Liberation Cycling

Still in shock...

2011-09-20T09:30:00.000-07:00

I've written a few posts about Fatty. I'm too lazy to do a search through my archive (which isn't that extensive, which should tell you how lazy I'm feeling) to see just how many, but it's a lot. Most of them are about one or another of the give-aways that he runs for good causes, most of which I've donated to because they're, well, good causes. I don't expect to EVER win but then there's this...

A Note About the Grand Slam for Zambia: The Grand Slam for Zambia was a monstrous success — we wound up raising $153,936, enough to buy 1,125 bikes. That’s astounding.
And a huge congratulations to the winners, the top ten of which are listed here!

Paul B of Vancouver: Africa Trip
Jan H of Belgium: RadioShack Trek Madone
Karen L of Vancouver: Tour de France Trip
Michael D of California: SRAM Red Group
Christoph S of Germany: HED Ardennes SL Wheels
Tim O of Austria: Lance Armstrong’s podium-worn yellow jersey
Joel P of California: Bike and an afternoon with Gary Fisher
Jeanette D of North Carolina: Specialized BG S-Works Road Shoes with Boa Systems Closures
Jeremy S of Florida: Ben King-signed jersey
Johan M of Florida: 16Gb White iPhone

So, yeah, I get to spend part of the day tooling around San Francisco with GARY FISHER! And that was a prize I got to choose...When I finish geeking out enough to make the arrangements and take the ride I'll post something, at least some pics.

Like a kid the night before Christmas...

2011-05-02T19:59:00.000-07:00

I just got done tuning the Trucker for biking to work in the morning. This will be my first time on my bike in...I have NO IDEA.

I honestly don't know if I'll be able to sleep - I'm that keyed up and excited by it. I don't know how or why I let this much time pass without riding but I can't wait to snap the fast and get miles under my wheels again.

First ride in a very long time

2011-02-19T20:55:00.001-08:00

It has been a long time since I've been on my bike. Today I decided to get on the Raleigh, which is strapped to my trainer, and rip out some time. I have it rigged up with an older computer on the back wheel so that I can record mileage, but I couldn't find the actual computer so I decided to just go by time. It was a little refreshing to just ride, no HRM, no cadence. I had a stopwatch running but left it in a different room. All I wanted was a total time at the end of the ride and didn't want to get hung up on watching the clock.

I learned that it has been far too long since I've been on my bike. I rode for less than an hour and was barely able to walk for the twitchy legs after. Now I just need to make sure I stick to training regularly enough to get past this. Since I've signed up for the LiveStrong ride again and want to make the metric, if not the full century this time around I need to get the miles in.

Returning in 2011

2011-01-02T10:44:00.000-08:00

So I've been away for far longer than I expected. Between work and family issues I haven't been riding, exercising, or blogging anywhere near as often as I wanted to be. I hope to be getting back in the saddle - both metaphorically with the blog and literally with the bike - in the coming weeks.

Thanks to anyone that has actually kept the blog in their feed through the silence. More to come.

oops

2010-05-31T13:38:00.000-07:00

I've been busy with this and that, which means little riding and no writing. Today I decided to take some time, put my new repair stand to work, and perform the much needed maintenance on my bikes. In doing so I discovered that the front tire on the Raleigh was dead, the loud and scary way.

As in, I pumped it up to almost full pressure (90 of a max 100 psi) and about 20 minutes later it blew out. Thankfully I wasn't working on the bike anymore and it was back against the wall, otherwise I would have been changing my pants and cleaning the floor instead of blogging...

Crossfit?

2010-05-03T19:06:00.000-07:00

I've been swapping emails with my brother, he of the Panama City Beach Iron Man, and he's been recommending that I look into Crossfit as an alternative to the standard gym-based or private coaching. I know a little about it, and know that he (and my sis-in-law) have been working out with a guy who based his program on it, but that's about it. When I did some digging I discovered an affiliate about a half mile from my office and another about two miles from my house. Neither of those is far enough away to pose an obstacle and now I'm intrigued.

Anyone have any experience with Crossfit that they want to share?

100 (or less) Miles of Nowhere

2010-05-01T10:00:00.000-07:00

In my last post I mentioned that I hoped I would be in shape (primarily my back) for the upcoming 100 Miles of Nowhere ride. For those who aren't aware of it, this "ride" started as a fundraising bet by the Fat Cyclist that he could do 100 miles in a single day on rollers (he won). The response was so massive that he opened it up to other participants, with the support of Twin Six and other companies. This year's official date is May 8.

The large and very stuffed goody-bag from Twin Six

I recently got my bag of stuff form Twin Six, which (morally) obligates me to ride. I won't be doing so on May 8 due to a barbeque (that I'm hosting). I may try for May 9 - it would be a good way to work off the barbeque and get me ready for my first vacation in something like two years, which starts on May 10.

The inside of the goody-bag

Either way, I doubt I'll be hitting the full 100 miles. My goal is to do 65, a metric century, to see how my training is going for the LiveStrong ride. Since I haven't been doing any training I already know the answer to that question but this might be a good way to jump start the new batch of training. One thing I do need to figure out is how I can determine my distance since I've shifted over to a GPS system, which won't measure anything on the trainer or rollers.

Starting over from scratch

2010-04-29T12:14:00.000-07:00

As the long silence might have indicated, I've been lax. Not just in writing, but in riding and just about everything that had been contributing to my physical well-being. Well, it caught up with me on Monday. I was moving and unpacking some not-all-that-heavy boxes and managed to tweak my back, leading to the last couple of days being spent in varying degrees of pain/discomfort and working from home.

This has been a wake up call for me, and come Monday (when I'm well enough to go back to work) one of my stops will be the gym to meet with the person in charge of their trainers. I need to find someone that I can see for both the minor rehab (mainly stretching) my back needs to get the last of the spasm under control, and then for moving forward. I need to focus on weight loss and flexibility, and hopefully there's someone there I can work with.

I hope I can be ready to go for the 100 miles of nowhere ride (post coming to discuss) and more importantly for the LiveStrong ride in July, but right now, I just don't know.

An interesting experiment

2010-03-21T19:59:00.000-07:00

The last two or so weeks I've been very strictly monitoring my diet including keeping a food journal. I hate keeping a food journal. However, keeping that close of an eve on my intake has allowed me to drop back almost to where I was a few months ago (~25 lbs down) before I got lazy. During that time I have been very lax about exercising, having gotten in only one true ride, no runs, and a heap of yard work/activity of daily living stuff.

The next two weeks will be almost the polar opposite.

I have two weeks of travel coming up, most of it for work, and the nature of the trips will limit my ability to control my food choices. The first week I'll be in a fairly small town for a training and doubt that there will be much available, in addition I'm in a standard hotel (as opposed to an "extended stay" style one with a kitchen) which limits cooking options. The following week I'll be traveling to Honolulu for meetings, but won't have a car, which reduces me to joining my colleagues in their food choices or guiding them to mine. What I will be doing is bringing my running shoes (and for the first trip my bicycle) and planning to work out for ~60 min per day.

All in all, it will provide an interesting comparison - which is better for me when it comes to losing or at least maintaining weight: rigorous calorie counting/food choice limitation or exercising?

On hydration and being fat

2010-03-18T20:53:00.000-07:00

Warning - I will be writing about proper hydration, and as any fitness person knows that means discussing what happens after proper hydration.

I've finally gotten back on track with watching my diet, and as such have seen my weight start heading back down. After a couple of days though I noticed something odd - my body fat % (measured by bio-electrical impedance) was climbing. Climbing at a rate of 1.0 to 1.5% a day. Keeping in mind that my scale reports in 0.5% increments this still seemed like a lot (not to mention odd) so I looked up the impact of hydration (lack of) on this sort of measurement. Short version, the worse your hydration is the higher your apparent body fat %, because it screws with the conductive properties of non-fat body mass.

Since I was already in "fun with Google" mode I decided to see what I could find about "proper" hydration. Sure, I've heard the old "8 x 8 oz glasses per day" thing, but it has always struck me as odd that my wee little friend Pest, who's maybe 5 feet tall in heels and weighs significantly less than I do, would need the same amount of liquid as me. The old stand-by is "clear and copious" urine and I knew I was failing that test, but the closest thing to a formula I found was to halve your body weight in pounds to get the number of oz of water you should drink. A little math gives us:

275/2 = 137.5

For comparison - 8 x 8 = 64

So, I need to be drinking not 8 8 oz glasses, but 17.

No wonder my body fat % has been climbing. I've made the effort for the last couple of days, managed to get close to 80 oz each day (and that was rough) and the body fat % has started reversing. Keeping up this level of drinking (water) is going to be tough.

The awesomeness....

2010-03-16T21:08:00.000-07:00

On my ride home tonight I was passed by a, dare I say, dapper gentleman (slacks, cardigan, neatly-trimmed grey beard) riding

a unicycle.

It was one of those days where my desire to have had a camera in my bike bag was unimaginable. He was moving down the sidewalk in the opposite direction, an older Bell (all white, obvious red logo) on his head looking like he'd stepped out of a college-based coming of age movie.

As I said, the awesomeness...

(Possible) Upcoming solo mini-tour

2010-03-03T17:39:00.001-08:00

I've got a class for work near the end of the month that will take me up into the Red Bluff (CA) area. After posting on Bike Forums for some good 2-3 day routes in the area I've come down on doing a loop around Lake Almanor. Sure, it's only a little over 30 miles, but this would be my first tour and it looks like I'll need to carry food with me (not fully loaded, but reserve).

Image from MapMyRide

The class is M-Th, so my plan would be to drive over from Red Bluff after the class ends, crash somewhere for the night and leave my truck at the hotel while I do the ride. I plan to finish in 2 days (one night on the road) and would probably stay at the same place after so I can rest before the drive home (3+ hours) which I wouldn't want to do right after the ride.

This would give me plenty of time for the riding and to check out the area. I'm not sure about the terrain, but it looks pretty level. If that's the case and I do the whole 30+ in one day then it will turn into a couple of day trips from the hotel. I would still ride fully loaded and can use it as a chance to check out the bags and get used to the balance of a loaded bike.

Rainy birthday

2010-02-24T10:36:00.000-08:00

Should be out riding today to celebrate, but work and weather have gotten in the way...So I'll just post a pic from riding in Carson City a few months back.

GPS oddities and my commute

2010-02-22T16:38:00.000-08:00

A little while back I switched from a wheel magnet based bike computer to a GPS one. This was mainly to make it easier to track my running and biking with a single device (read: toy). I had a couple of odd runs before I figured out that you have to wait until the signal is strong (correct number of blinks per minute) before starting off. Now though, I'm having a different issue.

Simply put, the GPS doesn't like my place of business. I can sit outside my building for 10 min (and I have) waiting for the signal and it won't come through. On multiple occasions I've given up waiting and ride the short distance (0.6 mi) from the building to Jack London Square and re-tried, only to get a connection in about 30 sec. Annoying, if not actually significant.

Punch it...

