..........................................................................................................................................................................................................
getting better
in june last year, following my thankfully brief excursion to the land of the unwell, i had my first appointment with the region's cardiology nurse at the hospital i had no idea existed in lochgilphead, a town around 40km from the ferry terminal at kennacraig. arriving by bus, i thought i had figured out the most direct route from the bus stop to the hospital, which may have been the case, but hadn't really taken into account the gradient necessary to reach the footpath. while this would normally have been scarcely noticeable, my level of infirmity at the time had turned it into annapurna.
however, the appointment went well; progress was as hoped for, but on asking what exercise i was in the habit of undertaking, the nurse immediately discounted any thoughts of referring me to the local health centre for remedial exercise. apparently i was already fitter than most, and exercising more than any referral would have added. prior to leaving glasgow's golden jubilee hospital cardiology department, my consultant advised that the level of fitness i had acquired prior to the health scare would make the recovery process relatively easy. what i hadn't expected was quite how easy it has been.
islay hosts a community that still enquires after my health over a year after i left hospital, many of whom have expressed wonderment bordering on admiration that i still cycle every weekend, and weather conditions in which many would refrain from driving their cars. i have had two hospital stays in my life, both of which have made plain that, the fitter you are, the easier will be the subsequent recovery period and the less time and attention will be incurred during time on the ward. following the advice that my recovery would be less onerous due to my level of fitness, there was no chance i was going to squander that by staying off the bike for a day longer than was necessary.
the cardiology department recommended car drivers did not drive for a period of four weeks after leaving hospital, and applied the same restrictions to my cycling. i'm happy to say that, since i renewed the acquaintance with my bicycle in april 2025, i have experienced not so much as a twinge that would remind me i'd ever suffered from heart problems. i walk just over a kilometre every morning after breakfast, and before i go to work, while my weekend cycling has gradually risen to an average of 130km (sometimes a bit more, sometimes slightly less). i cannot deny that the speed has decreased slightly as has the distance i can undertake at one sitting, but there's no denying that i'm not getting any younger.
another member of the sunday morning peloton has recently rejoined the happy throng, having been set adrift during covid and only recently rediscovered the joys of cycling. at least part of that rediscovery has been promulgated by learning he has abnormally high blood pressure at the behest of a hereditary condition. however, during several medical appointments to bring matters under control, his doctor advised that cycling would be likely to help, advice with which he is very pleased to concur. even cycling only at weekends has helped reduce his blood pressure to an impressive degree.
obviously, i do not contend that the only way to improve personal health is through cycling, but it would be hard to deny the benefits to be received from regular pedalling. at least part of the advantages revolve around the fact that the bicycle itself bears the individual's weight during exercise, a benefit it shares with swimming. and despite the industry's apparently unrelenting emphasis on speed, maintaining and subsequently improving one's health and fitness depends very little on riding fast. the sunday parcours consists of flat sections, downhills, short, sharp ascents, and more often than not, an opressive headwind in more directions than physics would suggest.
of course, the big problem here is that i am, once again, preaching to the converted. it is the youngsters of today for whom i fear; with a propensity to drive or be driven everywhere, many are not building a level of fitness that might serve them well in the future. and should they eventually realise the efficacy of so doing, we can only hope the light bulb switches on far enough in advance. i survived almost entirely because i've been a lifelong cyclist, and i hope to have many more years as a result. two of my sunday morning colleagues have reaped similar benefits.
feel free to tell everyone you meet.
monday 4 may 2026
..........................................................................................................................................................................................................bearing up under pressure
everybody's bicycle makes untoward noises at some time in its career, pretty much all of which appear to originate from the bottom bracket area, whether that particular nether region is at fault or otherwise. i once spent the better part of a week trying to nail down a persistent clicking noise that had me remove the crankset, the bottom bracket, check all the chainring bolts before moving onto the headset (you just never know). it turned out to be the pedal threads which had dried out during a particularly hot summer.
we've all been there.
