yer, if only all those emo kids knew that the grand daddy of their music and the inventor of punk is a quaff slightly incoherant pom who talks like hes as camp as a row of tents!

in all seriousness was interesting though, hes had a massive impact on modern society, would have been good to see him talk un jet lagged.

On the bike this morning I've got a fairly cracking pace up and I go past this dude who's struggling to make 20kays up a small rise. He catches up with me a little later at a set of lights. Brief chat and we're off. Ahead is one of the more painful and dangerous little climbs, with cars chopping and changing all over the place, drivers getting aggro with each other and innocent cyclists.

The guy clearly wanted a ride partner for that section. I wanted to keep the pace up and complete my quota of suffering. So I left him in my wake to fend for himself.

So what should I have done: do the social thing and ride with him for a chat and risk getting tangled up in commuter hell, or stick to the training plan and let him sort out his own problems?

Yeah, I saw Denton last night. During the first 10 minutes I thought MMc was an amazing character, but then I felt a bit sad for him because he just seems so far removed and detached from everything.

Jock, IMHO i think in that situation you need to look after yourself. your riding to a training plan and its probably safer riding alone at a good clip than relaxing and adding danger to themix by not concentrating 100% on what your doing + adding in the variable on an unknown riding partner.

Yep, saw it. He is a strange cat, thats for sure... I liked the Kevin Spacey interview before him too.

wanna brush up on your soccer skills?

http://tonaz.altervista.org/zidane.html

You did the right thing...I rarely want to do the social thing at the moment cause I have a limited time to get all of my training in. I get up at 6.00am cause there's less people/packs to get caught up in. After October I might change things, but for now I'm not prepared to drag anyone elses b*tt around Beach Road.

How good is that!!!:D

very funny. Wonder if Zidane has a copy yet...

Guys, check out this thread. Funniest read in a long time

http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?t=209678

How did you NOT get flamed for this???

Everyone's still busy playing the Zidane game

Because they know if they flame me I'll sick Hitchy on to them.

Plus......I'm right. :D

I assume you like Kennedy's idea about the long stays? Is anyone else doing it?

That Scapin I had must've had a 74+ degree headtube -- it was so twitchy that it was almost dangerous.

When I bought one of the aluminium Taiwanese robot frames off Kennedy a few years ago, I'd been mainly riding my Ralieigh, which has pretty light steering. This Kennedy import (the guy who painted it reckons it's a Norco :)) has heavier steering, and I complained to John that it made the bike feel slow, blah, blah, even though I liked the stability.......but after I got used to it I realized that something like 73 degrees is MUCH better than trying to get my bikes to feel like the track bike I had when I was 21 :p

Melted crayons?

Always

and scrambled eggs on vegemite toast

I think if you're tall, you should have longer stays. The further back you sit (ie: if you're tall or have long upper legs) the longer your stays should be. One length of stays does not fit all, which is what most companies seem to think. That makes no sense.

As for steering, 73 degree HTA with a 45mm rake will suit most people's tastes in not being too twitchy or heavy or anything like that. I like a certain trail figure in terms of handling, and I think that's part of what makes a Thylacine a Thylacine.

Of course there are other things to consider, too, such as bar width and stem length. They make a difference to how a bike feels and steers too, but people often forget about that. They think they can get away with an ill fitting frame and just put a longer or shorter stem on it and eveything will be roses. Doesn't work like that in my book.

Having said all that, I'm still living and learning. Road bikes aren't my main focus, but I'm not skimping when it comes to doing my homework and formulating ideas and giving them a go.

a head angle of 74deg on its own shouldn't make a bike that twitchy. Must've been a few other factors affecting weight distribution or the balance of the bike (or both).

If you take two bikes set up the same except for HTA (say one with 72HTA and the other with 74HTA) then with all other things being equal you should only really notice a difference at high speeds (typically entering corners on fast downhill runs). The bike with 72HTA will be marginally 'lazier', and that's about it.

hmmmm............I see

hmmmm.....I see

riddle me this....

Mountain bikes are very much classified on HTA, XC race bikes typicly have a HTA of 70 - 72 degrees, whil my cannondale has a HTA of 69 degrees. My hard tail is in the 71 degree range and is noticably twitchier and also more nimble. this may also be atributed to weight and bike length, the cannondale is looonnngggg.

so , why is the given HTA for a " race geometry " so steep? is there any associated climbing benefits to a steep HTA?

Having said that, you will find bikes with steeper HTA are (generally) more responsive on technical ccts coz they will naturally turn quicker

Ummm isn't this "The Aussie Thread"...mindless drivel & all that? Wassup with all this technical bike talk?:D

yeah, it's doin' my head in ! :(