2010-02-19T18:11:00.000-08:00

Last time I rode, home specifically, I encountered another rider heading my way. He passed me when a light changed and, mainly because I was in the @$$-end of my ride, the part where no matter how great I feel when I'm putting along my legs start to die on me, I decide to pace him. Keep in mind that I was in mountain shorts (nobody wants to see me in spandex these days) and had a pannier on the back end full of clothes, and my semi-companion was in nothing but bike clothing with a wee-little Camelback.

For about 2 miles (out of my 10) I went harder than I've done for a while - held better than 17 mph and cranking at around 85 rpm. It felt great.

The next morning - not so much...

Perfect temperature for riding

2010-02-18T08:38:00.000-08:00

I rode in yesterday and my morning commute is done in work clothes. I discovered that 56F is the perfect temperature to bike in long pants and a button, long-sleeved shirt. Cool enough that I didn't overheat, warm enough that I didn't need any excess "stuff".

Riding home it was 60F, which was just about perfect for riding in my kit.

Keep in mind that I've ridden in everything from snow to 100F+, bone-dry and muggy-wet. I do love riding in extreme heat, if it's dry, but that's a special event kind of thing. For my daily, regular riding give me the mid-60s.

Did Bell make "British" versions of their city helmets?

2010-02-17T08:06:00.000-08:00

Riding in this morning I found myself wondering that, are there "British" versions of the Bell city helmets (the Citi and Metro)? These helmets were great because they have little accessory kits that include a mirror, rain cover, and air vent plugs for cold weather. My morning commute it primarily through downtown Oakland on one way streets, most of the time on the left side of the road. That makes my (ordinarily very handy) mirror almost worthless, unless I want to check out the parked cars.

When I got to work I noticed that the visor has a slot on the right side for a mirror, but that the one I have is left-sided only (which makes me wonder if there really are left-handed smoke shifters, no matter what the people at the Wolfeboro Trading Post said). Are there right-sided ones for people who use the other side of the street?

On a less-whimsical note I could see this being handy for international touring, especially if there is just a second wee little mirror to pick up.

Travel and training

2010-02-08T18:02:00.000-08:00

The next couple of months involve a lot of travel for me, most of it short trips of the "fly one day, sleep, meeting, then fly home" variety. This is killing my ability to train. In most cases I work a partial day and then head straight to the airport, getting to my destination in the late evening (8pm or later). Since I am an evening-trainer, this means no workout those days. The following day is meeting, followed by a late flight home, arriving in the same time window (8pm or later), which means a second day without training. Again, in most cases I'm pretty thrashed and playing catch-up the third day, which means a late night at work and again no training. Additionally, it means two or three days where I don't eat the way I should. All in all, it's bad news.

Any ideas on ways to still get some training in with all this travel?

Running in the rain

2010-01-29T18:29:00.000-08:00

Tonight was my running night and so, despite a pretty heavy rainfall, I put on my gear and headed out. The run wasn't so great in terms of time or distance, but it was just what I needed. I'm trying to build my rhythm for working out so that I get into the pattern of run one, bike one, lift one, repeat, and like I said, tonight was the run one.

It wasn't a great run, but it was fun. If it had been just a tad warmer (it's about 50F here right now) I would have headed out without the hoodie, just shorts and t-shirt. There's something about heading out into the rain fully intending to get soaked that just makes it fun. The walk home form BART in my work clothes? not so great. Running in the rain, really great.

I think it comes back to the whole "accepting reality as it is" thing which is so key to Zen (and which Texafornia from ZenTri spoke about in a recent podcast from ZenTri camp). My "knowledge" of Zen being pretty basic (by that I mean I haven't studied a lot of writings by masters, I've read accounts of the way they lived and developed my understanding from there) I won't try to pass on some teaching from this. For me it was more a perfect opportunity to experience the difference mind (in a Zen sense) can make. There was no difference in the world between my walk home (~15 min) and my run (~20 min, maybe 10 minutes after I got home) but the way I reacted to it was entirely different, and all because I headed out for the run fully intending to get wet.

The world is what it is, but they way we react to it is entirely up to us. I've now experienced that in a very profound way.

I am stronger than pizza (tonight)

2010-01-27T18:47:00.000-08:00

Tonight was my first bike commute in a long-ish time, probably a couple of months. It felt much longer than it was given that it took me the same time it always has (around an hour). There's one stretch where I always feel whooped and wish I had SAG support and for some reason when I hit that spot tonight (it was already full dark) I wanted pizza so bad I could almost taste it. Then, just a few blocks from home I passed a Little Caesar's and I still wanted pizza, even if it was pizza pizza.

But no, I'll be good and heat up my stew.

Running > aggravation

2010-01-26T18:36:00.000-08:00

Without going into details, by the time I was heading out of work today I was miffed. or peeved. or salty. Take your pick. Personally, I'm going with so aggravated my eyes were bleeding. There are a number of reasons why I felt that way, and none of them matter now.

I was also very keyed up, almost jittery. So I decided to go for a run, something I haven't done for the better part of a month. On that run I ran (ha ha) into my friend Slav and his wife who live somewhat close to me. They were loading their kids into the car to go get dinner and we chatted for a couple of minutes, something else I haven't done for far too long.

A few minutes later I realized that I felt great, at least emotionally. My body was making it very clear that being overweight and taking a month off of running were a bad combo, but the borderline rage I'd been feeling for the last few hours was just gone.

Getting out to run, being able to let my brain switch as close to off as I can (I won't even get into how long it's been since I meditated), and pounding pavement let me subconsciously resolve the battles I'd been fighting in my head. Since there is nothing I can do about any of the things that had me so irked, I let them go. All without actually thinking about it, by just getting into the rhythm of the run.

Like I said in the title - running is greater than aggravation.

Rededication

2010-01-25T10:12:00.000-08:00

Last night I did something I've been meaning to do for a while now - I shaved my head again. I seem to have an anti-Samson complex or something, the more I let my hair grow the less focused I get. I need my focus back because I've signed on for another round of the LiveStrong Challenge and want to have a better showing than last year.

As before, I'm riding for Team Fatty, I plan on doing the metric century, and I'm asking for donations.

Unlike before I want to train with focus, hence the head shaving.

In truth, I haven't done any real training since the Turkey Tri at Thanksgiving which some of you may remember whooped me, and not just because of the REALLY cold swim. I have a plan this time around (unlike last year) which involves some mild running and roller/trainer riding for a couple of weeks and then getting more serious. I've picked up a book (Friel's triathlete training bible) and will be keeping a paper log to complement my electronic on on ActiveBody. I will also be posting here regularly as I train, and because I want to shame myself into sticking to it I'll be posting those reports to Facebook.

The ride is in July, which gives me a good six months to get into serious shape, and this time around I want to do just that.

Two good pieces of kit

2009-12-11T18:34:00.000-08:00

Despite the unpleasant weather (40s, drizzle) yesterday I set myself up to bike home. I had my new bags from Swift and loaded them onto the bike to test out.

The first thing I noticed when I got the box a couple of weeks ago was that the bags were beautiful. Swift lets you customize the bags and I couldn't be happier with how they cam out. The attachment is simple - I tossed in a little extra to have a bungie attachment with an S-hook for the bottom so all I did was hook the bungie on the bottom and pull up until I could hook the top bar on the rack. The two bags worked great for what I wanted to carry - my work clothes, computer, and some notebooks. With a second set of bags (which I have) I can easily load enough gear for a short trip (couple of days) without trouble. When the weather turns enough for me to test the bags out with a full tour, I'll let you know.

The other piece of kit I wanted to crow about is my Fat Cyclist woolie (sorry, it's a limited edition and there hasn't been any info on the next version). Like all FC gear it's made by Twin Six, and it's fantastic. Yesterday was the first time I really tested it in poor weather, I'd worn it on cool days before but not in the cold. I was wearing the jersey with a day-glo vest over it and shorts, and within a few minutes I was plenty warm. I will soon be ordering a few more wool jerseys for winter riding.

Clothes make the ride?

2009-12-10T11:02:00.001-08:00

I managed to get off my @$$ and ride into work this morning (well, ride to BART and plan to ride home). Most of the time when I've ridden in I've kitted up since that's what I wear to ride home (12 miles - bike shorts are nice). Today I just put on my work clothes since the morning ride is so short. I noticed something odd though - there's one major intersection between my house and BART, and I normally crosswalk it. Today though I just pulled over and turned with the traffic in the left hand turn lane.

I'm perfectly comfortable taking the lane, and traffic isn't so brutal that the crosswalk is safer, so I don't know why I took the lane today instead. My only thought is that most of the time when I kit up I'm doing back road or bike trail riding, and most of the time when I'm in street clothes I'm running errands and commuting. Either way, I was more vehicular in the my riding in my street clothes.

Anyone else find their riding style changed based on what they wear?

Quick note - great causes

2009-12-07T15:30:00.001-08:00

The master of soliciting donations, Elden Nelson (The Fat Cyclist) is at it again. First he sent an open letter to Johan Bruyneel explaining why he deserved to be on Team Radio Shack. Johan upped the game with this challenge:

By Friday December 11, 12:00 PM US Mountain Standard/Tucson, AZ Time you must have met the following criteria
Raised a minimum of $10,000 for World Bicycle Relief
AND
Raised a minimum of $10,000 for LIVESTRONG
If those two criteria are met by the stated deadline, I will fly you out to Arizona and you will have the one opportunity to ride with Team RadioShack on Sunday, December 13.

But I have a bonus for you!If you raise a minimum of $25,000 for World Bicycle Relief AND $25,000 for LIVESTRONG, you"ll get a brand new Trek Madone 6 Series bike powered by SRAM Red.

So, Fatty threw it open to everyone. Go to his blog, read the full post, and toss in for a chance to win.

Turkey Tri (San Dimas, CA) race report - for real

2009-12-01T17:18:00.001-08:00

OK, now that I can feel all of the delicate parts of my body that were near-frozen after the swim on Sunday I'll write the race up.

As I mentioned in my earlier post it was 58F in the water and I didn't have a wetsuit. I had a pair of tri shorts (bike shorts with a thinner pad), the yellow Clyde class swim cap, and a pair of Sweedish goggles. That's it. I had to do the first 1/3 of the swim backstroke because when I put my chest in the water I couldn't hold my breath. I eventually hit a point where I could take a few strokes without dying but the water sucked most of my strength. Walking up the beach (and then up some stairs to T1) was tough.

The bike was better. The day was warming and it was comfortable to ride. I've done one other race in the same park and the route was shifted to be easier to start (last time you had a good climb right out of T1 so you had to have your bike in a low gear to make the run/walk from T1 - jump and ride move possible). I rode my Super Course and it was adjusted slightly off, with the seat a little too low, but that's my fault for not re-fitting the bike I haven't been on for better than a year. Oh, and I left my helmet in my truck (I carpooled to the race with my brother) and had to borrow one (Brian, bib # 77, you are my hero).

The run was a little long for a sprint (4.5 mi) but it was through the park and pretty nice. My only gripe is that the kid's duathlon they were running was using the adult run route for the kid's bike route and I got tagged in the arm by a sprinting kid.

As you can see from the pic above, I was last (20/20) in my class and darn near DFL (dead f---ing last) overall, but I did finish. I haven't been as good as I'd hoped with my training this fall and now I have a base time to try and better.