the mid twenty-teens move to the press-fit bottom bracket was a move guaranteed to introduce hideous creaks and groans; a result that could possibly have been predicted without the benefit of hindsight. while metal can be machined perfectly round, carbon fibre, it turns out, can't. therefore when pressure is applied, the lack of two compatible round surfaces frequently resulted in a cacophony of sound. i count myself fortunate that specialized saw fit to install aluminium surfaces within the carbon fibre of the crux cyclocross bicycle in my possession, an innovation that as, as far as i can tell, obviated the sonic distress experienced by owners of competing brands.
however, even when all is well, eventually any given set of bearings will start to self-destruct, either as a result of poor maintenance (as if that would happen to us), or simply the conditions in which they have been forced to operate. in the bottom brackets most commonly featured nowadays, you'd simply unscrew the outboard cups, or remove the crank-fitted bearings if you ride campagnolo, and install the appropriate replacements. press-fit bearings are a somewhat different animal.
the original bearings in the crux lasted almost five years before i grudgingly accepted they had passed their sell-by date, recognition much-delayed by the fact that i'd no real idea of how to extricate the dud bearings and fit new ones. however, ultimately there was no option but to do so. had i lived in scotland, i'm sure i'd simply have dropped the bike in at my nearest bike shop, but for me, and many others in remote locations, that really isn't an option. what's also not an option, is purchasing the tool designed to push the bearings out of the frame; undoubtedly worth it for a bike shop, but for the home mechanic likely to make use of such a tool only once every two or three years, there are other trinkets that can be had for such expenditure.
on the first occasion of removal, i rather unsubtley hammered the bearings out with a steel punch, convinced i may have extricated several filaments of carbon fibre in the process (happily not). however, cheerfully admitting that i really had little idea of what i was doing, i subsequently discovered that there is a split ring behind each bearing set to prevent the latter from travelling inwards during the installation process. as it transpired, several of my hammerings had inflicted indiscriminate harm on these rings; thankfully not terminal.
the noise situation has not been helped by the sram rival crankset which, though thoroughly reliable, has expressed a tendency to make noises of its own every now and again, usually cured by unscrewing the integrated extractor, greasing the threads and reassembling. the most recent noisy intervention was, i believed, a repeated instance. but, having employed the above described process, there were still irritating groans when pedalling hard uphill, so i resolved to replace the bottom bracket bearings. and, for good measure, renew the headset bearings too. this time, however, i had a cunning plan to extricate the bb bearings, a plan that would leave the split retaining rings unharmed.
i have frequently noted on several youtube instructional videos, a highlighted mention that within the subsequent movie, there is a paid for promotion. since i will have no truck with such matters on the post, i make the point here that the following is my own recommendation, and for which i have received no moral or material remittance; it makes tautological sense that in order to replace any set of bearings on the bicycle, it will be necessary to acquire suitable replacements, items which bear the important need of being 100% compatible. with so many cotton pickin' bottom bracket standards, in this case, related to a bicycle manufactured in 2015, i can but recommend the services of a company called trailvision, which specialises in bicycle bearing sets, and which, in the absence of personal knowledge, is well-equipped to tell you just what you require. thus i ordered headset and bottom bracket press-fit cartridge bearings to fit my crux, both of which arrived in a matter of days, ensconced in sealed (and resealable) blue packets.
and so to my cunning plan. i have long possessed one of those tools designed to remove one inch headset bearings from within the head tube. one end of this hollow tube features a series of slots that allow it to compress when pulled through the bearings, and subsequently expand behind the bearing; hammering the other end unceremoniously removes it from the headset cup. my theory was that, since the tool was designed for a one-inch headset, it was likely it could be pulled through the press-fit bb bearing and allow me to hammer it free, without troubling the split retaining washers. for once in my life, i was right. whereas my previous method took over half an hour, i had both bearings removed in less than three minutes, and the new ones installed, with a bearing press, in five. altogether, the entire process of removing and fitting bottom bracket and headset bearings took less than an hour. (there was an undue amount of faffing with the headset, unrelated to the bearings themselves; long story).
