After a ride like yesterdays, I always clean my bike thoroughly when I get back because I hate sand and grit and the damage it can do to delicate parts! I've used Muc-off in the past but am getting increasingly disillusioned with them, their stuff seems really over-priced for what it is.
I saw method grapefruit in the Tesco near work purely by accident and decided to buy a bottle just to see what it's like. It's great around the house and smells absolutely gorgeous, exactly like pink grapefruit. I now use it on the bike as well. I just spray it over the wet bike and use a brush to loosen all the dirt and then hose it down with a spray gun. It's eco-friendly, smells gorgeous and leaves you with a sparkling clean bike - perfect!
June 1st: I did the same ride again today but I avoided the dirt track near El Golfo and added a bit of length by coming back in via Playa Blanca town center. I was quite proud of myself, I came back through town with the evening traffic and didn't go around a roundabout the wrong way and get killed once!
Anyhow, another hard but fun ride. One thing that really struck me about Lanzarote was how courteous the drivers were. The main roads are fast but every car that went around me gave me a full car's width passing space which was a very pleasant change! It was 25.1 miles to start June off.
June 12th: I took the Claud Butler out for it's first proper ride today. It was fun but a totally alien experience compared to modern bikes. When you're used to STI shifters, reaching down to the down tube to change gear is very weird. The skinny brakes are strange too, I generally ride on the hoods but there kind of aren't any on old road bikes - the Eroica is going to be an interesting challenge. One rather amusing incident happened on the ride, about 5 miles from home the seatpost dropped right down so I got home looking like I was riding a kid's bike! Anyhow, another 10.2 miles.
June 14th: I took the Giant out after work this evening and did the local 21. It was a fairly average ride buy my legs felt good and I averaged a fairly decent 16.7 mph. Another 21.0 miles.
June 19th: We've had some amazing rain this month, the type that only last for 30 or 40 minutes but leaves the roads running like rivers. Anyway, it wasn't too bad today so I took the Giant out to the local 21 with the farm track tacked on. The first hour was constant light rain but the heavens really opened for the last 40 minutes, by the time I got in I couldn't have been any wetter if I'd fallen in a swimming pool! One downside to rainy weather was that as I was coming in along the by-pass, sweat and moisturiser was being washed into my eyes by the rain making my eyes burn so badly I could barely see, I had to stop about four times to wipe it out of my eyes with my thumbs. Despite this it was one of the most enjoyable rides I've done for ages (my weird cycling in the rain fetish seems to be going strong...) and another 27.5 miles for June.
June 20th: Today started off with rain but the BBC weather website said this afternoon should be sunny and dry. With this in mind I took the Giant out again to do the local 21 with the farm track tacked on. As it turned out, it was an absolutely gorgeous afternoon, very windy but sunny, bright and warm. The wind kept my average speed down to 16.3 mph but an extremely enjoyable ride nonetheless. 27.5 more miles.
June 22nd: I was planning on doing the local 21 with the farm track tacked on after work today until I realised that wouldn't leave me time to make tea and watch an episode of Person of Interest when I got in...
..So I ended up just doing the local 21 in the end, it was hot and fairly sunny so it was a pretty fun ride. I didn't feel particularly good but I averaged 16.9 mph which was good for me, particularly after a day at work. Also, I finally managed to take a decent pic of the enormous wind turbine that I pass on the route as well. I hadn't realised until I was standing near it that it makes an almost inaudibly deep 'Woosh, woosh, whoosh' noise as it rotates. Anyhow, 20.6 more miles.
June 25th: I did the local 21 with the farm track tacked on today. Before I left, I lowered my stem and bars by about 10mm to see what effect it had on the handling. As it turned out, the bike felt faster and felt better on the climbs. This mirrors what I found with the Planet X I hired on holiday that climbed so well so I've ordered a steerer cutting guide so I can get rid of the surplus spacers above the stem. It was a mixture of clouds and blue sky and quite windy but a nice ride, I finished at my dad's to pick up a delivery so it was 26.7 miles overall.
June 26th: I finally got around to replacing the mucky white bar tape on the Giant with brown tape to match the saddle today. I'd ordered two packs of the tape to keep one as a spare because Planet X were having a 'everything under £5' sale but I ended up using both packs - fitting bar tape is such a black art!
The new tape matches the saddle very nicely and I think it looks great, a little bit of retro on a modern carbon fibre bike. I set off to do the local 21 with the farm track but it started raining and I needed to be back by 2:30 to meet my dad for lunch so took the photo above and came back via the old coach road. It was fairly cold and windy ride but it was 23.0 more miles for June.
29th June: I'd booked the day off work today in the hope of some nice weather. The weather gods however had other plans and it turned out to be pretty much the most Rule #9 ride I've ever done! It had rained all morning so I knew there'd be puddles everywhere but the heavens opened solidly again for pretty much the entire ride. At one point I was stopped at a junction and saw there was a pad of sand on the back of my saddle where the spray had filled the gap between my bum and the cover. Anyhow, I survived unscathed, the Giant's had a good wash, and it was 27.1 more miles to finish June off. The total was 208.7 which wasn't as high as I'd hoped but the second half of June was ridiculously rainy so hopefully July proves to be a bit nicer...
