- In the GMBN Tech weekly show we quite often look at bike caves. You know what the bike caves are, it's where you store your bikes and where you fettle with them. So today, I thought I'd show
you around my little bike cave. Check this out. (soft hip hop music) Now most people's bike caves tend to be like a garden shed type thing, or a garage if you've got one of those. Now, I wasn't fortunate
enough to have one of those, but when my partner and
I bought this place, we needed to renovate and
we spent the last two years completely gutting and
rebuilding this place, including where I'm sat right now. Now originally, this
was an outdoor toilet. There was a wall here with the tiniest little
window you can imagine, a little door, and the
next room was a cold bunker to feed the fire that
once existed in here. And there was a whacking great concrete roof connecting it to the
main part of the house. Now one of the benefits of this was this huge concrete
foundation underneath, which meant I didn't need
to have planning permission in order to use that foundation, I just needed to meet
building regulations. So we made some plans for
the ideal sort of bike cave, so I can keep all my bike stuff in here and not in the house. That got approved and we
built it, essentially. Now, it was quite cool
because you had to take off the five inch thick concrete
roof, which was full of rebar. We had to cut it with a steel stone cutter and basically smash it into pieces with a massive sledgehammer. Whack it all off the side of the building. Rebuilt it, insulated it. Put this window in, which
is the old kitchen window. Put a new big secure backdoor on here. Everything is great, I've
got everything I need, I got all the storage. There's storage and eaves
above where you are right now. I've got all my bikes down one end. Let's take a little look, shall we? (upbeat hip hop music) So starting with this
part of the room here, I've got my bikes hung up on the wall. Now a lot of people have asked why I hang them up
without the wheels on them and it's simply to save space. If I have the front wheels on them, it does fit in with the
ceiling no problems at all, I catered for that when
we built the place. However, it does mean
they take up more room pulling out into the room. Now, it's not a large space, this. So I wanted to maximize
on everything I could. Now, I have got a storage unit with a load of old archive bikes. The stuff that at some point
we're going to delve into. There's some very
special bikes tucked away but these are my work bikes,
these are my GMBN bikes. So I've got my Canyon Neuron here. I've got my Nukeproof
Mega, and I've got my Lux. And then over here, I've got these really cool old Ikea units. So this one used to be red
and I've spray painted this and I keep all my GMBN kit in here. I've got my glasses, my
gloves, all that sort of stuff. Riding kit below. There's various things in this one, including a bottle of Moet, just like you do in your bike caves. Various Camelbak bladders,
things like that, waterproof jackets, all my
sort of kit I need for winter. Underneath here, I've got a
little unit that I've built from old kitchen sideboard stuff leftover from when I
put the kitchen in here. So I've got all my riding shoes here. We're obviously supported by Northwave, so I've got loads of
latest Northwave shoes. Works out pretty good 'cause
they suit the way I ride. I've got various locks and stuff. You might have noticed
I've got a slam ball here. I've got a balance board and various exercise related stuff. And I've got leftover sideboard from when I basically built this place. So I managed to get three
pieces for a bargain price. So I've used this on the end here. As you can see, I've got helmets lined up. Black and white one is my daily, like just to use to commute to work. The blue one is my new one for videos. And the black one is a spare
for when I have friends that come and ride and
just need a spare helmet. It's always good to have
one of those lying around. Yeah, so that's that corner. And then if I move over here, there's all sorts of junk,
and all sorts of cool stuff. There's various things I'm
sure you can see straight away. So, I've got CushCore set up. In here, I've got loads of old spokes. In this box here in fact,
all sorts of stuff in here. There's some old XTR cranks. Some pretty ancient Burgtec pedals. These are called Penthouse Flats. Of course, Ratboy and
everyone use modern versions, but these are some of the originals. Look how thick those
things are, pretty crazy. And then this is quite cool. Don't need to worry about that stuff. A pair of prototype Raceface cranks. I spent my entire working life
basically as a journalist. I worked for Mountain Biking UK magazine for a very long time. So I've always been testing kit and riding other peoples'
kit throughout the years. It gives me a good balanced
view of what people are making, how it rides, how accessible it is. And to a large degree, it's
why I fit in well at GMBN Tech and why I can give you
the information I do, it's because this is
what I've always done. I've talked about bikes forever. I've got some classic old brakes. In fact, I've got some customs
