Another massive turnout for the ever-popular Thursday night rides on this warm evening, 13th August 2009 saw 23 riders turn out.

Great to see "core member" Ian F out again after a long absence, his out-of-the-blue return on 30th July being a great surprise and most welcome. He intends to get out more as long as his job permits.

Also good to have Isobel out again, once more tied up with work and an interfering private life!

Biggest surprise was probably Stephen, who after only two local rides on his pre-war Univega hardtail with rigid front forks, carried out his threat to invest a "few quid" and turned up tonight on perhaps the most beautiful MTB most of us have ever seen, a Lapierre Zesty 714. Wot a machine! It has a carbon swingarm and aluminium front triangle, bit like Jason's Whyte E120 but proper bike shaped, and much prettier, and the whole thing is covered in factory-fitted bling and superb detail fittings. XTR chainset, XT tubeless wheels and Formula brakes set the thing off fantastically. I want one Santa.

Did I say "biggest surprise"? That would be wrong apart from one small technicality. That being we already new our Jon had lashed out on something slightly different to his obnoxious Sky Blue "OnOne" hardtail. But when he actually appeared on the superb (careful now, Terry) Specialized StumpJumper, gleaming white like a few others the crew now run, but such a monumantal change from that "thing" he usually rides, well - on any other night that would certainly have taken first prize! Very nice bike Jon. One or two of the Brethren have already suggested he may be even faster now with real wheels under him - Oh Heck!

For as many Thursday nights as I can remember now, we again welcomed another couple of first timers in the shapes of Justin and James, hope we didn't ruin their night. We must have had about thirty thousand people on our books since mid 2007! Thanks to MidAirMembership Super Secretary Ian A ( The Speedian), here's the starting lineup:

1.   Alan

2.   Alex

3.   Arthur

4.   Chris D

5.   Chris K

6.   Ian A

7.   Ian B

8.   Ian F

9.   Isobel

10. James

11. Jason

12. Jeff

13. Jon

14. Richy

15. Simon

16. Stephen G

17. Steve X

18. Stewart 

19. Stian

20. Terry K

21. Tony
 
22. Justin

23. Paul

Just after 19:00 Golly led off on the evil CoilAir even after noticing he couldn't get any gears because his rear outer cable had rusted clean away under the handlebars - top gear only for the fool who could have easily switched bikes before the off - he'd pay for it later. Still had two chainrings up front though, so not as bad as it could have been.

We headed out the eastern side of the Cave for only the second time, taking to a "small trail" behind Alex as we sped across to the A19 before turning south to The Swallows Nature Reserve. When we arrived at the road into Battle Hill there was a distinct absence of Speedians! We hovered for a few minutes before Golly took off back along the trail to find the errant one, who'd taken a wrong turn but been corrected by a pedestrian - urk!

Off we went again behind Alex across to Silverlink and the Steam Railway, where the Gollum guided the group to the new, top-secret JumpSpot, discovered by himself, Speedy and Stewart on Tuesday night. Unfortunately there were a few "young people" swanning around in there, so after a quick look around we took the path of least embarrassment and left. Gollum's turn to lead again and we scurried south to the Coast Road underpass on the Tyne Tunnel Trading Estate before heading up the cycle path past B&Q. Next stop, that super-long, arrow-straght and indecently quick stretch of Urban Singletrack now known as "Gollum's Back Passage" down the side of the A19 to Howdon, slowing at the start only to warn Ian F to "be careful" as this is just the sort of trail to encourage his famous Circus Tricks, and some of them hurt!

But it was all smiles as we regrouped at the end of it, arriving there in two batches, much to the amazement of the local kiddery. After a very short discussion between Speedy and Golly, the former turned and began to disappear back up the same trail in the opposite direction. And why not, so as to maximise our time off-road and also to get us on track for The Burn at Wallsend, our next target. We cut through Jason's estate passing Churchill Community College before traversing St Peter's Park to the Coast Road. Skirting that, the squad followed the Gollum down to the Ambulance Station before following him at full tilt down into the greenery.

