An OK Week

I had an OK week this week.  Not outstanding but OK.

It started quite badly.  Monday morning I got 1 1/4 miles to work when my chain came off.  I got it back on the front, but when I came to the rear sprocket (single speed fixed), the sprocket had come off.  I have a Miche track cog on, which has a screw on carrier with a splined sprocket kept in place by a lock ring.  The lock ring and the carrier had come unscrewed and the sprocket fallen off.  I walked back home and swapped to my Hewitt.

The rest of the week I rode the Hewitt.

The Pompino hub was OK apart from the last few threads which were trashed. This meant that I couldn’t refit the Miche sprocket as there were no threads left for the lock ring.  I ordered a Dura Ace one piece sprocket from Wiggle.

We were meant to go mountain biking on Sunday with a few of the core team.  Unfortunately, it wasn’t panning out.  But friends were up in the Lakes and free Saturday to ride.  Unfortunately, my in-laws were up and we were due to go out for a meal early Saturday evening.  If I could guarantee to be back by 4:30, I got a very begrudging pass to go.

I picked up Nic and Ian early Saturday morning and set off to the Lakes.  It was a cold but sunny morning.  We got to Clappersgate just at 10, where Heather and another Nic were waiting.  No sign of the rest.  Eventually Karl et al turned up after missing the turn of the M6.  A turn they have taken 1000’s of times!

We decided to do as much of Castle Crags/|Tarn Hows/Loughrigg as we could manage.  Alison and I decided to skip the tricky climb and head to the top of the crags on the forest road.  We flew down into Sawrey.  The climb up into Grizedale forest was hard and after a quick splash through a small stream, my rear tyre went flat.  So we stopped for lunch while I fixed the flat.

Soon we were up into the forest.  I was struggling, my legs were really heavy.  But I got to the top of the drop down in to  Coniston.  The descent was fantastic.  There is a line between in control and out of control.  I was just over the line!

Karl got a pinch flat half way down.  We waited.  Then we set off on the road to the next section.  Nic’s tyre was flat.  We stopped to fix that.  It meant we were too late to finish the ride.  heather and some others headed off to do the rest. The rest of us headed back on the road.  All in all, a beautiful day in the lakes.  The sun  shone, it was warm, the hills were glorious. And I managed to get back in time to go for our meal.

Today we did a quick trip out to the pub and back.

Total for the week – 107

For the year – 798

Cheers

Tim