Last summer was when the bug bit for me, I had too much time on my hands after leaving the world of employment for a while and so all those ‘projects’ that were otherwise on hold got pushed to the fore.
Top of the list (after signing on and all that) was the construction of a single speed. Dr Dan had had his running for a few months after his 92 Clockwork finally succumbed to fatigue and it looked fun. So on one of those idle out-of-work days I hauled my old Orange Prestige out of the cellar and did the necessary making/breaking to turn it into a one geared groove machine.
To be honest the first incarnation was crap; a product of being cash-strapped and ignorant – the rear hub was shot, the saddle frayed and held together with duct tape and there was far, far too much slack in the chain. This coupled with a rear mech that was no longer straight meant its first ride was a nightmare. Powering up the first rise the chain popped off and jammed itself solid against the cogs, leaving me to hover uncertainly for a few seconds looking all the world like something from a cartoon, before dropping groundwards and gashing my knee open. This sort of thing was not uncommon on that first ride and along with my seatpost temporarily breaking, any time I tried to talk about the purity of the ride I was met with howls of derision from the rest of the group. Plus with an experimental ratio of 32:18 I was frequently left behind, all in all a deeply dispiriting experience. But, as is the case with things I persevered, eventually creating something that appeared to work most of the time and wasn’t too inclined to bin me into a hedge at the first opportunity. Jamming down a trail last summer into the Rivelin Valley in Sheffield (damn I miss that gritstone and that summer stuff) on an early incarnation of the single – the chain was prone to popping off every now and then and the rear rim was somewhere approaching paper thin – but these things are organic aren’t they? They grow and develop of their own accord like your favourite fleece. You know that you never need to wash it ‘cos after a while it develops its own self-cleaning properties (like hair in that respect) and it’s the comfiest piece of clothing you own and all those bubbly detergents and springy soft fabric conditioners are just going to ruin its essential being. It would be like killing a friend to wash it and besides the smell is kinda comforting on those long dark Red Bull nights¦
Anyway, Dr Dan and I buzzed on through the Cheesy Field and down some technical jiggery pokery that made me curse the 135 flat stem that I was saddled with. Then through the ponds, minding the film crew (with some poor soul sitting in a cloud of midges on the other side of the water) and generally enjoying cruising the through the dappled woody trails. We cross the road and drop down into Rivelin part II and come across two young lads standing forlornly by their Saracen 600lb super-deluxe-extreme-sport-clunky-2-inches-of-suspension-if-you’re-lucky-sheds-with-wheels. They ask us nicely if we have a chain tool to help them out of their plight – the super deluxe-o-rama Saracen has thrown its chain off which has then jammed between the chainset and the suspension pivot. Given that it’s a loooong walk back up the hill, particularly pushing all that scaffold they must make the bikes out of, we leap to their aid doing our zen trail guru thing (blame the film, Point Break, for all this karmic piffle) and getting them on their way again. We ride off into the sunset feeling all warm and cosy inside until my chain drops off again and I realise that any feelings of being a superior being will not last until I can learn to keep my bike in working order. There’s also some debate whether we should have helped; the good Dr thinks not, he says they only way they will learn is if we leave them for the wolves to teach them a lesson. I think otherwise and suggest that by our perfect good Samaritan-like example they will be inspired into getting better bikes and possibly removing all their gears to be at one with the world. Then I go and fall face-first into a muddy stream and realise that there is no hope, they will only ever grow into us which is not something I would recommend to anyone. Dan agrees that no-one should have the misfortune of that, so we scoot off to twiddle some fine Wyming Brook singletrack and agreeing to only help the deserving cases and heave the Saracen into the stream next time. Unfortunately the next time is someone with a racing bike halfway down the Race Track with a flat and we stop to help anyway ‘cos that’s the kind of idiots we are and then I’m late for my girlfriend’s birthday meal meaning that I am the lowest of the low and have to do some moderate grovelling to redeem that particular fuck-up. But, hell, there’ll be another one next year.
Midsummer. Longest Day. Solstice. Being a child of the West country living not terribly far from Stonehenge means that 21 June is important. I don’t know if it’s spiritual or not, certainly there’s an element of that tree-hugging mentality behind it, a celebration of the earth and such like. Also there’s something terribly belittling about watching the sun crawl over the horizon, I know it’s a cliché to say so, but it does make you feel very small and unimportant and yet part of the greater whole too in a very basic way. Feeling at one with the earth or something I think is the right expression. Personally I blame all the folk music I was forced to listen too as a child and a dad who goes Morris dancing (although largely for the beer I suspect). Whatever the reason, for the past two or three years I’ve found myself getting up at around 3.30am and hauling my over-tired carcass out of the house and on to the bike for a spot of spiritual battery recharging. Unfortunately last year was a bit of a failure due to low Peak District clouds – meaning that instead of a sunrise the clouds just turned slightly lighter shade of grey. In fact, we were that close to not bothering as the rain spat down outside the house, but eventually something in us clicked and forced us into the car and to the trailhead at Cutthroat Bridge. There is something particularly satisfying about early morning rides, largely due to the lack of noise or other distractions. Even the nearby A57 was silent all we could hear was the familiar crunch of tyres on the gritty soil and the occasional lost bleating through the acoustic sponge of cloud. There were loads of grouse chicks scurrying around the track too and in the half light it looked as though the rocks were moving, very disconcerting that early in the day.
The other problem was our brains not working at that time of the morning and all too often the slightest obstacle had me stumbling into the heather. We eventually stopped at White Tor waiting for sunrise but as all we could see was each other shivering inside our pertexes and tendrils of mist swirling across the moor we decided to head off. Further along Derwent Edge the path gets much worse, the Peak Park authorities have decided, in their infinite wisdom, to lay hundreds of stone slabs down in a bid to beat the erosion problem. True enough a peat bog is deeply unpleasant to wade through but he constant thumping from the slabs is a real pain – you can’t build up any rhythm so the climb is joyless in the extreme. It reminded me of eating sprouts – ultimately good for you but so unpleasant as to be hardly worth doing it. Still, the eventual descent down the un-named trail (shhh it’s secret): a sniggly piece of oh so wonderful singletrack with an occasional surprise hole or landslip made up for the grey blanket of cloud and the kidney abusing climb. Of course what really put a smile on the face as we drove back along the A57 to Sheffield was the fact that we had been out for a good hour and a half ride before the rest of the world had even drunk its first cup of tea.
Dom Perry
