The Ouzo

well I've just joined Disco at the new work. I will investigate Vitality again and see if it will work for me. I'm not prepared to move my entire financial life to them just yet (if ever), so my guess is it wont be worth it. But I'll do the number anyway.

Popped into Cycleb boksburg on Saturday. Man I forgot about ride for sight and that number collection was at CL. Parking was monumental. Anyway, grabbed what I wanted and headed to the till. The young lady behind the till was clearly not having a good day, a short conversation with her revealed that people were just being absolute boxes, most likely coming in frustrated because of the parking. Never the less, I had a pleasant experience (despite handing over more ZAR than I wanted to) and even Thuli greeted me by name whilst she was helping another customer. As mentioned before, you're dealing with humans, emotions and concentration levels cant always be 100%. Just be lekker.

Bought my Alpina from Amina back around 1990. If you wanted anything other than a PnP special bike in Alberton back in the day, they were the people to go to.

They bumped me into 1D for this year, up from 2A last year. So nice progression. Just not sure I'm feel up to the racing, but I've got a few weeks to decide.

sheez, all the best. at least you're back on the bike. Have a lekker ride

or someone can setup a google sheet again.

yeah cost is certainly a big factor. If this was not my 21st tour I'd most likely not have done it this year. I've found the cheapest flights I could, cheap accommodation and kept the stay to 1 night, wont be hiring a car, but still its a tidy little packet of ZAR for this. The dream was to have the family there to celebrate the milestone with me, but that is simply not possible this year.

actually I do have a question I'm landing Saturday morning, will Uber to the expo and pic up my bike at the same time. I'm staying near to CTICC. With all the muggings etc. going on down there, whats the best route to take to get to CTICC on foot (or bike) on the saturday. (and probably on foot on the sunday after the race)

Started a new job on Monday, so time to browse and post on bikehub is minimal right now. My 21st tour this year, but will be flying in Saturday and back out again on sunday. Time wise if I'm around the 3h30 mark I'll be happy, less than that I'll be more happy. Training has taken a knock this week with needing to be at work at 7, but should settle again from next week. Its probably not a bad thing to take the week off anyway.

sounds like some of you are pit crew on an F1 team

It went by to quickly, looking forward to the next season

Straight into this, at 36km/h A few of us were trailing the main bunch by about 20m, there was a large puddle to the left with some potholes around, 5am and cloudy so not great visibility. We had moved to the middle of the road to avoid the water and potholes, at the last second the guy infront of me moved left and I was greeted with the kerb dead centre. I really thought I was going OTB, but somehow the front wheel climbed the kerb, i was no longer in control, just trying to stay upright whilst looking for the best place to fall, again, miraculously I stayed upright as the bike went down the kerb on the left, ejecting my water bottle into the path of my rear wheel. How there is no damage to the bike or me is beyond me, but it certainly made me a lot more cautious the rest of the ride.

so here's the thing though, how much later are you going to get to work because a group of cyclists inconvenienced you ? And this is not aimed specifically at you, its just that you happened to mention it. It is the type of logic that prevails on our roads, which is why we have aggression and impatient drivers. change those cyclists to a slow moving car/truck/bus, does the motorist still feel that same ? most of the times not so much.

your history of posting on this forum is very troll like, but, for the sake of this discussion I will bite. Years ago in SA, only motor cycles had lights on during the day. Why? for better visibility. Enter late 90's early 2000s and Volvo, a brand that prides itself on safety, determines that a car with lights on during the day is more visible and hence safer. Hello daytime running lights now fitted to the majority of vehicles. A distracted driver is a distracted driver, but lights have been proven to make a vehicle (motorised on otherwise) more visible on the road. I would rather carry the extra few hundred grams and be ever so slightly less aero in order to be more visible, than take a chance and risk being put into a grave.

I've definitely seen the difference when I commuted. The days that the read light was dead, I had more close passes than with the rear light flashing. Also from the front, those drivers that are not distracted by cellphones definitely give more space. Having said that though, there is a short section of road where I need to turn right at the traffic light, it is dual carriage both directions with a painted island separating the oncoming from the other side. Because this road is sometimes busy, its not easy to cross from the far left to the middle in order to turn right, so I generally ride on the painted island in the middle. There have been enough occasions where an oncoming car has started moving over onto the painted island heading directly for me, only moving back when I raise a hand. So front light is no guarantee, but I feel is certainly does help