20mm makes a world of difference

Last year I had a nigh on perfect setup on my singlespeed, wide enough bars to swing on whilst getting up the hills, the right reach to pull decent bunny hops (hopping up those big 18" kerbstones was do-able) and I never wanted to drop the saddle on sketchy steep downhills (and I'm a compulsive saddle dropper) Anyway the tranz-x bar was a pretty very old one so as part of preperation for HTN I put some slightly newer azonic bars on, similar width rise and sweep but nope I'd lost it, didn't feel quite right. Did HTN without trouble, nowt too sketchy on the course, in the following months I tweaked the position but couldn't get it right. A couple of months ao I got some wider OS bars and shorter stem, played around with that but couldn't get it right, extra width was good for corners but I had trouble lifting the front wheel. Anyway I swapped back to the azonics last week stuck an extra 10mm spacer under the stem moved the grips in 5mm each end and WOW I've found the sweet spot again. I can lift the front easily (good job as I'm on rigid forks) bunny hop, corner and hit the steep downs no probs. As I rode out to the night ride last night I was especially enjoying storming down Jons 200 and then hitting a pedally section, no gears to change, no saddle to raise no suspension settings to faff with just ride fast and smooth. Great stuff...

Of course then it went tits up, I met up with Junkyard and Trio (and Steve but he forgot his lights so went back home) climbed up rivi no probs, on the climb up winterhill my chain came off and I cracked my knee on the bars, reset it and a minute later chain dropped again I impaled myself on saddle - ouch. Next my shoes unclipped (worn cleats) then the chain dropped again just as we got to the top road. By this time I was pretty peeved, chain issues with singlespeeds are bad news, so I left trio and junkyard to it and coasted home, not happy. Just changed my cleats and I've got a new chain on order, I'll be back for another go next week.