the bike ride that followed was smooth and mercifully noise free (apart from the puffing and panting of the rider). don't you just love it when a plan comes together?
sunday 3 may 2026
..........................................................................................................................................................................................................interpretation
i checked the wording on the front page of the exam paper during my thursday morning ensconcement in a small room in the local secondary school, reading for a pupil with mild dyslexia. it is a common state of affairs across the country, where teenagers with special needs are allowed extra time to complete their exams and the assistance of a 'reader' and/or 'scribe', where their mental abilities are pristine but reading and/or writing poses more than just a trivial problem. however, paper one, referred to as interpretation when national five courses were still known as 'o-levels', has now extended its title to 'reading for understanding, analysis and evaluation'. in other words, interpretation.
for those with memories as flimsy as my own, this part of the exam consists of reading a passage of prose, before answering a series of questions based on said passage. and in an opposing move to simplify matters for the candidates, each question directs the individual to specific lines within the prose, ensuring that they stray not from the programmed path. i also carried out the above duties during the school's prelims, where the pupil for whom i was designated reader, required me to read the whole piece, then the selection of lines indicated in the questions. this time round, i had only to undertake the initial reading, before sitting silently for the next hour or so.
of course, because i wasn't a 'scribe', i have no idea of the candidate's answers and how accurate they might subsequently prove to be. when i sat my higher english, i spent the majority of the allocated time writing what i believed to be cogent answers to the passage set for interpretation, before it dawned on me that i had completely misinterpreted its meaning, leading to some very hurried scribbling and crossing out. you may be relieved to learn that i passed the exam quite comfortably.
but my own experience clearly highlights that it is possible to misinterpret any given situation. it is uncommonly common in music, where the implied rhythm might not be heard as the writer intended. though i'd be fibbing if i said i could remember which particular track, apparently one of the songs on genesis 'and then there were three', was apprehended differently by drummer phil collins than its composer, tony banks, intended. collins' interpretation is the one recorded on the album.
and so it may be that founder and ceo of zwift, eric min has misunderstood what is meant by the term cycling.
someone whose opinion coincided with my own description of 'zwifting', categorised it, not as cycling, but indoor training. cycling i think most of us would probably agree, is the act of riding a bicycle outdoors, admiring the scenery, facing the elements du jour, and reacting to whatever it is we meet along the way. there is no implied purpose to this description; it may be that the rider desires to reach a specified destination for an undisclosed reason, or, as mostly practised by velo clubs all across the world, a leisurely/frantic (delete as applicable) spin around the estates. the latter, if adhering to the frantic adjective, could easily be defined as training, assuming it is carried out at speed, but very definitely cycle-specific training.
mr min's apprehension of the situation is clearly geared (pun not intended) towards the specific purpose for which he setup zwift in the first place, one that seems to have implied a connection with cycling, merely because there is a bicycle involved. however, i would maintain that, since no forward movement actually takes place, no matter how much effort is expended, i would respectively contend that zwift is not cycling. and, with that in mind, neither is rouvy, a competing means of indoor training in front of a flat screen displaying a verisimilitude or reality of the parcours of choice.
i include both of the above because zwift has just acquired its erstwhile competitor, the ceo of which, petr samek, seems a tad better informed than his new boss, referring to the rouvy platform as indoor training. mr min, however, said "we are now seeing more people come to cycling for the first time through indoor training, seeking an activity that supports their active lifestyle", unmistakably, yet inaccurately, categorising the riding of bicycles aboard smart trainers (the zwift variants of which will now find themselves compatible with rouvy) as cycling.
presumably wout and mads are now trapped midway between both platforms? though we are all well acquainted with the 'real world' exploits of both gentlemen, it may even have been assistance provided by rouvy that allowed wva to take victcory at paris-roubaix. but while his rouvy sessions were definably training, his victory was very much cycling.
