Getting back into cycling

**Zoidburg** · 01-02-2019, 09:22

Originally Posted by tapid

Another canal jobbie planned for this wk/end Ben ? Being a keen cycling warrior myself in London I've been keeping a close eye on this thread mate.

.
Had a good 20 miler along Regents canal on Monday from Camden Town to West Drayton, just really lovely to avoid the fumes of London and traffic lights of course !. Interesting things to note on route being
Wembley stadium, Kensal bone yard ( well ?), Sudbury golf course and part of the canal that actually goes over the A406 a huge ring road around London. Probably few drivers even no there s cyclist and water
above there heads ?. Anyway good luck with the ride this summer.... Took the train back to Paddington stn b.t.w

Sounds great mate, I will be doing the canal paths again maybe in a couple of weeks. My riding partner has plans for the next couple of weekends so I'm off out on my own.

The plan for Sunday morning is a slightly hillier road route towards Chester then hit the Forrest trails for about 5 miles then back homewards on the roads again.

Hopefully that will see me around the 20 mile mark which Il be very happy with.

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**Zoidburg** · 28-01-2019, 21:49

Cheers Svend mate,

Don't worry your not coming across preachy at all lol.

Some of the stuff you mention I know but there's plenty to learn so thanks again.

So pedal wise I'm using Shimano SPD's. I started off using SPD's on my first road bike before swooping to SPD sl's when I bought a snazzier pair of road shoes.

So I'm pretty happy with the pedals but will definitely experiment with seat height & position as there's prob some room for improvement there.

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**Zoidburg** · 28-01-2019, 21:51

Tire pressures as well I need to experiment with. Currently I'm.running v high prob around 70lbs. I could feel that was too hard on anything but roads so I'll drop them down a bit on my next outing.

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**Svend N** · 28-01-2019, 23:03

OK - great that I'm not out of line here. Sounds like you know a lot already

so I'll just shut up until you have a question

Cheers,
Svend

**Zoidburg** · 03-02-2019, 19:06

So my plans changed a lot this morning, basically I just wanted to stay in doors eating biscuits, drinking tea, listening to music rather than braving the cold on the bike.

But then I had a bit of a word with myself and figured that any riding was better than no riding. So I sort of headed towards town with the vague idea of getting to sefton park doing a loop round the outside if it then heading back.

But once I was out I started to enjoy it and after checking my nav at the park I pushed on towards town as I'd only managed 14k.

From the centre of town I passed the cathedral and headed towards Albert Dock where I picked up the promenade which took me back towards home.

I'm definitely enjoying being back on a bike but boy is it hard work on a MTB rather than a road bike. Still it's not to be good for the legs & lungs I guess.

So ended doing 36k which was a bit of a trudge in places but pretty pleased with it all in. I earned this afternoons roast thats for sure.

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**walpurgis** · 03-02-2019, 20:33

I'm knackered just from looking at your pictures. At least you had a decent day for it.

**Zoidburg** · 04-02-2019, 13:13

Originally Posted by walpurgis

I'm knackered just from looking at your pictures. At least you had a decent day for it.

Was chilly but I was prepared for it thankfully.

I've just got to get used to the idea that every weekend between now and the end of may is going to revolve around at lease 1 bike ride.

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**Svend N** · 04-02-2019, 14:32

Nice one Ben, and good on ya for getting out on a cold day! Scenic area you live in, and looks like no shortage of trails to explore.

And yes, riding a mountain bike on the road is a slog. Slow-rolling tires, heavy fork...Gasp! Are your tires set up tubeless? That helps a lot to reduce rolling resistance and rotating mass (about 250g/wheel). I did that on my bike, and it is brilliant.

**Zoidburg** · 05-02-2019, 10:02

Originally Posted by Svend N

Nice one Ben, and good on ya for getting out on a cold day! Scenic area you live in, and looks like no shortage of trails to explore.

And yes, riding a mountain bike on the road is a slog. Slow-rolling tires, heavy fork...Gasp! Are your tires set up tubeless? That helps a lot to reduce rolling resistance and rotating mass (about 250g/wheel). I did that on my bike, and it is brilliant.

Morning mate,

Yeah Liverpool has its scenic spots, its a nice place to live in that respect. There's not so much in the way of off road trails near me but plenty of paved cycle tracks to ride.

I'm running inner tubes at the moment but will look into going tubeless, anything to help with the on-road slog!!

**Zoidburg** · 10-02-2019, 16:37

Another Sunday another ride. This morning I got the train into town changing at Liverpool central and then continuing on under the Mersey and across to the Wirral.

The Wirral way is a 15 miles or so foot & cycle path that I picked up at Hooten and followed towards the ferry terminal at New Brighton. The first half was all offroad mainly hardpack and then when I hit the coastal section that was all paved.

The entire route was about 44k ish including riding to & from the station. About half way through the ride I felt like I could run a bit more seat height so whacked it up another 1.5inches or so. Result was an immediate improvement in knee comfort and I hit the sweet spot in terms of hips rocking nicely and being a bit more over the front of the bike.

I could of cycled from town back home but had a bit of a time constraint so jumped the train again homewards.

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