Well it has been an expensive few weeks for the bike. Day
after cleaning my bike (See my last blog entry) I started on my morning cycle
and the chain snapped. Bobby did tell me that this was going to be expensive
but I thought “Hey a chain can’t be that expensive… Can it?”. Well I got a new
chain (and link tool) for £20 and thought that was not too bad. But after fitting
the chain (Sheldon knows his stuff LINK)
I went for a quick peddle. Didn't make it to the top of the street. The chain
kept slipping around the front chain set. So I took it off and went to
Edinburgh Bikes LINK where the chap told me it would defiantly be the rear free wheel…. that was until
he saw the chain set to which he said “Ah that’s B*****d” and I picked up a new
front chain set. But sure enough after fitting the new chain set I soon discovered
that the freewheel needed replacing too. I use a MegaRange freewheel and I
chose to get one the same of ebay so I had at least a week to wait so I fitted
a spare standard freewheel to keep me going.
I also splashed out on some new cycle glasses. £5.50 from
China. They do the job though :0)
So all in all it has been an expensive time as Bobby had
warned me. Smart guy you know :0)
Training has been going well. I am now trying to do 10 miles
each morning of the week before work and then a longer cycle at the weekend.
The morning cycles are usually around the local area and I
am trying to vary them so that I don’t get too bored of the same old scenery
every day. I am trying to keep the idea of hills to the fore and all routes
have at least two assents on them.
This weekend’s route was a second attempt at reaching the
sea. Difference with this trip is I was aiming for something’s big enough that I
can see them from home. I headed for the Forth bridges (Road and Rail).
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| Zoomed in pic of Forth Road Bridge 15 miles away. |
I looked at the forecast for Saturday and Sunday and decided
on the Saturday Morning. This was because the wind would be against me on the
way down to the bridges and on my back on the way back up the hills to home.
The chance of rain was marginal but I recon we need to be used to it if we are
intending on cycling in Scotland ;0)
On the Friday Night I decided to fit my front pannier racks
(at last!). I need to get used to having extra weight on the front. The fitting
did not go to plan. The “U” bolts supplied were not wide enough to fit round my
extra thick front forks. Admittedly I was aware that this was likely to be a
problem as a lot of people have mentioned this when reviewing the various
different types of front pannier racks. So I set about widening the “U” bolts
and fitting the racks on. One issue was that the position of the racks forced
me to move my cycle computer sensor up the forks as the “U” bolts were destined
to fit in the same place.
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| New Front Pannier Racks |
Well once the racks were fitted I moved some of the training
weights from my rear panniers in to my new(ish) from panniers. I was very lucky
to get the same type and colour of panniers for the front 15 years after
getting the rear panniers :0). So now I have 10Kg in the rear and 5Kg in the
front panniers. I also have a handle bar pannier that I have my food and drinks
etc in.
I also found a perfect material to make a new spray guard from my mudguard Its made from an old chewed up traffic cone I found. Works a treat. :0)
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| Home make Spray guard. Made from Traffic cone. |
Well at 8am on the Saturday morning I set off for the Forth
Road Bridge. Weather turned out to be great. 20mph wind from the north but lovely
and sunny. Bridges are due North of me so in to wind the whole way there :0(
Quickly noticed that my cycle computer was not working.
(Turned out to be the magnet was too far from the sensor now. Fixed it the next
day)
This time I had printed off maps of the route so I would not
get lost. I travelled down through Ratho to the Airport where I had to cross a
dual carriage way on a foot bridge. Had to dismount for this as the steps were
quite high and with all the extra weight I could not hop up them.
 |
| Plane on Edinburgh Airport runway |
 |
| Tops of Forth Rode Bridge in the distance |
Next it was along to the Newbridge roundabout where I joined
the old railway route that would take me all the way to South Queensferry and
the Forth Road Bridge. The old railway path was a bit boggy in places but good
most of the way. Oddly it was a gentle uphill for about 8 miles on the old
railway which I had not expected and with the head wind it was a bit of a
chore.
 |
| Got to love the straight railways :0) |
Once in to South Queensferry it was back on to the roads and
along to the bridge. The views from the bridge were fantastic.
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| Forth Rail Bridge from car park |
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| Forth Road Bridge from Carpark |
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| Made it!!!! |
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| The Forth Rail Bridge |
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| South Queensferry |
 |
| My trusty stead |
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| Its a LONG bridge, this is half way over. |
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| Train on the bridge |
I cycled right over the bridge and then back to south Queensferry.
I wanted to go down to the chandlery shop beneath the road bridge to pick up
some boat bits. Then I cycled along to the old harbour in South Queensferry and
had my hot chocolate and banana (and a couple of chocolate Biscuits) where it
was out of the wind but lovely and warm.
 |
| Relaxing at the beach with the bridges behind. |
I met a couple of blokes who are
painter decorators by trade but do some creel fishing in their spare time. They
were saying since the work on the new bridge has started there catches are down
due to the mucky water being created by the work. They also gave me some ideas
for other routes along the coast :0)
Once I had finished my snack I started back home along the old
railway again. The sun was still shining but this time the wind was on my back,
but I have to be honest that my legs were beginning to ache, I think the 52
miles over the previous 5 days were taking their toll, but I must get used to
it.
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| Last view of the rail bridge as I was leaving |
Got back to the airport where I had a break for 5 mins to
take a picture of the planes going over head.
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| They really were close!!! |
After this it was back to the serious uphill climb to home.
About 8 miles of it. And the hill back in to Balerno (we call it the railway
hill) is very steep and about half a mile. But I was really please that I
managed it all without getting off once.
Well that’s it for this weekend’s cycle training. Will keep
up the daily 10 milers and see what I can think of for next weekend.
STATS (Bit of guess work here as the cycle computer was not
working)
Distance: 30 miles according to Google maps
Average speed: Approx. 10mph
Total time: 4.5 hours (but there was some shopping in there
;0))
Extra Weight: 20Kg
Wine Gum count: 4
AL
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