Mon Jul 16, 2018 - East Lothian Rough Stuff Audax

Yesterday Velo and I rode the East Lothian Rough Stuff Audax. I travelled down to Perth on Saturday afternoon and got an early start past Edinburgh. Velo and I were in the third group to start. It was nice and warm with very dusty trails. We had a pretty quick time of it as we powered away to finish early afternoon. I think we were so much quicker than last year as we didn't do any long detours or miss turns etc.
It was good to get away and also really good to catch up and ride with Velo. I had a really enjoyable day. A long drive home with the rain starting just as I got back to Edinburgh and then a bit on and off for the rest of the way back. So we really were lucky with the weather, especially compared to last year, which was some of the worst since we went to the Fort William ride that few years back.
Thanks for the company and the laughs Velo.

Jamie

Sat Jun 09, 2018 - Big Dummy with the boy

I had a while out this afternoon with Caleb as he put some miles in on his new bike and I tried to teach him about using his gears. Had to find a few hills but he is getting it pretty quickly. He wants to ride the 24 mile round trip to Thurso tomorrow as he has a party at the pool in town. We probably should as he wants to ride his bike rather than be on the back of the Dummy when we go tour Orkney again in the summer holidays. Not very retro but thought I would share.

Jamie

Sun Jun 03, 2018 - Jack Taylor shakedown pt3 ?

I must admit Caleb did ride his bike this morning with at least 6 of those steroids in his system and at least ten puffs of Salbutomol so I hope the testers don't show up. He's far too young to be banned for life
He is really not well at all but I had to let him ride it up the road this morning, he is so excited with his new bike.
I was out this afternoon still trying to decide about the Jack Taylor repaint or not. It is still just cobbled together with the stuff off the Mercian and some Dura Ace that was in the spares box. Problem is I have the Mercian that could do with a repaint and another project on the go. If only all my problems were so
It was quite foggy with the sea Harr not lifting much all day so quite bleak really but I got a good 30 odd kilometres in with a coffee stop at some friends.
Hope the weather was better for the rest of the macretro clan and you managed to bask in the sunshine.

Jamie

Sun Jun 03, 2018 - Calebs new bike - Frog 55 - Team Sky edition

Hi all, hope the weekend is being kind to you all.
Last night I arrived home with Calebs new bike, a Frog 55, and yes it is in team Sky colours but hey ho he loves it.
He has graduated from his 16'' wheel Diamondback singlespeed to this which is 20'' wheel and 8 speed Shimano.
It's very lightweight and has good quality stuff through out and seems a good proper bike. He really loves it but due to him not being very well at the moment he has only ridden it a short while this morning. He wants a rack so he can put panniers on it and ride to Orkney, not a bad ambition for a 7 year old.
It's a great bike that came with more rugged off road tyres, mudguards which I fitted straight away and touch up paint. Which is all very nice and saves having to then go and source it all when he just wants to ride.

As it's the Team Sky edition it came with a few extras in an unmarked box  

Our house is more a quickstep family of supporters and this was evidenced by Caleb asking if he can get some Lidl stickers to cover up the team Sky ones :)  It's how he picks out Gilbert and the team in the peloton on TV.

Jamie


Sky edition extras, + Salbutomol inhaler, for those tricky hills. Came in a jiffy bag ;)

April 23, 2018 - Jack taylor update and reply regards paint suggestions.

Thanks for the posts and nice words.
I realise it's just cobbled together and the chain as well as the brake cables are too short. I didn't want to cut new ones as these are the ones straight off the Mercian and I have new bars with non aero Mafac levers. I knew the chain would be OK as long as I didn't go anywhere near big to big
Peter I did slide the wheel forward a bit and that helped with tonight taking it on a slightly longer roll round after work. Even though it started raining I still really like the feel of the longer top tube and rear stays, relaxed angles etc, it just felt a bit more relaxed than the Mercian, which when compared to the Merckx feels relaxed normally.
I hear what people are saying about the paint too but my concern is that there is so much rust coming through. The paint before it went into the chicken shed years was obviously as the previous owner said, 'lovely and shiny' as when it is cleaned and waxed, what is left of the paint really gleams. Unfortunately the dust that has sat on it for years is quite corrosive and has gone through it deeply in some places.
Hence my to and fro with the idea of repainting, on one hand I don't want to lose Jacks original paintwork but on the other I don't want to lose the frame.
I had an email today from a long term Jack Taylor rider who has about four frames and hung around the shop when younger as well as ride with Norman regularly and he had his main frame painted a while back and he said Jack wouldn't be bothered, if it needs painting it needs painting.
I used to be undecided, now I'm not so sure

Jamie

Here is a couple of pics I took just before when I got in to show the corrosion up close.

Sun May 27, 2018 - Jack Taylor shakedown pt2

Out for a ride along the coast again today.
Rode out yesterday to meet fellow retrobiker Ken (jackosbournesnr) finish his end to end ride but was on my Trucker and it was wall to wall fog and gloom. Felt bad for him after the glorious weather we have had. Thankfully the glorious weather was back today and he managed to get back up to Dunnet Head and get the views he missed yesterday.
This afternoon I took the Jack Taylor out for a leisurely roll along the coast just checking for fit etc as I have a couple of ongoing projects and need to finish one or the other properly. So just looking for inspiration really.
It's really just cobbled together with parts from my Mercian and spares box, but they tend to work together Ok. The cables look quite short due to lifting the bars and cables straight off the Mercian, but they work with the Mafac Racers no problem at all.
Even with the parts I put on it not being what I will final build it with, it rides and handles beautifully. Really just forgot about trying to see how it fit and just really enjoyed the ride.
Hope the weather was good to everyone else.

