Black Canon Collective

Author: Archive User

  • Warminster Wobble 2011

    Not long to go until this year’s Warminster Wobble, so make sure you check out their website for details of how to take part in the many events running over the weekend. The event is put by Colin and Gordon and the rest of the Warminster Cycle Group who do a great job of getting loads of non-riders out on their bikes and making cycling accessible to all ages. For the rest of us there’s always the MTB time trial to enter, an event that our own Dan Irons won last year and will no doubt be there to defend….

  • wheelbarrow rodeo

    It’s amazing what you can do when you work together…

    On Sunday we destroyed the existing and very tired ‘Slam Berm’ on Spoons and went about rebuilding it from scratch with some proper materials…

    After hours of midge flapping, post bashing, rock gathering and mattock wielding we built ”el twato” (don’t get me started) a beautifully cribbed berm that is as good to ride as it is to look at.

    With so much more speed available out of the corner we decided to open up an additional line , so set about excavating even more soil and building a new feature (a pump-able kicker called ‘Rolo’) into the same landing as used by the double after the slam berm. After a bit of wheelbarrow rodeo (video to follow) and countless calls of “just 10 -15 more…!” we called it a day, packed up and went home. Well, not before a few people sessioned the new features in their wellies of course…

    Next time we’ll complete the section (it needs an additional small berm to be built) before we continue with the rest of the TO DO list. Remember, the more people we get along to Dig Days the more we can get done. Thanks to all those who helped out, you did an awesome job!

  • FUN in the PARK

    Welshmill Park, Frome

    Saturday 21st May, 12 till 4pm

    Frome Recreation and Open Grounds Supporters (FROGS) have got through the first stage for a £50,000 grant to improve Welshmill park and the bid includes a bike track, natural play features, woodland trails, etc, but there is a lot to do before the deadline in September.

    We are running a Consultation event on Saturday 21st May, because we need to hear people’s views, and also gather evidence to include in our bid.

    Please come along!  Bring your bikes!  No hard work involved.  I will put up a gazebo and be organising a few bike games involving balloons, water pistols and tightropes. The idea is to attract people to Welshmill and sample their views about what they would like to see in the space.

    All help will be very welcome, so why not pop by? Fill in a questionaire! Help with the activities! Talk to people about the loveliness of biking in general and bike tracks in Frome in particular!

  • Dig Day this Sunday!

    Having generated a pretty good TO DO list at the last Dig Day we’ll be working our way through it with our main focus being to build a new Slam Berm on Spoons, in the style of WEEEEEEEEBOING (see photo). There’ll be an opportunity to scope out some new features on Puppets (top and bottom) and BBMS (at the bottom) too.

    We’ll spend some time planning out the new XC Blue Descent too, marking out the trail corridor, and even clearing some of it if we get enough helpers.

    We’ll also be looking to add to the TO DO list with any new trail or feature ideas as the day goes on.

    So that’s Sunday 10- 4.

    See you there!

  • Big Bang Theory

    Last Thursday night three bike riders (I won’t use the word cyclist it would be an exaggeration) set off on a jaunt around the hills of Blagdon and Black Coombe.

    We started out after a protracted journey due to road closures, and when we finally arrived were subjected to watching Malcolm screw even more bits onto his classic GT Timberline (1993)….prompting me to almost rip the allen key from his hand.

    Well eventually we set off down Loves Lane (no really..it’s not a euphemism) to get to the bottom of the coombe, involving chucking our steeds over a couple of gates…which is where the trouble began.

    I dropped the trusty Duster over the second gate, which was immediately followed by a loud bang and the rim dropping to the ground.

    Dave nearly wet himself with laughter, and proposed that it was the enormous weight of my Alfine hub that had caused the tube to explode.

    Personally I think it may just have been a dodgy tube…and was glad that it happened whilst stationary rather than on the cheese-grater style rocks of the coombe.

    Any which way I was more than a little disappointed as it was a new Slime Tube that had just gone bang, and there certainly wasn’t any self-healing going on.

    So off came the tyre, and out sprayedpoured the entire tubes worth of slime, what a mess…new tube in and off we set with me now looking like Shrek and the Duster having an interesting brown to green fade paint job.

    The rest of the ride was far more fun with dry, dusty rocky descents mixed with a few whoops and steep climbs through the woods and massive grins all round.

    Everyone felt chuffed to make it to the top of the coombe without bringing up a lung, and looked forward to the drop from the top back down into Blagdon.

    Brakes off and down we shot, Malcolm fighting with his fully rigid GT, when we met up at the bottom his eyeballs were still bouncing up and down in his skull. In typical Scots fashion he dismissed the idea of suspension and put his blurred vision down to a lack of riding gloves….fair play.

    Anyway good route, good weather and great company…it’s why we ride.

