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feeling lucky?

beloved of many youtube videos and certain types of magazine, is the round table discussion, where an indeterminate number of individuals, often from the same industry or activity, literally sit round a table and discuss a specific topic, reputedly of relevance not only to said individuals, but to those of us out in the wild with aspirations to have been one of those sitting round the aforementioned table. hypothetically, i am thus including my reader as one such individual, then asking whether he/she and yours truly are feeling lucky? and the velocipedinal aspect about which i am theoretically enquiring is the number of sprockets accumulating on our back wheels.

this is in reaction to the apparent discovery that shimano has upgraded its dura-ace groupset to thirteen speeds, bringing it in line with sram and campagnolo. they both had to alter their freehubs to accommodate one extra gear, and there appears to be surmising that shimano has had to do likewise. however, bizarrely, in an industry that relies on selling stuff, shimano has declined to discuss an, as yet, unreleased product. shades of apple computer, methinks. therefore, the many potential customers who have eagerly awaited new trinketry for their bicycles, are excluded from planning ahead in conjunction with the mortgage department of their designated banks.

the luck part, in case you were wondering, is that we find ourselves alive in an era where the number of sprockets on the rear wheel has moved from the five-speed freewheel that originally brought us the ten-speed racer to the thirteen that has now become de rigeur in the peloton. i need not tell you (but i'm going to anyway) that a double chainset up front thus provides a theoretical twenty-six gears. in this particular case, i think the french approach it with the greatest degree of perspective, having provided the alternative word vitesses to describe the function of cassette sprockets. somehow mentioning to the great unwashed, that the bicycle astride which you stand, features x-number of speeds. conveniently associates us with the impression of velocity, and an avowed prowess to achieve it.

but is luck really that which has been bestowed?

if, like me, you have been watching either live broadcast or edited highlights of la vuelta, you will possibly have observed the speeds being achieved by the participants, speeds that few, if any, of us could reach without ending up in hospital. as mentioned but a day or so past, the current average speed in this year's tour of spain is presently at 40.5kph (around 24mph in old money). answer honestly; when was the last time the sunday ride ended at the coffee stop with just such an average speed showing on everyone's garmin? it's possible i may have momentarily reached near 40kph during my galeforce tailwind-assisted return from debbie's yesterday afternoon, but there's not a chance in christendom i could have maintained that past bridgend.

but, of course, whether we refer to them as vitesses or otherwise, does not in fact make life in the saddle any faster. i know the component purveyors would prefer that it not be said in public, but twelve speeds are not faster than eleven, and thirteen proffers no speed advantage over twelve.

so is this perpetual desire for more gears really all about providing smaller jumps between gears, or simply a means of maximising income at the behest of belief in the marketing?

when campagnolo introduced their thirteen speed ekar gravel groupset, it brought with it an inherent need for a new wheelset, whether a fan of vicenza or otherwise. harbouring thoughts of upgrading the groupset on my specialized crux, i approached google to investigate the cost of so doing. a groupset cost of around £800 didn't seem too outlandish, but the likelihood of having to purchase a new wheelset, and thus discarding the two pairs i currently possess, placed it beyond the pale.

but our luck may also be soon running out as highlighted by a sunday morning friend of mine, who has had more wheel problems than anyone else i know, and now encounters the difficulties inherent in finding a campagnolo compatible carbon wheelset suitable for rim brakes. as progress marches on, it has scant regard for that which it leaves behind. none of the big three are continuing to upgrade the mechanical versions of their top-of-the-range gearsets, and in so doing, they have cast aside the humble rim-brake. if rim-brake compatible, mechanical versions of sram red, campagnolo super-record or dura-ace are your holy grail, i hate to say it, but...

adobe's portable document format (pdf), apple's e-books and kindle's versions of the same, could arguably were once viewed as the future of reading material, yet i can still buy a 'real' book if i want to. and according to industry figures, books outsell e-books four-to-one. and isn't the number thirteen meant to be unlucky?

saturday 5 september 2026

currency

in yesterday's guardian newspaper, there was an excellent article by sports/football writer, barney ronay, entitled 'money loses meaning in chaotic carnival of excess'. as i have said to the point of boredom, i have no interest in football whatsoever, but was enticed by a front page click-bait which stated 'it's the fans who end up paying for the £3bn transfer window.' you can perhaps see why, instead of simply discarding the sports pages as usual, i turned to page 40 to read in earnest.