several of those i know who would answer to the apellation, zwifties, spend many hours indoors despite more than favourable weather outdoors, proving, if nothing else, that the indoor world does not necessarily lead to the great outdoors. succinctly put, it is in danger of becoming an end in itself, as opposed to a means to an end. and now that zwift and rouvy are as one, it appears that the end of the world may truly be nigh.
saturday 2 may 2026
..........................................................................................................................................................................................................the long way home
liege-bastogne-liege, won once again by tadej pogacar, has a parcours of 260km. amstel gold is just a smidgeon shorter at 257km, while paris-roubaix adds one kilometre to the latter. but the biggie for the season is milan-sanremo (another tadej box tick), covering an extensive 298km, while de ronde van vlaanderen runs it a distant second by traversing 278km. currently, my strenuous velocipedinal circumstances extend to a current maximum of 130km over the course of a weekend, punctuated, out of necessity, by the occasional soya latte and the now obligatory double-egg roll. and i don't mind admitting that, on reaching home on sunday afternoon, i usually retreat to the armchair to watch re-runs of columbo. keen observers of youtube's video shorts will recognise that, after holding high his victory cobble, there was no sign of wout rushing to watch television.
the last time i rode the late, lamented hot chillee london-paris ride, we covered approximately 160km each day, sometimes a little more, sometimes a little less. but irrespective of which, there was always an interruption for a lunch far larger than anything that might fit within a team-emblazoned musette, scoffed quicker than jasper philipsen can cross a finish line. and on that particular note, it's as well to pay attention to the fact that the professionals, while covering greater distances, are doing so at a rate of knots at least double that of the great unwashed. the likes of philipsen, van aert, van der poel and pogacar seem always to have sufficient left in the tank to put on a sprint display; in londres-paris at least, most of us had been rueing the lack of at least two remaining larger sprockets on the cassette, long before reaching the lunch stop.
bridgend village is but five circuitous kilometres distant from bowmore village, often blighted by winds blowing off the sea or directly from the north, but a mere five kilometres nonetheless. it's a distance over which one of my colleagues periodically rides at speed, aboard his professionally endorsed carbon bicycle, replete with a bona-fide time-trial helmet which sports a visor. it is less than surprising he can cover the proscribed distance quicker than yours truly, but as he returns to his abode a mere ten kilometres later, that is usually the extent of his bike ride until next time. not for him, the need to test stamina and resolve, surely the mark of the cognoscenti?
but how many of us would choose to ride the length of milan-sanremo after breakfast on a sunday? in order to catch the final episode of columbo before bedtime, i'd need to reach sanremo with an average speed of just over 41kph. i'll leave you to consider just how likely that might be.
several of the training books i dutifully enacted by way of preparation for review, suggested that slow but sure over longer distances, was the ideal method of increasing stamina while correspondingly reducing any excess fat accumulation. mitigating against that, is a tendency displayed by most of us not to stick to even a semblance of a cunning plan. in other words, despite the best of intentions to adhere to a modicum of pre-planned training, after five minutes, all caution has been cast to the wind, replaced by the old habits that scarcely promise exercise nirvana.
what i am attempting to point out, in the usual long-winded way, aside from recognising that a pro contract is unlikely to arrive in the mail anytime soon, is that comparison between ourselves and the professional classes is more than just redundant. despite being continually advised that cycling is almost alone amongst sports, where, assuming financial probity, you and i can acquire bicycles and apparel that are all but identical to those of our heroes, in essence, it's what the professionals do with that equipment that makes the difference. the fact that the difference is played out over considerably more kilometres than exist between ardbeg distillery and bunnahabhain distillery, pretty much puts us firmly in our place.
however, we should not completely resign ourselves to the position of second class, velocipedinal citizens. in essence there is nothing stopping accumulation of kilometres, irrespective of the speed at which they are traversed. prior to my initial attempt at london-paris, i covered a 50km loop of the eastern portion of the island to improve my capacity for distance. as matters progressed, i increased to at least two circuits and at an elevated pace. as it transpired, that saved a great deal of embarrassment as we surveyed the eiffel tower a few months later.