Turkey Tri (San Dimas, CA) race report

2009-12-01T15:28:00.000-08:00

I did the Turkey Tri in San Dimas the Sunday after Thanksgiving. The water was 58F and I didn't have a wetsuit. When I thaw out I'll have a full write-up.

Getting ready

2009-11-23T07:54:00.000-08:00

As I mentioned a little while ago, I've got a sprint tri coming up next weekend. I've done another race at this same location a few years ago, and that time I had to borrow my brother's old full suspension MTB to ride. The worst part (other than the fact that I don't like suspension to begin with) is that he hadn't used/maintained it for so long that the front fork lock-out wasn't working, so by the end of the bike section I was almost sea-sick from the bouncing every time I tried to really push on a climb. This time I'll be driving to his house instead of flying, so I can bring my own bike.

I thought about it a bit and decided to pull the Raleigh off of the trainer and use it. Sure, it's limited gear-wise (a straight 10, and not for climbing, compared to the 21 on the Trucker) but it weighs less, has no racks, and is easier to pack into my truck. I also decided to swap the pedals out. When I first bought it the Raleigh had what looked like original toe clip pedals on it and I pulled them off for clipless. In this case I want the toe clip so I can just wear my running shoes. Since I'm not going for speed the slight benefit of the clipless shoes is more than balanced by only having to put my shoes on once (I'm VERY slow at transitions.)

The only downside is that while I was pulling the non-driveside pedal off I wanged my thumb good - pinched it between the wrench and the crank. Darn thing is still tender. Oh, and the fact that the spare tube from the seat bag had spider webs on it.

Wednesday weigh-in: Week 15

2009-11-11T13:59:00.000-08:00

In addition to the update on my weight (still going down, slower than I'd like) I want to talk about weather. In this case, the difference between cycling and running weather.

I really like to ride. It's one the of the most enjoyable activities I do. What I don't especially like is riding when it's chilly. Not cold, mind you, just chilly. Weather right now in the Bay Area is mid 50s and 60s which isn't bad for riding but for some reason I just can't get myself to ride in this sort of weather.

Running on the other hand...

I love running in this weather - the colder (down to 20s) the better. I head out in my shorts and sweatshirt and pound for an hour or so and I'm happy as can be. So why not with riding?

(and yes, that parenthetical in the first line is the weight update for this week)

Wednesday weigh-in: Week 14

2009-11-05T08:08:00.000-08:00

Okay, so it's not Wednesday and I've been slipping more often than not on the "weekly" part. After a great week of working out I've had a week and a half of bad. Basically, I missed most of last week, was gone over the weekend (did a lot of hiking but no true workouts), and have been feeling a little meh this week. I will be back in the gym today to get back on the horse, but have a lot of ground to make up.As you can see from the graph I'm still trending down, although with some deviations. As I get back into working out regularly I hope to get that trend a little more solid.

I have registered for the Turkey Tri at Bonnelli Park in the LA area, the Sunday following Thanksgiving, so if any of you are in the are come by and laugh.

A rideless weekend

2009-11-02T09:48:00.000-08:00

I spent last weekend in Mammoth Lakes, CA and intended to do some riding. I loaded my bike and all of my gear into the truck, and that's where it stayed for the length of the trip. Two things caught me short - the altitude and the hills. I fully expected both, but wasn't ready for just how much they would whoop me. I had a hard enough time hiking around and don't want to think about what would have happened if I'd tried to ride anywhere.

Below is a shot of McLeod Lake, a short hike from where I stayed. I also tromped around Convict Lake and a bit in Yosemite. This is will certainly go on my list of trips to repeat, especially in the spring/summer/fall while 120 through Tioga Pass is open.

Wednesday weigh-in: Week 12

2009-10-21T08:54:00.000-07:00

I am a giant ball of muscle pain.

Monday I started a new workout routine, pinched from an old issue of Outside (I don't know which, except that it was in 2008). I had pulled the article out, probably because it's a triathlon-specific program, and stuck it in a pile of papers. I found it again about a week ago and decided to jump in. It's a 12-week program, with swim/bike/run and gym workouts. I'm two days into it and ... ow.

I'll add the screen-cap from Active Body (where I track my workouts) in a week or so, when there are enough of them to make sense of the pattern. For now, the weight loss graph.

1 - Last 30 days

The good news is that the weight keeps going down, and I seem to be getting back up to speed. I'm now down 32 pounds, and have cracked the 25-pound barrier with the Physics Diet calculated average.

2 - Total progress

A funny/sad side note on my fitness. I've been tracking both my weight and body fat % with Physics Diet, and while my body fat % hasn't changed much (which should shift with the workout routine being added) my BMI just seemed off. I knew I was fat, but I was coming in with a BMI of ~ 57, which as I understand it is essentially "Why Aren't You Dead?" level. Then I took another look at my profile and realized that I had listed myself as 5'0" instead of 5'10", oops. Added the "1" in and my BMI plummeted to 37, not a bad change in less than thirty seconds.

Wednesday weigh-in: Week 11

2009-10-14T09:57:00.000-07:00

Catching up again. I missed the last couple of weeks because we were activated to support a team that went to American Samoa to provide assistance after the recent earthquake and tsunami. That meant a week + of straight 12 hour days, staring with a 17 hour day. Needless to say, I didn't get much exercise in.

The chart:

This is for the whole length of the weight loss, and the key thing I am seeing here is that I've crossed the 25 pound line. My "average" weight as calculated by Physics Diet is now 266.01, and I started at 292.2 just under three months ago. That's the good news.

The bad news is that next week is the last week of the first round of the program, and looking back at my initial goal I hoped to be done at this point. Instead I'm only a little over 1/3 of the way there. I should have been losing about 5 pounds a week, I've been losing about half that. The main culprit is that I haven't worked out, almost at all. Work is the easiest excuse, but that's all it is, an excuse.

I have put some money out for the gym, I go rarely. I've now dropped some additional money for a trainer, which will get me over there at least one day a week, and the rest will be up to me. I've shifted my goal to New Year's and should be able to make it. At my current rate of ~2.5 pounds a week I should lose another 25+ pounds by then, which would put me at about 230 and I should have a better idea if my original goal of 225 was accurate (as in, do I still look fat at that weight) or if I've got more to go.

Wednesday weigh-in: Week 8

2009-09-23T08:44:00.000-07:00

I've broken through a wall that has been a problem for a while now - I'm dropped below 270 and held it for a couple of days. I've also made it back below the "best fit line" on the overall Physics Diet graph (red circle below).This is more significant that it might seem initially. What little graphing I remember from my time in math courses tells me that the "BFL" the is straight line that runs through or closest to most of your data points. If you look at the early days on the diet, my actual weight (green dots at the bottom of the graph, hanging down like stalactites) and the average weight calculated by the algorithm were far below the BFL, which indicates that I was losing weight rapidly enough to "confuse" the graph a bit. They we get to the last few weeks where it flips, and I'm above the BFL because I had pretty much stopped losing weight, excluding some daily fluctuations, and the BFL caught up with me. Now, it looks like I'm moving forward again and will hopefully start dropping like I was before.This second graph is only for September, and you can see the slight decline in the BFL, with the more significant drop in the green measured weight over the last couple of days.

Breaking 270 is significant for me, because that has been my floor of weight loss over the last few years, so getting past that is a great thing personally.

An almost fully-loaded commute

2009-09-21T18:39:00.000-07:00

I have avoided commuting to work on Mondays because I usually have my laptop and a big heap of papers that I've brought home to work on over the weekend. This week was no different, except that the heap was closer to two heaps because of the (work-related) trip to Carson City last week. But I also did some riding there that both 1) reminded me how much I luv my bike and 2) demonstrated conclusively (and emasculating-ly) how much more I need to be on it. So I loaded up last night to make sure I would ride this morning. The result:

The back end is my Two Wheel Gear garment pannier (that I luv almost as much as my bike) and the front end, strapped to the top of my Nice Rack is my backpack with many heaps of papers and my laptop. I'm not a fan of a high load like that, the front was a bit wobbly, which reinforces the need to get some normal panniers that will mount on the sides (and low, an advantage of the Nice Racks) in the near future.

I will post about the rides in Carson. One was on dirt and really fueled my desire to get my hands on a twenty-niner, the other was a solo trek around town. Both were great and both hurt (see note above on emasculation) in that good "this ride kicked my sorry @$$" way. But more on that soon.

Quick post

2009-09-14T09:26:00.000-07:00

Just a quickie this morning before a road trip. I'm on my way out to Carson City, NV and will be bring my bike. So here's the question - anyone know some good rides in the area? I don't have a MTB, but will be grabbing some knobbies for my Long Haul Trucker, so mild trails are fine, but I'm thinking more fire-road than single track. Any thoughts are welcome.

I do plan to spend at least part of the weekend in the area, so rides over a wider geography would be great.

Wednesday weigh-in: Week 6

2009-09-09T09:04:00.000-07:00

I'm traveling again, so the weigh-in this week will be mostly historical data. First, the graph.

My biggest issue is the grand flatness that is emerging. I've plateaued pretty badly, and it's my own fault. I've been lax with following the fast - basically I've had a number of days where I didn't have the correct number of supplements leading to extreme hunger at the end of the day, leading to me eating. I also haven't been at all diligent with exercising, so the excess intake from eating actual food isn't offset by increased burning.

All that being said, I've gotten back into the swing of the fast, before I left for my trip I got rid of the last remaining food components (things like peanut butter), and have some definite plans for exercising. The downside is that this week and next week involve a lot of travel, so my hope to begin biking to/from work a few days a week will be disrupted. On the upside, the hotel I'm in now has a nice gym and since I don't have to worry about getting dinner I'll have plenty of time tonight to "enjoy" it.

Wednesday weigh-in: Week 5

2009-09-02T09:06:00.000-07:00

This is just a quick note, and the full post will be up later today. I'm out of town for work today, and neglected to bring my little sheet with all my weigh-ins. Last week I had a last-minute trip to Seattle that messed up my timing.

The short version of the news is that things have slowed down. I'm at just over 20 pounds total loss, but haven't lost much in the last couple of weeks. My crazy work schedule has prevented me from working out, although I have plans for that.

Look for a full update tonight.

International Win For Susan Day

2009-08-23T06:22:00.000-07:00

I've written about Elden and Susan more than once, and won't repeat. Head to his blog, check him out. Anyway, a couple of weeks ago, David Schloss over at Bike Hugger declared Sunday 23 Aug "International Win For Susan Day" and encouraged all supporters to get out and have a ride in their Fatty gear, upload it to Twitter, and donate to LAF.

Since I don't tweet, I'm doing it here.
No, I wasn't having a bad day. I was just trying to catch a quick pic of myself as we were heading out after grabbing coffee at the halfway point in the ride.

The picture was taken on my first ride with the Cherry City Cyclists, a local club. It was my first club ride, with this club or any. It was a mellow ride, which I used to work on my cadence training rather than anything else. It was different for me to ride at someone else's pace for that long. The last time I did group rides it was with a group of friends who would stop periodically and regroup, but other than that we broke up and rode in smaller groups. Something new to get used to.