a bit like the business pages in the same newspaper, despite having very little comprehension or insight into the machinations of industry, i find myself strangely attracted to stories of chief executives' often obscene annual remuneration, augmented by very unseemly bonus schemes. and despite having no plans whatsoever to visit across the pond, i check the exchange rate between sterling and the dollar on a daily basis. similarly, though ignoring the sports pages, when perusing the bbc news website in a forlorn attempt to keep myself informed, there is inevitably more than a single instance of some ludicrous amount of money being exchanged for a teenage footballer, who will now receive an annual salary in excess of the money paid to to surgeons.

and all that just for kicking a football about for ninety-minutes.

mr ronay's contention, as if you hadn't already guessed, is that no matter how large the amount spent on transferring a footballer from one team to another, it's the fans that ultimately pay. to quote from the article, "Who pays in the end for this circulation of funds? You for starters. There is no such thing as football money. It's all TV rights, state propaganda funds and hard private investment from the kind of people who really don't give without taking back in the end." what the article doesn't mention is that it's not just football fans who are paying.

i know we've been over this ground so many times that it's almost part of the wallpaper, but tnt sports spent £6.7bn for the sole rights to broadcast premier-league football matches until 2030. not unnaturally, the owners and/or investors in tnt sports did not pay such a ridiculous amount in order to prove their altruism; they will not only want that £6.7bn back by the end of 2030, but a few pounds on top to keep the office coffee machine well-fed. yet the football fans mentioned above are not the only ones being charged £30.99 a month to watch the streaming channel. even if, like me, you only want to watch cycling, or, in my case, cyclocross, tnt still charge the full amount, presumably on the basis that i could watch football if i wanted to.

never a day goes past these days, without almost every newspaper featuring an often derogatory story about artificial intelligence. either because rich tech companies appear to be over-riding planning laws by assembling data centres wherever it takes their fancy, or that if a large pay day does not arrive sooner, rather than later, the billions that have been invested in the genre might well lead to yet another financial crisis. but with all the hype surrounding a.i., there is much truth told about the ability of artificial intelligence to reach hitherto untold heights; surely apportioning proportional subscription costs based on customer demand would be something it could do almost without trying?

however, let's not kid ourselves; inordinate costs are not exclusive to football broadcasts. admittedly, tadej pogacar's salary over the selfsame four years of tnt's premier-league coverage, is rumoured to be almost 50 million euros. while that is still a ridiculous amount to pay anyone to do what it is they always wanted to do anyway, none of it comes from tv money, entirely due to the latter being directed to the race organisers/owners, and not to the participating teams. but at least some of the costs incurred by the broadcaster will require to show a healthy return on investment, even if it occasionally appears that with a smidgeon of perspicacity, costs could be minimised.

while watching channel five's la vuelta highlights programme of stage eleven, coverage provided by tnt sports (presumably for a healthy fee) i identified four different voices from the commentary booth: sean kelly, rob hatch, adam blythe and an unidentified other. the average length of a tour of spain stage is 156 kilometres, with the current average speed pegged at 40.5kph. that brings the average time taken to complete the stages ridden so far as 3.8 hours. if we include some hapless fellow who appears on the finish line or mid-point mountain top, that's five, reasonably well-paid individuals, none of whom have to be on air for anything like those 3.8 hours. and occasionally others are drafted in to cover while sean and rob nip off for some lunch.

most of us probably work at least seven hours a day, and quite likely paid a tad less than tnt's commentary team (and don't forget orla and her daily necessity to have a different outfit for each stage). years ago, we used to happily listen to david duffield and sean kelly, with no pre and post-race punditry to tell us what was about to take place, followed by analysis of why it all turned out completely different. none of this alters the day's racing, and i'll warrant that few, if any, of the race participants are aware of who and how many are commentting on their efforts.

but we know who's paying for it.

friday 4 september 2026

i'm sorry, i haven't a clue

during this year's islay book festival, i met with a friend, whom i've scarcely been in touch recently, but who was promoted to a position of serious responsibility around eight months ago. though promoted within the same company, her previous position was one considerably different than the one in which she now finds herself. it was not, therefore, entirely out of character to ask how she was getting on in a job for which she is undoubtedly qualified. her immediate response was that she was eight months in, and still in the office. but she figured that, by-and-large, she was still flying by the seat of her pants (so to speak). i then enquired about another friend who took on the job my first friend had departed, a girl i've known for many, many years. the implication was that she too was juggling the spinning plates, and only just managing to keep them from falling.