what none of the training manuals i have read, nor marketing ploys allied to professional level bicycles espouse, is the simple principle of enjoyment. ride what you like admire whomsoever you wish, wear the best in the world; but don't forget to have fun while you're doing it.
friday 1 may 2026
..........................................................................................................................................................................................................editing
my first 'proper' road bike featured campagnolo chorus components, when purchase of a groupset included a seatpost and a pair of hubs; i'd be hard-pressed to pinpoint when component manufacturers devalued the word by removing them. that particular bike, built around a red, reynolds 531 steel orbit frame would more or less have coincided with campagnolo's departure from the mountain bike world, retiring its euclid, centaur and olympus groupsets to concentrate on the road. whether that was a smart move or not remains open to debate, but since shimano appeared, at the time, to have hoovered up the original equipment share of bikes built in the far east, it may not even have been a decision that was vicenza's to make.
that the worlds of road and mountain biking are dramatically different, needs only an awkward, but fleeting glance in the direction of either. both have influenced each other, though i've a sneaking suspicion that, if one of them is winning, it's the off-road sector. road bikes now have a-headsets, long-cage rear derailleurs, increasingly larger cassette sprockets and single, up front chainrings. mountain bikes, on the other hand, were somewhat late to the electronics party, so it looks like it all came out in the wash after all.
at the time i built my road bike, including lacing and truing the wheels, everything acquired from the campagnolo dealer was indubitably geared (if you'll pardon the pun) towards riding the road. and reputedly influencers for the entire industry, campagnolo offered differing ranges aimed at specific price points. thus i could have chosen from chorus, the superbly named (and much missed) croce d'aune, record and ever so occasionally, super-record. oddly enough, only a year past, campagnolo claimed that it was retiring the record name from its groupset range, leaving chorus as its second-tier offering behind the thirteen-speed super-record wireless. i say "oddly enough", for it seems they must have experienced a change of heart, having now introduced thirteen-speed record wireless; and not just in a single flavour, but three. this new set of gears can be acquired in road, all-road, and gravel, the latter of which must, at least, bring it within an electron's distance of their long-lost mountain bike groupsets.
road provides both single and double chainset options, while the all-road offering, strangely enough, eschews the 1x edition. i confess i was under the impression that the term, all road referred to the ability to ride on any type of road your heart desires, making the single-ring option possibly an attractive choice. unsurprisingly, gravel sports only the single ring, though, if you believe the hyperbole, "campagnolo's philosophy is that there should be a matching wheel for every groupset, because only the synergy between components from the same family can ensure the best performance". thus there is a gravel specific wheelset. however, unless vicenza implements purchasing strictures at its dealer network, i think it safe to say you can mix and match.
but it does seem an odd state of affairs that this leaves the original gravel groupset, ekar on the backburner, as a non-electronic option (for the time being at least) competing against electrons from sram and shimano. and, it should be pointed out, campagnolo itself. two years past, campagnolo and colnago chose to sponsor dutch cyclocross rider, ryan kamp. but instead of putting him on ekar, they equiped his g4x with super-record wireless, despite, at the time, the latter being positioned as their top-level road groupset.
given that kamp has competed in the last two 'cross seasons using super-record wireless, i, and others, are less than convinced of the necessity for different components for different disciplines. of the three record releases, it's the all-road option that seems to be sitting in no man's land; if mountain bikers and gravel riders are more likely to choose the single ring option, as featured on the majority of both types of bike these days, the sole option of a double setup seems likely to send potential customers to one of the other two choices.
marketing ploys aside, i'd think it more realistic simply to build the components to suit the worst that can happen to them, and let folks choose how many rings and what size of sprockets. granted, there might have to be two derailleurs from which to choose in order to cope with a dinner-plate at the back, but short and long-cage options are hardly new to the contemporary cyclist.
and finally, i can understand why hubs have disappeared from the groupset, but why did they remove the seatpost?
