About bikes, cycling and cycle to work - Tredz Blog

Bike to Work book

Carlton Reid and Tim Grahl, two infamous bike commute pushers are on the verge of releasing the print version of their new commuting book: Bike to Work.

Even better, they have recently announced they'll be releasing the thing in it's entirety on-line. Free.

Bigger exposure = more real sales and all that. Well, here's hoping it works. We'll push you in the right direction the moment it becomes available (in both real and virtual reasons), but for the time being check out the 50 page sampler.

Great advice is well worth sharing, so spread the word!

Easy chain cleaning

My commute is often beautiful. The sun rises and picks up the sea and windows in the buildings following the sweep of Swansea bay. I can honestly say I love it.

On the other hand, my commute is often hell. Across Swansea bay as rain lashes me and the beach, slapping sand and grunge into my rear mech. Gotta be honest, I still love it - nothing beats a hot cuppa tea afterwards, but my bike on the other hand...

Lets just say it would rather we didn't cycle so close to the beach.

Thank God for White Lightning Clean Streak. This stuff is wonderful. It'll de-grease a chain quicker than you can say 'ughh look at all that oil on the floor.'

I spoke to Steve, our head mechanic as I was spraying and he told me that he didn't know why more people don't use the stuff. apparently every time a customer sees him using it on their bike they buy a bottle. It's THAT good.

So get yourself a cassette cleaner, some de-greaser and some your chain and rear mech some love, or if your bike needs more than a clean chain, check out the bicycle maintenance books available!

Chris Hoy Vs Lewis Hamilton

Chris Hoy, Britain's triple gold medal winning cyclist is racing Lewis Hamilton on December 14th in Wembley.

Why?

God knows. Should be fun though. Hoy will be on his Dolan track bike (average output 2.5 horsepower), whilst Hamilton, this years Grand Prix champion will be racing a 600 Horsepower Mercedes SLR.

Whom ever wins, don't forget to vote for Hoy in the BBC sports personality of the year award!

The Atherton family

We were just ordering from one of our favourite suppliers (hey, these guys supply Cove and Race Face) Silverfish. In conjunction with e.Thirteen they had the latest instalment of a video diary following the Athertons in their quest for world domination, so we thought we'd share the wealth...

More cycling present ideas...

Further to our original Christmas gift guide for cyclists, that allows you to gauge your love of cyclist in question by price (at least thats what I'm telling my nearest and dearest), we have now got specific gifts for men, women and kids.

No excuses now!

2009 Test bikes!

Ok, we are aware that it's still 2008. But with new bikes from Specialized, Giant and Commencal already bulking up our demo bike range, you' forgive us for partying like it's 2009.

Stay tuned for the full list of test bike days and locations. Alternatively for £20 you can borrow it for a couple of days. Get in touch with our shops for further info.

Keep reading for the full list...

Hope Vision 4 Lights

A very rare sighting indeed. I caught this Hope Vision 4 skitting across the warehouse floor on its way out to a customer. We've had a massive influx of orders for the 4's this year. Some very good reviews, a slow(ish) handbuild process and Hope's usual build quality means that these things have been incredibly scarce. We've just had a shipment and they immediately vanished.

Even the staff didn't react quick enough to get a look in.

Incredible light output for the price. On top of that Hope seems to have packed it all into a casing not much bigger the Vision 2's.

Cycling cities

6000 bikes might soon be available for hire in London, in a Velib/Parisian stylee setup. A feasibility study by TfL reckons that London could accommodate the extra cyclists as long as the safety of cyclists was highlighted.

The renta-cycling quote Mayor of London:

"I have long held the view that a cyclised city is a civilised city.

"I believe that the work we are carrying out can make the capital a city of cyclists, where to use two wheels is common not curious."

Hear, hear Boris.

If TfL has it's way, London will see a 400% increase in cycling by 2025. It would be an absolutely amazing achievement.

Xterra World Championships

Since he started shopping with us, we've seen Ryan Evans develop from an entry level road rider to someone who's able to compete in the Xterra World Champs in Maui, Hawaii. Incredible stuff. Even better he's more than happy to chat about it.

The last time he came in (already thinking about the next challenge), Gus asked him how it went. Ryan took it a step further and provided us with a great write up with photos. Without any more ado...

Cardiff bike shop 2.0

Our Cardiff bike store - hardly a slouch in the stock, staff or size department has been given a face lift. Several weeks of working in a mini-building site and it's emerged looking, well, we'd like to think it's now one of the best looking, best stocked bike shops, period.

With massive thanks to Giant, who've helped out every step of the way our store is looking better than ever. Best of all though, our ultra modern open workshop. We're so proud of the job our mechanics do that we wanted to share it with everyone.

It's open now and we're desperate to show it off, so come check us out. And don't forget to say hello our grease monkeys!

Can't come today? No worry, enjoy a quick look around with this Flickr slideshow - only 736 images...(just joking!)