Category Archives: cyclocross

Kona Jake

Five in a row

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Summary for the week. Warming up after a cool weekend. Strong sun and little rain.

zing

Ridden the Zing, Jake and the Paddy Wagon this week. The first day felt hard and was rather disheartening, but as the week wore on – it felt more natural. I’ve worked away most weekends on DofE so that has interrupted my cycling habits.

Rides were 36.1+ 51.7+27.9+ 21.5+32.6 = 169.8km
So that’s 104 miles in 5 days. I’m happy with that even with the low pace of several.

Some repairs are pending. My summer road shoes are falling out of shape, the left tends to tilt my foot outwards which then changes the whole leg. My left knee sweeps outwards with each stroke and lowers the prower into the pedal that side. Those Carnac shoes are ancient, I’ve forgotten when I bought them, probably in the 90s. A new pair are on order.
Secondly, the headset on the Jake cross bike has gone notchy so I’ll get replacement races soon too. Next problem is lubrication in gear cables. Muc-off lube tends to dry up quickly making gear changes hit & miss. I’m going to try a heavier grade of oil. Maybe confine the thin dry lube to the shifter mechaisms.

New gravel routes.

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18°C, Kona Jake, full sun with a light SW breeze.

Canal, bike, sun.

Sought out several new gravel routes across farm lands. This was very fine.

The shoes feel much better than the road pair. The Carnacs I use with Look pedals seem to be distorting out of shape. The left one, especially has a twist that effects the pedal stroke.

Gales, gales gales.

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8°C, strong SW, mostly sunny

Kona Jake: it’s such a good bike for me. The fit feels natural and it’s light and reasonably quick. There were a few placesa where I had to carry it over fallen trees (felled by one of the recent gales. We’ve had 3 named storms over the last week. There is debris everywhere. The beech is a mix of dead grass torn from plants and masses of human rubbish.

It’s been a worrying time at home for the roof. Last time it was like this, i had to climb a ladder and replace missing tiles. It’s fun riding in the wind at times. Some directions I can on ly do 6mph standing on pedals and then I return at 30 mph with no effort.

That didn’t work out well.

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5°C, moderate SE wind, sun at first but heavy rain to finish.

Set out on the recently serviced Kona Jake. Just like I used to a few years ago, I rode down the canal towpath and found it almost empty. Here was mud in abundance though. He tyres worked well enough with improved grip on the rear. I put an old 35c Grifo which actually came with the bike. I took them off a few years ago because of he huge number of punctures I was getting. He first month of owning the Jake I got 11 punctures.

Anyway, all went well, even along the Sefton Way, a converted rail line. It was a string of puddles surrounded by deeper mud. It’s actually easier to ride through the middle where gravel can be felt.

Then the rear tyre went soft. At first I hoped it would make it home, especially since rain had started. I stopped to as pressure and fumbled with cold muddy hands. The tyre hardened, for a while. It’s now got a self-sealing Slime tube which should have held it. It didn’t last long. I know there are lots of hawthorn trimmings en-route but I was still annoyed.
{arts of the return ride were on a very soft tyre, others I walked. By now the rain was heavy and the road rippled with thin riverlets running along. I didn’t get cold though.

Riding on thin ice

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4°C, full sun but ice patches remain light NE breeze

Cheshire Lines.

This is Cheshire lines which runs up the side of Lancashire. It looks icy but there were no problems with grip. It was a fine day and I was so glad to be out.The muddiest part is by a sewage works and though the puddles look large, the best line is straight through the middle of them. Around there should stink but now it doesn’t. That is a Covid problem – I can’t smell bad things. You’d think that was good, but actualy it’s a nuisance. How can I tell if food is off, or whether a shirt needs a wash?

False crown

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8°C, light NW wind, milky sun.

New chain and BB on the Mustang.

Not ridden for a week due to another exhausting cold. One day, I even suspected I had Corona virus when a cough suddenly started. Today, suddenly, I feel better, so that was a false alarm.

Hour and a half mudding.

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7°C, sunny with light wind

Coming to the end of the wettest autumn I can remember. Black gritty mud coats most roads and puddles hide portholes. When I get time, I’ll put CX tyres on the commuter.

What about this little painting? It’s acrylic onto A5, painted while the others were watching Strictly. That makes it about 1 ½ hours or so. It needs a little work around the left eye and hand; about another half hour.
I found this quite tough in comparison to oil paint.

  • Sometimes you go back to a colour on the palette and it has dried up,
  • blending is rough when applying new colour to dry paint,
  • the colour changes as it dries,
  • the surface is chalky,

Most of these problems could be solved by using a slowing agent, the problem they introduce is that they look milky. All of those problems could be solved by using oil paint.