I want my life back

In fact I’d shoot for “Lumpy Slackness” to best describe my own take on the OSMM 24 hour mountain bike race held just down the road from here.  Every year I make a special effort to attend while adhering to a firm committment not to get involved with any of that riding nonsense.  I mean why would you? Ace riding on the doorstep, almost none of it encircled by a private deer park filled with desperate IT middle managers* properly hurting themselves to secure 321st place.

No I grooved a well worn record of scouring the vast campsite for familiar faces, stashing away any freebies before adjourning barwards to watch the start. This time I had family and mad mutt in tow so had to answer some slightly uncomfortable questions regarding my non participation. Straying away from bare faced lying for a change, instead I employed displacement tactics pointing out everything that was wrong with a thousand people crammed into a localised methane cloud waiting for the start.

After saving my cheers for the slowest, oddly shaped and fully paid up members of “Team Chubb-a-Lubb”, a navigationally challenged rendezvous with some old friends reminded me of a vague promise to ride an entire lap in exchange for beer. Thankfully my carefully studied slackness had ensured a ride-readiness state scoring about zero what with no bike, no riding clobber and a pair of wellington boots** which sadly merely postponed the horror until the following day.

But this is a team which would present Team Hardcore Loafing as a race-tuned, podium chasing professional outfit. So in keeping with the sleepy ethos, I turned up late only to shockingly discover a member of the team WAS OUT ON THE COURSE. Not to worry, a more than ample excuse for a sit and chat in the sunshine. That’s the fella out doing a lap I’m talking about who had located a grassy bank much to his liking, and passed a convivial half hour chatting with the real – if somewhat bemused – racers.

Eventually Tim found sufficient energy to roll back to Apathy Central and sent me on my way with a stern admonishment not to get back too early. The final member of the team was engaged in a full on race simulation and couldn’t be disturbed for at least an hour. Or revived really since he was entirely unmoving other than some jowly snoring.  I rolled onto the course in a unique position of being entirely fresh and light limbed, while every other poor bugger had travelled 21  and 1/2 hours into a place where pain and suffering live.

This is what fitness must feel like. I easily out-climbed the heavy legged, dusty and weary riders who were turning slow circles in tiny gears or – more frequently – getting off and having a walk. On enquiring how they were doing, most would bang out a pained grimace declaring “Six laps in and this bastard is the last one” before trying to reconcile my fresh faced pace, body shape and entirely inappropriate bicycle. “You?” they’d ask with some incredulation “Yeah, last lap for me too, be glad to get it done” I’d reply in shared companionship.

I didn’t feel it necessary to add that this was my first and indeed only lap. Important not to over-communicate when people are under such obvious mental strain.  So back to the course which I fully expected to but shit, boring and unchallenging. The first section didn’t do much to dispel such a hypothesis with rutted, tight scalextric  weaving pointless between trees. No wonder everyone looks a bit miserable I pondered as riders pulled aside to let me pass.

I did feel like a bit of a fraud, but this was easily offset by the shallow joy I took from it.  But I stopped thinking about that as the course suddenly became properly interesting. Some lovely, steep rutted descents, a few singletrack climbs, a more than pleasant flowy ribbon of hardpacked dirt that had me chasing fast riders and passing them before considering why they might be slowing down. The one disadvantage of my uni-lap strategy was that everything around the next corner was a total mystery. Which partially explains a couple of off-course transgressions and a eyes wide shut brush with one of the innocent marshalls.

So course was pretty good, quite challenging in places, brutal for multi-lappers with a halfway round campsite sashay  leading to a climb that started tough and kept on giving. The end of which we were rewarded with another sinewy wiggle through the trees, doubly enjoyed after some proper racer elbowed past without so much as a “Out of my way Underling” at the entrance.  I challenged him to show some bloody politeness next time to which I didn’t even receive the expected finger. Now I don’t mind being stuffed by those with proper riding skills, but that’s just disrespectful.

Fuck. Slack Mode off. Race Face On.  Catching him was easier than expected although not due to any fantastic riding on my part, more because he was, well, a bit shit really. Race-Car on the straights, pedestrian in the corners. Hard to know if his concentration was broken my the sound of my Northern up-his-chuffness offering such pithy snippets as “Did you steal that race kit?” and “You don’t deserve that bike, you’re too fucking slow to ride it“.

