The entire journey will eventually be turned into a film - we can’t wait. London Singlespeed wish Blind Pilot the best of luck on their incredible tour, and sorely wish we could be there to support them.

The first Raceguard was invented in 1994, an innovative seatpost-mounted rear mudguard, and it rapidly became the market leader among mountain bikers and commuters alike as the simplest and best-looking way to avoid that “wet stripe” up the back of your clothes.  It was a great design, simple to fit (although to do so you had to remove the seatpost and slide shims on and off), easy to adjust and once fitted it stayed in place and was hard to break.  I bought one in ‘95 and it’s been in intermittent use since then and is still going strong.

For 2009 Mr. Crud’s been challenged to redesign it, chiefly so you don’t have to remove the seatpost to fit it.  Other manufacturers (SKS, Topeak, Cycraguard) have recognised the Raceguard’s popularity and produced similar offerings, some of which fitted straight around the seatpost, so after 11 years it was time for an update.

So what’s new?  As you can see from the photo above, the mudguard itself keeps the familiar (and very effective) shape of the recent “RacePak” incarnation, but the main thing that has changed is the clamp.  It can now be fitted straight around the seatpost and with a very British, very CRUD-like conciseness of design.

The pack contains two rubber shims, one seatpost clamp, one nut and bolt, the arm and the mudguard.  It’s all made out of flexible plastic that feels pliable but hard to break.  It weighs a lot less than it looks like it should.  It’s very simple to fit in less than a minute.  The shims mean it will suit seatposts from 25-33mm and, once everything’s in the right place, a few turns of the one bolt mean it’ll all stay put.

…and that’s just what it did.  Over lumpy rattly stuff and in soggy mud and rain, it kept our backs (and saddles) dry and free from The Stripe.  Neither branches nor not-going-to-make-it faceplants managed to shift it.  We’re impressed.  I’m sure that the 2009 redesign will be even more popular as its predecessor.

Mine’s going to stay on my bike.

From Bikesnob NYC last week:

Of course, the truth is that on a lot of terrain a singlespeed mountain bike isn’t much of a handicap. In fact, often it’s an advantage. When confronted with a steep grade on a singlespeed mountain bike, you either have to stomp up it really fast, or you have to run it. Meanwhile, the geared rider will downshift eternally until he’s spinning a tiny gear so violently he simply falls over.

I can’t decide whether this is a great idea, or a really terrible one.

While round-the-clock parts availability is a Good Thing, I can foresee drawbacks.  I can just imagine the typical phone call I’m going to get at 2am from some random hipster who’s snakebite-punctured his brakeless fixie slamming it into a kerb as he’s failed to stop in time; he’s dug out enough change for an inner tube and an energy gel and now, drunken but buzzing as the sugary caffeine kicks in, he decides to slur his way through asking me why the inner tube didn’t come with instructions…

Rollapaluza XI - Kingspin - is taking place on Friday 8th August at the (rather excellent) Bloomsbury Bowling Lanes, WC1.  £7.50 entry with DJs, a bar until 3am, cut price bowling, food and underground stewarded bike parking.  Better polish up those Deep Vs and proofide that Swallow Classic lest the stewards should look upon your ride in shame.

For those actually interested in the racing, qualification is between 7-9pm with individual knockout and team rounds continuing until 1am.  There are £2000 worth of prizes to be won including goodies from Swrve, Madison and Condor.

For those who have no idea what this is all about, it’s basically like going on a bike machine in the gym, but while competing against a bunch of couriers zoned out on adrenalin, angry commuters and gurning roadies with faces transformed into rictus grins of fear and aggression with lots of drinking, shouting, cheering and loud music going on around you.  The riders sprint for what would be 500m at speeds of over 50mph so each round is quickly over.  Photos and videos of past events are available on the Rollapaluza website.

Tickets for Kingspin can be purchased online or bought on the door.

The inventor (titter ye not, he’s only naked from the waist up) proposes waiting until your bike is stolen before giving the thief a little more than he bargained for (presumably first waiting for him to get stuck at traffic lights and put his foot down for maximum effect).  

I’d take it a little further and try to hook it up to something with a motion sensor - an iPhone or the like should do the trick, that way you can shock the perp automatically and get it to text you when the bike stops moving.

Of course, anyone nudging your bike while it’s locked up would get shocked too, but you can’t make an omelette without breaking some eggs.

I am a particular fan of steps 9 and 10:

Step 9 - Trying to make your bike unridable

Fixed gear riders advocate fixed gear bicycles as a method of this, that they are somehow more secure because they are harder to ride. They are forgetting that due to the unbearable popularity of fixed gear bikes, they have become incredibly attractive targets for theft. 

The accompanying picture is of a Bianchi Douchebag Pista with chopped flat bars. The author says:

I love the reflectors on the pedals, by the way.  Nice, really nice.

