Lead Rider - John (The Wheel), Gas Gas EC250
Group - Jack (CRF 450X), Bernie (CRF 450R), Darren (CRF 250X), Chris (Husaberg 500)
Date - Sunday 2nd December 2007

This was to be the last outing on the Rolls-Royce of trail bikes, before 'the wheel' gets his new steed off Santa.

A short day's ride had been planned at the last club night, with a couple of potential new members going on their first ride with Manchester TRF. Bernie, Darren and Chris had been down to the club, and Jack had got in touch via the website contact numbers.

The plan was to meet at the roman lakes at 09.30, ride up to Chinley on the lanes, across the Roych and on to hope for a spot of lunch, then return to Marple before it started to get dark.

The day started off badly as I noticed the as gas had a slow puncture as I wheeled it out of it's high security, heated garage (read: mother's back yard, 2 x chains and locks and a plastic sheet) As it was now 09.15, I thought I'd better get to the petrol station on route to Marple and see if I could get a bit of air into the tyre.

At the petrol station I bumped in to Darren who was fuelling up his bike, no joy with the air line, so out with the tyre leavers. I let Bernie and Chris know what was happening, as they were already waiting at the lakes.

Whilst changing the tube, Jack rang so I told him to meet us at the petrol station on his way up. Tube now changed and wheel replaced with much cursing by myself, we eventually got to the meeting place at about 10.30.The only good thing was that the weather had improved, and it had started to brighten up after hours of heavy rain earlier in the morning.

At the end of the first lane, I stopped and waited for the others, as they got closer I could see the first bit of battle damage as Darren's fancy hand guard was hanging off. He had binned his CRF coming up the lane, no real harm done, we continued up to the donkey track.

Near the top, another piece of his honda was on the floor, this time a side panel that had scraped on the wall. As we went through the rutted section at the top of the trail, Darren flipped his bike, resulting in the other fancy hand guard snapping off.

At the top we had a breather then fired our bikes up to set off for Chinley. This was when the curse of the blue and yellow beast struck! Yes, the husaberg was playing up again. After lots of kicking it still wasn't having it, so Jack suggested bumping it. The beast threatened to get going with a bump, but once it fired up, it just died again. Chris took the tank off to get to the plug, only to now find that there was no spark.

It was now getting on for one o'clock, so Chris decided to push the beast back down the hill towards where his trailer was. I suggested that he should maybe swap it for a nice tidy gas gas ec 250, but strangely he declined?

So with Chris out of the way (sorry, on his way!) we carried on through the next set of lanes, when just as we were going to get down into Chinley, the bloody tube on the gas gas went again!!!

Gutted! Two flats in one day, I decided to get to the royal mortar in Chinley where there was a gazebo erected for the smoker's, perfect for changing a tube as the weather had now turned nasty. Thanks to Darren for supplying the new tube.

After taking in a little liquid refreshment and sorting out the new tube in record time (I bet I would give those factory enduro riders a run for their money, when it comes to tyre changes) we decided that we would head back to Marple due to it now being 2pm and also the rain was getting heavier.

We retraced the lanes back towards Marple, but as we got onto the start of the trail near Mellor Cross, the unthinkable happened, yes you guessed it, another freaking flat on the gas gas!

Not far home, I thought I'd just try and ride it and hope for the best, anyway I made it home at about 3 pm with no more incidents to report.

Quite an interesting day really, punctures breakdowns, crashes and shitty weather.

Oh well, there's always next weekend!