Dartmoor mountain biker

  Nineteen straight days in the workshop - that's where I was on Bank Holiday Friday, on day nineteen. During that time I worked non-stop, from 8.30am to 6pm or later, with just an hour at most on my static bike, each morning, prior to showering and heading back to the shop. I tackled a whole range of jobs during this time, from simple cable swaps to tapping a bottom bracket shell (above). Some of the jobs were more demanding than others, such as the Reverb dropper post (below), which just had brown inside it! It took a significant amount of cleaning and replacing almost all of the internals, but I got it back to 'as new' condition for the owner. I had some beautiful bikes to work on though, such as this Evil Wreckoning (below), which needed a bunch of work, including brake bleeds and a new headset. I think I'm right in saying that literally every single customer that came into the workshop, stopped and took an admiring glance in it's direction. Who wouldn't tho...

  One of my real pleasures in riding, is mastering steep, technical trails. Fortunately for me, the flanks of Dartmoor provide a wealth of such opportunities. Within riding distance of my home, I am spoilt for choice. From the big, all-day epics that take me 70kms or more, to a couple of hours spent riding roots and rocks in the valleys, I really do have my pick of the trails. The only thing we really lack here is elevation. The trails I rode yesterday, for example, whilst technically quite demanding in places, take a maximum of a minute to descend. Compare this to Gawton (a downhill centre near Tavistock), where the runs are three minutes long, or Wales and Scotland, where the choices are almost endless, never mind The Alps! I mustn't complain though, especially right now, when we can't travel and most people are severely limited in their riding options, I really do have quite a blessed life. One thing I can and do do, to keep my riding interesting, is coach others. It's q...