Coming down the north “face” of Fleet Moss at 100 Km/h takes some faith, but coming down at any speed with 50 Km/h gusts of wind that try to splatter you on the side of the mountain takes some balls! And balls were needed last sunday at the Etape du Dales. Buttertubs was just as…

I have been riding road tubeless tyres over the past 8-9 months and I have been extremely happy with them. When you ride the fastest tyre you have ridden, with all the desirable qualities such as grip and comfort AND it has sealed all the 5 punctures out of 5 picked up on all sorts…

Early spring is a time of the year when we start looking out of the window for challenges, yet most of the traditional Giro and Tour de France monster climbs are still closed for snow. Classic climbs like the Col du Galibier or Passo dello Stelvio don’t open until late May or even late June.…

Since I converted to tubeless tyres, I have been on the hunt for the perfect rim with a brake track, the one that ticks all the boxes. While Archetype ticks most boxes (wide, excellent quality, reasonable price, all drillings available, looking good, decent weight), it’s not a tubeless specific rim and it does not come…

To my surprise, there is still a lot of confusion about the different types of tyres you can fit on your bicycle, so I thought of writing a simple guide with pros and cons for the benefits of those who still feel a bit perplexed. There are currently three types of pneumatic tyre on the…

When Campagnolo went 11 speed what seems ages ago, it was seen as one too many cogs, but when Shimano moved the all range of their road group sets to 11 speed last autumn, that basically meant the days of 10 speed drivetrains are over. So, what to do? Stay on 9 speed, like I…

Whether you ride a top of the range lean and mean carbon machine, a heavy tourer or a tricycle, at some point you have probably experienced a wheel out of alignment. Typically panicking and seeking advice from your local workshop or the internet wisdom, the answer you got was most likely along the line of: “you hit…

The annoying thing about modern machines, to which bicycles are no exception, is that they rely on every single component, as well as the faultless assembly of them, to function. If you rewind fifty years, you would have probably struggled to find a single bicycle on the road that didn’t have some form of temporary…

In 2014 H plus Son Archetype established themselves as the rim of choice for pretty much any road based wheel set. The wider profile, great look, moderate weight, great choice of hole counts and robust build, combined with a very reasonable retail price strengthened their position as the benchmark. In my experience they build a great…

Two year on (updated Dec. 2014), a few updates on which spokes I like to use and which ones are best avoided. In wheel building, the choice of spokes and pattern determines whether a wheel will be stiff, light and durable, which are the three requirement one is typically asked to deliver, together with reasonably…