Cyclokairos

A confession. One of my bikes, The Red Bike, falls far short of the cyclcokairos mark. It not only has disc brakes but, steady yourself, they are hydraulic. I hang my head in shame.

Of course, Cyclokairos is a broad church, with all welcome (within reason – carbon ain’t getting in, for a start). All my bikes have evolved with a little tinkering here and there, and there are still changes I’d make to them, as I seek to match a certain ethos. My bikes aren’t a perfect finality but imperfect transients – nothing is finished. The closet I’ve seen to the perfect bike recently, is this Roberson one. With a few changes and additions, it’s where I see The Black Bike heading – an all-road tourer: a front and rear rack, lower gearing, bar-end shifters, a leather saddle, and a silver headset (I’ve mentioned how much the current one annoys me aesthetically, right?). It would be no match of the Roberson for sheer beauty and craftsmanship (those lugs!) but closer to a function it better suits. In my last post, I contrasted it’s ride quality to that of The Purple Bike (That Is Also White): it lacks a certain springiness, but loaded up I can see it being ideal for slowly cruising along.

Back to The Red Bike. I use The Ordnance Survey app to plan new routes. But featuring unfamiliar tracks and bridleways, I’m never quite sure how they’ll pan out. If I was true to the spirit of The Rough Stuff Fellowship, I would tackle them on a relatively skinny tyred, under-geared bike. Nice in theory, less so in practice. In the absence of a Rivendell Appaloosa (now that does tick many of the Cyclokairos boxes), The Red Bike has wide enough tyres and low enough gearing for tackling whatever rough stuff my new-route planning offers up.

My latest bridleway-bagging exploits took me to the nearby North Cotswolds, the car park at the top of Dover’s Hill the starting point.

Preparations were underway for the Cotswold Olimpicks. They predate the modern ones by 200 odd years, and the events differ somewhat. But what’s not to like about shin-kicking and spurning-the-barre? I took the road (National-Hill-Climb steep; I’ve come up the other way before – that was hard) down to Weston Subedge, seeking out the bridleway that runs parallel. An old track according to the Ordnance Survey map – it’s labelled as part of the Roman road Buckle Street / Ryknild Street. The Red bike was the right choice: it’s the bike with the widest tyres (2.25”) and lowest gearing (26×42) in my possession. I slogged up and even crossed a mighty waterway with ease.

When wool was worth something, much money was made in the Cotswolds. There’s still plenty of sheep and one was captivated by my Pantani-esque ascent.

It was sealed roads for a while afterwards – 2.25” tyres, whose idea was that? Their humming an accompaniment to the pedestrian progress. “Ah, but suppleness it what matters. Not width”, I hear you cry. I know, I know. But financial realities kick in from time to time, and The Red Bike is not shod with Rene Herses but rather On-One Smorgasbords (whatever they are – well, cheap for a start). The Red Bike is functional, doing the job at the cost of looks.

It came my way during The Lull: a period of time when I was sick of cycling – at least the type of cycling I was doing. This was the bike I was mainly using, a classy Italian steed with a lot of Campagnolo.

I became obsessed with units: km/h, rpm, bpm……..and I lost interest, no longer enjoying cycling. I did some running, played some 5-a-side and hardly touched a bike. Eventually I bought a Charge Cooker mountain bike that was on offer. The suspension fork was ultimately ditched, the groupset and handlebars changed, and it became The Red Bike – a bikepacking rig of some sort. It has elements I like, skinny steel tubes for the frame and fork. The latter is a Salsa Firestarter, and has all the braze ones you need and huge clearances.

The groupset is Shimano XT, and works flawlessly – of course it does, it’s Shimano. But the looks don’t convince. Like so many modern-day road and mountain bike componentry, it has a brutal look. The car industry is no different – what happened to elegant cars? It seems to be all brutalised-hatchback-on-steroids SUVs.

This is an elegant chainset and front derailleur.

The bars are Velo Orange Crazy bars. I got them for the variety of hand positions they offer but the aero-bar look is a turn off (the bag is a keeper though).

In fact, I encountered the inspiration for the bars later on in the ride.

Oh yes, the ride. It was empty country lanes past Broadway Tower and Snowshill Manor, then even emptier bridleways (didn’t meet a soul the whole time – bliss) from Welshman’s Hedge Wood onwards. I managed to stay off-road for a fair few miles, heading mainly east then briefly south to Hinchwick Manor. The bridleways were the norm – single and double tracks; sometimes rutted but also smooth grassy trails at times.

After Hinchwick Manor, a sharp climb into The Warren, as I skirt above the route I had just ridden. The direction north-east to Blockley. A red kite provided company for a while, swifts as well. The land is agricultural: for livestock, arable too.

It was good to see concessions to the untamed. A field left fallow, dotted with poppies.

Field margins, unkempt, give wildflowers a chance.

Out of Blockley, a left turn between houses, led to a bridleway. It was a steep climb that mellowed into another grassy track.

I pick up The Monarch’s Way, and a rapid descent takes me to Broad Campden. Through Chipping Campden, and one last climb up Dyer’s Lane to where I began. A decent jaunt, The Red Bike did its job, but imagine how much more stylish it would have been on a Rivendell.