Wednesday weigh-in: Week 3

2009-08-19T20:22:00.000-07:00

Another week down, this one not quite as good.

Don't get me wrong, it's still going in the right direction, but I was hoping I'd be able to get into the gym more this week and get the pace to pick up a bit. I did see the training last Thursday, but the Friday was working and driving up to northern CA to see a friend. Saturday was spent at a county fair (so lots of walking but not too strenuous), a couple of hours hiking Sunday before the drive home (oh, and couch moving once I got home) and the first few days this week had no real activity.

My work load has gone through the roof, and will stay there for the next week or so. Hopefully I'll be able to get some things organized and spread the tasks to other people, but until then I'll be pulling 12 hours days to get it all done.

Wednesday weigh-in: Week 2

2009-08-12T17:37:00.000-07:00

A little late getting it up, but today is still Wednesday...

I was a little concerned about what the trip to the group was going to show. I'll be quite honest here and say that I haven't stuck to the fast as rigorously as I should, as in I've had real food a couple of times, and my exercise hasn't kicked in full-bore yet. Also, I had no clue what the difference between my scale and the program scale was.

All that lead up, and it was good news. I'm down 11.8 pounds total (2 weeks) which is slightly above the average of 5lbs/week. I also learned (by checking) that my scale is within a few tenths of the program scale, so no more worries there. Once I get into a regular exercise schedule I should see the weight start falling more rapidly, but at this rate (5.9 lbs/week) I'll hit my goal in 11 more weeks, right in line with the 14-16 I thought it would take. I rode earlier in the week, and have an appointment with the trainer tomorrow afternoon. Next week I'll be starting a couple of classes at the gym, which will get me over there regularly (and whoop my @$$), which I need if I want to speed up the loss.

There's still a difference of a couple of pounds (about 3) between my scale weight and what the PhysicsDiet graph is coming up with. My guess is that this is because my loss isn't all that great compared to my total weight, and that the longer I keep up the same rate of loss the closer their average will get to my actual weight. This time around it's also a lot easier to see the benefit of the smoothing that the rolling average of their system puts into place. I didn't go above the average (all green points) but the spike where I was out of town and not weighing or exercising didn't really impact the overall trend. I also have a feeling that I pulled a Homer Simpson ("Dad, towel rack") on 9 Aug, there's really no good reason why I would have dropped two pounds and then have it show right back up and begin tracking slowly down from there. Had it been an up-tick it would make more sense. Oh well, it all comes out in the wash.

A newly discovered treasure

2009-08-10T20:38:00.000-07:00

Tonight I needed a ride. Work is moving back into being stressful and it's been a few weeks since I've been on the bike, so I decided to check out Oyster Point Regional Shoreline. It's a smallish park only a short distance from my house. The downside - getting into the park means going past the "Davis Street Station for Material Recycling and Transfer" aka a non-permanent dump site. Oh, and the San Leandro Rifle and Pistol Range.

Once into the park it was easy to forget I was only 10 minutes from home. Well, except for the airplanes landing just across the slough.

All in all it was a great place to ride and will probably become my new training site. It has paved flat stretches running around the perimeter and a number of fairly wide dirt trails running over and across the hilly interior, providing opportunity for some speed training and for some mild climbing (since I'm not ready for serious climbing yet). Since it's only a short distance from the house it's not a problem for me to head over after work, get an hour or so in, and get home before it's too dark.
On top of all that it was just nice to be out on the bike after a long day at work.

A fight well-fought

2009-08-05T20:17:00.000-07:00

I have written about Elden "Fatty" Nelson a number of times before. Today I'm borrowing his post in case there are some of my readers who haven't been to his site.

Don’t Say She Lost

08.5.2009 | 8:40 pm

Susan died tonight (August 5) at 7:25pm. It was a hard, long day, and Susan fought right to the end, for much longer than anyone would have thought she could.

My mom, my sisters Kellene and Jodi, and my Brother-in-Law Rocky were all here to support my family as Susan passed away.

I’ll have more to say soon, but consider this. Susan inspired me to expand the focus of my blog from nothing but bike-related jokes to a serious and pitched fight against cancer.

Then she inspired 500+ of you to join Team Fatty, the largest LiveStrong Challenge Team there has ever been.

And Team Fatty has raised close to more than $500,000 — a record amount.

Susan’s part in the battle is over, but she didn’t lose. She led the charge. She showed the rest of us how to fight: with determination, focus, creativity, and outrageous endurance.

Now it’s up to the rest of us to Fight Like Susan.

Wednesday weigh-in: Week 1

2009-08-05T06:00:00.000-07:00

I'm a week into my diet program and it's working about as well as I'd expect. I don't have an "official" weight since I'm on the road for work this week and missed my group session. Also, there is a significant difference between the program scale and mine, with mine weighing almost 10 pounds lighter. Next week I'll adjust my scale (if I can - haven't looked to see how yet) but I want to do it by weighing for the group, then coming home and weighing right then in the same clothes/condition, then making any adjustments. Either way, I figure it will still be good for tracking the direction/degree of weight change, which so far is all the right way.

If you're unfamiliar with PhysicsDiet, it's a free tool for tracking weight change. It's a little different, in that you're supposed to weigh daily for their system to work. I won't get into the details, but it involves a sliding exponential average of your weight and all sorts of other fancy math. The idea is to generate a trend line (blue on the graph above) and then show the daily weights as either green or red (losing/gaining, respectively) compared to the trend line. The end result is you get a better feel for the total direction of your progress even if you hit a plateau or have some "noise". There is also a "best fit line" (black), but I'm not all that sure about why you need to know it, and the site says that if your weight is going down (mine is, that's why there's lots of green - the shaded area is the difference between my reported weight and the mathematical average) all you need to watch is the average.

Something that I have also done, beyond the nutrition program, is join the gym near my work. They have a lot of classes, including a spin/TRX program I'm interested in and Masters swimming. My goal is to be there all five work days for some combination of classes and showering after a bike to work.

Wednesday weigh-in: Week 0

2009-07-29T18:49:00.000-07:00

I've been away for a while, and have been itching to get back at it. The time off has been good, and helped me move away from being so annoyed by some of the more strident "cars and the people who drive them are evil" writing that I was seeing and get back to just enjoying riding.

One of the things I had always wanted to use this blog for was to shame myself into losing weight. More specifically, to declare in a very public (and yet anonymous) forum the things I was doing to lose weight. And now is the time for that. Last night I began a very severe weight loss program that involves a medically-monitored fast. If my estimates are correct, I should be on it for between three and four months in order to make weight. Some background about me, courtesy of ActiveBody.org:

note - the only reason there is no body fat % is that I'm using the official weight from the program weigh in last night.

My intent is to post either a picture like that, or a graph of my progress to date every Wednesday, along with a running total of my progress at the very start of the post. Since this is the first one, and I have no progress, I'll stick to background.

I am, as the picture indicates, 5'9.5" and currently weigh 292.2 pounds. That gives a BMI (if you're the sort who thinks there's any validity to BMI - I'm not) of 42.5, which is well past "obese" My issue with BMI is that even if I hit my goal weight - 215, which would be around 15% BF - I will have a BMI of 31.5, still obese, although I don't think anyone would consider 15% BF "obese".

I got into this predicament through a couple of things:

Bad meds - I'm epileptic and the med I take to control it leads to weight gain. Since I started on the meds, about the time I graduated college, I went from 220 to 290. I give this about 7% of the responsibility.
Bad timing - I tend to miss lunch, often breakfast and lunch, and that leads to super-hunger at the end of the day. Too much food all at one time leads to more storage as fat. I give this another 7% of the blame.
Bad habits - Not only do I tend to skip meals, but I've gotten really lazy about preparing food. That would be why I miss lunch most of the time. More often than not (let's say 95% of the time) I just pick up something on the way home form work, as opposed to cooking. I give this 80% of the blame.
Who knows - Math majors will notice that my blame adds up to 95%. That's because I don't feel like counting out all of the tiny little things I do.
Me - At the end of the day, all of this comes down to ME. I knew there was research showing that my meds complicated weight loss (it's only more-recent studies that go so far as to call them a causative agent), I knew skipping meals was bad, and I knew not cooking was dumb.

Hopefully I'll learn my lesson this time.

A break

2009-06-23T21:32:00.000-07:00

I'm going to be taking a short break from this blog. The last couple of days the bike blogs I normally love seem to be filled with little more that hatred directed at people who drive and it's left me unable to write anything at all. I have the LiveStrong San Jose ride coming up, and hopefully the bike-positive (as opposed to car-negative) vibes of the rest of Team Fatty will renew my love of the sport.

I really hope so.

Being too close to transit

2009-06-13T06:00:00.000-07:00

In one of my last posts I mentioned that one of the things making it tougher for me to ride is how easy it is for me to take public transit. I want to expand that a little so I don't sound like a whiner without anything to really complain about.

Previously, when I lived in the Bay Area, I lived a few miles from BART, and my work was more than a few miles from BART at the other end. That meant that getting to work required me to drive the whole way, including fighting the San Francisco commute both directions, or biking. Easy choice most of the time, even when biking meant leaving home ~ 04:00.

Now, I live a 10 minute walk from BART and my work is directly outside of a BART station. This means that biking is almost more hassle than not. I have to get up in the morning, pack my work clothes into a bag, kit up (for the ride home), haul my bike up to the platform and then down at the far end. The payoff? A fantastic 12 mile ride home. It really is a conflict.

I plan to join a gym near my work when I get back from my latest trip. This will give me access to showers, which might, let me repeat and be honest MIGHT, be what I need to get me to bike both directions at least a few days a week.

Anit-cancer loot

2009-06-10T16:55:00.000-07:00

I've mentioned before that I'm doing the LiveStrong ride in San Jose, as a member of Team Fatty (and again, feel free to GO HERE and donate to me). One of the things that our team captain passed on recently was a link to the Team Estrogen site to get a pair of "Cancer Sucks" socks. The idea is that the whole team will show up with the Team Fatty jersey and the Cancer Sucks socks and make a strong statement. Today when I got home from work this is what I found in the mail.

Nothing like having anti-cancer kit for riding. I am going to look like a bit of a frilly bike-ninja though, with my all-black-and-pink ensemble for the ride. Maybe I should find an old helmet to paint...

On not riding and physical well-being

2009-06-09T06:00:00.000-07:00

It has been a while since I've been on my bike, or physically active in any real way. This is due to two things - work-related travel (15 days away from home with no bike or running shoes) and the ease of getting to work on public transit. Something I've noticed is that the more time passes between my last workout and today the worse I feel. It's funny, in some ways I feel like it's the day after a good ride/run because my legs are tired and sore. The problem is that they are tired and sore from underuse, not exertion.

Obviously, my weight isn't going in the right direction since I'm not exercising. I do have some rides planned for later in the week when I head out of town again, this time for my nephew's first birthday. Hopefully I'll be able to get back into a rhythm.