i've been in my current job for just over six years, and i'm convinced that my colleagues and board of directors think i have a far better grasp of the situation than is actually the case. not entirely on purpose, i find myself approaching each day in a remarkably similar manner to my approach to jazz drumming.

i'm improvising all the time.

islay is, to put it bluntly, very far from being the hub of the musical universe. narrow that down to specific genres, and jazz scarcely has a look-in. i have mentioned on probably one too many occasions, that you could probably end a conversation in main street by bringing up either jazz or opera (incidentally, scottish opera will present hansel and gretel in the high school this coming october). though i listen to little other than jazz recordings on a daily basis, apart from a gig each year at the caol ila islay jazz festival, i have no other opportunity to play jazz. thus, when those jazz gigs come along, i am, to paraphrase my friend above, flying by the seat of my pants.

and to place that in perspective, i quite like things to be like that.

at 6pm on sunday 13 september, at the local gaelic centre, i will perform, along with others, a 90 minute concert, the set list for which is still a complete mystery. and simply to top things off, i am aware of only one other musician with whom i will perform, and she's a saxophone player i have never met before. the members of the band in which i play more frequently around the island (very definitely not jazz), would be horrified to find themselves dropped into such a situation without several hours of rehearsal. in the case of the upcoming jazz festival gig, i will be provided with around 45 minutes of practise, ensuring that the subsequent presentation will still be a surprise to both audience and performers alike.

think of it as the equaivalent of rapha's oft-repeated advice to "ride until you no longer recognise your surrounds."

however, it dawned on me that, if i, and my two good friends, think ourselves only tentatively in charge of the immediate future, is it possible that this is a state of affairs which applies to a great many more? to explore that possibility, i queried one or two others whom, i have always presumed, were more than in charge of their destinies. as it transpires, while a couple claimed to be very much in the driving seat, the majority had the same appreciation of immediate matters as do i. and the aforementioned friends. so do we think that might also be the case with professional bike riders? the sort of individuals who regularly find themselves at the head of the peloton?

while watching highlights of la vuelta only the other evening, i observed the commentators behaving as once did my father when watching football on tv, criticising the tactics of either an entire team, or simply one member of same. as mentioned only a few days past, members of the tnt sports commentary team are inclined to take substantial breaks throughout a commentating day, while those upon whom they commentate, are required to persist from the end of the neutralised zone, all the way to the finish line. yet, despite scarcely experiencing the accumulated fatigue of the pelotonese, they find it within their portfolio to point out where each might possibly be making the wrong choice(s).

perhaps it's simply a case of nerves that encourages tadej to accelerate off the front of the peloton some 48km from the end, or maybe wout acts as a super-domestique because he's overwhelmed by the day to day aspects of riding his cervelo? could it be that matthew brennan sprints to victory solely because he has accidentally found himself in front of a bunch of raging sprinters with no easy way out? granted, in the post-race interviews, we are usually advised that the lead-out was the chosen strategy of the day, but how do we know that's true? given this recent appraisal of our own apprehension of the daily grind, other than being a great deal faster, there is surely little difference between ourselves and our pelotonic heroes?

on day one of any grand tour, there can be up to 21 teams of nine riders on the start line; that's almost 190 individuals, all with specific aspirations, but possibly little chance of achieving them as a result of the inherent chaos engendered by a fast-moving, ever-changing peloton. is it not statistically possible that only a handful of that number are able to confidently plan their trajectory towards the finish line? professional bicycle riders might be a class apart, but for the most part, that concerns only their athletic abilities, and not necessarily their personal organisational skills.

i'll never watch the peloton in the same light ever again.

thursday 3 september 2026

the future?

you will perhaps be aware that my absence from the interwebs over the past few days was at the behest of islay book festival, events of which upon i was required to report for the local newspaper. in the process of doing so, i cycled approximately 90km; something of a bonus you will doubtless agree, but alongside the need to take notes in longhand over one hour for each event, made for a somewhat tiring weekend. however, not only did book festival attendance interrupt my bicycle scribblings, but on saturday at least, the daily episode of la vuelta.