Step 10 advocates ratting your bike to make it look ugly.

even major bike manufacturers have taken to making intensionally ugly bicycles. Please, a bicycle should be a thing of beauty, make the madness stop. 

The accompanying picture?  A particularly nasty specimen of the Langster, London Edition.

Pretty spot on if you ask me.

Worth a look.

Marco crosses the landslide on the way to Tilicho Lake, the highest lake in the world:

Tenzing and Marco wait to cross the Thorung pass - 5416 metres above sea level:

Marco, Calden and Tenzing descend from the Thorung pass:

Check the London Singlespeed Flickr account for some more photos from the trip and if you want to know a bit more about it, do get in touch.

Yet more evidence that tweed is slowly making a comeback:

http://www.tweed.cc

The Club’s wheelmen and ladymembers wish for a return to the honest virtues of lugged steel, dynamo lighting and canvas saddlebags. A stout pair of plus fours offer day-long comfort while a Fair Isle vest takes the chill out of a frosty spring morning. Merino wool moves smoothly over a leather saddle. As the Club passes the village green, a jaunty cap is doffed. The only performance-enhancers are warm beer and woodbines.

Well, quite.

Photo by Kit Oates, with thanks.

In the Times article I linked to in the last post, they dragged out a lunatic who calls himself Captain Gatso to present a counterpoint to the otherwise pro-cycling tone of the piece.  I’d normally ignore this blatant trolling, but it’s amusing enough to want to go through it line by line.

For the unaware, gatso is a shortened version of gatosmeter - the name of the speed cameras that seem to be getting everywhere at the moment.  Captain Gatso is the anonymous mouthpiece of a somewhat dubious operation named MAD (Motorists Against Detection) who are involved in direct action (think angle grinders, tyres full of petrol, driving into) against motorway speed cameras.  They are, as I’m sure you’ll agree, ideally positioned to comment on contraflow cycling.

Captain Gatso says:

The same rules should apply to every road user.

True.

You cannot make exceptions just because someone happens to be on a bicycle.

Also true.

Cyclists already get away with blue murder 

The same accusation could be levelled at lot of motorists, in particular bus drivers, white van drivers, taxi drivers and Royal Mail van drivers.  Not all drivers, of course, but then I’m sure Captain Gatso mean that not all cyclists “get away with blue murder”.

and it would be a mistake to give in to their law-breaking.  If they get their way on one-way streets they will then start demanding the right to intimidate pedestrians on pavements.

I do not see the link here.  Pavements are full of people, dogs on string, prams, lamp posts and other hazards.  Roads tend to be a lot flatter and generally more pleasant to cycle on.

I would like to see cyclists pay a £10 registration fee to the DVLA and be forced to wear a bib bearing a unique number whenever they use the public highway.

Not unless it’s made by Rapha.

Then they could be caught on CCTV cameras, just as motorists are, when they ignore no-entry signs and jump red lights.

Jumping red lights is a funny one.  Technically if you go past the white line closest to the lights you are jumping a red light.  On most large roads there are cycle areas at the front of the traffic lane, however there is frequently a bus/HGV or other large vehicle sitting in it.  

In these situations the only thing a cyclist can do to ensure that they are visible to the driver of said vehicle is to move in front of it - which will normally result in the cyclist “jumping” the red light.  Drivers can be fined for driving in cycle lanes (I suppose the cycle only area counts if the lights are red) but until it’s enforced it seems a little silly to punish the cyclist for drivers’ bad habits.

If a police officer saw a cyclist without a bib, he could pull the cyclist over automatically as he would a car without number plates.

That sounds like an excellent use of police time.  No doubt Captain Gatso thinks they have a lot of it since speed cameras mean they don’t have to occupy themselves with chasing down speeding motorists.

What makes drivers angry and frustrated with cyclists who ignore the Highway Code is that they know there is very little chance of them being stopped by police. Cyclists are already far too smug – and giving them special rights that are denied to motorists would only encourage them in their arrogance.

Again, what makes cyclists angry and frustrated with bus/van/taxi/car drivers is that there’s very little chance of them being stopped by police as they swerve in front of you or aggressively overtake a gnats whisper from your elbow only to slam on the brakes when they notice the red light twenty metres away.

I can understand why some drivers may not feel inclined to give way to cyclists coming the wrong way down a one-way street. I shout at them when they ride past me but they either ignore me or come out with the old gag: “But I’m only going one way.”

I must remember that one.

Image stolen from Katmellie.

According to The Times, Kensington and Chelsea appear to be about to trial a scheme to allow cyclists to legally travel the wrong way up one-way streets.  The scheme will initially only involve six quiet residential roads.