Jamie

Sat May 05, 2018 - Randonneur Audax with Brian - Dingwall to Home (Barrock) 203klm

Randonneur run from Dingwall to Barrock via Lairg, Altnahara and Bettyhill. 202klm

Due to some family stuff going on I needed to be home for Sunday and Monday and so couldn't really make it to Forth Fat this year, but I still had Friday and Monday booked off so managed to get in a ride on the Long Haul Trucker.
Was looking at possible rides and decided on Thursday to plan out a DIY Randonneur audax route for Saturday. Brian and I had talked about a few routes in the past and one was from his home in Dingwall up to mine. This sounded good and so I mapped out a route from Dingwall, over the Struei, Bonar Bridge, Lairg, Altnahara, Betty hill and through Thurso to home. Looked good on paper so I logged it and on Friday afternoon I caught a train down to Brians with my bike, arrived around 7pm to be greeted with a giant pasta dinner waiting. Cheers mate.
Brian said he would join me to the top of the Struei which was a couple of hours in so all sounded good. Forecast was good with a tail wind to boot.
Bikes were checked and readied before retiring for the night. My LHT was sorted and running with just my handlebar bag with glasses, wallet, phone etc and Carradice trunk bag on the rack with multitool, spare tube, jersey, jacket etc.
Up at 5.30 loaded with porridge and on the bikes for 6 am from up the top of Brians road. It was a great looking morning, sunny and with a bit of heat already coming through, very pleasant.
A steady climb up out of Dingwall before dropping down towards Evanton it was nice to start with a bit of sun on some really quiet roads, just that early morning feel to it. We then slowly climbed up for the next hour or so to the top of the Struei where Brian said he would ride down with me and maybe stop at Bonar Bridge where we would eat and then maybe he would go on to the west to Ledmore and the long loop home via Ullapool.
Bonar Bridge came pretty quickly after such a rapid descent and I said to Brian I would push on to Lairg and get breakfast there, Brian said he may as well join me as it wasn't that far and I couldn't blame him as the sky was looking black to the west and the wind was also coming straight from the west at that piont. Onto Lairg only to be dissapionted as the lovely cafe I had been holding out for was shut and by now after 3 hours I was pretty hungry. So there was nothing to it but raid the Spar shop, breakfast consisted of a sausage roll, an all day breakfast sandwich from the fridge, of which I am sure the egg and sausage was artificial, boking, but it was fuel and this was followed with 2 custard doughnut balls.
At this stage Brian decided that he had come this far that he may as well join me, which was great news and we were also a 1/4 of the way there. We then climbed steadily for the next hour or two and then had the good fortune to have a clear run down into Altnahara. This was enjoyable as last time when I was fully loaded with the tent and everything I rode up this climb from Altnahara. It must be about 5 klm long and clearly still lingers in my mind. I was barely turning a pedal and was cruising around 30 - 40 kph.
I don't usually stop at the hotel at Altnahara, don't find it welcoming, and seen as there is nothing else it makes it a long way from crask to Betty Hill between food or drinks. This time though the B&B on the Tongue side had a sign out saying Tea and coffee served. So it was we had a brilliant cup of tea sitting in these peoples conservatory on a very comfortable sofa. Very freindly stop.
Just out of town we turned right off the Tongue road and headed towards Betty Hill, skirting round the western side of the Loch keeping a good average pace going. We passed another tourer here who was not happy with the wind blowing in, or the road, or the towns, just not happy which was the opposite to us so after a brief chat we pushed on, there's no way he was going to make us that negative. Just shows though, he was young, had a flash bike, a really nice new looking Thorn with all the bells and whistles, like the new annodised red Rohloff hub on the back and SON on the front riding or walking in his case through a very beautiful part of the world and he was not anywhere near happy.
The road here, which was still singletrack as it had been since Lairg was now following the river and instead of the big climbs was more rolling hills with short sharp climbs.
We soon hit the north coast and turned right to enter Betty Hill, climbed the steep climb past the shop and headed down to the tourist information centre and the new cafe we had seen the signs for. Only we found it shut, f**king shut! really, Sunday afternoon on a Bank Holiday weekend on the route of the North Coast 500 and it's shut. Despite the signs evrywhere telling us we can't sit at their tables , we can't use their toilet, we can't park our bikes, we did use their tables and park our bikes, they sure as hell weren't using them. besides the fact they have little signs strategically placed all over the roads leading into town, this place is the tourist information centre. Soon I'll most likely see in the local paper about the people of Tongue complaining no one stops their anymore. You can probably tell by now that I was hungry and this place which i have stopped at three time has never been open just made us laugh, and rant obviously. I defiantely needed a snickers. So we sat at their seats and ate our bananas, custard doughnut balls, and mars bars before heading east up some pretty decent climbs. This section has a few long steep climbs that while we managed no bother which suprised me we did stop at Melvish further on at one of the hotels for a coffee. We had both ridden out this way recently when we went down to Forsinard so knew we should make it bake to mine no problem. We turned off the main road at Reay and followed the national cycle route through to Thurso and after stopping for a quick drink headed out for the last 3/4 of an hour ride to home. Stopped just before home and put my last banana on a stone wall as a offering to the cycle gods and wind gods for a very good day, then headed home.
Made it home inside the time in just on 13.05 hours for 202klm with a lot of elevation/climbing as well as a few good descents.
Both bikes, my Trucker and Brians Pompino had no issues with the same result for the riders. I must mention here that it was a big ride but for Brian, he was running a three speed Sturmy Archer hub, so while he must be crazy, he must be a crazy guy with legs of steel
Thanks Brian for coming all the way up with me.

Jamie

6.00am Tulloch Castle behind ready to start the ride. Dornoch Bridge in background Top of the Streui looking north west