Inaugural Ride

Not quite the inaugural ride I had planned for the end of January but hey, things don’t often go to plan. I’ve been informed that my new bike (as you might have guessed from the links on the blog, is a Brompton) will take a bit longer to manufacture (as it’s a custom build), so that will have to wait until next month.

I spent some time umm’ing and ahh’ing about getting rid of my road bike as whilst it’s been a good bike over the past year and a bit and we’ve cycled about 2,800Km together, I’m not sure I’m to keen on it anymore. The position and the thinner tyres have made me a little jumpy on the road. As well as the bike itself, I’m moving this year (hopefully soon) and I’ll be forced to downgrade my bike collection to a single bike. I was toying with getting a hybrid again as with this, I can do all roads and gravel tracks, something that the road bike wouldn’t.

So during the week, I found that Halfords had the new version of the Subway in stock and on offer. The Subway has a special place in my heart as it was the bike that kickstarted me getting back into cycling - I’d picked up a Subway 2 on offer one Easter Sunday and since then, I’ve been in the saddle. So seeing the newer version, I ordered myself one and collected it Friday night for a weekend ride. All it needed was a weekend ride to break it in and to christen it.

Wet Weather

Over the weekend, I wasn’t able to get out on Saturday as I had some stuff to do so had to wait until Sunday to get out.

Well, that was a bit of a mistake as the weather was horrendous. Turns out the average temperature on the ride was 2°C which made life fun, especially with the rain.

However, the bike performed really well - I can see myself however, putting the cleats on it and also getting some bar ends. It also needs a bottle cage or two but these can wait. I’ve already changed the saddle over to my trusty Charge Spoon.

Not really knowing what route to take the bike on, I decided I’d head over to the new town that I’m moving to and explore the area a bit. Once done, I headed home via NCN Route 12 and enjoyed getting soaked by cars driving past. Not sure why drivers thing it’s ok to pass close during the summer but in the wind and rain of a winter day, it’s practically asking for trouble! Whilst I had my Knog Blinders on, a lot of cars seemed to pass pretty close. When I got back into Potters Bar, I ended up taking the lane to prevent it, as the hills were pretty wet and I didn’t want to aqua plane on the water running down some of the hills like rivers!

So after the ride, I think I need to make a few changes to the saddle position to get myself fully comfy, as towards the end of the ride, my left knee was beginning to ache. But other than that, I’m pretty happy with my purchase. A decent 30Km in the bag on it already.

So in terms of naming it, I think I’ve decided on Fenrir - after a Norse wolf God. After all, it’s a grey bike and wolves are grey… For some reason, I tend to name my bikes after legends and Gods. I’ve a name in mind for the Brompton already but that will have to wait. For now, Fenrir replaces the old hybrid (Mercury) I’d bought off eBay that I used for getting to the station each morning and will be off use on road and off. The road bike is due to be sold, this week it would appear. Either way, 30Km in and hopefully many more to go.