Solstice Explorer: Now THAT’S a proper Gravel Bike!

Don’t hate, but I went for a gravel ride. Yep. I indulged in some “grav-trav” or perhaps I “groaded” or whatever fancy term the cool kids of cycling are using this week. It was dirty and it was fun. I didn’t have one of those fancy carbon aerodynamic “gravel bikes” that the industry insists you…

Tyre pressure: Do you go low?

When I first started road cycling, I was very much in the “bang 110psi in both 23mm tyres” camp. It’s just how it was and what everyone did. Hard is fast. Skinny is fast. Who needs comfort when you can go FAST! These days I’m a little more relaxed, I know that (especially at my…

Have we reached “peak gravel” yet?

Gravel. It’s so hot right now. Flip through any road biking mag or scroll the usual websites and you’ll see it. Stories of romantic journeys across wild landscapes, grainy black and white photos of wide tyres crunching over high contrast pebbles. Gravel riding. It’s basically the new Rapha. I was naievly thinking (hoping) that the…

Trail Build Part 2: Time to tool up

After digging the first section of my backyard trail using hand tools, I needed a more efficient solution. It was slow and tedious work! A bit of YouTube research led me to this guy who uses a rotary tiller to cut his backyard trails.  What a revelation! I didn’t even need to visit the hardware…

Covid-19 has killed the club ride!

Well, it’s official. The Coronavirus has killed off the club ride. Okay so maybe that’s a slight overstatement, but it’s not far off the truth.  In a statement released earlier, Cycling Australia have recommended that; “all organised club activities that involve close contact be suspended.” The statement goes on to advise; “If riding two abreast,…

2020 Resolution Ride #2 – Country Ramblings

Having been distracted by the new trail bike recently, I was quickly running out of available days to knock out a solid metric century ride this month. It was going to have to be today. I knew this Saturday most of The Herd were away doing triathlon things (ewwww) so it was to be a…