those who have been following the spanish grand tour will easily equate that particular evening with the unfortunate exit from the event by its red-jerseyed leader, tadej pogacar. i did learn of this later that same evening during my frequent perusal of youtube videos, but was almost simultaneously appraised of the situation by an e-mail from tim dibden in australia, keen to point out that which we probably all knew was going to happen anyway. i am not regularly given to velocipedinal prognostications of a sporting flavour, mostly because i rarely consider myself top be particularly well-informed.

however, as tim rightly pointed out, i had stated, in pixels, following the opening two stages of the race, that the organisers might as well proceed directly to grenada and hand the trophy to the slovenian, as the following weeks were likely to prove remarkably predictable. of course, i hadn't considered the possibility of tadej suffering a race-ending crash, if only because he has seen a career rarely punctuated by debilitating accidents. if nothing else, this clearly outlines why yours truly should keep well away from cycle-related predictions.

however, having missed saturday's highlights altogether, the timing of my final book festival event on sunday afternoon, ensured that i was at home to watch stage nine, with its knee-breaking ascent to alto de aitana costa blanca. won by the race's heir apparent, enric mas, ending almost five years of a complete lack of stage victories in their home race, he was shadowed to the last few metres by scotland's oscar onley. but what we did see was what racing might be like, were jonas and tadej to take up indoor bowls or beach volleyball.

vingegaard succeeded in italy by a margin of more than five minutes over felix gall, a frenchman currently acquitting himself well in spain. come those three weeks in july, with no jonas to trouble him, after suffering his own race-departing crash, tadej stood atop the champs elysées podium ahead of remco evenepoel by over six minutes. gaps such as these after three weeks of racing obviously bolster the reputations of the dane and slovenian, as well as having a presumably similar effect on their respective salaries, but neither race did a great deal to improve the entertainment value of either.

granted, if you happen to be a fan of either gent, no doubt those winning margins following three weeks of derring-do are as succour to the less than downtrodden. but for those of us who prefer to embrace the whole enchilada, enjoying the frequent comparison between professional cycling and three-dimensional chess, it was twenty-one days of predictability, fostering considerations of switching off and doing something more interesting instead. i cannot deny that precisely that option had occurred following pogacar's victory by a tiny margin in the prologue time-trial. all he had to do, i contended, was follow the wheels ahead for the next few weeks, since the three brits behind him in the victory parade were hardly likely to challenge in the mountains.

i'm aware that so doing is hardly tadej's style, but since public entertainment rarely seems to be high on his strategy list, it would surely have proved the most pragmatic means of retaining the red jersey until grenada.

but, as echoed by tnt sports' apparently endless list of commentators (really, how many blokes does it take to commentate on one stage? most of us work at least seven hours a day, but i doubt any tnt commentator is challenged for much more than a couple of hours at a time), the racing we all witnessed on stage nine was a revelation, providing a clear insight as to the enjoyment to be garnered from a peloton far closer in abilities. i appreciate that it's hardly tadej's or jonas' fault that the competition does not rival their extraordinary abilities; it's not for them to regress, but the others to progress. but it's hard to deny that a gap of twelve seconds between first and third on a mountain stage is far more enjoyable to watch than a gap measured in minutes between first and second.

the next couple of weeks will either confirm or deny, but my ten pence is on the former.

tuesday 1 september 2026

the old ones are the best. maybe

as has become the habit of many, including yours truly, i spend way too much time on youtube, often in the forlorn hope that an interview or concert which coincides with my lofty ideals might be found amongst the dross. i have no idea how the platform's algorithms, work, or how they were designed to work; much of what i am served in my daily feed seems to have very little to do with that which i hoped to view, and even less to do with my viewing history on which i naively believed the algorithm to be based. however, on random occasions, up pops a blast-from-the-past, offering a few concerted moments of nostalgia, which may, or may not, make the entire venture worthwhile.

should that prove not to be the case, i find it hard to console myself that i have just spent an inordinate portion of my reputedly valuable time, indulging in what i believe is currently referred to as doomscrolling.

in april of 1970, keith emerson, erstwhile keyboard player with the nice, joined forces with former king crimson frontman and bass player, greg lake, and atomic rooster drummer, carl palmer (no relation) to form emerson, lake and palmer. in december of that year, they released the greg lake penned, lucky man, reputedly written by lake when he was a mere twelve years old. it is a notable release not only for its narrative, but the sound of keith emerson's moog 3c synthesiser, an electronic keyboard instrument that visually resembled a telephone switchboard, invented by american electronics genius, bob moog. absent throughout the majority of the song, it is clearly and threateningly heard when the lyrics come to an end.