here from the Avid days and from the SRAM days as well. I've got some Avid XO brakes. Dodd on the lever, that's pretty cool. Loads of cool old stuff. I pretty much seem to keep hold of most things I've ever used. If it can be useful, if
I can use it in a video, if I can help a friend with it, for broken parts and salvaging,
I pretty much keep it. I'm a bit of a hoarder. It can be a bit of a problem, but also, as I found out
in a lot of GMBN videos, that it's actually pretty useful. Remember these? Rockshox Totems. These are seven inch travel,
40 mm stanchions on them. These ones are kind of the anodizing's gone a bit funny on them over the years. Some homemade stickers
from back in the day. AC/DC and Goonies, but
that was a hell of a fork. A 1.5 inch steerer tube, so that's quite cool to see actually. Up here, I've got some
random retro stuff in here. Let's have a look and see what we've got. An original Specialized
helmet from back in the day. Before the really cool
helmets we have now, we used to have lycra covers on top of basic polystyrene helmets. Certainly not very cool and
they look like a mushroom when you worn them, not good at all. There's that AC/DC jersey that I wore in the retro versus modern video. Oakley Frogskins, pretty
classic glasses from the 80s. Remember those things? Woo, pretty stylish. Don't think I've ever worn those. I think they're pretty much box fresh. Let's have a look in me
tool chest 'cause this, it's actually quite of
a lot of sins in here 'cause it's quite a mess at the moment, I keep meaning to sort this out. On the top, as you can see, there's all sorts of stuff going on. A load of media passes
from over the years, Mountain Biking UK here, 2014 Sea Otter, various world champs, world
cups, and stuff like that. This is quite cool actually. This is an old helmet
that's been crashed in. A really old Troy Lee Designs D2. Owen from Slik Graphics, did these Doddy graphics on the side. They look at a glance like
it's part of the paint job. Pretty cool, useless now. It's been crash damaged and that. But just for old times sakes,
and it looks quite cool. And I've got most oils,
lubricants, and things I need for the sort of jobs I
like to do on my own bikes. Fork lower lube, shock oil. I've got Shimano mineral oil
in here for doing disc brakes and Polyfilla. Anyone for a bike? Right now, let's go into all
the source sins, shall we? So top drawer, this is the bad one. No one goes in top drawer
except me, fortunately. This a right old mess. I've got some many
duplicate allen keys here that have lived in the car and all sorts. I really do need to sort this out. Something very cool, it was a present given to me
by Kelvin, from Park Tools. I always love a good pick
for working on stuff. This one's from a Marzocchi
trip back in 2007, it's a Park Tool still. I've got another Park Tool
here with my name on it. Next drawer down, knives and screwdrivers. Stuff that is generally
used on other DIY stuff, not really in the bike world. These are quite cool actually, these are for cutting tire knobs. Literally for cutting your tires down, if you fancied doing that sort of thing. These are quite cool for cutting hoses, like a mini cigar cutter. This one was actually given to
me, in fact I did say given, I took it from Alex Rafferty, I loved it. Thanks Alex for this by
the way, Alex from SRAM. A really nice little tool there. This one's got a few more Park
Tools and bike tools here. Again, jumbled in with
another selection of stuff. Various files, I've got some
Epic Solutions, fork top cap, spanners here, these are
various bearing drifts. That's an Easton number 24. These are all for various different hubs and that I've had over the years. Next one down, there we go. That's starting to look a bit
more familiar to you guys. There's some various Park Tools in here. Of which actually, my favorite is the disc rotor
straightening tool there. Again, a few more Park
related things in here. And these are for setting
the crown racers on forks, that's the rocket tool. In fact, that's an old rocket
tool for inch and eighth, for knocking out headset cups. I forgot about this bad
boy, Avid Tools hammer. So this is a titanium hammer,
this thing is immense. If you go on the road, it's
a kind of useful one to carry 'cause it's nice and slimline. And also actually, probably
the most useful tool right now on mountain bikes is the Park
internal cable route tool. That thing has stopped me swearing more than I normally would. Really, really flipping good tool that is. This is cool actually. Use your drill, go around corners. (gentle upbeat music) Okay, so I've got my workbench here. I've got a nice big vice here, this is an adjustable angle one. It's not in the best position to be fair 'cause I was going to move it, I just haven't got around to that. These Park magnetic trays
are absolutely amazing. As you can see, I've got all sorts of nuts and bolts and stuff chucked in there. Got me trusty leather mechanics gloves, these are carpenter's ones. Use those all the time
when working on the house. Stopped getting massive
splinters in my hands. Well used Makita impact
driver and drill setup there. Impact drivers, one of my favorite. These things are amazing. You can see it's a bit of
a state on the top here. On this shelf, there's all
