Rubber Brompton

I love Bromptons. They are probably the most versatile bike money could buy. It’s a unique bike. Quite unusual and different to other options out there but they really should come with a special warning label. 

Something like:

‘Dear valued customer, this bike will gratuitously accentuate how silly you look in those rubber knickers....please for the love of God wear your normal everyday clothing when enjoying a Brompton’.

Brompton on a motorbike

I was passed on the M60 a few days ago by this motorbiker with a Brompton bungeed to the back of his motorbike. Looked like it fitted there quite comfortably.

Brompton on a bike

Unfortunately a temporal rift opened up in the space-time continium resulting in my bike being at work but it's rider at home.This little pickle would normally mean participating in somekind of vulgar act such as paying another £2.80 to a bus driver who thinks he's Lewis Hamilton. Thankfully a Brompton folds up small enough to fit on the normal rack of my Nexus. so I rode that in then the Nexus back. Just 4 bungess and a bit of cardboard to protect the paintwork. Even enough room for my pannier to sit in it's normal place.

Turns out those stupid barriers on the bridge do have one use. On that same note, as this exact spot, last week I passed a man pushing his wife in her wheelchair. They were using the cycle path as the pavement is too awkward (thanks to the barrier). What I wasn't expecting was a little old lady to mutter 'f*cking barriers' in the form of thanks for me pulling up to let them past.

Last snow ride (for now)

I went for a dogwalk / bike ride on Boxing day which turned out to be the last day of snow for now, it's all melted away completely with today's rain. Since I knew I'd be getting a lift somewhere else later on I took the Brompton. It's a very capable bike in the snow, mainly because it's very easy to put a foot down whenever needed and weighs so little, but you do have to watch out for the chain tensioner freezing up and skipping occasionally.

When it comes to the roads I'm kind of glad the snow is gone now, but on the flipside the clean compacted snow made all the paths around the river Tame and the canals very rideable. Whereas now that its melted these paths will be back to the unrideable filthy, muddy, gravel mess they were before. (ok - rideable if you want to get filthy on a mountain bike, but not rideable if you're visiting friends/family/shops/work i.e. anything practical and everyday).

 

Impressions from Tameside Cycle Forum

I can’t be arsed trying to type up a full account of last night’s cycle forum, so here’s a few bullet points for anyone out there who has never been to their local cycle forum or wonders what might go on in others. (this is the first I’ve ever been to)

Sorry if they all seem negative!. Just my personal impressions, I'm sure others had a variety of takes on the same.

First there was a presentation by Richard Dolphin from Greater Manchester Urban Traffic Control which was mainly about the different types of traffic light systems and crossings that are used across the country and Manchester. Richard was a really nice bloke and a regular cyclist too. Impressions from his presentation were:

• That although all the systems are very sophisticated (a lot more sophisticated than I had thought) all that sophistication is good for nothing when there are simply too many cars on the roads.
• How much is spent on fancy systems like SCOOT when providing a proper cycle network would achieve the same goals more effectively?.
• Richard swears blind that the induction loops that are buried in the road to detect the presence of traffic DO detect all types of bicycle – shame that that has no resemblance to reality! They are useless unless you are on four wheels.
• It appears to be unthinkable to have a press button that immediately stops all traffic to allow a cyclist to safely proceed in any direction on their own phase. (It’s all detection loops and radar cameras that don’t work and only wait until all the car phases have finished anyway).
• All these fancy systems linked into a huge network must be horrifically expensive but can’t solve the simple problem of there being too many cars.
• All the traffic light systems are part of a huge integrated network. it seems the country is too far down that path to think about approaching traffic management in any other way.
• Ridiculous toucan crossing setups on massive junctions (where a cyclist is expected to use about 6 separate crossings to turn right etc) are only there for mums and kids. It’s presumed ‘real’ cyclists will pretend to be a car and use the junction as if they are motorised traffic.
• There is no comprehension that certain junctions/roads (i.e as in the last point) have a v.low cyclist count because they are utterly terrifying and therefore nobody on two wheels dares go near them.
• Stats etc about traffic & congestion in Manchester available at www.gmtu.gov.uk/

Impressions of the meeting in general (after the GMUTC presentation had finished):

• The fact that nothing has ever been done about problems such as Denton Roundabout prove to newcomers that the cycle forum has a serious problem with achieving important goals. Which may or may not be due to a lack of cooperation/bureaucracy.
• Every other word from council employees is about the lack of money and cuts, totally understandable if you are worried about your job, but does seem like its being too readily used as an excuse.
• No details of the Sustainable Transport Fund have yet been released to the councils, but no doubt Stagecoach have got a copy knocking about somewhere ;)
• It’s very difficult to get any ideas and points across when time is short and there are others who want to speak, so for people like me it’s probably best to get things down in writing and email them over afterwards. (or in other words I'm too polite to moan in person, so I'll do it via email)
• Apparently certain issues such as street cleaning and policing of bad parking, ASL’s etc are best addressed at the District Assembly. Although I can guess that if you went there they would suggest you go to the Cycle forum instead!
• There is lots of cycle parking in Ashton - except none of it is anywhere near where it should be!. - suggestions on a postcard. I'll be making my own suggestion as soon as I can get a photo of the precedent I'm thinking of.
• There did seem to be genuine interest in suggestions for cycle parking/ solutions to certain problems on roads etc. I guess the only way councils will know that a certain road is a problem is if people inform them - whether they can do anything about it once they know is a different matter though!.