for progressive music fans in the 1970s, it was something of a revelation.

in 1970, i was studying for my o-levels (what are now known as national five certificates) en-route to a future career as an artist via a diploma course at art college. and a part of being a teenager at that juncture, was attending a wide variety of concerts at glasgow's apollo theatre. with the last train home departing at 11pm, and the majority of concerts ending between 10:30 - 10:45pm, there was frequently a very hairy run down renfield street to central station to avoid being stranded in central glasgow overnight.

having clicked on the video to listen to elp's lucky man, on refreshing the page, several other scarcely remembered bands and songs popped up within the first ten videos. i can but equate with the majority of the comments posted beneath each video, paying tribute to a period of time in which music was several orders of magnitude better and more original than most of the dross served up on today's streaming platforms. the majority paid tribute to their recognised good fortune at having lived through one of modern rock/pop music's greatest periods. even though that sort of appreciation is highly subjective, it's definitely an argument with which it's hard to disagree.

however, in the early 1970s, between my younger brother and i, only one of us owned a ten-speed racer, and it wasn't me. more kids rode sturmey-archer three-speed hub gears than attempted to emulate refugees from the peloton. it was almost 1980 before mrs washingmachinepost bought me my first road bike, a viscount by name, constructed from lugged, plain gauge steel tubing with steel-rimmed, galvanised spoked wheels and the cheapest of componentry sourced from shimano, but which the manufacturer attempted to favourably compare with the quality stuff used by tour de france riders.

the bicycle arrived with a small handbook that bore no relation to the bike with which it had arrived, and a poster of the viscount team members. i was too naive at the time to realise they were on handbuilt custom bicycles that bore only a visual resemblance to that which i had removed from the box.

but, just like 1970s rock music, there was a great deal to be said for the road bikes of the same decade. they had friction shifters clamped to the upper regions of the down tube, the brake cables exited the top of the levers in an aesthetically pleasing arc, and the rider had only five sprockets with which to deal (though a few more teeth on those sprockets would not have gone amiss when attempting to ascend dundonald hill from barassie). of course, life was hardly perfect; the tyres were "27 x 1 1/4" and a tad on the heavy side, and the chainrings were rivetted and inseparable. as for the saddle, the less said about that, the better.

but just like the pop music of the age, there was something undeniably attractive about the lack of sophistication. but shift focus to what is now known as progressive, and it was a genre of music which ultimately drowned in its own musical verbosity, ably highlighted by the emergence of punk. it is almost a mirror-like reflection of contemporaneity, where the bicycles have become the very poster boys of (largely unnecessary) sophistication, while the prevailing music makes punk sound like tubular bells.

perhaps the only thing missing is an available medium on which to signal nostalgic fondness for the bicycles of yesteryear. though it could have a great deal to do with the age at which many of us discovered bicycles, there's no denying that today's bicycles and their attendant youtube launches seem not to have attracted misty-eyed comments below the videos. where on earth are the crosby, stills, nash and young, ten years after and jethro tull of the 21st century when you need them?

friday 28 august 2026

adjustments

sad though it may seem, i have developed the habit of rattling off a few rolls and paradiddles on my slingerland radio king, gene krupa edition snare drum when i arrive home from work each day. the croft forms part of a terrace of housing, the neighbours of which would likely be somewhat opposed to a full-blown drum solo; i therefore satisfy myself with a rudiment or two on order to maintain what i have come to know as inherent rhythmicality. but, that said, there is an ulterior motive to my daily sticking patterns.

not that i wish to brag, but i currently own three radio king snare drums, two of which are limited editions and arrived not only with their own radio king embroidered cases, but the option of a remo mylar drum head, or bovide calfskin head. in both instances, i immediately replaced the installed plastic head with the calfskin alternative for two reasons. firstly, both drums are almost precise replicas of radio king snare drums which originated in the 1940s, long before remo belli invented the plastic drum head. therefore, in the interests of authenticity, i opted for the natural alternative that would have been de rigeur at the time.

secondly, no matter how many fine plastic calfskin replicas are produced by several contemporary manufacturers, nothing quite equals a genuine calfskin head. and despite the occasional comment from dyed-in-the-wool vegans, calves and cows are rarely, if ever, slaughtered solely for their hides; those are a by-product of the meat industry that would otherwise simply be disposed of. similar arguments will have blighted many a brooks saddle aficionado.