This went on for a couple of happy minutes. As we hit the fireroad, I beamed my best smile and innocently asked if he’d enjoyed that previous section as much as I had. Not a word, nothing, he merely vibrated a bit and spun off with the demeaner of an angry hamster stuck in a washing machine.  Ace, only one lap and I still managed to properly irritate a cock with a self-important complex. Mission accomplished I think.

Everyone else was lovely. Tired but feeling – quite rightly – pretty damn heroic. Tough course in the dry and had the rain come, most people probably would have left.  But in the continued sunshine, we finished on a proper old school fast grass-track descent that had even us clipped-in riders, clipping out moto style. I even managed a reasonably styling jump over a lip where the photographer was apparently lurking.  I’m sure his published image will clash poorly with that in my mind’s eye.

Arriving back in just under an hour, my reward was a nice cold beer and the chance to wave in the finishers come 2pm. I did feel slightly cheeky accepting the “riders medal” especially as some nutty singlespeed solo riders sprinted past the start/finish pylon in order to get another lap in. Aliens, the lot of them. Not for us, our laps were so few as  to be designated “DNF” More Did Not Start really.

But this is exactly the way to treat such events. It’s not a race strategy because we’re not racing, but as a fine way of passing a weekend with old friends with some bike riding thrown in, it’s hard to beat. However next year I’m aiming for a stretch target.

Two laps.

* Ahem.

** For the first time in epochs Mayhem was dry and warm***, but having endured the great floods of 2008 and 2009, there was NO WAY I was trusting some dodgy forecast.

*** Except for Saturday night which was frigging chilly apparently to the point where some neshers went home. FFS not even I’d do that.

Slippery little bugger isn’t it? I am fairly sure that last week it was still snowing and mostly dark, and yet here we are with the longest day barely a weekend away. This would be enough to make me grumpy as we contemplate the depressing slide into Autumn, but time has stolen more than my Spring, it’s bogged off with most of the days since as well.

I blame working for a living. Really chews up your days and eats into the light, warm nights when you really should be a) riding your bike b) drinking beer outside c) repelling the triffid invasion by deploying petrol based weaponry. And then quickly slipping back into b). I seem to be stuck with d) which involves a fairly fully time job augmented by wasting time I don’t have doing other peoples.

You may legitimately ask what they are doing instead, and you would not be alone but I have yet to receive a satisfactory answer. For which I may have to mix work and home life by implementing c) during office hours when a particularly trying situation needs resolving.

I did manage a monster end to end Malvern ride this week which started on one of the longest days of the year but still finished in darkness. The entire gamut of hills were either summited or sneakily bypassed including my favourite rocky horror tearing down 700 feet of steep bouldery ribbon before finishing on a superb rock step drop off. Right in between these two items of loveliness are a set of narrow yet very steep steps which puckered me up in all the wrong ways.

But these too were dispatched with nothing more than a clenched bottom and tightly closed eyes, before declaring to anyone who’d listen that a) it was really easy and b) no thanks I’ll not be doing them again*. Only at 9:30 and at the furthest outreach from our start did we begin to wonder how one of the riding flange was getting home un-crashed without a set of lights to his name. We did our best with a bypass of significant pointy ridge through the use of an “evening bridleway”, and a quick scoot through darkening woods to a final climb over Midsummer.

Where our brave – if foolhardy – pal was now shrouded entirely in darkness. What with it being 10:30pm. Some 100m below was his car and safety – between us and that were a second set of leafy woods letting almost none of the not very much light through.  He wasn’t keen to be the meat in a Lumen Sandwich so hung onto the back of us enlightened ones and mystifyingly made his way down using the little known skill of “bark brail“.

Brilliant, brilliant ride. 1100m ish and 30ks.  All that trudging through winter makes sense on an epic like that.

Sports Day topped the domestic billing today, but – predictably – I missed one child losing quite often and the other broken one watching on. But I still arrived in time for lunch and left with no phone, no watch, no gps, no water (oops) but a brief time window and a fast road bike. Just headed out in a random direction and rode until my legs were shot and my head was clear. As good as the other night, for all the wrong reasons.

Mountain Mayhem this weekend. I’ll pop in to have a laugh, and personally verify that this could be the first event in living memory where monsoons have now sunk the trails below the water table. Good luck to any nutters participating – I have been offered a cheeky lap on a slack team but any free time I have this weekend will be spent with a glass in my hand. Or possible one in each.

* Lists you see, under pressure I revert to type. Surprised I’m not accompanying this lunchtime post with a couple of beers.

