Our live blog can sometimes be slow to load so you may need to refresh your browser if it’s taking too long.
Live blog: Vuelta highlights, jobless Aqua Blue riders make best of it by going on epic bikepacking adventure + more
All today’s news from the site and beyond
Thu, Sep 06, 2018 14:41
Help us to bring you the best cycling content
If you’ve enjoyed this article, then please consider subscribing to road.cc from as little as £1.99. Our mission is to bring you all the news that’s relevant to you as a cyclist, independent reviews, impartial buying advice and more. Your subscription will help us to do more.
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
16 Comments
Read more...
Read more...
Read more...
Latest Comments
Tradescant 1 hour ago
@jackcycles I'm not sure my grandchildren got that memo. Cycling should not be just for hardened road warriors.
DS2025 2 hours ago
Chrisonabike There are a number of police forces in England and Wales that are using portable testing equipment already... How effective it is another matter, I haven't looked into the results of failing (I would hope they just seize and crush the motorbike without any faff but I am sure there are appeal processes, promises not to use them on public roads etc).
KiwiMike 2 hours ago
Woah there - a precision-engineered European-made product, with unparalleled adaptability, is somehow a ‘rip off’? Compared to what - Temu? As per the article, most quality through-axles go for £50-60+, but aren’t adaptable and don’t provide any stand or trailer capability. If you want to balance your £3-4-5k suspension or carbon bike, or bikepacking setup on a budget product subject to highly focused stresses, fair play. Cycling’s a broad church.
Dnnnnnn 2 hours ago
@eburtthebike I've found Spanish drivers to be almost entirely excellent around cyclists.
neilmck 3 hours ago
I agree, the study was made after cycle paths that had been introduced in Berlin during the 70’s and 80’s caused a big increase in cycling deaths. It is an interesting study for cyclists to read in order to know what dangers exist at badly designed junctions. Here in Paris we have very few bi-directional paths. The ones I have cycled on have no building entrances or courtyards (so no cars crossing the path) and every junction is traffic lights to prevent accidents.
thrawed 3 hours ago
We have enough regulation. They're running a motorbike without insurance/registration and possibly without a licence, and the punishment for being caught with all that is pretty severe already. The problem is lack of enforcement.
chrisonabike 4 hours ago
In my experience with anything less than one of those serious mid-bike two-foot kickstands, a wall / tree / hedge is the better option, or the bike will sometimes show you the alternative and lie down by itself. Maybe I've got panniers that are just too large and the wrong balance of (too much) cargo though? And of course Edinburgh streets are great at funneling gusts of wind...
chrisonabike 4 hours ago
I agree there's a clear legal line * but I do see something here. Like much tech it's entirely opaque from the outside (without even invoking things like the VW emissions cheating).** I know in NL they have trialled semi-portable "test stations" to check max motor speeds. However with the latest "but there's no money" crisis I can't see that over here. Indeed it's hard to see the police being motivated to do any more roads policing, with this even further down the priority list. Hope I'm wrong... While I guess many of us *would* be fine with EAPCs as a means to attract "non-cyclists" ... perhaps there's an "attractive nuisance" element to this? We're ushering people into an apparently effortless, easy and minimal consequence mobility mode without the "learning experience" of managing a lighter, unpowered machine on roads. And it's still (busy) *roads* where the new power-assisted riders will often find themselves. Not like in more advanced countries where people usually cycle in much safer and more controlled environments. OTOH we should always balance such concerns against "but cars and full-power ICE motorbikes now" though! Number plates, licences and insurance aren't necessarily mitigating that well... * As soon as there are laws games will be played. How long can you be above the "continuous rate power" for? Can we have *multiple* legal motors on one machine? ** Is the power / speed actually regulated by software, and how long will that keep a child armed with the internet from unlocking it?
Zazz53 4 hours ago
And maybe a planning obligation to have traffic Marshalls controlling access out of the site not obstructing the path and restricting it if cyclists are likely to be obstructed …one can hope
Bob Sprocket 4 hours ago
I'll stick to my low rider with Karrimor Kalahari dry bag panniers and Karrimor Kalahari barbag thanks.