 Can't think of much else right now.

 

Had a great pootle back to Hyde following Ian with a lot less traffic than I’m used to on my normal rush-hour rides, but every ASL had a vehicle in it (it’s so common I don’t even notice anymore!) and we managed to get beeped at for being two abreast & chatting when approaching a red light. Bloody cyclists! People on bikes!.

It's not all bad, If you want to see some guys who are cheery even when they are getting beaten down every week just have a look at these poor gits!

Weight Loss .....kind of

This post is not about intentionally wanting to lose weight, it's certainly nothing like the heroic efforts to lose weight put in by people like Gary over at theamazing39stonecyclist. It's just an observation on the effect that (almost) daily cycling has had on my own weight.

When I started riding the Brompton into work I weighed 10 stone 12 lbs or thereabouts. I'd roughly weighed this amount for years, it was a perfectly normal healthy weight for someone my size and it never occurred to me whatsoever that to take up daily cycling would result in losing weight. It just wasn’t why I was doing it. As far as I was concerned there was no weight to lose, so it was a little surprising to notice over the course of 8-12 months that I was steadily losing around 1 lb per month.

Early on, in response to this I decided I must be needing to eat more*, but it made no difference to the steady drop in weight.

The 1 lb a month kept disappearing til I reached around 10 stone 2 lbs. This is where it stopped and I still weigh roughly this much another 8-9 months later. This again happened without any further changes at all. My body seemed to have adjusted entirely by itself, slowly shedding the few excess pounds til I'd reached whatever magical weight my dna would be happy with given my current intake and exercise levels.

All of this without actively trying, I'm just cycling to work & back. Not particularly pushing it, but not trundling slowly either.

My weight has even stayed the same now that I'm back in Tameside and cycling much further each day. This makes me think that it's not really about the amount of exercise you do, but simply doing at least some everyday. Or at least 5 days a week.

I'm a stingy bastard hence the name, so hell will have frozen over before you get me to pay for a gym membership. Besides time is precious and I'm not inclined to waste any of it doing robotic exercise when I can achieve the same thing as part of my normal daily routine. In fact cycling has gained me some of my time back. It is by far the quickest way I could get to work and back and certainly beats catching colds on the train or bus.

*Bonus!, I get to eat and enjoy more tasty snacks without the bother of putting weight on. It's nice to know that little bit of money is going towards my enjoyment and not vanishing on petrol or public transport fares.

Brompton

The first time I tried cycling to work I lived North of Rochdale. Meaning it was a pretty serious bit of riding each way to make it the 14 miles or so into work. It would take around 1 hour in the morning and maybe 1 hr 20 to get home because the area I lived was at a higher elevation than the city centre. I did this journey for a short while, but mostly carried on getting the train because the distance and time it took was a bit overwhelming for a daily commute.

My previous experiences of commuting by train from Hyde were fine, but getting the train from Rochdale was soul destroying. It was constantly late, constantly cancelled, always dangerously overcrowded and bloody expensive. As soon as I stopped getting the train I stopped catching colds....go figure.

Luckily Woman changed jobs and began working in Manchester. Meaning we could commute together and get rid of one of our two cars*. This presented a new problem, we could park for free at her new workplace, but I would still need to travel the last 3.5 miles myself to get to the city centre. So at first I was driving the last few miles in and parking up in one of the cheapo car parks further out of town. But that was no fun, and all those £2 a days etc add up to alot.

So I started looking at folding bikes. The idea being the car would be parked up for free, then I would cycle in the last few miles. After a bit of umming and arring I stuck to my principle of 'buy cheap, buy twice' and went for the best folder there is - The Brompton. Second hand off ebay, it was a red basic M3L version, with 3 speed Sturmey Archer hub & mudguards. I worked out that if I rode it in everyday for around a year it would pay for itself courtesy of the savings on parking & petrol. But frankly, I would have paid that money just to be free of the train.

Of course none of that takes into account that the train used to cost £80 a month, or £960 a yr. hmmm... maybe I should have got two Bromptons....

Over that period the B recieved a few upgrades, some because I felt like it, some because they were required. It got a pair of the ever dependable Schwalbe Marathons, some ergo grips, new front brake cable, a lefthand folding pedal and recently a new cheapo right hand pedal.

The most important addition was my Dad's 30+ yr old Brookes saddle to replace the terrible spongy thing that Brompton's used to come with.

I'd definately recommend a Brompton to anyone. It might not beat other folders in a spec war and it might not look quite as racey as some, but its far far better than any of its competition.

*getting rid of a car is like giving yourself a payrise, nothing has changed but now you are richer.