Live blog: Kangaroo takes out cyclist, rider turns bike into boat to clear plastic waste from London waterways, and more

@Rendel Harris I don’t agree that a light gravel wheelset is expected to withstand impacts from rocks. Yes, it should be able to withstand potholes and also a cross country track, but if ridden directly into a rock, I would expect any carbon wheelset to be finished.

Something worth a mention in indoor cycling accessories is a rocker plate. Long rides on an indoor trainer can start to hurt after a while, and a decent rocker plate gives enough side to side and fore/aft movement to help prevent this. I acquired a TurboRocks Realplate React a year or so ago, it's very well made and the service from order to collection was excellent. It took a few weeks to get used to it, until the motion felt natural, but after that, longer sessions became much more comfortable. My current setup:

@eburtthebike now wondering if anyone has looked at the possible benefits of promoting cycling *goggles*, since the eyes are very easily injured but also easily protected. Presumably rather rare, but eye damage can have massive impact on someone's life...

The horizontal component will mean that on impact there's drag and so torque (not good) but that energy will mostly be dissipated over time (sliding) so much less peak force (ignoring torque briefly). ...but isn't the fate of many crashing motorcyclists decided when their flight / slide is checked by encountering a horizontal surface? If they do that with their head that torque could fatally damage the neck / brain, or their head / helmet then absorbs the likely much greater energy than the vertical fall. So the horizontal part matters - albeit still subject to the limited ability of currently practical helmets to help. Sounds like a good idea to wear one regardless of exactly how much it mitigates any of these risks. Not only keeps the law (and the in-laws?) happy but keeps debris out of your eyes, your ears from being blasted by so much wind, rain off your head etc. All of which would be very distracting and could well contribute to crashing in the first place. Bicycle helmets - slightly different calculation for me, since a hat and glasses do much of that and I'm rarely at wind-noise-deafening speed. Although abrasion protection is (and has been) welcome.

@theslowcyclistxx Completely agree. Or at least 4. The truth is that it is possible to crack a gravel, road, or a MTB rim if you are riding fast down a road with sharp rocks that stick out. It has happened to me before on rough roads. Notice that tire pressure, the width of tire used, etc were not mentioned. It is hard for me to imagine that "Value" is only three stars. None of the other wheels mentioned are anywhere near the weight of this wheelset. How Scribe's and Hunt's wheelsets have the same value ranking, despite the Particle one being 350g lighter despite being cheaper makes no sense.

On Picnic-PostNL, some interesting details from Nicolas Roche in NOS, "I think this management is not suitable for cycling. In cycling, we deal with a lot of variables. It's not a predictable sport. The body is not a perfect machine. We have to contend with weather conditions and also the tactics of 24 other teams. I understand that people want a master plan to be prepared, but they can't already be planning the seventeenth stage of the Tour de France in May. And that’s what they did." What did it mean to you that the bond between the coach and the rider wasn’t appreciated? "It wasn’t valued to maintain friendships. I find that strange. I remember that during the big tours, I got a different masseur every three days. For every rider, that massage is a moment of rest, or a chance to open up, call your wife, or just go over the day. I strongly disagreed with making changes with the sole purpose of ensuring we wouldn’t develop a friendly relationship with the masseur." Why were they so fixated on breaking those strong personal relationships? "A mystery. Maybe because in the past, masseurs often transported doping for riders? But I don’t know the real answer."

@NickSprink Didn't some people successfully threaten - er .. I mean protest - a council's installation of bike hangars? (I can't recall how this one ended but the IIRC the council contractors decided that discretion was the better part of valour, at least at the time).

It would be interesting to understand if this type of design is working simply by moving your hand position and centre of gravity, or whether it's as an enabler for keeping each on a larger frame. If you have (or could get) 2 bikes, one in your normal size and one a size up and put this stem on the bigger bike, does it then make sense? Much easier for you to try than us readers. (Oh, and side point, did you try adjusting the suspension to account for the rearwards CoG move?)

@OnYerBike Elsewhere on this post I've complained about the older button sequence and believe the newer implementation would suit me better. Having so many functions being controlled by a single button necessitates compromises. I'd prefer one button for on/off, one for brightness h/m/l and one for flash on/off and the brightness and flash remembered the last setting - but acknowledge there isn't much space on my Sirius.

@Bezzard74 Berry It may not be hard for you! On my, now comparatively old, Exposure Sirius the instructions to set flashing are "With the light already on in any constant brightness setting, press and hold the button for roughly 1 to 2 seconds, then let go. The beam will switch into its flashing/pulsing sequence." So that's a hold just longer than the hold to change brightness ,but not so long that it switches off the light completely - get it wrong and you have to cycle through the brightness modes again for another try, or everything's just gone dark - fantastic. I shouldn't have to practice how to confidently perform such a simple activity as setting my bike light to flash - and as my username suggest, I am a percussionist! This isn't a complaint that it unique to Exposure - I've a Moon front light which has an equally obtuse means of operation.