Three about Boris Johnson

2009-05-29T06:00:00.000-07:00

For US readers, Boris Johnson is the bike riding mayor of London. I'll freely admit that I don't know much else about the man, although he does get some discussion on "Politics Weekly", the Guardian weekly (natch) political podcast. I noticed that I had saved a couple of different stories about Mr. Johnson and since I'm not in a position to write extensively about any of them, here they are all at once.

Boris Johnson unveils blueprint for London's 'cycling revolution' - article outlines the mayor's announcement of a bike share program for London with an aim of 6000 bikes at 400 stations about 300 meters apart. Quote the Mayor:

"Much like hailing a cab, people will be able to pick up one of 6,000 bikes, and zip around town to their heart's content – not only a quick, easy, and healthy option, but one that will also make London a more liveable city."

Boris Johnson's 'near-death experience' with lorry caught on camera - a disconcerting article describing how a ride intended to show the transport minister and a deputy some sites for bike "super highways" the Mayor hopes to bring to London almost came to a catastrophic end. From the article:

In what is being described as the mayor's "near-death experience", the lorry's back door then suddenly flew open, dragged a parked car into the street and smashed into another – just feet from Johnson, Adonis and Ranger.

Most of it was caught on CCTV, and the article ends with an aide to Mr. Johnson making the incident an argument for the bikeways he (Johnson) is pushing for.

My "100 miles of nowhere" ride

2009-05-26T06:00:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday I participated in the 2nd 100 Miles of Nowhere Ride, from the one and only Fat Cyclist. (Note - he is the only capital F capital C, I most certainly am a fat cyclist.) The whole thing got kicked off last year when Fatty had the (INSANE) idea to raise some money for LAF by doing a century ride, on his rollers. He took "bets" in the form of donations on whether or not he would finish it (he did). This year he opened it up to other riders (read suckers/nuts). For a small entry fee you got some great loot and the comfort of making a donation to LAF, oh, and the opportunity to hamster-wheel yourself a century.

The day of the "race" was the day before I had to get on a plane for a 5+ hour flight to Hawaii (don't get jealous, I'm working including working on Memorial Day) so I didn't have as much time to set aside as I'd hoped. I also realized that I didn't have a computer on the bike hooked up to the trainer making accuracy a problem. So I opted for the "5 hours of nowhere ride" with the following logic: my average roadspeed (baring wind) is 13 miles/hour; my goal was a metric, which is about 62 miles; at 13 MPH 62 miles should take 4:45; so if I ride 5 hours I can call it a metric and we're good.
In total, I spent about 6.5 hours for the ride, with some stretch breaks and bathroom runs. I ripped through most of the last half of The Black Donnelys (Netflix), with some breaks for Simpsons to mellow things out. It was about what I expected - uncomfortable after a while (I don't have a good seat on the trainer bike), not very exciting, and surprisingly fun.

Oh, and I'll probably do it again next year if it happens.

On the road again

2009-05-24T19:05:00.000-07:00

Unfortunately, not on my bike. I'm traveling for work for the next two weeks and will try and get some things that I've been sitting on written up to post. One I need to do is my write up of my participation in the 100 miles of nowhere ride yesterday.

My commute

2009-05-20T06:00:00.000-07:00

I've been meaning for some time to take my camera with me on my commute home from work (the to-work commute is mostly me in the BART train, not very exciting) and get some pics up. I finally got around to it. I've posted more, along with the little map thingee, at flikr. Keep in mind that I don't have a camera with a GPS, so some of the map placements are rough.

Approaching the Oakland AMTRAK station at Jack London Square

Two-way bike lane on one side of the street to provide access to the ped/bike bridge from Alameda to Bay Farm Island

On the ped/bike bridge

Crew team (one of three I saw) working out in the channel near the Oakland Coliseum

The entrance to the Oakland International Airport

I have a heap more (72 pics total) at the flikr link above. They run from the bike room at work to my workshop at home. Hope you enjoy them, I know I enjoyed the ride where I took them.

My bike-to-work day

2009-05-18T07:00:00.000-07:00

I have been off and on with biking to work lately. A combination of being a short walk away from BART and working some long/tiring days have had me in kind of a funk. For bike-to-work day I made an extra effort though, and it paid off with pancakes.

Someone in the City of Oakland hierarchy organized a pancake breakfast/booth show/speeches event in front of city hall, and I work all of two blocks away, so I pretty much had to stop by. Because I was still in my bike funk, I rode the Schwinn and planned on only riding the short hops from my house to BART, and from BART to the office. I had forgotten how much of a workout (on the quads specifically) pedaling that monster was, and in my nice clothes no less.

I was met at the first BART station by some early volunteers. They weren't supposed to be up and running until 07:00, and I went by about 06:45. One of the guys came over to give me a bag and asked if I wanted any of the beverage/food they had, but since I was hopping a train I passed. When I got to Oakland I got a nifty "I biked today" sticker, like the "I gave blood" ones you get at blood drives. I also got a couple of pancakes, some coffee and OJ, and saw some interesting booths. I was pretty early (07:30) and most of the booths were just getting set up. I hung out for a little while and then wandered back to work.

There was one other guy from my office that rode, and where ever it was he went, he got a t-shirt. We did run into another guy in the building when we were heading out that night who had ridden for the first time that day (although I got the impression he had ridden before, just not to that particular location). All in all, a lot of fun.

Judging fitness

2009-05-12T06:48:00.000-07:00

As I rode home yesterday I found myself thinking about the different ways I judge my fitness, or more accurately my cycling strength. I was started on this line of thought when I realized that I was in a much higher gear (big chainring rather than middle, nearly the same cog) and was still feeling pretty strong. Then I looked at my speed and found it significantly higher (16 MPH vs 12) than normal. Finally, I took the few mild hills (overpasses) by standing rather than having to downshift.

All of this has got my thinking about the best way to really judge my cycling strength. I don't race, nor do I care to (and let's face it, if I tried to they'd have to create a whole new weight class, what would you call a Clyde class for someone in the Clyde class? Clyde-squared? sounds too much like the chi-square from biostats to me) so simple road-speed calculations don't mean much. I also only record my cadence to see if I'm steady, so that doesn't mean much. I used to use gearing as a judge of fitness/strength, by which I mean that the steeper the hill I could climb without shifting the stronger I felt I was, but does that mean anything about fitness?

I'm going to shift to the miles-to-bonk (MTB) standard, by which I mean how far can I ride before I stand up in the pedals, breathe deeply, and say "Wait, I have to go how much farther?" I figure this standard will come in handy as I torture myself on the 2nd Annual 100 Miles of Nowhere Ride (or in my case, 50) at the end of the month. Yes, I have done the insane and registered for the ride, and for some reason I'm looking forward to it. What does that say about me?

FINALLY, redux

2009-05-11T18:45:00.000-07:00

Again, I find myself saying "finally I'm back on my bike". This time I've been limited in my riding by weather (wind and rain) and travel for work. In the last week-and-a-day (that would be six workdays) I've ridden three times. Last Monday I chopped the ride short because I was feeling horrible and rain was threatening - I have a Brooks with no cover. Friday I rode and felt really good. Today I proved to myself that I was feeling better by jumping a number of gears and increasing my average speed significantly.

More than that, I'm just glad to be back in the saddle.

A short update

2009-04-30T09:05:00.000-07:00

I haven't been riding at all this week, which has led to not posting. For those who don't know, my day job is emergency preparedness and previously pandemic planning. That being the case you might understand why I've been a bit busy. That has led to long (10-12 hour) days in the office and me being whooped by the time I get home. On top of that, the local weather took a turn for the unpleasant (mid-50s with strong winds) making bike commuting less appealing. Hopefully things will smooth out by the weekend and I'll get a couple of days it. I'm really at the "Rides you need" point, as discussed here.

Unintentional hiatus

2009-04-20T12:09:00.000-07:00

Between back-to-back weeks of travel for work and spending the last few weekends trying to reclaim my yard from overgrowth and help out my recuperating mom I just haven't had time to write. Hopefully things will slow down soon and I'll be back at it.

Bike registration revisited

2009-04-17T06:00:00.000-07:00

A few weeks back I did a little ranting about bike and cyclist registration. Short version - I'm not a huge fan of either tagging bikes or requiring cyclist licensing, but can see some justification for both. After that post went up I had a short email exchange with a commenter, Bunny, on the value of putting police-readable identification on bikes and I have to admit that I had ignored a specific segment of the community.

Bunny's initial comment:

If you were in NYC and had heart stopping experiences with bikers going through red lights, against traffic and on the sidewalk you might think differently. They should have a license so they can be identified and fined for not following the rules of the road.

My response was a little too flip, basically a rehash of some of my earlier arguments which boil down to the idea that most of those cyclists wouldn't bother to register/tag their bikes. My dislike for licensing and registration schemes of most types stems from my dislike of governmental intrusion into my life, and in this case I looked at the issue only from my perspective. I am a vehicular cyclist and I follow the rules of the road. Because I follow existing rules I don't see why I should have to put up with additional restrictions/regulations. Thinking about it after reading Bunny's comments and emails brought something else to mind:

Cars have to have plates on them, so requiring the same from cyclists isn't adding restrictions, it's bringing cyclists into greater parity with motor vehicles.

This is something I need to think about a little more, but at the minimum I am willing to recognize that I was wrong about bike licensing, and in some jurisdictions (those with large populations of scofflaw cyclists) putting plates on bikes might be a legitimate way to discourage inappropriate behavior.

Training - a request

2009-04-13T06:00:00.000-07:00

I haven't been updating my training lately because I haven't done any. I've been on the road for work and that's going to keep going for the next few months. That brings me to my request.

Anyone who has followed this thing since I started should know that my primary ride, my Long Haul Trucker, has S and S couplers installed on it. In theory, they should allow me to pack the Trucker up and take it on the road with me. Since I've been and will be traveling to places like Nevada, Arizona, and Hawaii I'd really like to have my bike with me. Unfortunately, things haven't worked out as well in practice as in theory.

I have tried exactly once to pack my bike into a case. It was a soft-side, rented from Mt. Airy. Problem was, I couldn't get the bike into the case. There are all sorts of guides on how to do it, but it seemed like the Trucker was just too long to fit. What I'm hoping for is that someone who reads this is familiar with S and S couplers and has packed a bike with them. Or, maybe that someone in the Bay Area can recommend a good shop that works with tourers primarily that might be able to help me out.

I'd really like to be able to use the Trucker as I intended, which means being able to pack it up. Any ideas?

Integrating bikes into American transport

2009-04-10T06:00:00.000-07:00

The last few Friday's I've discussed some political/activist subjects, specifically licensing and helmet use. I'm going to keep that trend going with a couple of related bits on integrating bikes into the transport system in America.

First, is this bit from BRAIN from a few weeks back:

NEW YORK, NY (BRAIN)—It seems that New York City may only be bike friendly to a point.
On his weekly radio program on Friday morning, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg said he opposed allowing commuters to bring bicycles onto subway cars, even if the Metropolitan Transportation Authority permits it.
“I know bicyclists will now ring the phones off the hook, but they are just too big, particularly at rush hour,” he said of the bikes. “I just don’t think they should allow it,” he added.

The full story is from the NYT, available here. Reading the full article, it turns out that the mayor was responding to a caller's question so to some extent he was extemporizing, but the result is the same as if it were a prepared statement.

