'Ultimate weekend' trip...

Guest appearances
(in alphabetical order)

Alex
BobK
Chris
DaveC
Mike
Ray
Sboy

Flying visit
'Bristols' Mikey & Emma bird

...oh yeah & me...

Well the old timers finally got round to doing a road trip & I have to say (& I think all there will agree) it was a wicked day out! Leaving Banbury with an Audi estate packed to capacity, Chris, Rayo BK & I were hitting up the M40 south bound around 8am.

Hooked up with Al, Dave, Sboy & Mike @ Wheatley services & after a brief exchange of pleasantries, we were fueled up & off to the legend that is Romford skatepark. Trip down was good & seemed to fly by, helped somewhat by a viewing of Baco 10 & RideOn on the old portable DVD player & chewing the cud over what the day ahead would hold...

After a near miss of junction 29 we were homing in on Romford & cutting our way through town to the park. Man if you didn't know exactly where Rom park is & how to gain entrance to it, I'm certain we could still be driving around there now!! props to the navigators for getting us there without a hitch then. With excitement building from all, we were all scrambling to bolt on front wheels etc & get in on some BMX freestyle action!

The guy on the door was well sound, eating his toast & butter & talking about where we had journeyed from & giving info on the park (always makes a difference when the people running the place give more than a shit for who's actually paying to ride their park). Upon crossing the threshold, approximately 20+ years of expectations of Rom were realized - holy shit! those bowls are deep! After establishing a base for all our bags & a few yoga stylee stretches, it was off exploring what was on offer today & I can't see anyone going away, disappointed, from this place...

We all worked our ways around the park checking out each bowl with large grins on faces, a few trains here & there, steady down the snake run, trying to get the bottle up to roll into the big bowl (er..no) & generally having a blast. My problem with places like Rom is I get far too excited & usually end up over doing it, going & going & going until I'm completely fucked! well today was no exception & I'm still recovering 2 days later...ha!

The day was a complete success, everyone rode well & had some good stuff down, the weather was good, no 'local' attitudes at the park & it put us all in the 'must do this again soon' frame of mind...

Thanks to Alex for getting the thing organized, Ray for the driving down & back, everyone that came for the good time & Milkey for trekking across from Reading Fest for an all too short session.

cheers all!

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where's my bike at?

Milkey trying to look happy with soaking wet feet!

chill out time

Base camp

Alex - text book table

Sorry I didn't get fotos of everyone, I'm hoping Sunil's superior camera skills will provide all the evidence required but safe to say, everyone rode well & had a good time.

Zen & the art of bicycle maintenance...

Bit of a strange one this, I love working on my bike. I know everyone doesn't like to spend an age dialling in their ride as they would rather be out riding (you can tell from the rattles & clanking that emanates from some of the bikes I see at the ramps ;-) but I can't seem to stop messing with mine! Is this some form of O.C.D? Or a substitute for various 'habits' of my formative years?!?

Whatever, I find myself wanting to take stuff apart all the time & try to find ways of making it better or modifying it in some small (or big) way... I spent far too much time fitting my cranks last weekend, they had to be perfect, I can't abide anything that isn't just right on my bike, it plays on my mind... But do you really need a vernier, a slide rule & a quantity of graph paper to fit a set of hollowbites!?!?! (OK - I didn't use a slide rule or the paper but you get my drift...)

So is this normal? Have I taken leave of my senses? Or is this some form of 'addiction' to bicycle maintenance? I don't smoke or drink alcohol & have absolutely no desire to do so either but I find myself becoming irritable if I can't twist a spoke wrench, torque down a few wheel nuts or spend the odd couple of hours toeing in a brake block or two. I think that part of this is because I don't have my bikes at home due to my housing 'situation' at present.

Obviously some of my friends find this beneficial, after all it saves them having to learn the intricacies of building a beautiful, perfectly functioning BMX bike...

back to BMX...

Hey doods!

Been in Newquay for a week, very nice it was too ;-) saw some guy cruising around town on a Diamond Back Viper, all chrome with laid back post, Skyways, number plate, all good! was gonna stop him for a foto of the bike.... So how was the jam? I see nick put some fotos up but can anyone tell me what went down??? need some 'bike fix' if you catch ma drift!?!? looking forward to hooking up with you all soon then...

cheers