RIP: Phil's Orange Bokeh

One of MASON's most enthusiastic testers and supported riders is Philippa 'Phil' Battye, whose approach to riding, racing, and life in general, seems to be about doing as much as possible, travelling as far as possible, and having the most fun possible while she's about it.

Recently, we had to break the news to Phil that her beloved orange Bokeh had come to the end of its (very, very long) road, and it was time for us to give her a new green one.

Phil took the news stoicly, so here are her reflections on the years she spent with her beloved orange Bokeh.

It was with a fair amount of sadness I traded in my beloved orange Bokeh for a newer shinier model a couple of months ago. To say it was the end of an era would be an understatement. But after six-and-a-half years of being ‘one extreeeemly careful lady owner’ my orange frame was deemed beyond help, suffering some structural damage via some ambitiously sized tyres and a lot of frozen mud in the winter of 2022!

As someone who tries to literally wear things out to nothing, I was conflicted when I felt the old girl still had life in her, but I was assured not much life, and the kindest thing was to put her out to pasture. Safe to say she’s taken a battering but lived a pretty full life, giving me my freedom, allowing me to cover silly distances riding more types of terrains than I thought it, or I, were capable of, and she’s picked up some battle scars along the way. Functionally though, she has been without fault, never having been stopped in my tracks by a single mechanical.

This bike has been everything to me these past 6 years… until very recently my primary mode of transport - living in the countryside and not owning a car. Many a journey I would load my life onto my Bokeh to ride to the Outer Hebrides, or Hungary, or sometimes for an easier life, the nearest train station! During Covid I even stretched the rules, riding 200 miles across the country ‘for exercise' to deliver my mum's birthday card.

This bike quite literally opened up the world to me, once a roadie but with a new tool at my disposal… I began to dabble in gravel, to then wild remote Scottish riding, to then racing over 3500m+ mountain passes in Kyrgyzstan. It certainly wasn’t always the most appropriate bike for the job, but its adaptability knows no bounds!

I’ve ridden a 2200km road race, then on the same bike with an extra 15mm of rubber the Silk Road Mountain Race just a few months later… but safe to say my younger self was a more robust version with a tweaked tolerance for eyeball rattling descents! Cutting my teeth on off road terrain like this though certainly taught me some bike handling skills, but as an older and wiser MTBer, I’m not sure I need to do it again!

My Bokeh has travelled the length of the country three times, finished ten endurance races (and won 6), travelled through 20+ countries and has been carried across the Pyrenean mountains more times than I’d like to admit. It has Everested , cyclo-crossed, and even crit raced with varying degrees of success!

Most of all though, this bike has allowed me to take small incremental steps towards the things I wanted to do, the person I hoped to be, so I could set aside the many fears and limiting beliefs I had allowing me to be free! Bikes, and especially this bike, are wonderful, wonderful things, which I probably wouldn’t be overstating to say… changed my life.

Thank you Phil. Enjoy your new green Bokeh.