These feelings aren't restricted to either Mayor Bloomberg (a staunch advocate of mass transit) or New York. Most places where you find light rail or subways and cyclists you find conflict. Yes, bikes are large and take up space, but does that really mean they should be blocked from use? I'm a regular BART rider, with and without my bike (a largish Surly Long Haul Trucker). BART has specific times, peak commute, where bikes aren't supposed to be on cars and they ask cyclists to use judgement before boarding. I would really like to see BART take a more cycling-friendly stance and provide more space specifically for bikes, but for now the benign indifference is alright. As long as our work/live situation remains the way it is (live in suburbs, work in cities) many people will need to travel farther than is easy by bike, and that mean multi-mode. As long as people are traveling multi-mode, they need to be able to bring their bikes with them.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The other piece I saw was on the East Bay Bike Coalition blog a couple of weeks back. This one was discussing Federal "complete streets" legislation. Specifically:

H.R. 1443: Complete Streets Act of 2009 Introduced Mar 11, 2009
S. 584: A bill to ensure that all users of the transportation system, including pedestrians, bicyclists, transit users, children, older individuals, and individuals with disabilities, are able to travel safely and conveniently on and across federally funded streets and highways. Introduced Mar 12, 2009.
Much like the Routine Accommodation policy adopted by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission in 2006, and the Complete Streets bill signed into California State Law in 2008, the national version will work to make certain that federal transportation dollars are not spent to build new barriers or daunting hazards for bicyclists.

This is one of those issues where I like the idea but not necessarily the execution. Transportation spending is a state issue, and this kind of action by the Federal government is referred to as "power of the purse" - using Federal funding to force the states to do something (aka "Do it my way or watch your butt.") As a small government person, this sort of side-stepping around separation of powers bothers me. On the other hand, there are likely some states that won't do the right thing by cyclists and other non-vehicular traffic without the Federal carrot/stick.

So what is the right answer? I can't say. I for one won't be involved in pushing the issue forward, but unlike the other political issues I've talked about recently I'm not entirely opposed.

Helmets

2009-04-03T06:00:00.000-07:00

Over the last few weeks I've seen a few different pieces on bike helmets in the blogs and newsfeeds I follow. Some, like this picture/post from Fritz are on the more humourous side:

and some, like pieces related to the accident, head injury, and unfortunate death of Natasha Richardson (there has been some discussion that the injury could have been lessened or prevented if she'd been wearing a helmet) are more serious. A third, also UK related, is from a recent High Court case:

Many cyclists were seriously concerned when a High Court Judge recently remarked that cyclists who suffer head injuries when not wearing a helmet may not be entitled to full compensation if it can be shown that a helmet would have reduced or prevented their injuries. After all, it is not compulsory to wear a helmet whilst cycling and there is no clear or conclusive evidence to support the view that compulsory wearing would either advance the cause of cycling, or necessarily improve cyclists’ safety on the road.

As I said, all of this got me thinking. Granted, helmets are one of the taboos of cycling blogs, and discussing their use is enough to start flame wars on even the most well-moderated forums, but I'm going to wade into those waters anyway. As in last week's post on licensing, I'll discuss the reasons I see for government action on helmets, and then give my opinions on each.

There are two major arguments that are used to justify helmet laws, whether for bicycles or motorcycles: protecting the riders and protecting the system. (In this case I am using "system" to cover everything and everyone involved in providing medical care to an injured rider who is uninsured and otherwise unable to pay for their own medical care.) Both of these are the same reasoning that led to mandatory seat belt use laws. The first derives from the belief that the government has a role in protecting us from our selves, and the second derives from the fact that there are more than a few people in the US who are unable to pay for their own medical care, meaning that it falls to uninvolved people (the taxpayers) to pick up the tab.

The first argument is one I have issues with. I don't believe that the government has a role in protecting me from my own choices. If I want to ride without a helmet it's on me. In fact, I agree with the High Court case mentioned above, and I've felt that was the better approach for a long time. Don't want to wear a helmet or seat belt? Fine, your insurance can then pay out less if your injuries are aggravated by your actions. It's the same thing that happens with drivers' insurance - you drive like a twit (as in, you get pulled over a lot, demonstrated poor behavior) your rates go up. That's called negative reinforcement and it's a great way to teach people not to do dumb things.

The other argument is a tougher one. I'm a taxpayer and that means that I'm partially liable (a wee tiny bit) when uninsured people are injured. To minimize that liability, I like the idea of requiring people to be safe. The question is - how far do you take it? Helmets on bikes make you safer than not, but then what about helmets in cars? or helmets for skiers? It rapidly becomes a slippery-slope argument, which makes me uncomfortable.

All in all, I agree with encouraging helmet use but not mandating it. Unlike a lot of cyclists, this extends to children. Parents should (and I would if I had kids) require their kids to use helmets, but I disagree with the government stepping in to force the issue.

A great way to look at it comes from the WashCycle, a blog covering cycling issues in Washington DC:

Wearing a helmet is like wearing sun screen. It protects you and only you from something harmful. Except unlike helmets, the efficacy of sun screen is not in question. And it helps you without some bizarre occurrence. The financial benefits of everyone wearing sun screen is probably higher than for wearing helmets. The same could be said of condoms. But, I don't hear anyone talking of mandating the wearing of either the way this article seems to encourage mandating helmet use.

I want this

2009-04-01T06:00:00.000-07:00

When I bike commute these days it's one way, BART in the morning and biking in the afternoon. One problem with BART is that there aren't many bike spaces on the trains. What has been done for cyclists is that a few of the spaces for wheelchairs have also been tagged for bikes. Some mornings there are a few bikes in each car, more than enough to make it worth having some kind of reserved space. Maybe even something like this.

Sure, that type of rack works best if there isn't much rain, but at least from May through October the Bay Area is pretty dry. The picture links through to the CommuterPageBlog which is where I saw the picture. Follow the links there to get back to the original.

Bike registration, cyclist licensing

2009-03-27T06:00:00.000-07:00

Updated 3/28 - added a few more in-text links to articles about licensing

A little while back the Bicycle Retailer and Industry News blog (BRAIN) had a piece on an effort in Oregon to get a bike licensing bill passed. The article was written primarily on the impact the bill would/not have on retailers and the general feeling was that it didn't have a huge chance of getting passed. From the post:

“The word I have is that the chair of House Transportation does not intend to schedule it for a hearing, so it is dead,” [Karl Rohde, government relations and public affairs director of the Bicycle Transportation Alliance (BTA)] said. “But we'll continue to monitor it though, in case it comes back from the dead.”

The piece does include the concerns that BTA has with the bill, specifically:

(f)or its part, the BTA opposes the bill stating that net revenue would not contribute significantly to the construction and maintenance of roads and ancillary facilities, and the cost of registration would discourage bicycling.

All of this, and some other posts I've seen floating around lately, has got me thinking about the validity of bike licenses.

My first thought is that there needs to be a good reason for licenses if you're going to require them. This is mainly my small government mindset speaking, but it's also common sense. Too often the reason given for requiring bike licenses is the "cyclists don't pay their fair share of road maintenance" argument (debunked and debated at the preceding links). Accepting this argument as valid (which I emphatically DO NOT) the appropriate response would be to just add a tax at the time of purchase of a new bike or other cycling equipment. Requiring licensing just for the fees generated makes little sense.

Drivers are licensed twice, once as an individual and once for their vehicle. In the first case, the license is supposed to ensure that the driver has gone through a state-approved course of education, or at the very least has demonstrated through testing knowledge equivalent to having completed the training. In the second case the vehicle license is to ensure that there is an accurate record of the vehicle (used when the driver violates the law) and that the vehicle passed certain safety/emissions testing. Do these same criteria hold up for cyclists?

Individual licensing - I think there is some validity to having cyclists go through a specific course of education and be "certified", especially for cyclists in urban areas. If there were a recognized cyclist license, it could potentially ease some of the scofflaw-cyclist hatred, or at the very least provide riders with a ready response to that line of argument.

Bike licensing - Unlike with motor vehicles, an unsafe bike is rarely (if ever) a threat to anyone other than the rider. Additionally, there are a number of existing private ways to get a bike "licensed" for theft-recovery purposes (identifying the bike). Licensing bikes for the purpose of catching lawbreakers strikes me as something that would require far more time, effort, and money than it would ever recoup in terms of tickets or deterrence.

So what does this all lead to? In my opinion there is some justification for licensing cyclists, if the goal is to integrate cyclists into the larger pool of road users. Licensing bikes makes no sense to me, although that seems to be the favored model of politicians. I will say that I'd rather see programs like those offered by the League of American Bicyclists expanded as a de facto standard rather than something coming down from either state or Federal government, but I don't know if that will carry the same weight with non-cyclists as something that is government sanctioned.

"Riding" vs "training"

2009-03-25T06:00:00.000-07:00

A recent post on the Bike Noob blog asked "When does your riding become training?" The thrust of the piece was that there is "riding" - getting on the bike and having fun, and "training" - getting on the bike and doing a certain number of miles/hours because you have to get in shape for something specific. In the post, the author (Ray) discusses his upcoming MS 150 ride, the need to "train" for it, and his dislike of "training" compared to "riding".

As this stuff tends to, his post got me thinking. This time it got me thinking about my own riding vs training questions. I now have to admit that not only do I dislike "training", I just don't do it. Like Ray, I ride because I enjoy it. I do not enjoy riding on my trainer, just like I enjoy jogging and can't stand treadmills.

Previously, when I was pulling down a couple of hundred miles a week, I did my training by having a long commute home and riding it three to five days a week. That's my goal again. In this case, my commute is only 12 miles or so if I take it straight. I have a couple of options though, which include going up into the Oakland hills or just stretching the trip out past my house and looping back up. For now, the 12 miles is enough to whoop me but good by the end, but hopefully that won't last too long.

I can hear those hills calling.

Training update - 23 March

2009-03-23T11:20:00.000-07:00

Last week I only got one ride in. It was another commute ride, so slightly over 12 miles in just over an hour. After only three of these rides my legs are getting much stronger. The first day I did it I wasn't sure I'd get home, the second day I made it home and was twitchy for a little while after. The third day I got home and felt good - tired, but good.

This week I'm working from home (well, my mom's house) so I won't have the commute to motivate me. I've accepted that training is something I just don't like to do (by "training" I mean going to a ride just to train, as opposed to commuting or riding with friends - see Wednesday's post for a more extensive discussion) but I'm going to have to force myself to do it this week.

Commuting mojo

2009-03-20T06:00:00.000-07:00

In the months that I haven't ridden my commute I've lost my commuting mojo. Specifically, I have lost my red light mojo.

There was a time where I could drift through town without missing a light. Sure, I'd have to hustle through some yellows, but I didn't have to stop. These last few days I've had streaks where I've had to stop at every light, five or more in a row. And since I'm rolling through a town like Alameda, if those lights are turning it means there's cars coming.

