Today's Bike Ride

[Graham Breeze]

In view of Graham's comments re: pulse rate, I decided to use my very accurate Scandinavian heart rate monitor, with chest strap, that I normally only use for HIIT today.

I started with a resting pulse which was 48bpm. It looks very good, compared to Graham's highly impressive 50, until you consider that it is 50 percent more than the 32 I was regularly recording in 1994.

With another beautiful day for getting out in, I headed out after lunch for ride to Tutbury which sits, complete with ruined castle, on a cliff surveying the Dove Valley and many miles to the North in Derbyshire. Although it was 21 degrees C, and only light winds, there was certain amount of haze so a positive identification of Beacon Hill was not possible.

Went wrong in Tutbury, but eventually found the road to Fauld where what is said to be the biggest non-nuclear, man-made explosion occurred. (They were storing thousands of tons of high explosives in the old gypsum mine in 1944 when something caused the whole lot to blow up.) It has subsequently been planted with trees, so you can only just make out the egg-shaped crater on aerial views, but you can walk around part of the crater, and I can tell you it is very deep.

Continued West through Coton in the Clay, before reaching the entrance to the Marchington Industrial estate, where the main climb starts. I'd been watching my heart-rate monitor watch, strapped to my 'bars, but it was somewhat disconcerting to see 140bpm upon reaching the foot of the climb. I started steadily, but it's a difficult climb to judge and the numbers and the gradient kept increasing, topping out at 178bpm.

Having gone further than I'd anticipated, I headed downhill to Newborough and the easier, shorter, valley road through Hoar Cross to Yoxhall, King's Bromley and home.

65.2km, 293m of ascent* (to be ratified), 2hrs and 21 minutes, average heart-rate 142bpm. No food taken or eaten, just drank one extra large bidon of filtered tap water.

Well if 48bpm is resting (100%) then 178bpm is 370% of resting and I know you are going to research how typical that is.

Dunno what my son's resting pulse is but his typically goes into the 170s. Of course he is only 46 years.

For fat old me if I assume 50 or slightly below as resting then below 150 (say 300%) I feel OK but once above it (red zone?) I start to think and feel I am on borrowed time before I blow up.

[noel]

Went wrong in Tutbury, but eventually found the road to Fauld where what is said to be the biggest non-nuclear, man-made explosion occurred. (They were storing thousands of tons of high explosives in the old gypsum mine in 1944 when something caused the whole lot to blow up.) It has subsequently been planted with trees, so you can only just make out the egg-shaped crater on aerial views, but you can walk around part of the crater, and I can tell you it is very deep.

Fascinating: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAF_Fauld_explosion

[Graham Breeze]

Fascinating: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAF_Fauld_explosion

Thanks Marco. I didn't know about that.

[Graham Breeze]

In homage to Marco...

Yesterday in Tesco, Ilkley foyer (ie not outside where my bikes rest!) there was a vintage touring bike equipped with Campagnolo cantilever brakes (+ Campag double chainwheel etc). It really was a splendid affair with an old broad Brooks saddle and had enough steel supports for panniers to support an army on the march.

But...illustrating my snobbishness, it was a Dawes frame. Perhaps they always were built for strength rather than lightness? By the time I had made my purchase and exited it had gone and I regretted not taking a photo of such a magnificent beast.

[Graham Breeze]

Before disc brakes, cantilevers (whoever made them) were the best way to stop your bike and widely used on touring bikes.

Dr Hutch has a little piece in Cycling Weekly about a reader who has swapped his front wheel round left-side for right-side etc after every ride for 40 years "to equalise the wear on the rim in case one brake block is pressing harder than the other".

Hutch adds that if you do the same thing today with disc brakes it will prevent rotor wear almost completely.

[Llani Boy]

Dr Hutch has a little piece in Cycling Weekly about a reader who has swapped his front wheel round left-side for right-side etc after every ride for 40 years "to equalise the wear on the rim in case one brake block is pressing harder than the other".

Hutch adds that if you do the same thing today with disc brakes it will prevent rotor wear almost completely.

Dr Hutch's column is the only thing I miss since I cancelled my subscription to Cycling Weekly a couple of years ago.

[Graham Breeze]

Dr Hutch's column is the only thing I miss since I cancelled my subscription to Cycling Weekly a couple of years ago.

Yes.

Most of CW is bike porn for adolescents, fan worship of British riders/teams, reports of races one has seen on Eurosport...so thinking about it.

[Llani Boy]

I originally started reading CW after picking it up occasionally from the newsagents or supermarket. Then around 7 years ago they had an offer of a set of Lezyne lights free if a subscription was taken out.

Needing some lights I took it up with the intention of cancelling, but I never did, and I recall looking forward to it dropping through the letterbox every Thursday morning.

But after a couple of years I realised that it kept regurgitating the same stuff and peddling what you describe Graham, so eventually I binned it.

The lights are still going strong though!

[Travs]

I originally started reading CW after picking it up occasionally from the newsagents or supermarket. Then around 7 years ago they had an offer of a set of Lezyne lights free if a subscription was taken out.

Needing some lights I took it up with the intention of cancelling, but I never did, and I recall looking forward to it dropping through the letterbox every Thursday morning.

But after a couple of years I realised that it kept regurgitating the same stuff and peddling what you describe Graham, so eventually I binned it.

The lights are still going strong though!

Very good.

Should perhaps be pedalling though?!?

[Graham Breeze]

Had Cino Cinelli's bivalent hub https://www.pinterest.ca/mihailiuk/c...bivalent-hubs/ taken off in 1962 then we'd all be swapping our rear wheel with our front nowadays. For those of us who only use our front brake, this would have been ground breaking as it was a form of cassette hub - some 20 years before Graham's favourite fishing-tackle manufacturer developed one.

For those of you, apart from Graham, who are not familiar with Cino Cinelli he was a former Bianchi professional cyclist and winner of the Milan San Remo, (almost 80 years ago). He also introduced the first aluminium 'bars, the first plastic bodied saddles, and what is accepted to be the first commercially available clip-in pedal system - in 1970. As well as this his company made the best bike frames in the 1960s, and Ole Ritter used one to set the world hour record in 1968

Cinelli also developed the Spinaci handle bar extension to help riders adopt a time trial, arms out, aerodynamic position. However the UCI felt a rider's hands were too far from the brakes and banned them.

In 1997

Since when riders have still ridden with arms out in front resting them on the bars so the UCI has now banned this riding position from 1st April.

April 2021, that is.