Wednesday, August 20, 2008

A nice drive in the country

Under the pretence of staff training, Alastair (my boss) and I spent last Saturday here
Basically we got to drive 3 wicked - well ok, two wicked and one chicks car in the snow and ice all day under the supervision of this guy: Hunter Edwards; apparentley he doesn't google (WTF?)

Check this link for Hunter's gallery
We were the group dated 16/08/2008 and yes, that is me behind the wheel of the Golf in pictures 3-15.
Yes, the car did nearly a full 360 spin and yes, Alastair did grab the hand brake moments prior!
And that's me again reversing out of the snow bank in the same car a bit later on as well.

Here's some data gathered from the GPS gizmo in the BMW from the morning session:
STUDENT - rick - alastair
LAP 1 - 70.5 - 72.3
LAP 2 - 72.4 - 72.4
LAP 3 - 74.5 - 72.7
AVG.SPEED - 30.4 - 29.4
MAXSPEED - 45.7 - 44.1
STDEV - 2.00 - 0.21

And because the boss has only heard of a blog, but never read one I'm fairly safe to mention that I did post a faster lap than him and did I also mention he hopped out of the Beemer leaving it in drive ? Lucky the Golf was parked in front to halt it's travels...... :-)

Whilst freaking expensive, it was a great time and a good one to tick off the list.

Oh & here's a link to Shaun Summerfield doing the very thing but at the tax payers expense.
(It takes an age to load, but it is the best way to show what happended)









Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Momma & Poppa Redwood go ridin'




After much confusion on Saturday morning Hugh turned up with a very pregnant Jess (due that day), who looked after the nippers while we went out riding.


This was a big thing for myself and Keighley as the littlies pretty much put the kybosh on going "hey, let's just go out for a bike ride" In fact it's the first time since we moved here a year ago that we've been out into the Sticky Forest together.




Hugh wasn't even like a third wheel ! More like a studly version of myself - he was wearing my vest which I purchased from Big Bear Bikes - wait for it - in Big Bear Lake, California...............they even have Tinker Juarez's Etto Helmet in the window.


This is officially the middle of winter - the rest of the country is getting slammed with less than ideal bike riding weather.

We however had dust coming off our tires.

Not that I'm bragging.

Thursday, August 7, 2008

The Boys in Blue

Nah, not the cops - a couple of bikes I own.
One is broke.

& the other one is it for off road at the mo - what's that you say?
No Foes ? Yep it's sold, 1st time in 8 years without a Foes
I've even been de-Kleined !
Indeed the '98 Attitude comp has gone too.



Clark Kent: used to belong to Stephen Swart when he was racing for the Coors Light team in the USA, prior to the team switching to Serottas the next year.
It has unceremoniously been sitting in a bike box for the last 12 months waiting and waiting and waiting......finally after a wiff of cafeine inspiration from http://rewiretrorides.blogspot.com/ I'm into it.
The paint is stuffed and there is a hairline crack in the gusset under the down tube.

So it's off to http://www.kiwibikes.co.nz/ for some love with the welding torch and then down to Wellington to get some new paint and decals from Ross Bee.
The 8 speed down tube shifter Dura Ace groupset complete with "Coors Light" marker pen on the rims will be re-instated.