DANNY ROBINS' EVENTS GUIDE: 8TH JULY

World Mountain Bike Bog Snorkelling Championships - Sat 10th July

The Tour De France is in full swing at the mo, but another cycling event has caught my eye this week - one that involves a specially adapted bike full of lead weights and with tyres full of water instead of air.

The challenge in the World Mountain Bike Bog Snorkelling Championships is to drive this specially adapted bike through a 6ft deep Welsh bog whilst wearing a mask and snorkel. Oh and back again. The winner is the person who does it in the fastest time. You'll be wearing a belt of lead weights to make sure you stay on the bike. I case that sounds panic inducing, there are 'scuba drivers' (get it?) on hand to make sure you are ok.

This is happening in the Welsh town of Llanwrtyd Wells, which is also home to the Man Versus Horse Half Marathon and other strange competitive events - for some reason it seems to have spawned a mini industry of such things in a bid to boost local tourism.

It's £20 to take part, it starts at 11am and the registration forms can be found online.

Here's some video footage of a previous event.

Do you find scarecrows a bit sinister?

Do you imagine an army of them coming to life and chasing you armed with pitchforks?

If so, this may not be for you. But, if you find them interesting/amusing/endearing like the one in Wizard of Oz then you can't say fairer than the Langwathby Scarecrow Festival.

It's taking place this weekend - 10th-11th July.

Langwathby is 5 miles from Penrith in Cumbria. And the Scarecrow Festival is quite literally that - there are over a hundred different scarecrows that people have made around the village - in gardens, on the village green and by the roadside. Some of them are wry satirical comments on topical matters and some are historical characters or celebrity inspired - I saw a good Shaggy and Scooby one on the website. The villagers to compete to win a prize.

There are some good photos on the website.

It's not the only scarecrow festival going on this summer either. According to Langwathby's website you could visit one every weekend during the summer if you wanted. They do seem to be quite popular. There's one in Kettlewell in the Yorkshire Dales in August and one in Harpole in Northamptonshire in September.

Udderbelly - Southbank (until 18th July)

It's less than a month to the Edinburgh Festival now and comics are fine tuning their shows. If you're not going to make it up to Scotland and fancy catching some comedy before all the comedians decamp there you can see Edinburgh previews all over the place. Some of the best are at the Udderbelly - a giant upside-down inflatable cow on London's South Bank.

They've been doing a season that's been running since May and there's been loads of interesting stuff - on Weds 7th Chris Addison did his first ever live poetry gig and there's still good stuff to come - some Edinburgh previews from the likes of Jack Whitehall, Jimeoin and Brendon Burns and some special one off shows. The season ends on 18th July and there are still a few things that are too good to miss.

Ones that have caught my eye are:

Frisky and Mannish plus guests on Friday 9th July - described as 'neo cabaret' stars, their act is hard to describe but it's musical hip and very funny.

Alexei Sayle on Weds 14th July, talking about and reading his new book Stalin Ate My Homework.

Sat 10th & Sun 11th - An Audience With Clarke Peters who was Lester Freamon in The Wire.

Get down there before it moves up to Edinburgh.

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