Snow on three rock
You can tell the winter is here when you get to the top of the trail and there is snow for the whole length of it. Looks like its going to be a case of wrapping up warm and night lights for the next six months.
The original spec for bike I brought about a year ago was http://www.specialized.com/bc/SBCBkModel.jsp?spid=22022 but has been upgraded a large amount to make it a more comfortable and enjoyable ride. The spec is as follows…
FRAME SIZE: Medium
REAR SHOCK: Specialized Fox Brain Fade
FORKS: Fox F100 RL (100mm of Travel)
HANDLE BARS: Race Face Carbon Next SL Riser XC
GRIPS: Ergon GX1 (http://www.ergon-bike.com/en/grips/gx1.html)
BRAKES FRONT / REAR: Avid Juice 7 160mm rotors
FRONT DERALIER: Shimano M581 LX
REAR DERAILLEUR: SRAM X.0, 9-speed, long cage
SHIFT LEVERS: SRAM X-9, aluminum trigger 9-speed
CASSETTE: SRAM PG950
CHAIN: Wippermann 920 Teflon 9sp
CRANKSET: Shimano XT Chainset HollowTech II M770
PEDALS: Shimano M-520 SPD
WHEELS: Fulcrum Metal 1 UST
TYRES: Maxxis Cross Mark UST
SEAT POST: Race Face Next XL Seat Post
SADDLE: Specialized BG Phenom
Looking for 1650 ono and I am selling because I want to get a hard tail for next year. I will post some pictures at the weekend when there is some light in the day. But here is one from a few months ago (Minus the mud guard)
Email: oliver.castle@tribeguru.com
Tel: 0862255391
Prizes and Number Boards
Well I have been off the bike all week with a stupid cold but life must go on and I have been busy organizing the single speed national championships all week. As you can see in the picture the prizes are more then just trophy’s following the scheme of single speeding and I decided to make the number boards a little more interesting than the normal ones you get at events .
Should be a good event so check out http://www.singlespeedireland.com/ for more information.
The tea pot of wine
Cause and effect are a funny thing, it started off with a few glasses of wine and then the idea that maybe wine served from the tea pot might be nice. This then followed with some wobbly cycling as my friend called it and then a leaving party and lots of whiskey….
The effect was a two day hang over and a stupid cold that will probably keep my of my bike for the rest of the week.
Note to self: Wine from a tea pot is never a good idea…
Single Speed Championships Poster
Well this week started with the Irish Single Speed National Championships being an unsponsored event until Kearney Cycles in Galway kindly stepping in and helped out with some of there well earned cash.
I never thought when I started talking about this event that it would ever happen and now next weekend we have the first single speed championships in Ireland. Hopefully this will be the first of many single speed chamionships and we can start to build up the numbers but I suppose only time will tell.
Check out http://www.singlespeedireland.com/ for more detials.
Dublin at night from three rock
Had a bit of a bad week getting back on the bike and into training because of life getting in the way. Managed to cycle to work, pool at lunch time and then cycle home followed by a single speed ride in three rock.
Had the best day of my life for climbing three rock as I managed from Taylors pub to the aerials in three rock without stopping which is a first for me. About a month ago I was struggling to get up stopping three times and today finally cleaned it so something is going right.
After that it was down the regular trails and home, not much to report apart from it was wet and muddy and slippery. Need to look at riding some other places because when it is wet three rock never really rides that well or maybe I just need to look into getting some better tyres.
The start of the wicklow way
I would say nearly every week I cycle on some part of the wicklow way becuase it is the main off road route out of dublin into the wicklow mountains. I have always wondered where it started so yesterday I took a walk down to Marley park to find out.
It turns out its right by the bottom car park and in full view of the world but unfortunatly you will never be able to cycle the start because cycling is banned in the park. The wicklow way its self is 127km of walking track which would normally be walked in about 4-5 days but there is a cycling record for doing it non stop in about 24 hours.
I was meaning to cycle the whole length of it this year spilt over two days but of course everything got in the way. I would love to attempt to cycle the whole route single speed as there is some fair climbs which would certainly make it into an epic.
Route Map:- http://www.wicklowway.com/trail-maps/index.php
Curry the food of the gods
There are some things I hate doing in this world, one of the largest being shopping for food. I am much better at cooking and eating it than actually going and buying it from the shops as I always forget something or dont buy the right things (Well thats what I am told any way).
When I do go shopping it generally involves buying lot of ingredients for making curry as well as lots of jars of curry sauce for when we dont have time to make it fresh. Being a typical english person with a love for curry the hotter the better in my books.
So last night I went to pick up a few jars of vindaloo source and noticed there tag line for selling it “Cures your Curry Cravings”. I thought this was particularly true to life as if I dont have a curry every few nights I start wanting one. This is of course sometimes to the dismay of people when I add three or four extra chillies to a vindaloo just to make sure it is hot enough.
Intresting Article:- How do you cure your curry cravings
I suppose this year is the first year I really wanted to do some competitions but I have already had the first conflict and its not even 2009 yet. The UK single speed national championships and the Wicklow 200 have been scheduled to be the same weekend. I suppose you can forgive them considering that they are both in different countries but they are also the two big events I was looking forward to doing this year.
View of Lugala
There are some days where I wake up and just feel like doing something different. It usually is not sitting on the couch or going shopping but instead a good brisk walk up a mountain. Today some of my friends were walking up a mountain that we quite regularalty look onto when biking so I jumped at the chance to walk up it.
Lugala is not the biggest or the longest but provided to be a good laungh. In the end about 11km with just under 600m of climbing and becuase of the amount of rain we have has lately even a river cross, followed by another 2km walk in wet boots.
Checked out more photos on flickr.