The Tuesday night ride I mentioned brought the three intrepids down this trail, so Golly, Ian A and Stewart knew exactly what was coming, but it hurt every bit as much this time. With a revived and rampant Chris K pushing hard, Golly had to give it ten tenths through the tall grass, nettles and barbed thorns, just managing to keep the wheels turning as the legs got heavier, probably more to do with the weight of blood running down them than the absence of muscle power. Chris thought he'd heard the shout go up behind for a puncture so they both stopped. The resulting traffic jam left next up Alan, Alex and Chris D standing in a nettlefield, so we moved on a few hundred metres into a safe clearing to await the arrival of the others. It turned out there was no puncture, well, not to tyres at least, just pain and screams.

Next stop the bottom of the Burn following another downhill gravel blast before the Gollum attempted to ride up the savage drop adjacent to Arthur's Stairs (ask Arthur!). Failing after about ten metres, his effort was beaten by about a foot by the next five riders before we all gave up and pushed to the top. The sensible ones took the steps to get up to Rosehill. It was down to Jason now to discover the path down again before he took us through pastures new along the edge of the Burn to the iron bridge. From there we turned right up the cycle path and onto Hadrian Road at the Hotel.

We rode under the red arch onto Hadrian's Cycleway and headed west upriver. Once again, that intriguing grassy drop at Low Walker led to many a fallen rider, but no injuries, and we finally accumulated down on the riverside by one of several different routes. Just a cruise now up the banks of the Tyne to our regular resting place in St Peter's Marina after a decently paced ride thus far ("fairly quick" according to the Commencal Comet). A chance to inspect the new bikes on display and do the usual geeky, boring comparisons before heading off to The Tyne Hotel and the road up to Byker Bridge behind it. It was here that Golly's lack of rear gears began to tell on his scrawny physique.

Anyway we all got up to the City Stadium somehow, and while the Gollum could do nowt other than keep his pedals turning across to heaton Park Road, the others all grouped along the top of the stadium bowl to witness Allex and Jon having a right old falt-out ding-dong around the running track, only for Alex to slam on his anchors and Jon to do likewise. Unfortunately, Jon's new bike has a somewhat more capable front disc than his old hardtail and it just gleefully obeyed it's command input - STOP! That saw Jon being flung straight over the handlebars onto the gravel at something approaching 25 mph, and he didn't come to a halt straight away but slid a while just to dump a bit more flesh on the ground. That gorgeous new Stumpy took a slight hit aswell, but MidAirMen being what they are, he was back up and riding again very soon after the laughter and applause from the trackside mound had died down.

Up the road into the park behind Speedy next and a bit of a tumble for Stephen on his new Lapierre but nothing serious. The party got split here after someone apparently came off and hurt himself. Richy and Golly backtracked to find them but they'd gone over the first bridge while the rest took the second. This is all too easy in here where the front man just gets his head down and the queue is so strung out the chances of a split are pretty high. In fact its happened here at least three times this year!

The Walkie Talkies got us back together again five minutes later at the Quarry and all was well from there although we'd started losing bodies now as they took the shortest route home where applicable. The remainder got to Freeman Road where the next few split off and there was only the Tram Track to Benton to cover and the short stretch from the Powder Monkey to the Coast Road. When we got there, however, instead of the Forest Hall Brigade splitting off left, we all turned right and hit the new Metro Singletrack behind first Alan then the Gollum.

That frantic blast led to the next split to Forest Hall for Arthur, Ian B, Ian A and Ian F. The rest thought they were now returning to their cars, but Golly had a few more diversions to put in place. First was the singletrack along to ASDA, and with Alex and Alan up front the pace was, er, not slow. That marked the end. Or not! Golly then diverted the crew up towards the Rising Sun Country Park Centre and warned them to look out for a path off to the left. This one was discovered by Jason and he took off through the lumpy grasses with Golly and the rest trying to keep up. Finally we were dumped at the Wheatsheaf with a fence to climb over, and Alex disappeared from here. Good laugh again, and the MidAirCrisis Fair Weather Fairy was with us once more. Cheers gents (and Lady).