Back in December 2007 I tried a bit of cycle commuting on a borrowed mountain bike. I stopped when I realised that it wasn’t really saving me any money, and because I thought I was about to move to a job closer to home, whereupon I would start again. Sadly, the job never materialised, and I never started up cycling again, despite having done over 200 miles at that point.

Fast-forward to 2009, where I got 2 offers – a new job at Central and a new (to me) bike via an online friend. He had been given an old 10-speed road-bike, but wasn’t allowed by his wife to keep it, so I said I would take it.

I took delivery of an old Peugeot Carbolite 103 (actually the name of the frame, the model is an obscure number on a sticker near the bottom bracket that is a bit torn ) in November, but sadly there is no such thing as a free bike. New tyres were a good start, but when I went for my first serious test ride, the chain broke. A new chain then enabled me to see that the saddle was woefully uncomfortable, so a new saddle arrived for Christmas. I’m still in need of some mud guards, and I suspect a rack at some point, and some additional cycling clothes, etc, etc, etc. You get the picture

Me collecting the bike:

A few alterations later:

Of course, then there are the alterations that need doing. The brakes are shoddy and need a bit more work, if not replacing. The brake levers have been moved, but need moved a lot more to make the drops anything more than decoration. I have bar tape to fit (matching the saddle…). Plus it now needs a good clean and oiling.

However, I’ve done 100 miles in January, having ridden every work day, and I intend to ride at least 200 work days in 2010, which would be about 1000 miles of cycling. It will also save me in the region of £400, although I would need to minus expenses off that…… now – where’s that cycling mag….

mrBen

Wow – I am so behind on blog posts it’s unbelievable. I have 3 or 4 in my head at the moment. However, just a small one for now to wish all our readers a Happy New Year. Some things to look forward to posts on:

• My New Job
• My New Bike / Commute / Fitness plan for 2010
• Thoughts on PVRs
• Snow!

But for now, a few excellent links for those of you who are into cycling. My aim this year (more later) is 200 weekday commutes, so I am officially “into” cycling (again!)

• .citycycling (free monthly online cycling magazine)
• Yehuda Moon (cycling webcomic)
• Cyclogs (site for recording all your cycling stats)

L8rs…

mrBen

I finally managed it – a full 5 day working week with cycling to work. Plus I’ve notched up almost 200 miles now – will hopefully hit the 250 mark before Christmas. I’m certainly getting more used to it, I even managed the wet weather 2 days last week. Might need to wrap-up a bit better if it gets much colder, though

While I’m here, a couple of useful biking links:

CityCycling is a monthly online magazine which hails from Edinburgh. Has some really good articles, and is well produced. Check it out!

Not that I participate in the National Lottery, I would be pleased if they gave £50 million to Sustrans for improving the cycle network in the UK. Vote here *Would’ve been helpful if I’d posted this when I first heard about it, rather than a day after the voting closed…..

mrBen

It’s been a good few years since I attempted any maintenance on a bike, other than pumping up the tyres. But on Saturday, I bit the bullet, and splashed out on some “proper” kit and did the deed.

From my “LBS” (Local Bike Shop) sold me some degreaser and chain lube, and Halfords (I know, I know) supplied me with a chain cleaner and a Park Tools gear cleaning tool. Pretty much everything worked well – the chain cleaner was a bit fiddly, but once I’d figured it out it did a fairly good job.

Then I set about adjusting my rear mech. Now – with my previous bike I had attempted this a number of times, with no real success. But it turns out I was missing 1 really important piece of information – at the point where the gear cable meets the derailleur there is a barrel adjuster. This is for adjusting the indexing (ie making sure that the gear lever (or in my case twist-shifter) selects the cog correctly). I wish I’d known this before – credit to Cycling Plus

So – now everything is working nicely. Happiness abounds, etc. Well – until the next rainy day, in which case it will probably need doing again….

mrBen

Well – the first 2 days of this week have been marred by chronic (and potentially expensive) forgetfulness viz

1. When cycling to the station on Monday, I forgot to zip up one of my jacket pockets. This became blinding obvious at the point when my mobile phone fell out and bounced along the road behind me. Luckily, other than some nasty chips in the plastics, it all seems to be working
2. Also on Monday, I got halfway through Finnieston when I realised I had forgotten my cycle lock. Which meant I had to cycle home and take the car to work instead.
3. I managed to leave my (1 month old) cycle helmet on the train when I got off at work yesterday. Sadly, it does not appear to be possible to get telephone numbers for train stations, and the lost property number is an answerphone for the central lost property for Scotland, in Queen Street, rather than the lost property office in Central. So far, it has not been returned, which could set me back £25 for a new one

So – not a good start to the week. Here’s hoping that, after Liverpool’s record-breaking 8-0 win last night, things are looking up.

mrBen

Today was my 2nd (!) full day of commuting by bike from home to Central. Friday was easier because it’s dress-down day at work, but my work shoes are now at work and will remain there for the foreseeable future. More on logistics in a bit.

