Yuji Yamada

I just stumbled across the most excellent work of painter/illustrator Yuji Yamada, check out his gallery here, the guy has some serious skills! I particularly love his style with bold colours, and the faceless figures. I happen to think one would look just fab on the walls of bianchista hq....

http://twitter.com/yuji_yamada

Swains Lane 'o Pain

I love Swains Lane. I mean really... I don't... but it makes for some great lungbusting hill repeats before settling into a shift at Getty (its only a couple of miles away). Id thoroughly recommend it for any town dwelling cyclists to head up on their lunch break and pop out a couple of climbs. Head right up and the you can descend down Highgate Hill and repeat the fun ad nauseam. Highgate village offers you an extensive selection of café's for a post-hillclimb machiato.

View Swains Lane O Pain in a larger map

Vinobrero

Rapha Continental | Levi's GranFondo

Rapha Continental ride Levi's King Ridge GranFondo

Nobeyama Cyclocross Live!

The first ever edition of the top cyclocross event in Japan in the highest village in the country, Nobeyama, is on the 31st October. Together with the local tourist organization, Rapha will be playing host to a super challenging muddy course, where top Japanese 'crossers including Keiichi Tsujiura will take on international talent Molly Cameron. The race is going to be broadcast live here make sure to tune in and catch all the action, its a well documented fact that the Japanese have a tendency to make things super-cool!

Cross Crusade Race #4 PIR

Cross Crusade Race #4 PIR from Burk Webb on Vimeo.

James Straffon - 'Art of Cycling'

Founder of the excellent online space 'No Endevour', James Straffon will hold his first solo exhibition, aptly entitled 'Art of Cycling' from the first day of November at the Frameless Gallery in Clerkenwell, London. James lists design clients as prestigious as The Royal Opera House, Tate Modern, EMI, and The Royal Academy of Arts, but it is his recent collaborative endevours into cycling -themed art with Paul Smith and Condor Cycles that have really captured the two-wheeled audience. Frameless details his exhibtion as >
"Focussing on the visually-rich narrative of cycling heritage, Straffon explores this theme via paint and collage on canvas, often incorporating carefully selected items of rare and unusual cycling ephemera; employing a 'pop art approach to capturing the multi-faceted legacy of the bike'. 

The exhibition will run from 1-7th November.

James Straffon - The Art of Cycling
1 - 7 November 2010
Frameless gallery
20 Clerkenwell Green, Islington, London, EC1R 0DP

투르 드 프랑스!

A very good friend bought me a crazy Tour de France review magazine back from his F1 travels to the far east. Its got some cracking bike pics in, but most hilariously there is a manga-style cut out game, snakes and ladders style, featuring some very funny cartoons....

Cover shot 

Andy v Alberto

Spartacus

Cadel loses the yellow jersey

Cadel & Lance have a cry

London Walk

I think I fell in love with London again over the past weekend. I gave myself a couple of days off the bike and spent it with ma & pa visiting from Sheffield. We ambled along some lovely walks soaking up a great city. Fully recommended for tired cyclists on their days off.

Meraklon Special Edition

Most of you guys are aware of how awesome the prendas oversocks are... a perfect piece of kit for those mid season rides and chilly mornings. Added to the range are two special edition british and world champ socks. Check out an ode to the oversock over at RoadCyclingUK. Available now for £9.95 over at Prendas

Velodrome Augsburg 10#2

Rendezvous Feedback

I did a little post outlining the Rapha Rendezvous app below. Rapha have now launched a feedback url for users to report any bugs or improvements to the app. So swing by and let them know what you think....

http://www.rapha.cc/rendezvous-support

Condor Cycles World Series

Condor Cycles raising their game yet again, and releasing this very very fresh frameset as part of their continuing celebration of founder Monty Young’s 80^th birthday. Each triple-butted steel frameset will have a pricetag of £550, and be available in white with a dash of colour. Crafted from  The colour highlights available will be from each of the world champ rainbow stripes. A very simple but striking design makes this a lustworthy steed. To add to its appeal, the frameset is only being produced as a run of 150 - once its gone its gone! And for the price condor are fitting each frame complete with a specially branded Concor world series saddle, colour coordinated bartape and a Condor branded seatpin. A natty classic looking frame, ideal for a retro inspired track racer and about-town single speed beaut. Head in to Condor Cycles to find out more.

Rapha Rendezvous App

You may or may not be familiar with the tagline 'Where the hell is Fausto?'
Rapha has today launched its group ride locator app called 'Rendezvous'... all for the price of a gulp of fresh morning ride air. After an initial play around iv got to say the app looks great, especially for bigger groups looking to coordinate their rides. Iv now badgered 2 of my skids boys into downloading (tough luck Jimmy - 'should have got an iphone')
Im going to try and plan a midweek ride with a friend through this, so hopefully will work a treat and avoid lengthy email chains and last minute changes to routes/times. I say get ye over to iTunes right now and download, its not often there's a free app actually potentially worth its weight in cycling gold, so take advantage....

Surrey Dawn Raid

This morning myself and my two skids buds Dr Jones & RowRow hit the hills in Surrey for a ride. Riding over to Kingston to meet was pretty amazing due to the weather, Richmond Park was covered in a mystical-looking low fog around 7am, I could barely see a thing.
We decided upon a nice 130km route, foregoing the norm of heading out to cobham-whitedown-box hill. It was great to actually hit some new lanes, thoroughly enjoyed I have to say.
I think iv got this whole training thing backwards and actually peaked for the off-season... I found my legs with a boom today and hit them both with some cunning attacks early on the hills, taking a few scalps! Upon reaching Box Hill (New p.b attained.... whoop!) Dr J decided to be a madman and hit the lanes for an extra long solo loop, obviously taking his Exmoor beast training super serious! Jim impressed blowing us away for dust on the last few lumps, although it has to be said Row was never in contention with a hangover and a breakfast of leftover Subway (Must try harder).
My leg felt as good as its felt for the past 6 months, I still had a residual pain in my calf that niggles away, but the foot sensation seemed to have improved vastly, due to refining my cleat float and working on my posture I suspect. It was a great ride as my confidence is high and Im more determined than ever to avoid heading under the surgeon's knife to fix my back discs, Im going to try and be more committed to physio and alternative solutions - such a perfect ride has me thinking that I don't think I could bear to be off my bike for any period of time at the moment. I heart my bike.

Edge 800

One For Us Girls

Paul Smith miniskirt - featuring the UK's finest (and most stylish) race team, the Rapha Condor Sharp boys..... absolutely loveing this! perhaps sneaking its way onto bianchista's christmas list :-)