Review: Cannondale Jekyll 700
In the beginning: Lust and Longing
Long, long time ago, I can still remember when... I walked into Alan Dent's shop in Lancaster, and saw something beautiful. I knew about mountain bikes, of course; I even had one (and had shedloads of fun on it). Mountain bikes were crude, heavy gas pipe things with straight bars, wide gear ranges, tandem-style brakes, huge, knobbly tyres, and garish paint jobs. But what I saw that day was something different. Yes, it was a mountain bike, but in place of that crude, heavy gas pipe frame was an elegant confection of aluminium tubes, so cleanly welded you couldn't see the joins. In place of the garish paint job was plain, simple colour — a slightly muted green. In place of fancy graphics was a simple makers name in a simple bold sans-serif font: cannondale. It oozed quality. It begged to be ridden. But — it cost an arm and a leg, and I needed all mine for riding.
In due course, as happens in Lancaster, both my bikes — my hill bike and my beautiful custom framed road bike — were stolen, and I went down to Alan's shop to get myself a new one. The Cannondales were still there and I still lusted after one, but there was no way I could afford one and I walked out with a Scott Sawtooth, a huge, heavy, ungainly gas pipe contraption in swamp-monster-vomit green with purple and shocking pink banding — but at a third of the price.
Grin factor nine
It's the middle of the sailing season, and I've got a lot of work on, and I've also been doing stuff to the house. And the consequence of all that is I haven't had much time to take a bike up a hill for a while. When I've got on a bike it's been to nip into town or to nip round to see someone, so it's been my road bike.
This evening, after work, I took the Cannondale out and just blasted up Bengairn to the 200metre contour and back down to sea level. And it reminded me why I love that bike so much. 200 metres of climb in under 3 kilometres of track, and it just blasts up — the only time I put a foot down was on a short crest where the track was rising so steeply I couldn't keep the front wheel on the ground. Then, at Forest Hill, turn round, spend five minutes drinking in the glowing post sunset view out over the sea towards the cardboard cutout mountains of England and the Isle of Man. And then blast down the track again, feeling the bike do its magic carpet thing over stones as big as my skull, riding as steady and as comfortable as a road bike on smooth tarmac. Hurling down through the hairpins to the gate, and when the brakes are needed — no fuss, no anxiety, no worry, no noise, just smooth sure-footed stopping.
Through the gate and blast down through the wood, in and out of shadow too quick for eyes to adjust, the track at times no more than a dim grey snake through the trees. And not slowing down because there didn't feel to be any need to slow down — knowing for certain the bike could cope with far more than this track could throw at it.
A Journey to the Bottom of the Sea
Over the course of this year I've been hearing about audaxes and thinking about trying one. Finally, one came up which was reasonably near home and a manageable distance: 114 kilometres. I took my twelve-year-old Raleigh Record Sprint, which is not really a very good bike in a lot of ways but is fast and comfortable for long distances. It was pretty much standard apart from a Brooks saddle and Shimano SPD-R pedals.
An Inauspicious Start
Start was at Coldingham Beach at 9.00am. I arrived at 8.30, unpacked my bike from the car, assembled it (carefully, I thought), walked over to the control table and signed my name on the sheet. Sitting on the grass by the control table was someone with a long black ponytail who was clearly Jon Senior, so I greeted him and we chatted a little and then I started organising my gear — again, carefully, as I thought. Finally nine o'clock rolled round, and Bruce Lees (the organiser) said his bit, and the whole bunch — about twenty five bikes, including one tandem — set off. Up the first hill was fine.
Fixing the holes in Sun's APIs
I've spent another week fixing a lacuna in one of Sun's APIs — in this case, the fact that JDBC lacks a database neutral means of manipulating user accounts.
Unlike MaybeUpload and the Servlet API, JDBCUserKluge is not even nearly seamless to use for users of JDBC API. It's written very much as an integral part of Jacquard. It's something I've known I had to do for — literally — years, and which I've been putting off because I knew it would be hard. And now I've done it.
Happiness is a Filthy Bicycle
It's been one of those weekends. Saturday the weather was too horrible to go sailing, so in the end I worked all morning and half the afternoon. And then the weather was still horrible so I stated playing a computer game, as you do. And, as you do, I went on playing it late into the night (and then it crashed just as I was about to achieve something), and the consequence of that was I overslept my tide this morning. Although in all probability I'd have got down to the marina, looked at the weather and thought, nah... It was gey dreich. So I was determined to get a bike out but what with one thing and another the day was getting by. Finally about four o'clock I stuck the Mantra on the back of the truck and headed up country.
I left the truck at Stroan Loch and cycled up the Raiders' Road. The wind, which had been easily force six down on the coast, was pretty blustery out of the west but not too bad because it was at right angles to my direction. By the time I got to the Otter Pool it was raining quite sturdily, so I stopped, peeled off my jersey and pulled on my waterproof. Then on up the Raider's Road. I've cycled it before; it's an interesting but not altogether pleasant surface to ride on being essentially a dirt road but much better graded than most dirt roads, so the surface finish where it hasn't been chewed up is almost as smooth as tarmac. Unfortunately it had been chewed up a bit by the Galloway Hills Rally which was through there a couple of weeks ago... It's a filthy surface, though, and the bike was covered in a fine dark grey grit.
You're also climbing steadily but noticeably along the whole length of the Raiders' Road, mostly running close alongside the Black Water. And it's pretty scenic. The Black Water is gorgeous, particularly in the long sections where it runs over beds of flat rock. Towards the Clatteringshaws end the road swings away from the water quite steeply up the hillside, and as the sun had now come out (the weather improved steadily) I stopped at the top to change my waterproof back for my jersey. Then a blast back down almost to river level and another short climb and I turned left onto the tarmac of the A712... for all of fifty yards. And then left again onto the track up to Loch Grannoch, which is signposted as part of NCN7.