madison

Paddy Agnew is actually briliant compared to the new guy.

I had a issue with the shifting on my rear derailleur after day 2. I took it to the lab & they installed new cables front & rear plus new housing & charged me R136.00 which I think is very reasonable, so no complaints from my side. I could probably have sorted the problem myself by cleaning my existing cables, but by the end of day 2 I was simply not in the mood for bike maintenance.

It has never happenned on a new chain ring, usually on an older chain ring. The problem would then go away once any burrs had been filed off the rings. It was the fact that this started so early on with a new chain ring that got me thinking that there may be something that is causing irregularities on the ring. I always lube as you have described & use finish line wet lube.

How do you change gears properly? I have been riding mountain bikes for more than 10 years & this is the first bike I have ever experienced chain suck in the middle blade.

Some suggestions please. I am experiencing chain suck in my middle chain ring when riding in very wet conditions. I have recently (3-4 rides ago) replaced my middle & big chain rings, chain and cassette. All were replaced round about the same time, so the drivetrain is all new parts. I ride a Giant trance X0, LX crankset (all replacement rings were shimano), SRAM PG970 cassette & PC951 chain. Thanks

I received mine about three weeks ago. On Saturday I get an SMS informing me that my license has been dispatched & will be available for collection on the 4th May

Successfull lubrication has less to do with which lube you use & more to do with proper application.

I Don't shop at Pick 'n Pay or ride Argus. Not sure where the wife shops.

Kimmage seems to be condemned because he was not particularly talented & doping did not really help him, so he dicided to turn whistle blower. Will we ever know if his true motivation was revenge or because his morals got the better of him? Can we only ever trust a truly talented rider who profits from doping & then turns whistle blower? Anyone remember Jesus Manzano?

I was reading the latest issue of Mountain Bike Action last night & they did a review on tubbies for mountain bikes. This seems to be the next innovation in tyre technology, but purely for the elite racers. besides a performance advantage & being able to run at lower pressure than tubeless, what makes it usefull in the world cup XC scene is the fact that you can still safely ride the bike with a flat tire, allowing rider to get back to the tech zone for a wheel change. Apparently the top XC racers have been secretly using tubbies for the last two years. There is currently one company that makes a 26" tubbie rim & Geax are now producing a 26" tubbie. There is one other company (cant remember the name) that makes custom tubbies. At around $170 for a custom tubbie they are not cheap, which limits them to the elite. Interestingly though, tubbies have found their way into mountain biking via 29ers, using cyclocross rims & tyres. The closing comment in the article is that if money was no object & they had helicopter tech support on each ride, they would switch to tubbies for every ride, such is the performance advantage

http://www.velonews.com/article/87593/the-explainer---whose-blood-is-it-anyway Interesting article trying to explain how the Italians are pursuing a Spanish investigation using evidence obtained in a French event.

For what it's worth, I have a Trance X0 & I am quite satisfied. I previously had a Giant NRS & I actually think the Trance, despite it being somewhere between a trail bike & a XC bike performs better on uphills than the NRS did. Downhill of course the two cannot compare. I would say if you are going to race rather go for something like the anthem, epic etc. If you are more of a mid pack rider just out to have fun, go for something with a bit more travel. Fit is also very important. The Anthem medium was way to small for me & the Anthem large was way to big. The trance however fits perfectly. I stand to be corrected, but you cannot compare the meta4 to the trance X, a better comparison would have been the meta 5.5. Cannot comment on the Mongoose, but I see a lot of them around so there must be a few people that are happy with them.

Any idea who stocks Pedros Lube?

Not the race. I rode the whole trail a number of years back on a fully rigid bike & all I can remember was that it was the most uncomfortable experiece ever. From what I can remember the trail was pretty good. This was a long time ago though, so I am not sure in what state it is now. Maybe phone the hotel & find out from them.

There was a race there many years ago. Up the pass, a loop around the top and back down again. Here is a map.

A lot of the items listed below may seem like overkill, but they do not take up much space & you can share the load with your partner. On the ride, Spare derraileur cable, gator (Use a car tyre patch), cable ties, duct tape (wrap around seat post), quick link for your chaim (In fact carry a few) & make sure your multi tool has a chain breaker. Day 2 in particular could be epic & in case you find yourself stranded with injury km's from a water point, carry some big plasters or bandage, super glue & myprodol. In your overnight bag, carry a spare tyre & some spare spokes & a decent spoke tool. You should be able to borrow a chain whip & other tools for removing a cassette, so I would not bother with these in your overninght bag.

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What about all the doping in cricket. There was a Pakistani that thested positive after to indian pro 20/20 series. If cricket players are doping, then which sport is not? Maybe Darts.

This is the problem with the Armstrong era. A lot of new "cycling fans" were created by the hype, only to dissapear when Armstrong retired. Unfortunately to many people who do not know the history of the sport, Lance Armstrong & the tour de France was cycling. The sad thing is that we have had the most interesting tour in years, seven different leaders to date (the most in the tour history was apparently 8) & it all could come down to the final TT. These former fans of the sport do not know what they are missing & maybe it is because they do not actually understand what the sport is about. Does the sport actually need these fairweather fans? I think not & quite frankly the sport seems to be doing well enough in Europe judging by the support on the stages and as was mentioned in yesterday's commentry, the sport may have lost two sponsors, but it has gained three big long term sponsors shortly before the TDF. No one condones doping & i do believe it happens in all sports, but the fact is that no other sport tests as much as cycling does. Lets wait & see what happens at the olympics.

Where would cycling be without such characters?

So where is abdou now?

Interesting article on HGH research. Human growth hormone (HGH) has been thought to be used widely in the professional peloton as a performance-enhancing drug for several years, but a new study suggests that riders might have been putting their health at risk for a benefit that was all in their minds. A study funded by the World Anti-doping Agency and the Australian Anti-doping Research Program was presented at a meeting of the Endocrine Society this week, as reported by Medical News Today, showed that some athletes showed improvements in performance while believing they were using HGH, but were actually given a placebo. Previous studies have shown little performance benefit with human growth hormone, a drug which has been banned by the World Anti-doping Agency (WADA). The drug also has some dangerous side effects which include diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, high blood pressure and heart problems, abnormal growth of organs and a hastening of osteoarthritis. But neither dangers, the ineffectiveness nor the fact that the drug is banned has stopped some athletes from using HGH to try to boost performance. Researcher Jennifer Hansen of the Garvan Institute of Medical Research in Sydney, Australia, led the study in order to find out if any performance enhancing quality comes from the drug or the athlete's belief that it works. "Athletes are doping with growth hormone to improve sporting performance despite any evidence it actually improves performance," said Hansen. The 'double-blind' study, where neither researchers administering the drugs nor the athletes knew which person was given the active drug, was performed on 64 volunteers, all recreational athletes, over eight weeks. The volunteers were subjected to tests measuring endurance, strength, power and sprinting ability at the beginning and again at the end of the eight week period. The subjects were asked at the end to guess if they were the placebo or HGH group. The men were more likely to guess that they had received HGH than women, and the ones who were "incorrect guessers" who were given placebo but thought they had received the drug not only believed their performance improved, but also showed some actual improvement in jump height, a measure of power. The researchers concluded, "The results of this study suggest that the placebo effect may be responsible, at least in part, for the perceived athletic benefit of doping with growth hormone for some people."

It's not a doping excuse, but Hansie's - The devil made me do it excuse was classic.

And Frank Vandenbrouke claimed the dope was for his dog.