Ronde van Oost Lancashire teaser

I snuck off work for a day earlier this week and went filming. Armed with a Go Pro camera and a moody, misty East Lancs day I thought I'd give you a sneak preview of some of the Ronde's finest features.

Dave Haygarth has done a superb job editing it, and supplying the music - huge thanks. Wayne McIntosh replied to a twitter invite to come and join me filming, albeit for the first section.

The eagle eyed among you will also spot another Planet X prototype - the forthcoming 'XLS' carbon cross, internal routed cables and discs included. Like.

Final details for the Ronde on 31 March are coming soon - check the links over on the right hand side of this page for route description and further background info.

Hometime

Time to clock off and go and get some riding in......... 'Hometime'

Aided and abetted by a nice Planet X Ti cross disc prototype via Dave Haygarth

Meet the Bradshaws - the Sportsunday Bradshaws

I spotted the flouro bibs first. There were already bib-sporting marshals at cross races but this pair seemed to be lurking in the undergrowth, or at improbable points along the course. After a race or two, I realised they were photographers and that they weren’t casually snapping friends and family. No, they were taking pictures of each and every rider, lap after lap.

Welcome to the North West’s hardest working photographers of amateur sport – David and Laura Bradshaw from Sportsunday Event Photography. David and Laura cover not only every North West Cyclocross League event, but also pretty much any other outdoor endurance sport you care to mention – triathlon, fell running, ultra running, mountainbiking as well as road sportives and other mass participation cycling events. Apparently, photographing winter cross is what they like to do on their days off……..

Professional photographers of many years standing, their town centre studio in Burnley was the base for many a wedding and portrait shoot but they were drawn into cross after beginning to cover local fell running in March 2010. Their portfolio has now expanded across the endurance sports spectrum and they have a team of 8 other photographers with whom they work to cover all the events. True to form, there don't appear to be any pics of the pair themselves in action. I shall have to get some for an update.

I recently asked them what drew them to the North West cross scene – ‘what we really like about the cross scene is the family aspect. Lots of dads and daughters/sons all playing together. Competitive yet friendly, we’ve met lots of NICE people.’

And they echo the clear signs that the local scene is growing too:

‘The cross scene looks set to burst into life. The 2 things that get a lot of kids are Tri & Cross. We would like to see cross become even more popular. Sunny warm with mud would be good. Perhaps a couple of evening events, louder with music and sponsors. Make it something where people would stay longer.’

Last year, in the run up to my annual social ride, the Ronde van Oost Lancashire, I got a call from David and Laura. They asked if they could come and photograph the event and if I wanted any support with running it. Slightly taken aback at the offer of support, I mumbled something about cake and from that point possibly the most legendary cake provision in any cycling event was born.

‘We got involved with the Ronde because it was something new. The cake was a way of us putting something back. Defo our fav event last year. So really looking forward to it this year.’

The Sportsunday Ronde Cake Stop, at the top of the cobbled climb through Heptonstall, whilst about to have only its second running, is spoken of in those revered tones reserved for those true pillars of the cycling world – ‘did you go on the Ronde the first year of the cake stop….?’ 

Apart from the most amazing collection of cakes to greet 70 hungry and breathless cyclists, it featured David and Laura’s daughter Clare and her friend dressed in fairy costumes whilst dispensing cake. Many of us were speechless…

So if you're out and about at any two-wheeled or two-legged event where weekend warriors are putting themselves through their paces, be sure to look out for David and Laura and say hello. Chances are, they'll have taken a great shot of you along the way....

First day of Spring: Cyclocross time....?

Dave has been at it again - another beautiful little film and if you look carefully another Planet X prototype.

This time a more than tidy Ti cross bike. With discs, naturellement.

Winter commute - off road

Sometimes the daily routine of work and homelife can bear down a little too strongly, just refusing to let a chink of light in, especially during those long winter months. A sense of deflation after one of the most anticipated races on the calendar adds to the funk. The appearance of those yellow orbs in my iPhone forecast this week, combined with sub zero temperatures and warnings of ice on the roads gave me an idea - time to reprise the summer off-road commute. In icy February. On a cross bike.

I'm fortunate to have ended up living on the edge of some stunning Northern moorland, wild enough in places but not overly remote and definitely in-between home and my office in Rossendale. It's not hard to construct an off-road route to work then, in fact it's a wonder I don't ride that way more often rather than just when the 3 Peaks concentrates my mind on things bumpy and steep (note to self...).

Inspired then to have a mini-adventure on a Tuesday morning, I head out into the hills above Burnley. It's cold, well below zero but offroad this presents much less of a problem than on the road. The weekend's snowfall, has already gone through several cycles of melt and refreeze, but is granular and frozen enough to give surprisingly high levels of grip, even where it has been slushed up and then turned to ice.

A runner trots past and simply exclaims 'Mad!' as I teeter down a rutted icy track. Then no-one, just space, a sun rising fully over the hill and the deep sense of wellbeing that only physical exertion in convivial surroundings can bring.

It's tenuous at times, riding at or near the limits of grip on the icy surface. I'm off walking sometimes too, as frozen streams cross over or follow the track for a while, progress is slow in places. I'm mindful of not taking too long to get in, this is a weekday commute after all but seeing as I'm out here now, I might as well enjoy it......

I drop off the moor using farm tracks now for speed, descending into a blindingly cold pocket of air at Lumb. The cold air always collects there, the inversion bringing it's own micro-climate to the little hamlet. My rear disc brake freezes and I get 'brainfreeze head' as I speed down the road and into the Valley proper.

Rolling into work there's that familiar endorphin haze we all know, and love but also a deeper sense of satisfaction, a feeling that the day just got put on hold for a moment before the regular demands are addressed as normal. If you commute to work, even if you don't have hills, do something different and vary your commute - back roads, parks, canals, just use what you have. Your day just might start with something special.

Hit the North - where it hurts

All pics: Jo Allen

Hit the North isn't any particular type of event, cross, mtb, enduro - it's just Hit the North. That's it.

It defies categorisation really. You can have an entertaining little 'which is faster - cx or mtb?' argument, though to be fair it is almost always won by cross bikes. Dave H set up a carefully calibrated scientific experiment between On One Dirty Disco crossbike and Planet X Dirty Harry 29er mtb to settle this score for once and all - read further if you wish to find out the results.

Either way it lumbers on, this entertaining off-the-wall, hors-categorie of an event. Mint balls, brass and samba bands,a  horizontally laidback atmosphere and a constantly entertaining course - it's got it all. Brant from On One even brought his inflatable Inbred man to stand and menace the brass band in the sub-zero temperatures.

The racing was fast and furious in the frozen conditions with a bigger than ever field of varied athletic types and not-so-athletic types. Favourite memory? Piling into the base of a particularly steep and hard run up, and having to navigate around a large group of fellow competitors, off their (mountain) bikes and having a right good natter. Mid race. But that's the point - whilst I was there to race, they were there to ride. Each getting exactly what they wanted from the occasion.

Of course, in true Hit the North tradition, we weren't going to get away with just minimal mud and fast conditions....  It started snowing on the last lap, slickening up the course a little prior to a mad mass scramble to exit as rapidly as possible from a by then fully snowed up car park and approach road. Which was a real shame, as half the fun of the event is the apres-race stuff - food, chat, eclectic prizegiving and tall story telling...

Ice breaking with Dirty Harry

Dave Haygarth put on his baggies on a crisp winter's day last weekend and went for a blast on the new Planet X Dirty Harry 29er mountainbike. Here's what happened.....