16 thoughts on “Live blog: Vuelta highlights, jobless Aqua Blue riders make best of it by going on epic bikepacking adventure + more”
So that’s where the sheffield
So that’s where the sheffield ofo bikes end up!
Well done Daniel, even if the
Well done Daniel, even if the perp seemed a rather sad person. I’m sure the police will learn the lesson and equip all officers with a decent bike to catch criminals on foot.
burtthebike wrote:
Yeah, felt a twinge of sympathy for him there.
Re. Tavistock Place. All that
Re. Tavistock Place. All that fuss (how long in consultation?!?) and looking at the map it’s about 50 inches long.
The taxi lobby in london have too much power.
StoopidUserName wrote:
it’s part of a very significant cycle corridor. It’s been a cycle lane for years, maybe 10 years – I’ve been using it for at least seven years. I use it a lot more now that they’ve replaced the previous kerbs separating the lanes. This is a good result.
What they need to do now is resurface Tottenham Court Road, which is pit-holed to fuck.
I love these professionals
I love these professionals doing their bike tour just for the hell of it. I wonder how many accountants lose their job but then go off and do some double-entry bookkeeping together for a couple weeks, just because.
So dark shoes aren’t even
So dark shoes aren’t even acceptable now. Get Sir Chris Boardman on the case.
Organon wrote:
They have form for bringing this shit up for motorcyclists on their FB page too, they never apply this to car drivers, bunch of victim blaming cretins. HC needs to be changed ASAP, lighting regs need changing too. Get rid of reflector requirements and static and/or british Standard lights because that’s so ridiculously out of date.
If you can’t see any person or vehicle on the road during the day or at night by your own headlights then you’re travelling too fast, driving distracted or not competent mentally or physically to be allowed on the road other than by foot
So, ignore your own rules to victim blame, wankpuffins
BehindTheBikesheds wrote:
As you no longer drive a car, thought you might be interested to see this from a drivers point of view.
Please note that as a driver, I don’t want to see you at the range of my headlights, I want to see you at the greatest distance possible even if that is 1/2 a mile away so that I can adjust speed, take road position and generally plan well ahead for your presence. Even to the extent of protecting you from other traffic.
As for dark shoes? In this video, pretty much the only visibility of the peds is motion of their light coloured trainers.
Mungecrundle wrote:
You have so much to learn about safe driving and what the statement in the HC means. You can’t even grasp that driving faster because you can see stuff further means shortened thinking time, massively increased braking time and more incidents.
Congratulations on proving how much you know about safety, the sqaure root of nowt.
BehindTheBikesheds wrote:
Who said anything about driving faster? I think I was explicit in stating that I want to see vulnerable road users at the earliest possible moment exactly so I can plan for their safety.
Probably best that you have given up the car. Not only are your driving skills rusty but your powers of critical thinking are also on the wane.
Anyway, winter is coming (in Sean Bean accent) so another season to test out your theory and maybe as the nights draw in you will be able to regale us with a few more anecdotes of incidents where drivers claim not to have seen you.
I’m finding that dog really
I’m finding that dog really annoying today. Look at its grin, and its puffed-up stance. Little git.
It’s gonna be a long Friday… roll on the weekend.
davel wrote:
Grumpy today, are we?
davel wrote:
Haters gonna hate.
Much better now. Chris bless
Looking at the vid, Munge has
Looking at the vid, Munge has a point. Once the light starts to fail why stack the odds outside your favour? You can make your point that drivers SHOULD see you in your ninja gear and maybe they should but the reality is they need a helping hand. God knows what sort of people are out there.
I had eye surgery the other day and whilst I was walking back to the car (wife drove!) with a patch on one eye and the other blurred to hell, I said to her “I bet there’s people out there with worse sight than me at the moment”. I bet there are. Don’t become a pair of shoes you see at the last moment. Maybe you can’t get Rapha in hi-viz but whatever.
Flashing xmas tree posse in tha house!