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Live blog: Specialist bike shop Ubyk reportedly ceases trading – but has it found a buyer? Team Sky sacrifice aero gains for festive spirit; County Down cycle lane cleared by ‘bloke with shovel’ + more
In today’s cheesy festive pro promo vid of the day, Team Sky are apparently ‘cold’ in Mallorca, so the wagon stepped in to give them something festive to warm up…
Thu, Dec 20, 2018 15:19
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Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn’t especially like cake.
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Gm_Crop 7 hours ago
I'll counter that by saying the Bryton 750se I have drives me nuts at times. Inconsistantly picks up on routes created on Komoot and the app re-syncs every few seconds when trying to set up the device and sends me back to the home screen. The most infuriating one is that I turned live track on. Once. It now won't turn off and repeatedly flags up the live track is starting, and then disconnecting every few seconds whilst riding. I haven't timed it but it wouldn't suprise me if 10-20% of the time the the screen is covered with an error message. That's been about 6 weeks now. Other than that it's great :/
IanGlasgow 7 hours ago
RE: Police launch road safety operation... by clamping down on cyclists using footbridge Meanwhile in Glasgow, Police Scotland are riding their motorbikes over the pedestrian and cyclists only bridge. https://x.com/FietserGlasgow/status/2065106152917012523?s=20
Rendel Harris 9 hours ago
@Paul J Van Schip certainly seems a bit of a dick, but he's a European and multiple World Champion on the track, pretty sure you don't get there without having some talent in your legs.
Bill H 9 hours ago
Poor Vincent cannot get over the simple fact that given the choice people prefer dedicated cycling spaces, rather than pretending to be cars like vehicular cyclists.
pbunyon 9 hours ago
What is the point of the fancy air sensor if it can't account for changing weather conditions?? If all you care about is a delayed approximation of aerodynamic watts in steady conditions, you don't need any special sensors for that. Just your speed on a decently flat course is enough to approximate rolling resistance and drivetrain losses. And the rest must be aero. If you assume a less aero body position at the same watts, your speed will drop while rolling resistance also drops, which means approximated aero watts goes up. And that's enough to demonstrate what you've shown in your testing protocol ("I sat upright and the number went up a little while later").
chrisonabike 10 hours ago
Your correction is accurate - it's almost always been "the (lack of) thought that (doesn't) count". "Massive" - less than a billion a year spent on active travel (trying to catch up / building a network across the entire country) Not massive - 6 billion every year (2026-2030) spent on road *maintenance* of existing "already built, goes everywhere, very convenient" road network for inactive travel Ultimately the reason "cycle infra" is *needed* is those unbelievably colossal amounts spent every year (and for more than a century now) on making mass motoring not just viable but apparently the "best choice" for most journeys. As the Dutch and others have shown, the majority of people *are* prepared to cycle and even mix with very light, slow local motor traffic *if* cycling is also made safe and convenient for the whole of their journey (including secure parking at both ends). (The history of the financial drivers of the current situation are a complex topic but note that while people complain about "crumbling roads" and underfunded motor infra - with some reason - by us continuing the fuel duty escalator freeze (for example) we're actually helping motorists pay *even less* for that activity / subsidising more of the cost of driving than ever.)
belugabob 10 hours ago
yes, but people will still object - which was my point.
Astralstroll 12 hours ago
So ' Priority of Road Users' and 1.5 metre clearance at 30mph has been been reduced to 'sharing'? NCN route 2 here in South Hams is an absolute scream with white vans, tractors and total idiots who refuse,or are totally incapable,to reverse on high Devon banked lanes ...means you have to get off and pedal back to a passing place....could be at that all day...so I don't bother...
Mr Anderson 13 hours ago
@MaxiMinimalist Agreed. The big problem I see now is today's parents grew up being driven to their schools, and therefore, see private motor vehicles as the only viable form of transport. The vast majority of UK infant and primary schools have a catchment area that is within easy walking distance from home to school. Yet, the traffic caused by pupils being driven to/from school is astonishing. Banishing the "School Run" should be a priority for all schools.