As Meatloaf may once have crooned if he could count past 5*. I appear to have died and been transported to Singletrack heaven with 100 kilometres of the wiggly stuff squeezed into less than a week. Ascent and, more importantly, descent has reached five imperial figures which is exactly half of what I managed all of last month.

But these numbers mean nothing without context. In this rather lovely – if confused – country we live in, every dry spell is vigorously mainlined by MTB junkies getting their rocks off on dusty trails under sunny skies. And for those of us who refuse to accept this is a three season sport, all that winter drudgery is rewarded with fast legs and an unquenchable thirst to go do it all again. And again.

Four rides, three locations, one simple idea to bank happy memories against future wet and miserable. We rolled into the Forest twice this week, and it rolled lush singletrack right back. It might not have the elevation of the Malverns, not the stupendous panoramic views, but bloody hell it’s somewhere beyond fun and into a place that surely cannot be legal. And yet a Malvern ride some 24 hours later reminded me how damn lucky we are to live between this two MTB environs.

A bit cheeky, trails that come alive in the evenings when the walkers have rambled off, perfect blue sky and visibility half way to Russia. A final descent into the setting sun with many metres bagged and ready to be unleashed in a duet with gravity.  That’ll stay with me for some time, as will fast laps of CwmCarn – a trail centre 45 minutes from my house and a chosen testing ground for new bikes**

I know its’ secrets well enough to show Martin a clean pair of wheels on the first lap – feeling fit and pretty fast. Big Sandwich and Life Saving Cup Of Tea later, then  it’s pretty much even as Martin hustles his big forked hardtail line astern to my brilliant – if fragile – ST4. I can forgive that bike anything because it is so natural to ride. Don’t think, just do. Don’t brake, just trust . This sometimes leads to Don’t look, just hope but how damn alive do you feel when all that is going on?

The last descent at CwmCarn has been properly breathed on by the trail pixies and now it is a kilometre of giggly awesomeness. I can hear Martin’s fat tyre scrabbling right up my chuff so abandon fast and smooth for ragged and dangerous. There is nothing wrong with such an approach assuming you’re still trail side up, which I very nearly wasn’t.  Very Nearly is more than okay because it takes you to a place where you want to speak at a hundred miles and hour, but you cannot actually get any words out. I find pointing helps.

The only thing that scares me now is how long will it be before I’m too old to do this any more, maybe too broken, or too tired to ride in the winter, or too worried about mashing myself up. Just too damn crocked and decrepit. The worrying thing is – right now – I am as fit as I’ve ever been and riding at a pace that feels reasonably brisk. Probably all down hill from here then. Hope so, sounds like it might be an uplift

* Our mutt appears to have some musical talent as lead hound for Mad Murf and the Howlers. Current album “Where’s my breakfast” includes such classics as  “Is there any more?”, “That was disappointingly small” and “How long till dinner?“. The difficult second album has stalled at the concept stage with only a working title “I’ve eaten the cat, what’s next?”

** There have been a few.

As trail conditions go, a sprinkling of fresh white stuff covering a crunchy layer of corn snow atop a bed of mid winter mud doesn’t trigger an enthusiastic “Let’s Ride” response to a 7am Alarm call. Except today when two of your five tomorrows include 18 hour London Returns and a whole week of shitty looking weather.

We kept to the South side of the Malverns with the high ridges and peaks being properly deep in snow. This still didn’t make our passage easy as every climb had to be forced through the greasiness and energy sappin g slippiness of trail wide mud. Which you only found as tyres broke through a thin crust of snow on the fourth day of a freeze/unfreeze cycle.

I’m fairly bored of snow. Only our last descent was on the right side of conditions nirvana with hardpacked snow on firm trails. The rest of a rather weedy sounding 10k loop had to be hard earned with granny ring gurning, and significant pushing. Downhill was pretty exciting to be fair, with fantastic levels of grip being attained right up until the point when there wasn’t any. At all.  I’ll be going straight on then regardless of the spiky vegetation blocking my way.

Momentum was truly your friend – my old mud riding memories surfaced from years of Chiltern Winter* allowing be to blaze a stinky trail over half frozen stutter bumps and endless draggy slush. It was more fun that is sounds, especially as we had the hills to ourselves and most of our tracks were the first ones.

