My poor, neglected Rock Shox SID fork. I got this fork for the World Champs way back at the start of 2012. Since then I’ve ridden rather a lot of very long races on them and apart from the occasional wash, I’ve shown them no love and attention whatsoever.

I think it’s all those years of riding with rigid forks. All I had to do with those was clean them, check for any signs of them snapping (!) and moan and grumble about the tingling in my hands caused by nerve damage for a couple of weeks after a 24 hour race. Suspension forks, it would seem, need some looking after.

I’d noticed that they weren’t as controlled or smooth as they used to be. I also noticed that they looked a bit shorter. “Maybe I should give them a service” I thought. Then I remembered the last time I serviced a suspension fork back in 2002. That particular fork now lies at the back of the cellar, in bits. A constant reminder of my ineptitude and ham-fistedness. “I know, I’ll send the fork to someone who knows what the bloody hell they’re doing” I then thought. It’s an expensive item, a modern high-end suspension fork. If you’re going to take it to bits you really should make sure you know what you’re doing….or just send it to a professional.

I’ve a few racing friends who’ve recommended Loco Tuning in the past so I called them. Shortly after filling in the booking form on the website I got a reply from Simon at Loco telling me to box them up and send them over. “You’ll have them back by Friday” was the bold claim (it was Tuesday already). I also booked in a second SID fork which needed the travel increasing but this didn’t make a difference to Simon’s optimism. He reckoned I’d still have both of them back by Friday.

Sure enough, they arrived back on Friday. New seals, new oil, the older fork had been leaking air into the negative chamber so that was sorted and both forks feel as good as new. In fact, better than new.

Now that winter’s over and the summer is just beginning, do your fork a favour and get it serviced by someone that knows how to do it properly. For the price of a night out you can get your old suspension working as well as it did when you first got it and you’ll have it back faster than you’d have thought possible.

Get in touch with Simon at Loco Tuning via their website – www.locotuning.co.uk

In a previous blog I pondered how training for a 24 hour mountain bike race would be compatible with training and taking part in a long-distance fell race. I was wondering how I’d be able to give one priority over the other, how I’d cope with the 3 Peaks race at the end of a reasonably intense week on the bike and how I’d be able to recover properly after running for 24 miles in mountainous and difficult terrain before getting back on a bike the week after.

Well, it was even harder than I thought it was going to be. I’d afforded myself a couple of easier days at the end of last week but if I’m being totally honest, I made a mistake that I’ve made time and time again over the years. I didn’t give a race the respect it deserves. I didn’t feel particularly tired, but not spending the week tapering was only going to make life difficult when the race started.

The first few miles were ok. After setting off nearer to the front than last time I made it to the top of Pen Y Ghent a couple of minutes faster than last year and I’d learned from last time that bombing down the hill at full-pelt was only going to end in tears so I took it reasonably steady. One hill down, no dramas, happy.

The long drag across the moor towards Ribblehead was as dull as I remembered it last time and for me is a real test of focus. And it was still quite spongy and energy-sapping. By the time I’d reached Ribblehead I’d slipped over once and belted my knee into something hard (possibly to liven things up a bit). I was also starting to feel knackered. Deb was there, waiting with water and a gel. I moaned like a champion moaner and carried on.

photo: Sportsunday

I dragged myself up to the summit of Whernside. I could almost hear my knee shouting “please stop!” but I carried on. The pain wasn’t that bad that I was full-on limping but it was throbbing just enough to cause a distraction. At that point the climb gets really steep, goes up for a bit and then gets REALLY steep. I did ok at this point, my ‘determined march’ technique was quicker than many of those around me and I got myself past a few guys before the summit, an incredibly strong crosswind and the descent that consists of stone slabs, steps and large rocks. If you’ve not got sore feet at the start of this downhill run, you’re going to have sore feet at the end of it.

I reached the road which marks the end of Whernside and the start of Ingleborough. Deb was there, waiting with water and a gel. I moaned like a champion moaner and carried on.

I did consider dropping out at this point. It was only my prior experience of dropping out of stuff and the painful memories of how that feels that kept me going. Even if I was going to walk to the finish line, I was going to finish.

Once again, the climb became silly-steep and I got past a few other runners. Maybe I should find a race that just goes up a steep hillside. I’d do ok I think.