MaxiMinimalist 14 hours ago
When I was a kid (that was during the previous millenium when phones were connected to a plug in the wall), I rode my bicycle to school, music academy, sport grounds, parties even during the winter. The government didn't have to spend, correct that, didn't have to think of spending massive amounts of money to build cycling specific infrastructures. Over the past 3 or 4 decades, cars have grown bigger, taller, safer (for their drivers) and faster. Meanwhile, motorists have become abusive, aggressive, hypersensitive to people moving on two wheels, aka cyclists. Spending billions upon billions on new infrastructure won't address the crux of the matter. Sadly.
19 thoughts on “Live blog: Specialist bike shop Ubyk reportedly ceases trading – but has it found a buyer? Team Sky sacrifice aero gains for festive spirit; County Down cycle lane cleared by ‘bloke with shovel’ + more”
Well done Terry, is there
Well done Terry, is there some sort of award road.cc could give him?
Had something similar last year, with overgrowing foliage blocking the local paths, so I got the battery powered hedge trimmer out and sorted it myself, didn’t even bother wasting my time asking the council.
burtthebike wrote:
The cordless Hedge Trimmer is the tool of power for those in a similar position, you can do so much in so little time with them and they re about as safe as they possibly can be to use… weve kept a 7.4km long greenway clear for over five years using two of them !
scrapper wrote:
Nice one.
I’m kind of hoping that you use two of them yourself – one in each hand, swinging your arms in great circles whilst letting out a rampaging war cry against foliage.
HawkinsPeter wrote:
The cordless Hedge Trimmer is the tool of power for those in a similar position, you can do so much in so little time with them and they re about as safe as they possibly can be to use… weve kept a 7.4km long greenway clear for over five years using two of them !
— scrapper Nice one. I’m kind of hoping that you use two of them yourself – one in each hand, swinging your arms in great circles whilst letting out a rampaging war cry against foliage.— burtthebike
Juggling them surely?
Whilst rending the air with screams against the austerity that means the councils don’t have the resources to trim a hedge anymore.
burtthebike wrote:
Technically, it only counts as juggling if you use less hands than objects, so for two hedge trimmers you’d have to use one hand (which to be fair is quite feasible – ex-juggler here).
HawkinsPeter wrote:
Sorry, but that picture would only count if it was a squirrel juggling the shears or the man juggling sharpened squirrels.
burtthebike wrote:
Tough crowd!
HawkinsPeter wrote:
Oh no it’s not!
CygnusX1 wrote:
Is this some kind of joke to you?
HawkinsPeter wrote:
All a bit soft really that, a real man juggles chain saws in a ring of fire
burtthebike wrote:
Please send that man my road.cc socks, which I am going to win of course.
Elf and Safety gone mad,
Elf and Safety gone mad, innit?
If its not safe for a council worker to walk along with a broom then surely it is not safe as a cycle lane / pedestrian footway either. Ciouncil effectively admitting that the infrastructure they built is not fit for purpose.
Or if its safe enough for pedestrians and cyclists surely a bloke with a hand cart and broom or even a snazzy little pavement sweeper EV could manage to negotiate it without dying a gruesome death?.
Astonishingly, are not liable
Astonishingly, councils/authorities are not liable for “accretions” on the highway, and councils hide behind this to avoid keeping roads clean.
(Section 41(1) of the Highways Act 1980).
I wonder if tory Cllr Susan
I wonder if tory Cllr Susan Webb also considers the billions spent on building more roads to encourage more people to drive everwhere “vanity projects”? Or is that particular epithet only applicable to schemes to get people out of their cars.
^^ forget the ring of fire,
^^ forget the ring of fire, real men wear a neckerchief and no shirt ^^
Ubyk saga on STW. Long read
Ubyk saga on STW. Long read but the new owner appears to discuss the situation in more detail.
hopster wrote:
Aside from the shittyness of losing money to a fraudulent company, that’s an amusing thread in the typical STW competition for stupid prize and other internet stalking (for the wrong person, obvs) wankery.. Hat off to the new owner, even after the demands that he pays out for the previous owner’s shenanigans, and suppliers stepping in.
Head down TTing kills. Not a
Head down TTing kills. Not a great advert really. Plus, his helmet with the head down is so un-aero that he is being overtaken by a lovely lady on her shopping bike! Pahhh!
The old Ubyk owners seen like
The old Ubyk owners seen like scam artists after reading stw. New owner seems daft wanting to use a name with much bad will associated.