This seems like a fabulous bit of common sense for, as the article points out:

The alternative to cycling the wrong way down a one-way street is often to use a much less safe busy road.

Which is certainly true on the commute of several close friends.  They do, however acknowledge a downside:

Motorists, however, might be taken by surprise after failing to spot new signs at entry points and could find themselves being held liable for a collision with a bicycle.

Yes, well, it would be a shame to be found liable for a collision that could have been averted by, oh, I don’t know, looking where they were going?

Image stolen from The Nowtopian.

It looks like our new favourite bike has made it as far as the Telegraph.  Even if we forgive them for taking the celebrity angle:

The likes of Madonna, David Beckham, Paul McCartney, Paul Smith, Boris Johnson and Fatboy Slim are seen as prospective buyers since they can actually afford to own it.

(and are presumably stupid enough to buy it) what’s harder to ignore is the following:

This model is especially hard to ride since they don’t freewheel, which means that the pedals keep on turning as long as the bicycle does.

Hard to ride?  I think they mean hard to stop.

For a bike that normally costs £399, they’ve certainly managed to add some extras to bump the cost up including Velocity Deep V rims (naturally), “custom” chain, seat and bars. By “custom” they mean stuff that normally doesn’t come with the bike, rather than stuff that has been custom made. This includes what looks like a white KMC “Z” chain, white Charge Spoon saddle and Charge Slice “track” handlebar with white bar tape.

All of the above can be yours including the finish; copper plated and finished with 24ct gold, since you asked; for an eyewatering £9,500 - or you can enter the competition to win the bike on ETA’s website (the fools who commissioned this lunacy to promote their bike insurance). Unsurprisingly ETA’s insurance policy does not cover bikes of this value.

ETA are on your side though - they have attempted to reign in the price slightly as for your money you do not get a front brake and they’ve also seen fit to retain the cheap and nasty standard stem, chainset and pedals.

Ordinarily we quite like Charge (no idea who ETA are) but to our eyes this bares a passing resemblance to chavy yoofs driving around in “upgraded” Nissan Micras with tinted windows, non-silencing exhausts, boom boxes and bucket seats.

More info on the gold Plug over at the Charge site, if you have the time to kill for their overly slow flash movie to load.

I’ve just come across this rather interesting website - Dashing Tweeds.  They make a selection of modern tweed garments, some aimed at the sporting lady or gentleman.  What is particularly interesting is their use of a reflective material called “Lumatwill”.  It appears to be a Teflon coated tweed with reflective thread woven into it, creating the effect shown below when a bright light shines upon it:

The suit on the right looks like a particularly stylish way to cycle to work.

A fabulous time was had by all, with Drumlanrig putting on a great weekend bringing together amazing food, drink, dancing and good times. There was a fantastic ceilidh band on the Saturday which combined with copious amounts of Bruichladdich and Charlie The Bike Monger’s countryside mojitos meant for some interesting injuries and a bit of a hangover.

The riding was tough starting off with a 50k(!) guided ride on the Saturday and with Rik’s trails challenging the best of us for the race guided ride with numbers on the Sunday.  London Singlespeed were packing water pistols filled with vodka which was liberally dispensed, easing the pain of some of the climbs.

It’s been great to catch up with friends from SSUKs past and we look forward to seeing them all again next year or preferably before.

Our thanks go to Tom, Jules, Kenny, Singular Cycles and the rest of the organisers and helpers.

The film is divided into four parts, each reflecting a season of the year.  A group of top competitive professional riders are followed through the year starting with winter training, competitions over the summer and winding down by riding with mates into the autumn. It’s all top stuff - if you can get into a cinema to see it, jump at the chance.

All this has put us in the right frame of mind (we hope) for this years SSUK championship which kicks off this weekend in Dumfriesshire way up north in Scotland.

Incredible. Not only do the Japanese have the best technology and a never ending supply of pimpy bike bits, they also appear to have converted missile silos to use as off-street bike storage. Want want want.

The sensors change the colour of the lights in response to the rider’s movements - the ones on the back go from green to red when braking and the ones on the arms trigger when the rider raises their arms to signal that they are turning left or right.

The video below shows the jacket in action.  Sadly it looks like it’s still got a way to go as the lights don’t seem to trigger very reliably and the main panel will be obscured by even the smallest bag - fitting the brake lights at the bottom of the rear of the jacket would have been far more sensible.

The designer, Michael Chen, is planning on selling the jacket in the UK by the end of the year.  There is no news on whether he is working on a matching pair of gloves that light up like a Christmas tree when flicking a v-sign at the SUV that just cut you up.

“One of the cycling community’s most passionate members,” Sheldon was an inspiring writer, inventor, mechanic and fixie rider whose knowledge created possibly the best archive of bicycle technical information on the internet.

Our thoughts are with his family and everyone else who will miss him.