but because it is a natural product, calfskin heads are highly susceptible to variations of temperature and humidity. during the summer months, even though the hebrides did not experience temperatures that equalled the south of the country, it was often warm enough to noticeably raise the pitch of my gene krupa drum on a daily basis. now that we are about to enter a period whereby it will be thought appropriate to play joseph kosma's autumn leaves, the lowering of the ambient temperature, accompanied by increasing humidity, the pitch and resilience of that calfskin head has begun to lower. by playing even a few strokes on the drum each day, not only am i acquainting myself with these factors, i find myself intrigued by the variation in sound, even though, in many cases, i will subsequently struggle to replicate them.

only a year ago, when playing out of doors at ardbeg distillery, the pitch of the radio king chosen for the performance, effectively dropped through the floor, resulting in a less than pristine pitch, but delightful nonetheless. it adds a certain frisson to proceedings when such matters become, essentially, outwith my control. if i truly need clarity and precision, i will opt for a snare drum that features a plastic head.

yet, such abrogation of control, is the very thing we are encouraged to dispense with when tme comes to fit a bicycle to our exacting requirements, and not without good reason. eddy merckx was infamous for his endless faffing with the seatpost to adjust his saddle height by mere millimetres. he may have had good reason for so doing, but it seems a great deal more likely that the man suffered from obsessive compulsive disorder (ocd). though merckx was the forerunner of tadej pogacar in his ability to ride off into the sunset, leaving the rest of the peloton in his wake, it seems highly unlikely that a saddle one millimetre too high or too low, would have impinged upon that particular ability.

there is, i believe, a strong case for supposing the majority of us to set the saddle height at point of purchase, and never trouble the seat-bolt with an allen key ever again. while the professionals are likely to have an imelda marcos-sized wardrobe of identical footwear and cleat position, most of the velo club peloton wear whatever comes to hand, or perhaps on sale at evans cycles. and despite the unlikelihood of the sole thickness being identical across several brands, i'm willing to wager that the saddle height remains at a fixed position. it seems that the human body is more adaptable than is the contemporary road bike.

and that is perhaps just as well. in the halcyon days of yore, bicycle shops may have been more than willing to swap out the stem on a new bicycle, should it prove to be either too long or too short. but modernity has begun to dictate that we all adopt one-piece stem and bars, meaning that not only would a complete swap-out require removal of bar tape and levers, but nowadays a dismantling of the integral cable routing through both bar and stem, and more than likely refilling and bleeding of the hydraulics on the disc-brakes. not only is that no longer a five or ten minute job, but if undertaken, likely to incur a (not particularly cheap) servicing fee.

so, despite an emphasis on ensuring that the bicycle fits us, rather than the other way round, it seems many new adherents to the peloton, or older members, but with new bicycles, will be required to place themselves at the mercy of the manufacturer's ability to size proportionally. nine times out of ten, that will be unremarkably simple, but don't bank on it. my specialized crux arrived with a stock 110mm stem, which, as the possessor of longer arms than is usual for my body size, i eventually switched for a 120mm stem to alleviate growing discomfort. thankfully i still retain separate bars, stem and external cable routing.

i know it's called progress, but sometimes it doesn't feel like it. at one time, slingerland built snare drums with an internal light bulb, not specifically for the lighting effect, but a steady temperature that would keep the calfskin head at the desired pitch througout any given performance.

it's a funny old world.

and following my recent monologue on the predicted predictability of the current tour of spain, following tadej's 48km solo victory on tuesday, thank you to all those who e-mailed to point out that i was right. not a common occurrence i must admit.

thursday 27 august 2026

it's on its way

a few saturdays past, a fellow coffee aficionado asked me in debbie's whether i ever got out of bed of a morning and figured that i couldn't be bothered to go cycling? it took but a few seconds to give a negative reply; i simply cannot recall any weekend when the prospect of riding my bicycle was anything other than compulsive. granted, there have been one or two days over the summer, when percussive requirements kept me out of the saddle, but these were thankfully few and far between. succinctly put, unless the weather threatens to wipe me out completely in front of oncoming traffic, i will simply don the appropriate apparel and go riding anyway.

i have no doubt that there are those amongst the island community who doubt my sanity under certain meteorological conditions, but a bike ride is a bike ride, is a bike ride.