A final climb up a quickly renamed “Mist-Summer” found us finally on harder tracks where pedalling brought a proper forwards, rather than sideways, reward. A brief stop at the top ratified our choice to stay away from the high places with wind driven snow making riding difficult and a bit dangerous. Off the top we went, carefully on the narrow, snowy tracks and then faster – sometimes unintentionally – through the steep, muddy tree section.

A comedically heroic snow spraying plunge back to Hollybush brought forth icy tears and big grins.

If I’m still loving riding so much in these conditions, what’s it going to be like when it’s dry, dusty, fast and warm? I’ll hardly be able to sleep

* And Spring. And Autumn. And Summer as well on too many occasions.

This is my unofficial measurement of unpleasantness when bicycles meet rain, dark, wind, cold and mechanical catastrophe. So a 1 would represent a light sprinkle of mid-summer rain cascading over an un-jacketed rider, thereby souring an otherwise delightful experience of tanning and pedalling. Whereas a 10 would be the archetypal “dark and stormy night” attempting to fix a puncture with no tubes, a busted pump and bloodied thumbs while being frequently deluged by passing HGVs.

This morning was a strong six. Dark. Check. Early. Check. Wet. Check. Mechanical. Oh yes. After 30 minutes of sustained fettling, the screeching mudguard of doom now emits a piercing howl rather than a dull scratch. Ratcheting up the GOM score was some unrelenting rain triggered, as I moved the bike from indoors to outdoors, from an apparently clear sky.

A little music tends to ease the passage from night to day, but my MP3 player lay abandoned where I’d placed it charging the night before in a location impossible to miss at 6am. That’s an area of my commute that needs some work, as does about half of the road surface which is either pot-holed, subsiding or entirely missing.  The only joy of mid winter riding stems from darkness hiding an ever more pretzled wheel set.

So whereas last weekend I strode the quantocks as a cycling collusus* stomping up climbs and gloating over early season form, this week has been payback. Firstly a Malverns night ride shortened first by apathy and secondly by sleet. My legs were fine, but  the shop steward of the brain demanded a one-out-all-out withdrawal of labour.

We still poked a big pointy hole on the upside of 2,000 feet of vertical climbing, but sticky trails, too much great riding lately and a shared sense of can’t-be-arsed saw us lowside it home to avoid all the really hurty bits.

And we weren’t alone. At least not quite. Two weeks ago, I was lamenting the burgeoning flange of riders on my hills. But Tuesday saw just us and another pair who were talking a hell of a game in terms of a peak bagging epic** trudging through the plasticine trails, and sliding about in a generally not-very-good-at-cycling manner.

The signs of post Christmas apathy are all around. The fug of a microwaved pasty has already replaced the smell of fresh lettuce in our office. On the train – come summer – we struggle to position six bikes in a space for barely three. But this week there’s been just the one, with the rider receiving pitying looks from fellow passengers.

I know what they were thinking “Nice bike, shame he had to sell his car to buy it, because well you wouldn’t got out in THAT by choice. Or maybe he’s a nutter“.  February is always a bastard month, not quite close enough to spring for light and warmth to permeate the times when I ride, nor far enough into the season to motivate yourself that this is training for summer events.

No month 2 is a slog. And there aren’t many of us still doing it. But great riding gear, fast road bikes and a level of bloody mindedness not to let this unheralded fitness slip shall keep me going. Although I expect the Grim-O-Meter to take a beating for the next few weeks.

* Other people who were actually there may have a different – and less glowing – opinion.

** But based on the physical evidence of them blowing it out of their arse on a flat section, I’m thinking they were fibbing. A lot.

The price I paid for losing my mobile earlier was to learn that even our little part of the world is sadly full of cocks.  The phone and I parted company on British Camp, the most easily accessed and therefore busiest on the Malverns. It should not surprise regular readers that I’d abandoned it, what with my personal belonging regularly being scattered far and wide over a number of continents. Phones, Wallets, Sunglasses and – I kid you not – on one occasion my car tend to go AWOL,  although mostly returned through the kindness of strangers.

Losing the work phone SIM is a bugger because until you’ve smothered yourself with Nutella and been prostrated naked in front of  the Vodafone helpdesk, they refuse to even accept you have ever owned one of their products, never mind losing one. I say SIM because it was encased in my old “weekend” mobile which I’d thoughtfully left on silent. Furthermore it’s furnished with only a few names of chosen drinking buddies and my wife via her nickname*.

