Day 264 (Sunday)

Got up and did normal Sunday house tidy, had a quick check on the current weather, according to Lyneham it showed -2.9 Deg C!!!! so decided to leave cycle ride until after lunch and we took dog for a walk instead :-) A side shoot of the river was frozen!

After we got back I had lunch then set of for a cycle ride (By this time the weather had warmed to -1)

I set of on my 'normal 25' unfortunately either the cable or the rear dérailleur now needs a little adjustment as the chain is not happy running in the high gear, I did stop and give it a quick tweak which made it a little better but not yet right!

Other than the high gear issue (which I avoided by being in 1 gear lower) the bike seemed really smooth and it was a fun ride :-) If not a little cold



According to the cycle computer I cycled 25.63 miles in 1hour 46 minutes.

I will stick the Dawes on the turbo trainer tonight, back off the cable adjustment and set the dérailleur up properly :-) I cant stand things not working properly!

I have had a very successful Christmas break, I promised myself 25 miles a day, which should have been 11 days @ 25 miles = 275, I actually did 288.75 miles in 10 days (I was ill on new years day), Ohhhhh I do feel good about myself :-) Now all I need is a nice dry day so I can take the Merida out on the 20 mile ride to see how much better I am!

..............Ohhhhhhh I just fixed the gears! (6:37 pm)
I put the Dawes on the turbo as promised and found that I had routed the chain over a guide on the dérailleur (Between the two Jockey wheels) where it should have gone under! All because the darn chain tool I used was crap! It did however give me the incentive to remove the two jockey wheels and clean/grease up the bearings.

The gears all work properly now! and the chain has been cleaned/oiled and has not been adversely affected by its misadventure.

I think however I will use and abuse the Dawes over the rest of the winter and give it another new chain in the spring just to be sure!