News update from Up North (the real north, lol)

A few updates from moi.
In brief:
The stinky will be up for sale today! The beast no more.

New Commencal arriving with me soon, awesome test ride on Thursday.
Great trails 15 minutes from my flat.
DJ heaven in Glentress.
Long term vision for 'race scoot'.

In detail!:
I tested a Commencal 5.5 on Thursday night, was awesome! Managed to bend the Sun equalizer 27 rim, but it is a xc rim and I was doing 40ft near 90degree descents into big kicker jumps! Went to ride the Cathkin Braes, south of Glasgow where the riding for the Commonwealth games will be held in 2014. A while off, but the lads showed me some great natural trails and there is some BIG stuff to go at too. Great ride, and I'll be getting Spank hardcore rims on my 5.5XT! Great bike, so light and chuckable, yet no bottom out on the big stuff. Plenty travel for trails riding, and at about 30lbs, light enough for me to actually climb on. Never thought I'd ride an air shock! So Thurday was a great ride and a new spend secured for me. Not many XT's left in the country in large, so I had to commit :)

Friday I spent 7 hours at the FR park in Glentress. No pics sadly, but easily the best days riding I've had in years. Trails are awesome but 7 hours dialling in the tricks on the park is such a buzz. Met a sound rider called Daz, he's riding Mega and has an 11 week summer in France ahead of him, so we chatted all day and got our lines and tricks going. Despite it being a Friday, the park was dead, but we didn't mind! Sessioned the top jumps mostly, but included the second hip and subsequent two jumps before the rock garden. The last jump is SO BIG, I was sending massive tables off that, big smiles. Complete runs were awesome, in between the wind and my chain snapping! Also had a spill early on, so my ass and ankle hurt today, but hey ho, fun and games. 7hours, that will be my new daily session length, roll on the sunny days. Happy days!

Summer plan - get fit on the commencal, learn new tricks on the park, then january find some cash for a 224 and start racing next year!

That's all folks...