So the poor sod who found it was faced with a dialling dilemma: “Trousers Jenkins” or “BogDoor Bob” being a couple of the more sensible entries, and this to a man who does not have English as his first language**. Eventually my Mum received an 8PM phone call from a nice fella recently of Poland, who enquired if she had a geographically displaced son with a penchant for lobbing expensive electronics out of his backpack. After initial confusion, she rallied magnificently and soon I was on a mercy mission to re-unite myself with my phone.

Which is where the story should end happily, but it doesn’t. Because this amicable gentleman, out taking an early morning walk with his lad, had attempted to flag down some mountain bikers after failing to get my attention once I’d launched Space-Nokia-1 into a low orbit. Now if it were me, or the guys I ride with, we’d have stopped, exchanged pleasantries, and either taken it into care until an Internet forum burped up the owner, or offered any other help we could have.

Not these cocks tho. A whole bunch of them basically told him to fuck off and get out of their way. I can only assume he was somehow in their way, and their version of shared trail access worked on the principle that some animals are more equal that others. This has made me really bloody angry. For two reasons; firstly how can people of some kind of shared-outdoor-experience be so damn rude and inconsiderate? Secondly – and far worse – was the chaps acceptance that somehow “it’s okay, I don’t mind, some people are like that. Especially to us“. No it bloody well is not okay, it never is and it never will be. The shrug and phrase “especially to us” made me wince with embarrassment.

Sure I only know one side of this story, but riding in London for three years de-constructed the myth that all cyclists are good and everyone else is a twat. Almost the other way round in far too many cases, and nothing since has convinced me otherwise. So I could well imagine this playing out exactly the way it was told, and someone needs a good bloody slap. Forget the fact that cyclists are already demonised by most other trail users in the Malverns, many of who are on a mission to enact a partial or full ban. That’s merely a side show to the fact that we are the most scary people in those popular hills, and we need to show a bit of bloody respect.

That’s why we ride early in the morning or late at night. It’s why we try really hard not to bring ourselves into conflict for the sake of it. It’s because we understand the fragile nature of competing groups on a small set of hills. Well most of us do anyway.

I’m pleased I’ve got my phone back, I’m really fucking angry about how.

* we’re not going there. Glad I got it back tho

* Kindred Spirit you might say.

The pre-breakfast* Malvern hills ride is full of many wholesome and  good things. One of them is the impression that you have this small package of awesome pointedness all to yourself which, considering the barrier to entry must be breached by head torches and frozen knocking knees, seems entirely reasonable.  For a good year, we scoffed at the late rising fools playing unhappy slalom with a phalanx of other grumpy trail users.

Until now. Sure we expected New Years Resolutions translating to puffing fatties pushing up hills for a couple of weeks. And there is always the odd introverted rambler lost in his own world so never acknowledging a friendly hello (or a less polite “fck off them you miserable twat“). But these last two weeks, it has gone properly mental.

In the previous 50 weeks, we’ve probably seen a single digit accumulation of mountain bikers before the 9am watershed. Today we say double that in a single ride with a side order of over-wrapped family groups and their mad dogs. And frankly, I find this bloody irritating. Some of it is – I admit – trail snobbery  personified by the Colwall Night Riding crowd, who perambulate line astern with ever increasing numbers and ever decreasing velocity. They’re another bunch  who cannot find it within themselves to chew the fat with non-groupies, although that may be blindness brought on by an ever escalating Lumen arms race.

Honestly, on a dark night I’m sure the Malvern residents are frantically dialling 999 to report an extremely slow moving UFO.  But seeing trail numbers increase by day makes me even more irrationally angry.  I want to stop them and demand their cycling credentials “Have you ridden at night EVERY week come rain, wind, snow or creeping apathy?” “What about taking in that extra hill even when you legs are pretending to be un-set jelly” and “Do you know the way of the secret paths? Do you dare ride them when it’s shitty and muddy?”

The answer has to be no, which makes them undeserving in my view, and that’s the view that counts. And I’m counting far too many trail users when only the righteous are up and riding. Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised after a recent thread on a cycling forum had so many authoritative voices on winter conditions in these hills. All I can hope for is their enthusiasm will be diminished, and we’ll get the hills back to those who have properly suffered. It’s that or get out of bed even earlier, for which I am insufficiently motivated.