This morning was interesting, in that I finally remembered to pump up the tyres on my bike. The tyres currently on there have a max pressure of 55 psi, which seems quite low, but I was surprised to find how far below that I was. Add that to the fact that I hit a run of green lights that ran from Crow Road all the way until the penultimate traffic lights onto Argyll Street just round the corner from the station, and I managed to knock a good 5 minutes off my time from Friday, which was nice. Cycling home tonight was, if anything, a bit quicker. I think there’s something about riding in traffic that helps me put a bit more effort in (although not having to worry about being sweaty at the end helps too).

The riding is good fun, and good for me. And I’m coping with having to sort out lights, helmet and lock. Probably the most frustrating thing is actually the logistics of clothing, and arriving at work in semi-tidy clothing. Both on Friday and today I carried a full set of clothing and changed in the toilets at Central Station (20p). This has 2 main disadvantages – firstly that, given that I’ve barely got off the bike and the toilets are quite stuffy, I’m still quite sweaty, and efforts to clean myself up are on partially successful. The second is that it means that my sweaty t-shirt and joggies go straight into my bag for the rest of the day. The alternative would be to change at work, but that means arriving at work in t-shirt and joggies, and then wasting 5 minutes getting changed, which I don’t really have. It’s tricky.

The other possibility would be to get an alternative train that doesn’t arrive quite so late, and give myself time to get in to work and get changed and ready for the day. I haven’t worked this out fully yet, but I reckon I’ll be looking even more seriously on the first properly wet day. Biggest problem is that, rather than following in the x.50 time (7.50am, 8.50am etc), the earlier train is at 6.36, which is a bit early. The alternative would be to go to Greenock West, which has more trains, but would require an additional 3 miles cycling at the other end.

All-in-all, I think it’s a success. Hopefully I’ll manage to lose a bit of weight, and get a bit fitter to boot.

mrBen

Last night I decided to do a bit of a test run of cycling into Glasgow Central, part of the grand scheme to get fit/get thin/save cash. Here are some observations:

• Firstly – big thanks to Scott who loaned me his bike. I moan about it a bit below, but ultimately I’m immensely grateful for the opportunity to test out whether I can cope with this without having to splash out money I don’t have
• Glasgow is a lot less hilly than Devon! But…..
• I am a lot less fit than I used to be, probably even less fit than when I was at Uni, despite playing football on a weekly basis
• I can average around 10 mph on the flat according to my speedo. However, the same speedo reckons it’s just over 4 miles to central, whereas the GMap Pedometer suggests differently Will need to drive the same route to get a definitive answer
• While cycling in the rain wasn’t as bad as I remember, it underlined how massively unprepared I am for cycle-commuting
• While I only saw 1 “RLJ” (red light jumper) on my travels, I saw an enormous number of people cycling without lights. I cannot believe how many stupid people there are out there….
• I’m going to need to do some work on Scotts bike, namely:
  • Fix the gears – the rear mech is badly aligned, meaning that it never hits the smallest cog, and hitting the biggest is a little risky…..
  • Add some mudguards – cycling in the wet without them is just asking for trouble
  • Ideally I need to replace the tyres with something a) less knobbly, and b) capable of higher pressure. Schwalbe Marathon Plus seem to be the tyre-de-jour
• In the long term, if I manage this, I need to get a lighter bike. I don’t plan on offroading, so a chunky frame with suspension forks is wasted weight
• I’m still short of some gear that I’m realising I’ll need:
  • Spare inner tubes and stuff like that, probably in a nice saddlebag
  • A mini pump – I bought a nice track pump which is great for the shed, but probably too big for my rucksack….
  • Cycling shorts – need something to stop my “luggage” from rearranging in transit

So – there we go. I feel like I’m on my way, metaphorically at least, but I still need to properly decide the logistics of (mainly) how to arrive at work presentable. Working around trains times is the main problem here – leaving 15 minutes earlier won’t get me to work any earlier, it just means I’ll have 15 minutes extra at Central. I’m also contemplating revising the plan to initially only cycle to Partick, which is (a lot) shorter, but saves as much money. (The difference in price of my ticket doesn’t change if I go from Central).

I will, however, be attempting to cycle a bit more for things that are close by, rather than taking the car.

mrBen