taking a long, hot bath whilst having a nagging feeling that you've wee'd yourself.
Now, that was worth the read wasn't it?
Sunday, 2 October 2011
Catching Flies
As predicted, the weather yesterday was blistering. It was the first of October, and it was my first minimum-clothing-full-length-zip-unzipped ride of the year (excluding foreign lands). And no, this isn't the Southern hemisphere.
I had one of those magic legs days too -the days when you glance down at the computer and can't believe the power you're maintaining. I even overtook someone. Admittedly he was shirtless, on a loaded tourer and looked like he'd been riding non-stop for six days, but hey, an overtake is an overtake. I broke my record for the ride to my Mum's, and then broke it again on the way back. I'm surprised Team Sky haven't been round.
I celebrated this achievement with a stretch and a Cornetto, though not in that order. It was more important to get the recovery ice-cream down quickly. Proper sports nutrition is vital for an athlete like me.
Then I went for a shower. That was where I discovered that not only had I been dragging my own sorry carcass up the hills, but the carcasses of twelve flies. Twelve. At least - there were a few mushy black dots that could have once been flies but it was hard to tell. I only counted the dots that had a clear, visible leg or wing.
There are definitely a lot of flies about at the moment. In the evenings, when the sun is low, you can see clouds of them and feel the bigger ones slamming into your glasses. Are they as confused as I am by the weather? Do they think it's Spring and have all hatched six months early? Any entomologists care to comment?
Still, there are definitely twelve fewer than there would have been had I not been out yesterday. No need to thank me. All part of the service.
I had one of those magic legs days too -the days when you glance down at the computer and can't believe the power you're maintaining. I even overtook someone. Admittedly he was shirtless, on a loaded tourer and looked like he'd been riding non-stop for six days, but hey, an overtake is an overtake. I broke my record for the ride to my Mum's, and then broke it again on the way back. I'm surprised Team Sky haven't been round.
I celebrated this achievement with a stretch and a Cornetto, though not in that order. It was more important to get the recovery ice-cream down quickly. Proper sports nutrition is vital for an athlete like me.
Then I went for a shower. That was where I discovered that not only had I been dragging my own sorry carcass up the hills, but the carcasses of twelve flies. Twelve. At least - there were a few mushy black dots that could have once been flies but it was hard to tell. I only counted the dots that had a clear, visible leg or wing.
There are definitely a lot of flies about at the moment. In the evenings, when the sun is low, you can see clouds of them and feel the bigger ones slamming into your glasses. Are they as confused as I am by the weather? Do they think it's Spring and have all hatched six months early? Any entomologists care to comment?
Still, there are definitely twelve fewer than there would have been had I not been out yesterday. No need to thank me. All part of the service.
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