On the slightly less grumpy side of things, we had a brilliant ride and the ST4 is big-grin central over all terrain. My latest fascination for all things statistical shows 5 rides in 8 days, climbing over 8000 feet in a little more than 105 kilometres.  So impressed with my performance, my breakfast choices were bacon or egg. I couldn’t quite decide so plumped for both.

Advance warning, Thursday Night Ride this week. And I’m bringing my list of questions and big stick, so be ready if you’re out on my trails

* which is good as it’d be recycled noisily within minutes of the first climb.

Certain combinations work well together; the world would be a far inferior places if Scones weren’t accompanied by Cream, Spring un-carpeted by Bluebells, or beer not matched with, er, more beer. But the flip-side reveals such horrors  Brown Sauce on Bacon Sandwiches and Train Timetables accompanied by Seasonal Emergencies.  Feel free to add your own, while I fuse together the grim composites of  cold and dark with Seven am and Sunday Morning. It’s hard to be positive over any future experience when you’re clumsily loading the bike trailer, with five minutes vigorous ice scraping to follow. All with a head-torch and a mentally disturbed mutt chewing your tyres – another combination that entirely misses the sweet spot.

Driving in the midst of a thaw/freeze cycle scores nought when compared to the warm bed and wife you’ve just abandoned, and riding in such conditions seems as impossibly dim as the halo of road illuminated by frozen lenses. I expected things to improve as the sun struggled over the horizon, and – as usual – I was wrong. Firstly the temperature actually dropped back below freezing before a chirp from my mobile phone triggered barely repressed fury that my frost bound pal was bugging out.  Not so, he was merely late and tremendously hungover* which improved my lot no end.

Improved is not a word that you could even charitably apply to the trails after bucket-loads of snow, weeks of icy temperatures and a thaw so fast we’re twinning Herefordshire with Atlantis. The first climb used to be a tarmac road but was now a stream of broken aggregates flowing between banks of slush and ice. Heading quickly onto dirt, we were soon slowed by sideways action mud clearly imported from the Chiltern Hills. Struggling past that, we were eventually un-horsed by a ribbon of ice too challenging for the latterly unridden and recently hungover.

Dawn made a grudging effort to punt the sun skywards and we headed down through woods offering mud, ice and snow all within in a 100 yards. Three seasons in a single trail – this was obviously going to be our lucky day, proven once more after a much reduced pace gave sufficient time to stop before being decapitated by a fallen tree. Hitting that at normal trail speeds would have ended with body parts flung about in a post-modern ironic interpretation of the phrase “Blast Radius“.

Half way up the next climb, suffering for our art seemed an entirely appropriate metaphor as we discussed the questionable benefits of re-instating the 7:30am Sunday ride. It ticks all the boxes in terms of poaching trails before the rambler hoards are even poaching breakfast eggs, and being done and dusty before our own families have found time to complain about absent husbands and fathers. Again. In summer, it rocks as well as ticks, early sun drenched blasts on firm trails with hard muscles and seasonal fitness. In winter, it’s winching up buckets of karma from deep, frozen wells, sticking two fingers up at the three seasons MTBr’s, and  pumping miles into legs that’ll hate you now but love you come Spring.

On days like today, it’s quite scary too with every descent offering multiple ways to impale you on a rock or tree of Fate’s choice. When the snow finally gave way to a different trail surface, this was invariably wet grass which needs no introduction as the mountain biker’s most hated ground condition.  I remember covering the brakes on some descents then thinking I’d be better off sorting out coverage of a different sort, namely insurance and specifically hospital cover.

I loved it though. Not in a  “yeah was good, glad we put a shift in, reward in future, feeling worthy” kind of loved it. Nope, was just bloody happy to be riding my bike with a good mate, and soaking in the slither of sunlight on offer. Having the new MTB is of course a novelty that has yet to wear off, which considering how much money it cost is a damn good thing!

More of that please. Less of the 0553 to London tomorrow. Ah well, one out of two ain’t bad**

* After promising abstinence on Saturday night, I switched to white wine as it’s less dreadful come morning. Jezz, and far play to him for this, had downed about half of his entire alcohol stock in a single session. I’m assuming he was drinking to forget the insanity of a decision to enter the Etape.

** As Meatloaf would have said if he could have counted properly.

Blue skies, frozen trails, tea and cake to finish. What’s not to like? Well there is the ongoing digestive conundrum of our dog who – having eaten one of everything at Christmas – started to spray liquid from both ends at high velocity.  Mostly in the house. The vet – after spending some time calculating exactly how large the bill would be – recommended a pasta diet and a course of  Dog imodium.