and as previously advised for at least two reasons into which i'd prefer not to delve at the moment, i am closing in on a straight twelve months eschewing the road bike, and confining my exploits to that of my specialized cyclocross bike (yes, specialized might like to position the latest version of the crux as belonging to the gravel genre, but i will defend to the death, my right to consider that which i ride as a cyclocross variant, the category under which it was supplied).

we have also spoken way too often about the fencing off of the grass and dunes at uiskentiue strand. so frequently has this been mentioned, that i'm sure many of you think of the strand as being an integral part of your own weekly parcours. anyhoo, despite claims by the owners that the fencing was implemented in order to install cattle in the field, thus encouraging the endangered chough (pronounced 'chuff'), doubts have never completely evaporated. this member of the crow family confines its scottish activities principally to the islands of islay and colonsay, relying predominantly on the bugs to be found in cow pats for its food.

unfortunately for the estate, those with far greater knowledge of this bird than do i, tend to suggest that choughs rarely breed on flat ground, preferring the occasional cliff or barn roof. thus, while there may have been chough-related funding made available for the substantial length of fencing, it seems the chances of it achieving that for which it was constructed are remarkably small. and due to the itinerant nature of cattle, it appears that the chances lessened dramatically only a matter of weeks after the herd had arrived.

unfortunately, though the strand is bordered on one side by the main bridgend/bruichladdich road, the other side is open to the shores of loch indaal. and because of that fact, the fence has to end somewhere; in this case, a few metres short of high tide. therefore, it was only a matter of time before the cows found their way round the edge of the fence and spilled out onto the road. following such a traffic-scaring event, the cattle were summarily removed to a fully-fenced field on the opposite side of the road.

also previously discussed has been the distinct difference between flocks of sheep and herds of cattle. the former may be predictably the most unpredictable animals on the planet, perpetually searching for the most awkward way to die, but they are not belligerent, and will inevitably run away when approached by a cyclists with a flashing front light. cows, on the other hand, are largely inscrutable, a great deal larger and heavier than a bicyclist, and randomly predisposed to enter attack mode. which is a very long-winded way of saying, i'll ride on the grass through sheep, but not on your nellie if there are cows present.

the cattle have been missing in action virtually the entire summer, staring over the fence across the road in apparent envy at my ability to ride across the grass. but with the 26/27 cyclocross season only a matter of weeks distant, suddenly the cows re-appeared on 'my' side of the fence just last week. the timing, from my point of view, couldn't have been worse; i actually have zero cyclocross skills, but the desire for an impressive narrative would have me persuade you that the opposite is the case.

already i am pretending to look forward to once again offering tnt sports my monthly £30.99 for twice weekendly 'cross racing, when once again i can alternate between my uci big bobble hat and the yellow x20 badkamers headwear with a little duck's face on the front. there may be two and a half weeks of vuelta still to go, but already i find myself envisioning the season when cameron mason will surely achieve his first european cyclocross victory, and wout van aert will decide that he prefers mud and sand to tarmac. and all that before i board a calmac ferry in mid-december to join a cacophony of cowbells in glasgow's kelvingrove park for a round of the uci cyclocross world cup.

until then, i will hope for the best, that the cows return to the other side of the road, and i can once again plan a strategy to leave an imaginary mathieu van der poel trailing in my wake. mind you, if that actually happened, i'd buy the coffees.

wednesday 26 august 2026

an awkward split

as one who has had noticeably long hair for more years than i'm willing to admit, split ends have been a long-term problem; or at least they would have been had i been even remotely irritated by something that can apparently affect folks even with regular length hair. that, however, has never stopped shampoo purveyors from alluding to a cure for the created problem contained within their flagship products. the first of which i became notionally aware was produced in the 1990s: pantene pro v. of course, since hair is no longer living tissue by the time it leaves your scalp, let alone when it reaches your shoulders and proceeds halfway down your back (may or may not be based on actual events), a permanent fix is largely fiction.

shampoos which purport to fix your split ends, such as schwarzkopf's gliss split ends miracle shampoo or l'oréal's paris elvital dream length shampoo, simply coat the hairs with temporary conditioning agents that superficially appear to have reformed your split ends into a smooth, single strand of hair. for that particular reason, augmented by the knowledge that such products cost an arm and a leg, i'm more inclined to stick to a well-known dandruff shampoo. and at the risk of paraphrasing their regular tv adverts, "i don't".