sorts of random stuff here. That's an old Bontrager, in fact, that's a new Bontrager mug. Looks old, it's from Bike Ninja. And inside, randomly,
I've got some old knives. This one was, I did a
press trip to Alpe d'Huez and it says Oz en Oisans on
here and it's an Opinel knife. It's in disgusting shape actually, I haven't used that for
years, don't really need to. This one was a present
from Race Face way back when I visited them in Vancouver. Those guys are really cool and
had these little lock knives. Don't really need to use it for anything. It even says Race Face, say
hello to my little friend. That's an old vintage fork,
that's Answer AcuTrak. To some, it might just look
like a rubbish old fork, but actually it's a nice bit of history. Now artwork is something I'm quite into and I'm quite obviously
into my bike history. So this is from Repack. Repack was the first ever
official downhill race, the one that we all knew about. It's called Repack 'cause it was so fast, that the coaster brakes used to heat up and the grease would be
pouring out the bottom and to repack their
coaster brakes with grease, hence Repack. And that was from Charlie
Kelly and Joe Breeze, their signatures there. Those two guys, alongside
Gary Fisher and Tom Ritchey, really are pretty much
the founding fathers of what we now know as mountain biking. This is really cool, in fact, I'm going to have to dig
this bike out and show you. I was lucky enough to
do a trip to Intense, which are based in Temecula, California. This actually, I got to
design my own geometry bike and Jeff Steven made it for me. And look at the numbers on this. There's a XXL, this is still
big by today's standard. Wheel base, 1240, reach, 518. Back in 2014, I was all
about the big bikes. This one is my favorite all-time rider. That's John Tomac. Doddy, go hard, Tomac. To me, as a kid, growing
up watching mountain biking on the TV and all the magazines, Tomac was the one to
beat, inspirational guy. You've probably noticed
there's all sorts of other randoms on here as well,
Peaty's last orders. Some Steve Peat world champion beers. That's from 2009 when he finally won. I think everyone in the
mountain biking world was absolutely stoked with that. I've got myself that
Tioga disc drive clock. Thought we got one at
work, I had to get one for my own little bike cave. My old computer, my beloved
thing, I can't throw it away even though it barely works now. But it's good enough for Spotify, good enough for a bit of surfing,
YouTube, stuff like that, while I'm working on my bike. I can watch the world
cups and stuff like that. And in fact, I've just
seen up on the back here. So this is a shot of me
taken in Lee Quarry up north. That's by Russell Burton, I think, and the bike was a Banshee. In fact, it would have be called a Mystic because at the time, you
couldn't call 'em Banshee in the UK. I think it was a Spitfire,
quite progressive, didn't have that one very long. But what I've just noticed
is this print underneath. Now this, I need to get framed. That is Shaun Palmer. In Sweden even, 1999 World Championships. That's the finish line. He pretty much slid across it and he crashed just
before that finishing line and he didn't win the race. I don't think he would have won it, but we'll never know for sure. But he signed that. And originally, I was
going to give these away but this one was the one
I was going to give away but actually kept for myself. The other one, which he also signed, he hadn't actually seen
this picture by Geoff Waugh, he kept it for himself. So Palmer has the other one
one of these in his house, which is quite cool. What else is there? There's also something
else I've just see here from my MBUK days. This was a gift when I left the magazine. So if you've ever read
Mountain Biking UK magazine, you might know about Mint Sauce. Now, Mint Sauce to me is
a bit of an institution. So he's a mountain biking sheep. Now this is an original piece of artwork, you can see by the
texture and stuff on this. Absolutely amazing. That's Coleman the Cow. Just Mint and Coleman in
this particular one here, but it's absolutely
fantastic, I love the artwork. This one's quite funny. This was when he was riding
tubeless for the first time and his tube doesn't seal and ends up with gunk all over himself. But I love Jo Burt's artwork,
absolutely fantastic. You can see this stuff on Instagram. I best show Joe, going to
put a link to him underneath. He is the guy that does
all of this artwork. He's absolutely fantastic. But I'm super lucky to have
those, I must get those framed. Jo, if you're watching this, thank you. You're an absolute legend. That's definitely two of the coolest bits of memorabilia I've had
from over the years. Absolutely love Mint Sauce. (soft music) That's me without a helmet. Not good at all. That was me as a fridge magnet. And that's the bike that
essentially got me my career. I think I've talked about this before. Snapped the forks on
that one, broke my face, thus giving me my marvelously good looks. But it got me a job, so
I'm pretty happy with that. I had a lot of covers through the years. So this one, that's me. That was taken in Bootleg
Canyon in Las Vegas. That's a Russell Burton
picture, I believe. Check him out on Instagram,