    P.S. it’s Daves birthday today…

  • Frisky bullocks

    Eight of the more foolhardy members of the Tuesday Nightriders had to demonstrate their cattle-wrangling skills last night when they joined the Anti-social group’s ride.
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    En route to some newly-found and much-hyped singletrack, they had to negotiate a series of field-edge bridleways the last of which contained a herd of very inquisitive and frisky bullocks. Not knowing quite how to deal with an approaching army of two-ton bovines, our intrepid band of non-farmers walked/trotted/ran their bikes through the enclosure, desperately trying not to start a stampede or spook the residents. Visions of that scene in Black Hawk Down where the Somali locals swarm on the doomed, crashed ‘copter, or that scene in LoTR where the orcs are chasing the Fellowship through the Dwarf Mines of Moria flashed through my mind… Anyhoo, we all made it safely through the farside gate (just) and nervously laughed-off the experience. Now on to the more serious stuff of enjoying what we had come for.
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    This singletrack nirvana was about a mile-and-a-half in length. Starting inconspicuously on nothing more than a deer-track through bluebells near the edge of the woodland, it continued unbroken for over two kilometres. It could easily be ridden in one continuous length, but this being new territory and under encroaching darkness, we paused three or four times to regroup. Occasionally dipping under the odd low deciduous branch in its early stages, it wound its way around the periphery of the wood. Soon it widened and became loamy as it dropped steeply down through conifers to the river, offering up some interesting roots, drops and dips to surmount along the way. From there it narrowed again and followed the watercourse downstream, twisting and rollercoastering between the trees and over fallen logs. A short, sharp, unrideable rise near the very end was the only major obstacle to interrupt the flow. By the time we emerged at its end onto some fireroad, eight white grins in the forested twilight indicated that we’d all ridden some of the finest singletrack on offer in Longleat.
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    We arrived back at the pub 22 miles and nearly three hours later, only to find it in darkness and no sign of the Social group… maybe they had fallen foul of those fire-breathing, man-eating young bulls…
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  • 3 Minute Gaps – Local Screening

    Thanks entirely to Jonny Ashelford we’re all going to be able to watch Clay Porter’s next film 3 Minute Gaps sooner than most (09 June · 20:00 – 23:00 at the Little Theatre Bath)!

    Check out the Facebook events page here for ticket info and make sure you buy them as soon as they go on sale so that you don’t miss out!

  • Bath Cycle Races

    Just a heads-up, really. Road-racing makes a return to Victoria Park in Bath for the next four Wednesday evenings. Many friends of mine from a previous life will either be organising or competing so I’m going along to watch (and wish, misty-eyed, that I was still that young and fit). If anyone from the BCC would like to join me in spectating, they’d be very welcome.

    This kind of closed-road circuit racing is fast and furious and given the narrow nature of the roads, chicanes and gradients in Vicky Park, it should make for some amazing viewing.

    If none of you have ever seen a circuit race, come and see what road bikes are really for and what proper fitness looks like! First race is this Wednesday evening (4th May), then 11th, 18th and 25th May. If anyone would like a lift, gimme a shout.

    Chas.

    “Bike Racing Returns to Victoria Park in Bath.

    It has been many years since the smell of embrocation has wafted around Victoria Park in Bath but it’s going to be back for four Wednesdays in May. Next month sees the exciting return of the Bath Cycle Races and with a slightly different format compared to your average bike race you’re promised some hard and fast racing from the off.
    With the support of Bath and North East Somerset Council, British Cycling and with the collaboration of four local cycling clubs (Somer Valley CC, Avonlea-Treasure RT, Velo Club Walcot and Bath CC) spectacular racing returns to Victoria Park each Wednesday evening in May with a 6.45pm start. And with an overall prize fund in excess of £2,000 the competition is bound to be fierce.
    Each race will be an action packed fifteen to thirty minutes long. There will be separate races for Youth A/B, 3rd and 4th category riders and women, with the evening of racing finishing with the Elite 1st and 2nd category race. Series leader and points leader jerseys will also be awarded after each round.”

  • Southerndownhill.com set up at the Allotment…

    This is a real family affair; with BCC Member Dan Irons (Fascade Photography) making this promotional video for Rob Lewis’s (a BCC Founding member) DH Race Team and TFTuned Shox (who are close friends of the BCC), and all the riding being filmed at The Allotment.

    It’s a great video, so watch it!

  • A crime we didn't commit

    On Thursday evening a crack litter picking team was sent to longleat forest by the BCC Committee for litter dropping crimes they didn’t commit. These men (and a woman) promptly went about picking litter all over the Longleat estate whilst riding bikes and doing skids. Today, still trying to work out why so many people left bags of poo all over the place, they survive as riders of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire… The BCC Litter Picking Team-crew-gang.

    Al, who had spent most of the evening wearing an unnecessary amount of jewellery and talking street, was keen to comment that “I ain’t gettin’ on no plane!” though we, like you, have no idea what the hell he was going on about.

    Chas Thursfield, who organised the pick declined to comment on Al’s oddness but was heard saying “I love it when a plan comes together” on a number of occasions.

    Say, are we a groovy, happenin’ bunch o’ guys, or what?

    Listen!