I have some later 80's Bicycle Guides that I read mostly in the dunny. They don't make mags like that anymore....you know....with interesting bikes, good photography, intelligent commentary......

Sounds like another short story.

Gotta thank you for your "I didn't get home 'til Tuesday after the 1993 Grand Final" story -- I've got a few laughs out of that, even from tough crowds .

I bet you bought the full Team Down Under kit too....so you look just like Phil Thuaux

You read 'ride'?......best mag out, I reckon

Hands up who wanted one of those black and white Concordes, with Record.

I think Sean Kelly used to ride one. Man, I used to drool over those shiny chrome forks, but especially those big white Columbus stickers on the blades.

I only just found out you can buy "Australia" outfits. Who would fukn wear one of them?!?!?

As Terry Hammond says, he once saw some fat guy on Beach Road in a rainbow jersey

.....It was the 2000 GF....& i think it was tuesday...mighta been wednesday?....thursday?........we got chucked out of the social club about 6am...so they could clean up in readiness for the Sunday hordes to arrive....we staggered down to the 'Royal' about 200m away.....kept drinking till the social club opened again at 10am...then went back......after that a dim sort of blackness takes over..........

YES!!!! I even tried to buy a Concorde in Holland....but there was just too much other nice gear there too. They were the shizzle, my nizzle...

Sean Kelly, Erik Breukink, Uwe Ampler, Steve Rooks, Raul Alcala, Gert-Jan Theunnisse, Jean-Paul van Poppel, Nico Verhoeven (a mate of mine bought his bike), Martin Earley....

A bloke I used to knock around with wore the rainbow jersey like it was his club top. He never raced, jsut rode sections of the Hell Ride (was a rich as hell and American) and wore the Mapei shorts and Mapei WC jersey on his freeky-looking Corima.

Hang on, I'm writing all this down

The Royal, huh?? Perfect for a bit of tittay action before taking in a wheelrace at Vodafone....

Here's another short story.....

Back in 1993 when I was a new graduate, struggling to make a living by working in a bike shop a day or two a week and doing whatever freelance design work I could get my poor arse hands on, 'one of the owners' of Groupe Sportif wanders into the shop I was working in. Not long after the owner and him get chatting, his phone rings and it's some French restaurant he's confirming a booking on "Wee Wee, Gee ThompSANNNN!" and all that ****. I swear to this day it was a bogus call that the other guy who runs GS made so he could sound all important and stuff.

But anyway, I digress. Not long after that, they asked me to design some Look and Mavic jerseys for them after seeing the one I did for the bike shop I was working in. I did. They loved them. I even did the colour separations BY HAND, which was insane.

We had an agreement that I'd barter a Mavic Gruppo for the work, and they could write it off as a promo/sponsorship type thing, which worked well for the both of us. ( the gruppo wholesaled for about 900 bucks, which I thought was pretty good considering the ammount of work I did and the fact that it probably cost them only about 700 anyway ) Anyway, after I finished the job, I went to their warehouse to pick up the parts. "So what would you like, some cranks or some hubs?" They say. "Err, the whole ensemble?" I reply. "That's not what we agreed" they said.
Well, I was farken mad, and insisted they honour their agreement, go look at all the work I did for them and pony up the parts.
After making me wait for over an hour while they ********ted on, they eventually agreed, but I had a bad taste in my mouth and was reluctant to run the parts because they were such PITA's.

Naturally I did run the parts and had a great time on them as they were bullet-proof and shifted like a dream *clack clack*

Over a year later I was approaching home after going out for a ride.....a small divot in the road.....*bump*......cassette locks solid, bike skids, I crash.

The following day, we take the hub appart and noticed that one of the bolts holding on of the drive pawls on has sheered off, and locked the freehub solid.

We send it back to get replaced, they say "no warranty, because the chain has dropped off the cassette causing the freewheel to freeze." I say "********, the chain has dropped off maybe 3 times while adjusting the derailleur, but I haven't had to touch anything since then, coz they're actually, like, good parts", they then change their tune and say "Sorry, it's out of warranty period".

I still haven't got those wheels back. This was 10 years ago.

Subsequently, I will never use or recommend anything they wholesale. To anyone. Ever.

Just to rub it in, they used my designs for 4 years but only paid for 1.

Nice PR job, fellas!

I knew you'd know the Royal....not as good since its gone 'pokies'.....used to go there many moons ago the night the HSC results came out...tons of drunken St. monica's girls!

Hitchy

Gold.

Shifty pricks.

CU*TS!!

Is that the real reason you've been bagging Mavic wheel-sets for the last two years?

Fukkin pokies fukkd up everything. Back in '91, no bands could get work, so we all had to get hair cuts and get fukn real fukn jobs

The Clifton in Kew wasn't bad for skimpy's, either.....

Unfortunately I like Mavic rims. Fortunately, DT rims are just as good, and as a consequence those guys can go **** themselves, and have a nice day

Okay, time to squeeze a ride in, and whilst doing so, try to convince myself throw this carbon fork in the trash, do a lugged steel fork, with a white crown, black legs, and gold pearl over the top.......you guys can keep talking schoolgirls, beer and pokies......

PRE RIDE ADDITIONAL:

Q: Your missus has only managed to wash one of your gloves. Do you -

1) Ride with one clean, one stinky glove?
2) Ride with no gloves?
3) Go and buy another identical pair of gloves?
4) Trade the missus in?

either 3 or 4 works for me!.......( & then i'd go buy a new 585!)

Hitchy

no gloves. Go Sean Yates-style.

how does one sprint without going too far forward and having the back
wheel skip all over the place? I was mucking around with it last night, but
I'm crap at it, and it's now obviously worse because my Kervello is lighter stiffer.

Start in a lower gear (it's harder to get too far forward on the bike at high rpms)......then ramp it up.

hmmm, I see

try 'feeling' the tip of the seat between the top of your legs/bottom of your arse area. Start in a higher gear & just do some 75% sprints....as you get the feel for it...build the intensity...takes abit of practice. the 'coaching nazi' had me doing these...he calls them 'form sprints'...sprinting done for 'form' rather than speed.

Hitchy

Exactly. straight out of the Davis Phinney coaching manual. "You want to replicate the effort of a sprint, not necessarily the speed."


And he could sprint a bit, too.