thursday 30 april 2026
..........................................................................................................................................................................................................quick, hide
i admit, i'm only a few days into my garmin-less bike riding, but already that empty space on my handlebars has highlighted that, as cyclists, we might have a bit of a speed problem. you could possibly use the same argument against motorists, perhaps with greater justification, but when the police and the court systems can hand out various penalties for exceeding legal limits, the need for some means of accurately gauging the vehicles' velocity is a tad more pressing. there are very, very few of us who are capable of sustaining illegal speeds on a pedal bicycle; those who can frequently do so on closed roads and are paid for the privilege.
though the garmin device in my possession harbours a greater number of data features than there are spaces on its liquid crystal display, two that i opted to include, were actual speed and average speed, neither of which are, ultimately, of any real use. the highest speed i have ever recorded, took place a great many years ago when i had only just cast-off the mantle of youth, achieved on a downhill stretch of road, with a very strong tailwind. and though i thought it impressive at the time, it was still a good 20mph shy of the road's speed limit, so the local constabulary were unlikely to have been troubled by my accomplishment.
of course, that which separates us from the motoring public, can be demonstrated by the number of videos on youtube showing a wide variety of exotic super and hypercars (what's the difference?) attempting, and occasionally succeeding, to reach stratospheric speeds for reasons that are beyond my ken. considering the price and sophistication of the vehicles employed, for no more than bragging rights (so far as i can see), it's a somewhat vacuous quest. but is it posssible that you and i are naively involved in a similarly pointless pursuit?
there are, of course, the traditional scrambles for sprint victory at the village signposts, childish competitions that have existed since time immemorial. who, in their right mind, would ever legislate against such harmless striving for such pyrrhic trouncements? but it is hardly necessary to be made aware of the terminal velocity associated with loss or victory; you either passed the road sign at the head of the pack, or you didn't. speed will depend entirely on the relative quality of your peloton. yet the cycle industry is entirely complicit in the facade, spending countless hours in the wind tunnel, aided and abetted by computer fluid dynamics modelling.
and hiding the cables inside the frame.
it may be that we are at the mercy of a previous discussion, whereby the shape of modern carbon fibre cannot be easily or economically fashioned in a manner different to that originally crafted for the professional classes. we are therefore subjected to acres of marketing hyperbole, convincing the great unwashed that speed is the ultimate accolade to be gained from riding that which occupies the upper regions of the company website. admittedly, even the owner of a colnago y1rs, the self-styled fastest bike in the peloton, is perfectly at liberty to ride that bike as slowly as they like. just like eighty year-old drivers of porsches.
but i fear it is insufficient simply to acquire one of any number of reputedly fast bicycles and ride to the limit of one's ability; it must also be quantified by some sort of definable measurement, whether bar-mounted or software displayed. why else are so many of the amateur peloton signed up to the likes of strava, and why else would you eschew a delightful outdoor bike ride in warm and sunny conditions, in favour of accompanying online virtual riders through the auspices of zwift? it is, like it or not, because it is very much a case of 'never mind the quality, feel the width'. unless you harbour a genuine fear of the outdoors, are effectively city-bound, or find puddles to be scary, the only reason of which i can think to favour indoors over outdoors, is to work on one's topline speed.
and that might be considered obsessive, unless the competitive milieu is one in which you frequently participate. for where else is the joy to be found in consistently trouncing your compatriots at the final sprint, or simply riding into the distance for no particular reason, other than because you can.
mitigations can be put in place by referencing the previously mentioned cultivation of speed by hardware, softwear and software providers. a recent mailshot from rapha, extolling the virtues of their latest pro-team range of apparel, was entitled 'faster, sharper, more engaged', while their summer roadsuit was described as possessing 'lightning-fast and flyweight aerodynamics'. couple that with the integration of otherwise innocent cabling for reason of aerodynamics, and it could be argued that it really isn't our fault at all. after all, how many bicycles and jerseys could be sold on the promise of comfort, solidity, longevity and sensibility?
so maybe it is our fault after all.
tuesday 28 april 2026
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