I don't normally post twice in a day, but I haven't been on for a few days and I have a few things stored up. This one relates to tyres too (see below). I regularly got punctures and I remember it being miserable - I got so many, in fact, that it almost put me off cycling.
So I went to the bike shop and demanded the most rugged tyres they had. (Slightly reminiscent - though only slightly - of the "Withnail and I" scene where he demands "the finest cake and wine money can buy"). They fitted me with
Schwalbe tyres. I think I can safely say (and this is so clearly tempting fate that I'm almost not going to say this at all) that I haven't had a puncture in more than a year, and that's riding in fairly rough London conditions sometimes 20 miles a day.
Chatting to a friend at work (a different one to the
Brompton one) he revealed that he's just switched to Schwalbe after a miserably high number of punctures in the last few weeks. I'll give an update on how he gets on (in fact he reads the blog so you could just comment here!) because it would be interesting if there was a pattern emerging and whether it's really worth spending the extra money. And by the by, my Brompton friend also has Schwalbes ... not quite sure what that means though.