thankfully, the shampoo best known to followers of mvdp does not list split ends repair amongst its reputed properties. alpecin, if you hadn't guessed, stops short of such claims, though it does insist that it reduces hair loss (not something i find to be a problem) and promotes hair growth (i might refer you to my previous answer). however, cycle sponsorship obviously comes at a price; it was somewhat alarming to learn that a three-month supply of alpecin caffeine shampoo bears a recommended retail price of £70. however, strange to relate, today's monologue actually has nothing to do with split ends, long hair, or hair loss, but more to do with the invention of solutions to satisfy a problem that either doesn't actually exist, or one that we never realised we had in the first place.

years ago, in the early days of rapha, announcement of the availability of their spring/summer collections, or autumn/winter, attracted so many of us to their website, that it buckled under the strain and threw the toys out of the pram. it's possible that cycling apparel providers had always recognised delineation between the seasons and proffered timely solutions at appropriate times of the year, but i'd be fibbing if i said i could recall any specific instances.

there's no doubt that a difference between seasons exists, depending on where you live and in which hemisphere. the fact that cycling is now regarded as a global sport, has brought its own problems. when rapha first announced their sponsorship of ef education in january 2019, as a famous member of the cycling media, i was sent a jersey and bibshorts for review to highlight their entrepreneurial spirit. that launch, in terms of the apparel on offer, was a tad problematic, at least from my own point of view. with racing commencing with the tour down under where january constitutes the height of summer, the short-sleeve jersey and lightweight bib-shorts that arrived at the croft were thinner than our toilet paper. i don't mind saying that riding thus clad, was not an experience i was keen to experience in the midst of freezing atlantic gales and horizontal rain.

i did point out to mr mottram that photographs on rapha's website, showing team members riding in full-length winter tights, were a tad misleading, given their unavailability on the selfsame website. he at least appeared to comprehend the nature of my gripe and promised to investigate further. let's just say, i still await his reply. but to return to the aforementioned transition periods, it can often be something of a lottery when setting out cycling garb for the following morning. in the 1980s, laphroaig distillery ran a series of adverts citing islay's ability to provide all four seasons in one day; though last saturday may have been dry and sunny, that has no bearing on what i might awaken to on sunday morning.

however, well-aware that i am extremely fortunate in such matters of apparel, i truly believe i have a sufficiently wide range of cycle clothing to cope with whatever the hebridean climate throws in my direction. thus, the problem is not a lack of suitable attire, simply a potential lack of foresight as to which items to choose. sage advice from those perhaps better acquainted with the paradigm than are you and i, has always been to layer, layer, layer. while that won't necessarily absolve the peloton from the stage abandonment that afflicted la vuelta yesterday, it generally means that this mix-and-match approach can not only solve daily indecision, but perhaps ameliorate meteorological iniquities experienced during one single bike ride.

granted, the variety of apparel on tap might well depend on possessing an adequate bank balance, but currently, the shift from one season to another is relatively easily coped with. or at least, that would be my apprehension, if not necessarily that of castelli.

tautologically naming its latest range of cycling apparel, transition, castelli contends that the "collection has been developed in response to increasingly changeable conditions between traditional summer and winter seasons, with riders often facing temperatures that are too cool for lightweight summer kit but too mild for full thermal layers." you will perhaps forgive me if i fail to note how that is any different from previous decades.

however, castelli's product-line manager, andrew montgomery claims, "the old way of riding was simple; summer gear in summer, winter gear in winter." he continued by stating that climate change had altered that pace. seasons transition gradually over a more prolonged period.

i'm not really sure where mr montgomery has been living in recent years, but in the uk, we've always suffered from unpredictable weather, rarely finding ourselves bereft of suitable apparel for the job. in june of this year, i could still be found riding in bib-threequarters and a rapha classic gore-tex jacket. on one sunday in july, i donned a thermal goretex shakedry, such was the coolness of temperature and density of rain. the point is, that i already own the very layers of product designed to cope with such eventualities. and i'm pretty sure that castelli's existing range would have coped admirably without the introduction of an ostensibly new collection.

of course, if castelli were to find themselves well-disposed towards sending a transition item or two to the hebrides, i'd be quite willing to reassess my initial point of view. (but i still think i'm right).

the first product in the range is the corretto l/s jersey, "designed for conditions where summer heat has started to fade but heavier layers are not yet required."

isn't that why we own gilets and windjackets?

tuesday 25 august 2026