GT Avalanche.

The OG.

Distance ridden: 3,388km (since Strava)

This is where it all began. Not my first bike ever, obviously, but certainly my first as a ‘grown-up’ and the first after a long period of not having a bike. I realised around 2004 that I now had a desk job and would need to do something to stay fit. Then there was a bit of a lull.

On 12th September 2011, I went out for a ride using a tracking app on my phone for the first time (it was actually Endomondo, but all that important historical data has since been migrated to Strava) and so began a new era of riding with actual numbers.

The only original parts of the bike are the frame, fork, bars and shifters. The wheels were pretty rough to start with, but the rear gave up spectacularly while riding a sportive at Cannock Chase so was replaced by a SRAM item - the only rim-braked 26” wheel I could find at the time. The whole drivetrain was stripped and rebuilt with XT components and the fetching purple Jagwire cables around 2013 when I had bought my first road bike and could afford the GT to be off the road for a while.