Such a get well strategy has resulted in Murphy’s normally happy and loyal demeanor being somewhat tested. Nothing looks quite as sad and depressed as a hungry Labrador on starvation rations and unable to poo. If he doesn’t go soon, we’ll be needing to consider a cesarean.

Sorry, nobody eating was there? Anyway with the dog plugged, I snook out for a quick ride that ended up being not quick at all. A route away from the crowds on some fantastic frozen trails was one reason, my mechanical incompetence another. Why I ever though that two new chainrings and one new chain would mesh perfectly with an old – and if I’m honest somewhat ground down – rear cassette is a mystery to me.

Less mysterious was the cacophony of ill fitting teeth failing to establish any kind of interference fit, even with my meagre thigh power applied to the pedals. Eventually I ended up with about three working gears carrying the rest around as mere fitness ballast. The fellas took pity on my plight with a slew of their own mechanicals including a case of such magnificent chain-suck, I thought we were going to have to go in through the stay to release it.

And with the New Year bringing out the Malvern Hoards to overflow car parks and perambulate on every major off road thorough-fair brandishing new cameras and old fat glands, we embarked on a cheeky tour of the lesser known South Side. Some good stuff there as well accessible only by granny-ring grinds and much facial gurning.  For which Tim H of this parish may very well have usurped me as champion gurner.

We retired after a few hours for the aforementioned tea, cake and medals. I wish I could retire but after spending yet more cash on wide-bar love and boring bits of metal to make the gears work, I reckon I’ll be sharing Murphy’s diet soon.

So 2010 is officially off to a superb start. Just the next 364 days to ratchet up the grump-o-meter.

… adults with real responsibilities, and an understanding of trail erosion who should know better. Right, right tossed out of the “well scanning phrase bucket” to lie contextually embarrassed before you, but I thought we’d try some festive honesty on the hedgehog.  I expect we’ll be back to big whoppers, outrageous slurs and general inaccuracy come the new year.

So snow then, quite an interesting trail medium when under Mountain Bike tyre. The correct approach is – apparently – to hang gently off the back so allowing the front wheel to meander in a generally terrifying way, and then having a big crash. Tim and I tried that earlier in the year, whereas today on eve of Christmas with kids bouncing off the walls and Al feeling pretty similar, our approach was somewhat different.

Because when you’re in touch with your inner five year old, the only snow riding technique is to barrel bravely down the straights, weight firmly over the front wheel and whispering “be brave, it’ll be alright, be a bit braver, no not quite that brave on reflection“. Until a corner hoves into view, at which point your left hand squeezes almost as much as you bum, your hips shift in the opposite direction of proposed travel, while the bars are yanked hard in the alternate direction.

And if you live a righteous life, the unweighted rear will begin to slide the perfect arc slicing into the corner’s apex, and you will squeal with delight like the small child you clearly are. It is also vitally important to risk a look rearwards to check the height of your snowy rooster tail. You may crash of course, but hey practice makes perfect or close to mediocre in my case. As while Tim was sashaying side to side as if method acting a drunken fish, I was more having it quite small. And working down from there.

But disk brakes have such brilliant modulation, and dicking about is infectious which pretty much summed up our two hour ride in hills still full of snow, but mostly free of other grumpy trail users. And driving back sandwiched between the stupid and the timid, I couldn’t help thinking that it was a shit load easier to pilot a chunk of steel supported on four fat tyres with the driver protected by a huge metal sandwich, than ride on 2 inch tyres on trails that offered nothing but hard times if you got it wrong for one second. No ABS, no traction control, nothing between you and a frozen ground promising the gift of much soreness for Christmas.

Which is the way it should be, and may go some way to explain why – on the transition from gritted main road to the ice rink that passes as ours – the big old four wheel drift was corrected with a deft flick of opposite lock and a burst of throttle. Frankly I was bloody disappointed with the lack of rooster tails showing in the mirror.

And that may be the reason I explored the envelope of 4WD and a violently applied handbrake in our little patch of Herefordshire. It was bloody ace, mainly because even my own kids thought it was immature. Trust me on this, that is officially a good thing.

Anyway I’m back a better person and ready to deal with a day of waste packaging, sibling fights and sloth. Which seems an ideal time to thank you all for continuing to participate in my on-line therapy, and wish all a Merry Christmas. On that note, I’m off to get drunk.