MIA

The big question for everyone tonight is:
are those who have been missing in action actually going to brave the weather and mud and dare to get their bikes dirty?
you know who you are!!!!!!!!

Ampthill Mountain Bikers Saturday ride

As I and D missed Monday and Thursday's ride out, we decided to go out on a ride this morning to make up for the for it.

To start off we went over to Milbrook test track to see if Pudsey bear was still hanging around after Children in Need last night, but only found damp steep hills along with very wet sticky mud. With D's new bike we both made easy work of the mud and hills but neither of us made it up the ultimate hill towards Lidlington (you know the one, the one that only Neil has done!). Really good down hill in to Lidlington then more hills kept coming at us but we made it over the top and on to the usual course over towards Eversholt.

Everything was great even got through the bog, which has got much harder, until I had to fall off my bike to save a very rare species of bird hopping around in my path, it had nothing to do with going in to a corner over wet leaves on concrete to fast! ask D, I'm sure he'll back me up.

Really good ride, I think a Saturday morning ride is going to have to be a regular thing!

Stats: -

Ride time - 1 hour 38 minutes

Mileage - 16.41 miles

Calories - 1583c

Elevation Gain - 655m

Avg Speed - 10 MPH

Max Speed - 25 MPH

http://connect.garmin.com/player/19304884

Not riding!

Sorry I've not been out lately and just to be consistent won't be able to make it Monday either :(

Monday 16th Nov Ride

Just Paul, Dave and myself were out tonight and it was rather wet and muddy after the rain over the past few days. Made for a lot of fun though - Paul was back out on the hardtail which with its interesting tyres made for a interesting ride for him. We just did the normal route but seems a lot harder work in this condition. I had an incident in the singletrack with on of the slippery logs and almost went over the handlebars and there is a new tree blocking the way after all the storms. The bog wasnt too bad really but the farmers field after was pretty tough although Paul seemed to pick a better line up the edge and went flying past me. A quick dash up the bypass and we were home about 10 mins longer than usual so it isnt too slow yet!

See you all on Thursday

New frame!

My new frame has arrived. Decided to avoid full suspension as it would only cost me a fortune in parts so decided on an On One 456 instead. Supposedly they are supposed to handle great and also good for trail centre use so looking forward to building it up. Wont get time to build it up until after the weekend so will prob be out on the old bike still on Monday!

Ampthill MTB Monday Night Ride

Stats for Monday night ride: -

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/18403519

Reply back to this blog as to which course we should do on Monday: -

a. normal loop over to Eversholt

b. Chicksands

c. suggest a new route

see you all on Monday night.

thursday 5th Nov

Well it ceratinly seems like winter is here, thursday night was bonfire night although we didnt see any fireworks we set off like rockets (sorry no more firework puns). we decided to just do the usual route and i think everyone was suprised as to how hard the ride was. the route is so different when its wet and muddy with everyone have a couple of arse twitching moments, personally i prefer the winter, the ride was such a laugh, slipping on wet leaves, skidding through thick mud (which my tractor tyres are loving!!!) and sliding along moss covered roots. Hopefully there will be more out on monday as there was just the 4 of us on thursday, it seems the weather turning has put off the fair weather riders (you know who you are, Fletch!!!!!!).
see you all monday
dave

Monday 2nd Nov

Mondays ride was meant to be a nice easy affair with Paul, Massey and myself all recovering from colds.
We met at the usual spot and decided that we would do the normal ride and even do the short route as we were all feeling the effects of the man flu that has been going around (well that I spread to everyone). First of all the light that Paul donates to Dee would not switch on but with a bit of taking the batteries out and giving them a rub, they eventually worked and we were off.
I was at the front heading to Millbrook and when I got to the top of the hill about to cross the road I looked back to see the other 3 further back. I thought oh perhaps I am not too bad and I had blasted up the hill, I waited for them to catch up, playing with my lights and not taking much notice of what the others were doing. After a few minutes I thought where are they, I realised they hadn’t moved so thought something must be up. It turned out Paul had a puncture, which we pumped up and plodded on. After getting into the woods and blasting down the now not so sandy tracks, half way up the hill the battery on my new light decided to jump off my bike into darkness, so I had to turn back and go hunting for that. I found that and caught the boys up, Paul then decided his tyre was going flat again so decided to turn back and head to the pub. Dee, Massey and myself then plodded on, after possibly the slowest ride I have ever done since I started this mountain biking lark and after coughing up about 5 litres of flem and one of my lungs we made it back to the pub for some well earned food and beers.
Hopefully Thursday will be without as many incidents and marginally quicker!!!!

Dave