From the summit, you’d think the mostly-downhill run to the finish would be easy. It’s far from it. It’s probably the most knackered, lumpy, muddy and rocky drag across a windswept moor in the world. It’s bloody awful!

“3K to go lad” said the marshal at the final water station. It might as well be 100 miles. I looked at my watch. If I could somehow average somewhere near 7 minutes a mile for this last bit I’d beat last years’ time, but it wasn’t happening. I had nothing left and just couldn’t go any faster. Even at this distance, it wasn’t 100% that I’d be able run all the way to the finish line.

I crossed the line (still running) in 4 hours 2 minutes, 4 minutes slower than last year (but a few places higher). That wasn’t too bad considering the much softer conditions this year but all the same, a bit disappointing. There’s always next year though, eh?

Nine years ago, just as I was starting to get into ‘organised’ cycling events rather than just riding about on my own, I took part in the Builth Wells MTB Marathon. I think it was the first event I did and I bought a new tent and some nice new shorts for it. I think I might have done some training but it was purely an adventure and a chance to ride somewhere new.

I took my one-and-only bike, my beloved Orange Patriot. It was a pretty heavyweight, rough-and-tumble type of bike and while I’d built it reasonably light it was no lightweight. It wasn’t the ideal bike for tackling a long day out in some large Welsh hills in hot sunshine anyway. But I got round and I enjoyed it.

state of the art in 2005

Fast-forward several years and I returned to Builth Wells for this year’s MTB marathon, actually two marathons as I’d entered the Exposure Lights Big Night Out on the Saturday night (40K of steep hills and narrow sheep tracks in the dark) and then the 75K full marathon that would start on Sunday morning. I arrived in the nick of time after some last-minute bike fixing and a 3 hour drive from Manchester, got signed in, ate a small plate of pasta and got ready for the 8pm start.

The bike I’d brought with me was my Niner EMD singlespeed – the one with the Lauf fork that Chipps lent me. It should have been ok but I’d not had time to change the gearing, so I was making do with a reasonably-tall 36:17 ratio. Hopefully the hills won’t be too big or steep….

The hills were really bloody big and some of them were very, very steep. Bugger. I was in trouble. It’s not often that I get off and push up a hill, but I was doing my fair share of it in this ‘ride’.

The flatter sections of trail and road were fine- not too spinny and anyone that grovelled past on the steep climbs were soon caught up and overtaken.

After the first couple of climbs, things settled down and it was a decent ride. Until my chain tensioner decided to literally fall apart with three miles to go, the jockey wheel ending up somewhere near my right crank arm and subsequently my chain came off.

I put the chain back on and watched as it hung limply from the chainring and rear sprocket. Great. I climbed the remaining hills to the finish very slowly and carefully, knowing that putting the chain under too much pressure would probably result in it coming off and sending me, nads-first, into the stem.

19^th place I think.

I returned to the car, got changed into some warm clothes, ate some food and set about ‘redesigning’ my chain tensioner. In the darkness I removed the jockey wheel and chain loop thing and turned them upside down. Due to the fact that the spring in the tensioner had snapped it would no longer be able to push down on the chain. Instead, I had to make it push the chain up with the aid of a large zip tie around the tensioner arm and the frame chainstay. I was pretty sure that it’d work well enough for a 75k ride tomorrow but just be to absolutely certain I rode twenty feet along the campsite road and back….

I thought I’d warm up a tin of soup with my stove. It promptly ran out of gas, so no soup and no Pot Noodle either.

I crawled into my tent to get some sleep. I realised that I’d forgotten to bring an extra blanket so I spent the night in my sleeping bag, fully-clothed (including jeans, down jacket and woolly hat) and freezing cold.

Skipped porridge for breakfast because I didn’t have a stove so I ate a banana and a piece of cake.

The 75k marathon started at 10:30am and I’d decided that if I tried to race around I’d have to properly hurt myself on this bike, so instead I was going to go fast-ish but enjoy the sunshine, dry trails and the day out.

I had to push up a few of the climbs but less than I was expecting. I stopped at a couple of the feed stations and had a couple of Custard Creams. I chatted to a couple of mates I saw along the way. I even got a bit sunburnt.  I finished in 4 hours-ish (and about 45^th ish place) which wasn’t too bad considering the fact that I crawled up anything resembling an uphill gradient towards the end. I was ages and ages behind the guys at the front but I was happy and satisfied that it had been worth the trip. Which is pretty much how I felt the last time I was here with my big red Patriot.

