On Your Bike - Belfast

I had a super day today (or yesterday if you're a pedant). I started it with a short cycle (in case you're wondering, I didn't clean my tyres this time), came home and watched the Vuelta ([SPOILER STARTS] well done Señor Cobo [SPOILER ENDS]) and then drove to Belfast to watch three cycling related films at the On Your Bike (hence the post title) mini festival-ish thingamajig.

First things first; That's three cycles in the past three days for me. Although the last couple have been quite brief, it's all been a test for my wonky knee. It's feeling a little off right now so maybe I should rest it for a few days. I think the weather may stop my having the option to go out cycling (I'm very fair-weather) anyway. All the same, it hasn't given me any real bother. That's marvellous. Hopefully it'll be even better once I get some physiotherapy, if anyone ever contacts me about that. Maybe I should phone them (although I'm not sure who them is) and ask what's going on.

Second things second; I don't want to mention anything about the Vuelta itself in case anyone missed today's stage, will be watching it on the rest day tomorrow and is reading this inbetween. It would be quite easy to have missed it if you live in the UK as, despite it being one of the biggest days in the history of UK cycling, both ITV4 and British Eurosport decided not to show it live on television. Prior to that, ITV4 had shown every stage live and British Eurosport had shown all but one.

In their defence, ITV4 was streaming it live online but we've got an awful internet connection and it wouldn't work. Thankfully I eventually found I could watch the Eurosport (which must have been broadcasting to mainland Europe) coverage online and the picture quality on it was low enough for even our yokel connection to suffice. Phew! It's a day I didn't want to miss.

Lastly (is that a word?) ; On Your Bike. The films we went to see (in the order screened) were Böikzmöind, A Sunday In Hell and Jour De Fête.

There's not much point in my writing a huge lot about each one as one's view of films is entirely subjective (and because you can look at information on the links yourselves). All the same...

• Böikzmöind made me dislike some hipsters a bit more (the director seemed very pleasant though and wasn't too hip). The premise was to display why some people ride fixed wheel bicycles. In reality, it was more of a short (30 mins) piece about a fixed wheel cyclist collective in Bristol and their hijinx (mostly comprising of being slightly-annoying-but-probably-more-likeable-in-real-life silly-face-pulling hipsters) than a conscientious attempt to answer the question. That's not to say it was devoid of entertainment. It was pleasant enough viewing.
  
• A Sunday In Hell was fairly interesting but could have been at least half an hour shorter, more informative and featured less of the dreadful 'Paris Roubaix' choral singing. It's not one the French tourist board might want to promote, unless they'd like people to think the people of France are surly protesting flat cap wearing heavy smoking (it was the 70s) poodle walking malcontents.
  
• Jour De Fête made me laugh quite a lot more than I had expected; at japes no more sophisticated than Jacques Tati walking into stuff. It had the most tenuous link to cycling, although M. Tati was on/off/back on a bike for quite a lot of the film. It was probably the film I most enjoyed of the three, even if it turns out that Jacques Tati isn't French for jacket potato. Oh, if you do see this film, doesn't Roger (played by Guy Decomble) look like Thomas Voeckler. There's another coincidental cycling link for you.
  

As we didn't have to pay for any of today's activities, that was good. That written, I must be getting old as I had to put my fingers in my ears during the first two films as the volume was too loud for me. Even Jour De Fête was a tad on the noisy side for me, although none of the other nine people there complained.

Now I'm going to bed to continue reading Rough Ride. Who says I'm one dimensional?

Crosswinds? They were bloody furious

Forgive the awful cliched joke I titled this post with. In fact, revel in it. It's all downhill (and not in the good cycling downhill way) from there.

Unsurprisingly (as most of my posts start this way) I was out for a scoot (again, not anything fecal) on my bicycle today and this time found myself thinking a lot about crosswinds. It wasn't particularly windy but enough to bring them to my attention. Plus, they'd been talking about crosswinds on ITV4's Vuelta coverage and Paul Kimmage mentioned about them in the bit of Rough Ride (so far an upbeat piece of chirpy light reading and chuckles if ever there was one) I was reading last night. I was prone to crosswind thoughts. 'So get to the point' I hear you cry. Yes, you're right.

Thinking about crosswinds and suffering a little bit of them today, I wondered why they're so annoying. I cycle alone most of the time so it's not like I'm missing out on shelter in the bunch. I'd have thought, using my basic abilities, a wind coming from the side wouldn't make much difference to one's forward motion. It seems I'd have thought wrong. Why does a perpendicular breeze make it more difficult to move forwards? I mean, it's not as bad as an out and out headwind but it's far from pleasant. Am I being an idiot by not knowing? Probably.

In other gibberish, I'm pleased with the way my dodgy right knee has been behaving. I went up (by my standards) a couple of reasonable climbs today. They were quite different from one another too; one was a longer consistent drag and the other was pretty steep (up to about 16/17% at times, which made me feel like walking). It was a good test for my knee and it appears to have passed. That Talar Made 'Compression Cold Therapy - Knee' ice pack seems to have been doing its job. Even asides from it, in general, I've been taking better care of my wonky knee. I've been rubbing anti-inflammatory gels into it, stretching it more fastidiously than I might have in the past, making sure I don't kneel on it too much and lots of little things like that. It appears to be paying off. Here's hoping it continues with its good behaviour.

Do you remember me slabbering on (a few posts ago) about sticking Elite bottle cages on my Sab Alicudi? No? Don't worry about it. Well, I've got a pair of Elite 'Custom Race' bottle cages and the Elite logo on them (which is kind of rubbery) got quite grimy very quickly. I thought I'd give something a go before heading out today and, to my pleasant surprise, it cleaned them up well. It was, simply, to clean them with a toothbrush and toothpaste. Ha! In your face people who think Europeans don't own toothbrushes or toothpaste. Obviously I'd advise using an old toothbrush (or one bought specifically) for such purposes.

While on the subject of the Elite 'Custom Race' cages, I'd advise people to make sure their bottle is fully pushed into place when using them. It slides in a bit and seems to meet some resistance but takes another push to get it into the desired position. I've accidentally put it into the 'first' position a few times. It hasn't caused any problems but I'd guess it holds the bottles less satisfactorily and slippage could occur. Don't come crying to me when that happens.

ADDENDUM: After writing the main piece of this post I (although it was fairly spotless when I got it home as it had been dry) cleaned my bicycle. That in and of itself isn't anything peculiar for me. However, this time, I cleaned the tyres. Is that a step too far? Am I on a slippery slope?