On another note - when I wrote about the TwoWheel Gear bag I mentioned that there wasn't a blinkie loop. I was wrong. I found the loop when I was packing the bag up for another trip to work. The little bag on top has a blinkie loop on the back, which puts the light right up on top. The downside is that at least with the light I'm using (Cateye TL-LD1000) unless the pocket is full the light flops over on its back. For now I'm going to keep playing with the way I load the bag to see what I can do to keep that pouch full, but in the ling run I'll probably try and figure out a good way to attach the light to the rack directly.

The future of cycling?

2009-03-18T06:00:00.000-07:00

A recent post over at Web Urbanist (a great blog of the odd and artistic sides of life) was on interesting concept bikes. Much like the concept cars unveiled at every auto show, the bikes on display in the post are radically designed. In some cases the bikes look like they're more artistic than functional, and some are designs I've seen in other places (like Bicycle Design). In either case, it got me thinking:

Why are so many people looking for "the future of cycling" in some kind of radical or odd design?

I freely admit to retro-grouchy inclinations when it comes to bikes. I ride nothing but steel and 2/3 of my stable is older than I am. All that aside I have to wonder what it is that causes so many people, including avid cyclists, to dream of the future? I don't see the future of cycling in an odd, artistic, or radical design. Far from it. I see the future of cycling in a throwback, specifically the old-school city bike.

We don't need bikes to be different, we need to look at bikes differently. Most people, including many cyclists, see bikes and riding as:

something kids do
something athletes like Lance do
something you have to wear spandex to do

As long as bikes are viewed as either athletic equipment or toys people won't think about cycling as a part of daily life. As long as people don't see cycling as a part of daily life we won't see wide-scale changes to the way cities are laid out, meaning that while we may see more bike lanes we won't see any serious integration of cycling.

And personally, the future of cycling I want to see is one where people riding a bike to work aren't given strange looks.

Training update

2009-03-16T06:00:00.000-07:00

Last week there was a big jump in my training. As before (years before, the last time I lived in the Bay Area) it's easier for me to fit lots of miles in by commuting. Last week I did about 25 miles over two days, about an hour each day.

On the good side - the weather should make it easier for me to keep commuting by bike, and it shouldn't be too long until I can hit four or five days a week. My hope is that once I get up to that many miles in a week I'll be in better shape for weekend rides, and then I'll really be able to see what I can do.

On the bad side - in a couple of weeks my mom is coming home from the hospital and I'll be staying with her in case she needs any help. This means much less riding. Coming right at the start of my training this could be a problem.

Next week, or some time in the near future, I'm going to start adding weight info to my weekly training update. Honestly, I want to make sure that it's regularly going the right way first.

Product review (Initial Impressions) - TwoWheel Gear suit/pannier

2009-03-12T06:00:00.000-07:00

A while back I mentioned that I had purchased one of the nifty suit bags/panniers from TwoWheel Gear. Until I started bike commuting again this week I hadn't used it. Now that I have, I can give my initial impressions.

I likes it.

The main compartment has a little velcro closure that goes over the hooks from hangers, which makes it easy to put the clothes in, a clipping strap that runs across the middle of the bag where it fold to go over the rack, and another strap near the bottom. All of which make sure your clothes (in my case slacks and a long-sleeved dress shirt) stay in place.

On the outside are two pouches, one faces up when the bag is on the bike and the other faces up when the bag is hanging up. I don't know if it was what the designers intended, but the way I will be using this is to put things like my lunch in the "upright on bike" pouch, and things like shoes and toiletries in the "upright when hanging" one. Lastly, there is a small pocket that sits in the middle of those, which ends up on top of the rack with the opening facing the rear of the bike when the whole thing is mounted.

The bag held everything I needed to put in it, but I did have a few problems. First, the bag was tough to zip/unzip. I think it was probable because the material is stiff from being new. The other big issue is the lack of a loop for a blinkie. I used the clip for the shoulder strap, but it was sideways and the light came off on a bump. Maybe there's a loop that I missed, but I don't think so.

I'll write another review when I've used it a little more, but at this point I'm ready to say that if you commute more than a few miles and have to wear nice clothes at work this may be the bag for you.

Ow

2009-03-10T06:00:00.000-07:00

Alright - I slacked last week and didn't train. That's why there was no training update. I sort of made up for it yesterday by finally bike commuting again.

The trip to work was not very thrilling - I rode the mile or so to the BART station, took the train most of the way to work, and then rode the last 10 min or so to the office. On the way home though...

The total trip ended up to be a little over 12 miles, and I did it in just over an hour (better than I thought I could do). The trip took me past Jack London Square and the Oakland Airport. In the next few weeks I'll start taking my camera with me so I can shoot the ride and put some pictures up.

I was pretty glad that the only thing (clothing-wise) I forgot was my belt. I'd gotten so used to be able to commute in my work clothes (Baltimore commute was 1.6 miles, one way) that remembering all of the stuff I needed to bring was a little rough.

Going on how I feel (a little sore, a lot twitchy, and REALLY eager to do it again) I'm hoping to do three days a week until I get the base miles in, and then up it to 4 or 5.

LiveStrong training update 1 March

2009-03-02T06:00:00.000-08:00

Okay, this won't be much of an update, but I'm trying to establish a rhythm here. I have put in a whopping one day of training and learned something important -

the butt is more out of shape than the legs.

Specifically, I was okay to ride longer than the 30 min I got in, except that I just couldn't sit in the saddle any longer.

By my heart rate monitor I did 30 min with an average heart rate of 143, resulting in ~ 411 kcal burned. None of that is very impressive, but the important thing for me is that I was able to finally get started. Hopefully next week's update will be a wee bit more impressive.

Training site prepared

2009-02-23T20:51:00.000-08:00

So finally, after meaning to get at it for almost two months, I've taken the extreme step of getting ready for the LiveStrong ride by...

putting a bike in the trainer.

Yeah, I've been a wee bit lax in getting prepared, but since the ride isn't until July 12, so it's not like I have to be ready tomorrow.

This will be essentially the same set-up I used a whopping three times in Baltimore before the boredom drove me batty. There are a few things working in my favor this time:

Need - when I was in Baltimore I was training to train. Now I not only have the LiveStrong ride where I want to make a decent showing, but being in the Bay Area means that I have a number of cycling friends who aren't significantly overweight, which really tells in the climbs.
Desire - I'm making what will hopefully be the last attempt to get my weight back under control. I worked with a group in the area before I took a lot of weight off, and I plan to sign back up. Roughly put I've got about 75 pounds to peel, and it's going to take significant changes in food and exercise to get there.
Entertainment - the way I had things rigged up in Baltimore I think the bike/trainer was too close to my VCR/TV antenna, because when I would try to tape things the tapes came out sketchy. I'm not taping now and I'm on cable (for the moment) anyway. Also, I've recently found a couple of new series (Primeval being one) and with the bike at the window I'll be able to enjoy.
Removing tech - I've only got one computer and it's on my Trucker. I'll be training for the first few weeks at least purely on time in the saddle, and will be basing my training time on how sore my hind-parts are and whatever I have from Netflix.

As I move forward I'll be doing a weekly weight/training update, focused mainly on time spent per day. I hope to be commuting by bike again soon, and will be adding that info in as well. Oh, lastly, I'm a member of Team Fatty for the San Jose LiveStrong Challenge ride, and if you want to donate or just wish me well, follow this link.

San Diego cyclists

2009-02-19T07:54:00.000-08:00

I'm in San Diego for the week for a work thing, and have been both excited and disappointed by the cycling that I've seen. I've seen heaps of commuters, walking between my hotel and the hotel where the conference is, and last night hitched a ride with a new (10 days) pedicab "driver" who was absolutely ecstatic about his job. From what I can see there's decent infrastructure in place for cyclists, including decent bike lanes and some nice MUPs with some separated areas (tagged for bikes to go on a specific route). Oh, and bike lanes that apparently allow planes. Nice.

So why am I disappointed about San Diego cycling? Because I'm not doing any of it. I still haven't gotten a case for my LHT (which has the S&S setup to let me pack it) and the one time I've tried to pack it with a rented case I couldn't figure it out (the rear deraileur was to long). So I'm walking and looking at all these lovely cyclists riding through perfect weather, without being able to participate.

Something new

2009-02-17T21:54:00.000-08:00

Two somethings actually. First, I'm making my first attempt to use pictures taken with a camera phone. Second - bike racks at a local hospital. Sure, that may not be new, but the racks at this hospital are fairly new.

I was over at a local hospital last weekend to see someone and noticed the bike cage in the new parking garage. The hospital (John Muir, Walnut Creek Campus) is doing a heap of renovation work and part of that was building a parking garage, and it's great to see the bike parking. When I was there on Sunday the cage was locked, but the presence of a lot of locks on the rack makes it clear that the cage gets used. I guess it's set up for staff and not visitors (but I also didn't ask anyone about access).

One thing that makes the really great (in my mind) is that the hospital sits right next to the Ygnacio Canal MUP, which means there's easy access to some off-street biking. Great to see this sort of thing being included in new developments.

Still here

2009-02-11T19:18:00.000-08:00

My work schedule went pot, and I'll be pulling long days for the next few weeks. That means little time to ride and very little awake time at home. Hopefully I'll get some posting done soon.

Simplicity

2009-02-06T06:00:00.000-08:00

When I first started this blog I intended to write not just about cycling, but about Zen (as I see it) and some politics. This is the first of what I hope will be a series of periodic posts on Zen (as I see it). I am adding the modifier to indicate that I have no formal training in Zen, and will be writing about the path as it appears to me, not according to doctrine.

Simplicity of life is one of the tenets at the heart of Zen practice, and one of the things about it that most appeals to me. Interestingly, there is now an active movement, that I encounter mainly through other blogs, on ways to simplify your life. Something I find interesting about much of this movement is that the way towards simplicity expounded is often by adding complexity. The most visible form of this is the Get Things Done way of thinking. At its heart this involves adding small things to your life which enable you to more-effectively use your time, sounds good. However, many of the practitioners I've encountered talk about convoluted systems where there is a specific time to do everything that you can conceive of, which doesn't sound very simple to me.

I am a fan of achieving simplicity by removing the things that make life complex. What got me thinking about all of this was doing yard work. This is the first time in many years that I have lived in a house that had a yard which requires maintenance. I have small front and rear yards, with lawns to mow and plants to trim. As I was working on the yard this weekend I found myself thinking about how much more sensible it would be to have a "native garden" type yard. Simply put this is a yard planted with native vegetation and allowed to grown more naturally. All told it means less work, less water use, better habitat for local wildlife, and an extension of the local wilderness into your yard. Given that my rear yard backs up to a creek, going native would allow me to incorporate some of the creek wildlife into my yard. However, since I'm only renting there is little I can do for now.

Another way I strive towards simplicity is biking and walking rather than driving. I don't imagine that I am rare among car-free commuters to find it more mentally relaxing to walk or ride rather than drive. As I continue working towards a more simple life I will continue to post the little things I find that help. My goal is not to create some artificial zone of emptiness around me, but to have those aspects of my life I have control over to be as stress-free as I can make them.

And that includes not adding stress by overdoing the attempt to simplify.

