You’re not getting our money you scumbags. Trying to book a trip to Spain for my birthday.. online check-in this, ?30 for checking in bags, non-EU citizens have to pay extra..
Your procedures are a fucking shambles and I’d rather and now WILL spend my money elsewhere.
What am I ranting about? Read about Ryanair’s Online Check-in Scam.
UPDATE: Still not flown with these bastards since, don’t worry. Just thought this was worth adding:
My Aristarco EMA 75 coffee grinder is finally at home.
Professional coffee grinder with a 1 kg. hopper capacity, adjustable coffee doser from 4.5 gr. to 8 gr. Grinding production per hour up to 8 kg. It made of painted light alloy with grinding wheel in special steel of 64 mm of diameter. In the automatic model the grinder starts to restore automatically the grinded coffee level into the batch as soon the coffee fall to the minimum quantity.
Dimensions (W,D,H) W=200 D=400 H=550 mm
Input power 230V~50 Hz
Power 380 W
Revolutions per minute 1400 r/min.
Grinding flat blades diam. 64 mm.
Colour Metal gray
Total weight 12 Kg
Put myself in Group B (3.5-4hr for 100k) and for some reason so did Richard and John. They then proceeded to drive the bunch for most of the 100k ride. At a couple of points I found myself in the lead before quickly heading back to my normal wheelsucking location. Since I’d dropped the chain on the Ashdown I’d kind of decided to ride this reliability trial in the big ring and not bother changing down.. I think this was the reason behind me appearing to be ‘good at climbing’.. I mean, come on fellas!
John and I ended up on the front for the final 5-10k and were complemented for holding the pace together. I think we were just too busy talking bollocks to worry about putting the hammer down. With such a relaxed finish it was surprise to find we’d come in in about 3:20 (3:08 ride time on my PT) for the 95k(ish). The route appeared to have been cut a bit short – I think due to dodgy roads since the snow. According to Rich, we actually beat the ‘fast’ A group time. Ha!
I appear to have failed dismally with the recovery from this ride, skipping turbo Tuesday and its catch up on Thursday. I feel less guilty (perhaps) since I’m reading Joe Friel’s Cyclists Training Bible where he makes a point of “if in doubt, leave it out”. My issue appears to be I’m leaving out ALL my training! :S
www.guardian.co.uk – Australian bushfire death toll its worst ever
www.telegraph.co.uk – ‘Black Saturday’ worst blaze in country’s history
While we have the heaviest snowfalls in 18 years, my thoughts are with those who are suffering or have lost property or loved ones to the bushfires in Victoria.
Activist comedian Mark Thomas draws up a map of Britain that reveals the places the government and the establishment do not want the public to know about, disproves the claim that the government is an ‘open’ institution, and looks at the secret democracy that Britain really is. (Channel4, 2002)
Click for bigger version of my phone cam photo.
The 2009 Hell of the Ashdown sportive didn’t quite deliver the fire and brimstone I was expecting. How sad it’s only Melbourne burning up. Instead they turned on a different kind of hell.. a daily maximum temperature of 0 degC.. yes.. ZERO degrees celsius and snow.. yes, my Australian friends.. that white stuff that falls from the sky.. SNOW!
I knew it was going to be cold so I had on two pairs of socks, a head warmer and cap and arm warmers under my jacket. I missed my planned train to Orpington (last night’s vodka and a headwind conspired against me) so my start time was around 10:10 after Rollapaluza CC member Ant lead me from Orpington to the start (he lives local).
After a kilometre downhill there was a steep (25% at the end) climb. Nice warmup, thanks guys! Here I caught up with Matt and Estelle from LFGSS/Rollapaluza and we rode together for a bit (it’s always nice to have a bit of company to pass the miles) until we hit a T-junction with no direction sign and I followed another rider while they consulted directions. It seems a few people made the same mistake but I found myself back with some bunches and carried on.
The wind meant that any flat road was hard work. The hills (here’s a list of the big ones: 1. Cudham Test Hill 2. Toys Hill 3. Hollow Lane (Dormansland) 4. Kidds Hill/Ashdown Forest (THE WALL) 5. ?Col de Groombridge? 6. Bayley?s Hill 7. Star Hill) were hard work and even the descents were a bit of a worry due to the likelihood of encountering my arch enemy – “black ice”. You could see frozen pools on the side of the road in a lot of places and in some spots the water run-off had flowed across the road and then frozen. VERY slow through these. This was only a training ride for me and I’d easily made the decision to ride it safely rather than try to bust out a fast (for me) time.
After climbing Kidds Hill aka “The Wall”, around the half-way point, I met Claus (another Rolla rider). We finished our bananas and rolled out. He was faster than me climbing so I was going to let him go but I seemed to hang on and then.. well.. he just kinda disappeared. He mentioned going pretty hard in the first 50k.. pacing my friend, pacing 🙂
I carried on alone from here and it was now snowing quite heavily. The wind gusted snow drifts across the roads and into your eyes, making for some interesting cycling! There were a few stages where all I could do was remove my shades and drop my head, following the trails left in the snow by previous riders. I stopped a couple of times here to try and find out what was making the odd noise from the bottom bracket or rear wheel of my bike but didn’t find anything. Rolled through the second checkpoint without taking anything on, since the bloke said “only 15 miles to go”.
After this I kept looking at my computer. This is a sign that I’m not really having that much fun! 🙂 “How far have I got to go?!” I was so glad to have worn the extra clothing but the wind, snow and hills had taken their toll. Riding up Star Hill, I was under the impression it was the last major climb but another guy in SEUR kit suggested there was another 25% climb to go. Not looking forward to that. Still, on we plodded on, all the while expecting another climb and low and behold it never appeared! Woo! The finish line!
I crossed the line in 3:59:53 – not bad considering the horrible conditions and the 1500m of climbing.
Claus, Matt, Estelle and I sat down with some coffee/tea and food before going our separate ways back to London. Of course I got slightly lost going back to Orpington – via that horrid 25% starting climb – Cudham Test Hill I guess it was. My hands were so cold and painful on the train I thought I’d got frost bite or something! The circulation did return fully however, allowing me to ride home from London Victoria in one piece. All in all this was quite a challenging day, due for the most part to the weather conditions. It’s a good little ride being so close to London. Give it a go.
Oh yeah, BIG THANKS to the poor marshalls and organisers who had to stand out in the cold all day for us! You guys rock!