Maybe there’s a moral to this story that involves hard cycling events and unsuitable bikes…(all that climbing steep hills on foot is good prep for the 3 Peaks fell race as well).

Next time though, I’ll bring a bike with gears.

It occurred to me at the weekend that it’s only a month until the 3 Peaks fell race and only 8 weeks until the Isle Of Jura fell race. I’m doing them both. I did the 3 Peaks last year and while I did ok it was a very uncomfortable experience due to an over-eager start, so this year I’m aiming to finish in better shape than last time even if that means I’m a few minutes slower.

I feel very fortunate to have bagged an entry to the Jura race. I know that some people would give their right arm for a place on the start line of this one so I’m very chuffed indeed that my speculative email to the organiser explaining that “I’ve done a bit of fell running but mostly some bits and bobs of cycling in the past” and asking “would I be wasting my time even bothering sending an entry in?” seems to have paid off. I need to brush up on my navigation though. Apparently getting lost in this race means a bit of a rubbish day out. Simon’s advice was “don’t lead the race”, so I’ll be sure to bear that one in mind. I can’t get lost anyway; me and Dave are riding to the start and back again and he’ll be stood around, holding my coat. Probably plonking himself within arm’s reach of the distillery.

Anyway, all this means is that right now, this week (should have been last week but I caught a cold), I need to step up the running by quite a lot. I’ve been running for a few weeks but nothing like the kind of mileage I should be doing if I’m going to avoid dying on my arse. The 3 Peaks is an offroad marathon with three mountains in it. The Jura race isn’t quite as long but it’s got seven mountains in it. In fact, the Jura race packs in a quite staggering two-and-a-bit thousand metres (that’s METRES, not feet) of climbing. Get in 🙂

Four weeks after the Jura race, it’s Mountain Mayhem. Does long-distance fell running mix with 24 hour mountain bike racing? Will the reduction in bike-specific training in favour of running help, hinder or make no difference at all to my performance in a long mountain bike race? Watch this space and find out.

The rest of 2014 has got loads of amazing stuff lined up, including a bit more 24 hour racing (obviously), a few more local XC races, some summer midweek cyclocross races if I can get away from work on time, a bit of MTB marathon racing, some singlespeed racing and an ace project involving me, a mate and a tandem. I suspect I’ll end up sleeping outside in a bivvy bag more than once as well…

None of this stuff involves me dragging a bike bag through a crowded airport, thankfully.

Bikes are ace. Heavy bikes, not-so-heavy bikes, light bikes. All ace.

Very light bikes are very ace indeed.

Ok, I’ll do away with the repetitive ace-ness now. But I really like bikes that are very light because they go faster up hills. It’s as simple as that. They’re also easier for chucking over a farm gate when there’s a herd of menacing cows approaching, but anyway.

The problem is, when you go mad and replace all the parts of your already-light bike with parts that are even lighter, quite often you make the bike less fun to ride. And then it breaks.

Luckily, I’m helped in my own quest to make my light bike (bikes) even lighter by Mount Zoom components. Replacing the handlebars, jockey wheels, seatclamp, bottle cage, bar ends, wheel skewers and headset top cap for Mount Zoom ones might sound like fairly insignificant ways to lose some grams but add them all together and it’s actually quite a lot. And they don’t break. And they look cool.

There’s a load of different handlebars on offer – wide riser bars, wide flat bars, narrower flat bars. Bars that are ‘bar end friendly’. All of them carbon and all of them tough as old boots. I’ve not knackered mine anyway, and I’ve done thousands of miles on them.

One of my favourite components is the side-entry bottle cage. Also made of carbon, it solves the awkward problem of getting your water bottle in and out of the cage when there’s not much room in the frame by letting you ‘push’ it in and out from either side. It works and the bottle never falls out. Spot-on.

The wheel skewers are dead easy to use (in a hurry) and weigh less than any other skewer I’ve used.

In fact, it’s all good. Have a look! www.mountzoom.com

Ant White is the man behind Mount Zoom and he knows a thing or two about lightweight kit and rides bikes hard enough to expose anything that’s not up to the job. If it’s good enough for Ant, it’s good enough for the rest of us 🙂