amazing photographer. Something a bit questionable, I think. Actually, that's quite cool. That's on a Mondraker,
that's in the Forest of Dean, so that's 2014. That's a fair while back
as well, that's quite cool. I think that's a Steve Bear photo. That's another Russell Burton photo, doing a skid through a puddle. Looks pretty cool, doesn't it? I feel very fortunate to have front covers on such a prestigious magazine. I think that was my last major
cover then, I left in 2015. And that's actually a really good one. I really like that Troy Lee clothing. Aziro shoes, riding on a 29 Specialized. Pretty cool. As you can see, I've got stacks of pedals. In fact, from some modern
ones that I ride now and some really old ones. Some very thin ones,
some very battered ones. But for some reason, did
I tell you I hoard stuff? I can't throw stuff away,
there's something wrong with me. Down in this one, this is kind of a random retro stuff. That's when SRAM did their
pink limited edition stuff, that's pretty cool. Titanium springs, oh look at that, that's the first ever Crud Catcher. Old Easton flat pedals,
they're pretty cool. MRP Ultra Speeds. Oh, I've even got a carbon
one, oh, look at that bad boy. Hope brakes, six pot
brakes, I think these. And I had the laser etch
brake levers to go with it. Got the Zonic hammer
stem, look at that thing. That's pretty much just a whole
lump of billet aluminum that. May just look like a coda stem tube, but when you take an angle grinder to it, you turn it into a bottle opener. You can pretty much make a bottle opener from any bike part. I think I did that in one
of my home hacks videos. Okay, then I've also got
my little top drawers here. They're quite organized, although it looks a little bit messy. I kind of know where everything is. In this back one here, I've volume spacers for various forks and
shocks, I've got foam rings. Anything sort of suspension
related up there. I've got various different
tubeless valves, valve cores, bearings and that from back
ends, bushings, from shocks. In here, I've got some
lights, o-rings, brake pads, starfangled nuts, cleats,
old cleats, new cleats. Various different chain master links. All sorts of stuff that comes in handy. Always keep this stuff. And lastly, I kind of
keep waterproof jackets, apron, various different riding packs and that sort of stuff on this wall here. I've got quite a cool Park
Tools bottle opener here. So if I fancy a cheeky beer
when I'm working on my bike, it goes in there, that
catches the bottle tops. Down here, I've got like
a little wash station. All the sort of usual
sort of things you need to keep your bike clean. There's something that's very cool, just behind the work stand here, is this. So this was a present from Steve Peat after he won the World
Championships way back in 2009. To Doddy and all at MBUK, thanks for all the support over the years, cheers Steve Peat, World Champ 2009. Absolutely love that I've got this. This is one of the coolest things. It's obviously not the jersey
that he actually raced in, it's replica of that. But it's been under the pen of Steve Peat and it was a gift from the man himself. Super cool, really, really nice
to have this sort of stuff. And then just above here, is all sorts of stuff up here as well. So up on the tops here,
I keep all my tires, spare tires, that sort of thing. Up here, I've got full face helmet. That's actually an old
helmet that's crashed. I need to get rid of that one. And up on this side, I've got
my big Douchebags bike bag. I've got cable reels, I've
got various suspension forks and other bits and
pieces stashed up there. I use this bar. This is pretty good
for chin ups and stuff, but it's also good to
hang my wet clothing on. When I come in, let it drip
dry in here, reproof it. As I say, I use this
room as a utility room for looking after my bike kit, not just looking after my bike. So the whole aim is
that none of that stuff ever has to go in the house. Which means the house can be quite cool and quite different to my bike cave. And well, there you go,
that was my bike cave check. I guess you can call it a bike cave check. I'd love to know what you think of it. There's probably some bits
and pieces you spotted in some of the footage. Let us know if you've got any questions in the comments underneath. And more importantly, let's
see your bike cave entries. We do get some really
good submissions already on the weekly GMBN Tech
show, I'd love to see more. I'd love to see some smaller ones, I'd love to see some sheds. I'd love to see people
keeping bikes in lofts. Literally, whatever it
is, it doesn't matter. It's just cool if you have a
little house for your bike. So keep them coming in. So for a couple other videos, click down here if you
want to see Martin Ashton's pro bike check. That was our first feature
that ran last weekend over on GMBN Tech, or
actually the weekend before. I might be lying there. And click down here if you
want to see Neil's garage tour. Little bit different. He's a bit more rustic, shall
we say, than my bike cave. But, it's all good, it's
all cool stuff nonetheless. Don't forget to give us a huge
thumbs up here at GMBN Tech and don't forget to share and subscribe. See ya later.