A different spin on car-free

2009-02-04T06:00:00.000-08:00

Continuing in Monday's vein about car-light living, I bring you this:

That is a pedal-powered roller coaster from Japan, the Skycycle at the Washuzan Highland Park in Okayama to be precise. I first saw it written about on the Everyman Triathlon blog, as a way to actually combine the very disparate concepts of "endurance training" and "fun". The post there has more information and pictures, as does this one from Geekologie, from March of 2007. Finally, there is this page, linked to in the Geekoligie article, which has a lot of details on the Skycycle.

I don't know about you, but I would love something like that to play on. I mean, I live in the SF Bay Area, one of the most dedicated liberal/green enclaves going, and we don't have a human powered roller coaster? What are you greenies thinking?

The self-perpetuating nature of car-light

2009-02-02T06:00:00.000-08:00

One thing I have noticed since moving into my new house is that living car-light is a self-perpetuating thing. I chose a house that was close enough to transit (BART) that I would be able to take it without biking or driving to the station. When I was staying with my dad I was far enough away that I had to bike/drive, and various things meant I was driving most of the time. Now, I'm a short walk away, and the truck sits in the driveway five of seven days by default. What I've been noticing more though is that I avoid driving on the weekends.

When I was in Baltimore I would avoid driving because of parking issues - I lived in neighborhoods with street-parking only and it was often a fight to get a place. Now, I have a driveway that could hold two or three cars without issue and I still avoid driving. As I was thinking about the around-the-house chores I need to take care of this past weekend I realized that I was avoiding some (yard work) because I need to go pick up a few things from the hardware store, and the distance/roads means that I have to drive there. I am actually excited about some of the work, but the idea of driving to get the implements (and it's not expensive stuff, brooms, dustpans, and a new ribbon for an edger) has me turned off.

Funny how something that most people think is the easiest way to get around, driving, is actually preventing me from going out.

I KNEW Twitter was a bad thing

2009-01-26T06:00:00.000-08:00

Recently I went on a bit of tear about Twitter. I just don't get some of the excitement people seem to feel about it, and one of the podcasts I used to really enjoy (net@nite, part of Leo Laporte's Twit Network) has gotten almost impossible to listen to due to all of the rhapsodizing about the wonders of Twitter (I get it, it's a Web 2.0 thing, but there must be others). Anyway, imagine my surprise, after all my whining, to see a fellow cyclists and blogger (although I'm nowhere near the calibre) getting Twitterjacked...

Just days after I discovered that a certain online retailer is using this blog to market yet another inexpensive singlespeed road bike, I've now learned that somebody has taken the liberty of creating a Twitter account in my name
I'd like to take this opportunity to say, "Hey there! I am not using Twitter." If you're reading this blog you know I'm wordy, and there's absolutely no way I could restrict myself to 140 characters per post. And naturally, since it's not my Twitter account, I can't access it.

From BikeSnobNYC: The Indignity of the Internet: Twitterjacked!

So there you have another reason not to go within a mile of someone using Twitter - they may not be the person you think! I'm looking at you, Fritz...

Goop

2009-01-15T06:00:00.000-08:00

I've been meaning to test out Green Slime for a while. Not because I just like the idea, but because I keep getting slow leaks in the rear tire on my commuter bike. Since it has an internal-geared hub, getting the wheel off and on is a bit of an issue, and then I have to make sure the chain is tight and occasionally readjust the cable tension to keep it in the right gear. Add to that the fact that just flipping the thing upside down to get the wheel off is a significant challenge due to weight, and you'll see why tire changing/patching is low on my list.

(Keep in mind, I do have liners in the tires, but I think the spoke ends may be poking through the rim tape and causing little tiny holes.)

The last time I flatted, a few weeks ago, I just stuck my tongue out and left it flat. Last weekend I picked up a tube of slime and went to work. The bottle has pretty clear directions on it, and I went by them. I won't repeat them (rote) here, but roughly:

Let the air out and then pull the valve core (the top of the bottle has a built-in removal tool).
Use the hose to pump slime into the tube, about 1/2 the bottle for a bike tire
Replace the valve core and inflate.
Roll the tube to distribute the slime and remount.

That was the basic chain of events I followed, and it was almost that easy. The biggest issue I ran into is that the goop is thick. It took a lot of squeezing on the bottle to get it moving. Another thing to be aware of:

DO NOT REMOVE THE BOTTLE FROM THE HOSE, OR THE HOSE FROM THE VALVE STEM UNTIL THE HOSE IS EMPTY!!!

I cannot stress this enough. If you do (like I did) the pressure in the tube will pump all of the goop back out and it will go everywhere and be a pain to clean up. I had the advantage of having a utility room that I could work in and worry about cleaning up later, but had I been in my old apartment I would have been in trouble.

So far the slime is holding. I've done a few rides of varying length, and haven't had the slow leak problem again. If it holds I may go ahead and slime all of my bikes, just in case.

Off-topic rant: Why is Twitter taking over the world?

2009-01-14T10:57:00.000-08:00

I am not a Luddite. I blog, I love my various high-tech devices, and I am looking forward to the day I can get a computer jack implanted in my head so I can interact with my computer mentally. One thing I cannot get excited about is Twitter, and it keeps invading my life.

There are certainly limited uses for this sort of micro-blogging. The best that comes to mind (for cyclists) is the use by mass transit agencies like Caltrain (mentioned regularly by Fritz at Cyclelicious) to inform riders about issues with service. OK, that works for me, an alert about delayed service doesn't take a lot of detail to be useful.

Where I get grumpy about Twitter is when things I would otherwise care about (read: giveaways) use Twitter as the notification and/or entry system. Recently Fritz has done this (and it's completely his prerogative to run his contests the way he wants, but he did write a post asking for feedback...) and now there is a project to use this tech to track issues with people traveling to Obama's inauguration.

Great idea, but what about people who try to live at least occasionally away from their computers? Isn't one of the big draws of cycling the fact that it takes place outside? Why would I want to take a tether like Twitter everywhere I go? My previous job included a Blackberry, and my current one would if the budget included it, and after that I can say thanks but no thanks.

Maybe I am Luddish (it's a word now) but I just can't think of any person I care enough about to want to read insignificant bits of trivia from at all times of the day. So Lance is on Twitter, whoopee! I'd rather be on my bike than reading a 144-character report about someone else on theirs.

A ride to work (sort of)

2009-01-13T08:43:00.000-08:00

"Sort of" to work, I mean, not a sort of ride. Most of this week I'm in training away from the office. The training is a couple of miles from the closest BART station and makes it a perfect ride. The area of Dublin where the training is has a lot of new development, including new wide roads with nice new bike lanes.

There were a couple of downsides, which go more to show how long it's been since I did a bike commute than anything else:

The stairs - the BART platforms are raised, somewhere between two and three stories high. My bike is a tank (and I love it) and hauling it up all those stairs was a little rough.
The climbs - the office we're meeting in is up a mild slope. I have said before (and will say again) that I hate gentle slopes because I always think I can take them in a manly gear and then bonk about halfway up. To some extent this, is mitigated by using the Schwinn since it's only a three-speed, but still.
The weather - not a big deal, but it was five-ten degrees cooler when I got off the BART train in Dublin than it was in San Leandro when I left. Nothing significant, just surprisingly chilly.

All that aside, I'm glad to be on the bike for the week.

A short follow-up

2009-01-08T06:00:00.000-08:00

A little while ago I got up on my soapbox and ranted about some of the cases I'd seen where advocacy had gotten a little out of control. The particular thing that set me off was an article I'd read about a proposed rule change that would allow MTB use in some national parks (which I agree with). The article included some comments from a few hiker groups who were opposed to the idea, and I found it a little depressing that two pro-environment, pro-outdoors groups like MTB riders and hikers were fighting when there really should be enough space for all of us.

A few days ago a post on BicycleSpokesmen.com brought the issue back to mind. This article pointed out the oddity that new park rules had been proposed to allow concealed-carry weapons in national parks (in states where concealed-carry is already legal) and that one seemed more likely to go through than did the rule change to allow bikes in parks.

The way I see it both groups mentioned above (cyclists, gun owners) are the victims of the public image of their membership but we don't have the benefit of being included in the Bill of Rights. As long as the public image of cyclists comes mainly from news footage of fights between cops and Critical Mass riders we're going to have an uphill battle.

Unfortunately, the hill we have to climb isn't one in a national park.

Back in the Saddle (almost)

2009-01-05T06:00:00.000-08:00

I'm moved into my new place and have gotten about half settled in (what I have is settled, now I need furniture). Hopefully this afternoon I'll get the trainer unpacked and start some light riding again. I have figured out where I'll be training - in the nice, mostly enclosed rear patio.

My patio - full of greeny-goodness

The patio opens off the downstairs den, and I think will be the perfect midline between being outside and protected from the cold. And before any of you start giving me grief about the "cold" in California, it has been sub-freezing here in the evenings (when I'll be training) for the last few weeks. I have a utility room I could train in if it gets too cold, but prefer the openness of the patio.

(See, it does get cold in CA)

I've tried trainer riding once before, last winter in Baltimore, and it was a disaster. I did two days (I think) and just couldn't do any more. It bored me to tears. This year I have a few motivators which I hope will keep me at it:

Being back in the Bay Area and near a largish group of cycling friends I have to be able to keep up with
The Oakland Hills rides I loved a few years ago, which would demolish me and my pride should I attempt the climbs in my current sorry state of health
The LiveStrong ride I've registered for and must complete
Being in a place where there are S24O options in every direction

Like I said, I hope these will keep me slogging away on the trainer, but I honestly don't know.

Short break

2008-12-29T07:47:00.001-08:00

I hadn't intended to take time off, but between moving and not having active internet service at the new house I haven't been able to write. I'm going to yield to the inevitable and take a short vacation through next weekend, when my internet will be hooked up.

Hope everyone has a happy and safe New Year's.

Random bike-spotting (4 in a series)

2008-12-17T03:00:00.000-08:00

Today's "bikes in life" comes from a while back. It actually has me a little puzzled, but more on that in a minute:

"Marriage is a wonderful invention; but, then again, so is a bicycle repair kit."

I've seen that quote attributed to two different people. One, the link above, is Geoffrey Chaucer in the Canterbury Tales. The other is comedian Billy Connolly. My confusion here is over the age of the bicycle (~1816) and the writing of the Canterbury Tales (~1380-1400). I'll freely admit I have only read sections of the Tales, in senior English in high school, so I have no idea what context the quote is in, or if it is a modernized translation. (My reference for citing it here is the great Short Attention Span Philosopher podcast from Roy Trumbull, followed up by some Googling). Whoever said it, it qualifies as a bike reference in a non-bike setting.

A little help?

2008-12-15T17:36:00.000-08:00

I have written about Elden "Fatty" Nelsen before. First off, I identify (far too much) with someone who goes by "The Fat Cyclist" and secondly I really respect what he's doing. Elden's blog is largely about his wife's fight against breast cancer, which isn't going so well. He has been a long-time supporter of the LiveStrong foundation, resulting in Lance giving Fatty's wife a shout out. This year he decided to put together a grand scheme to have the largest team ever pulled together for the LiveStrong Challenge and raise more money than any team had before. (For the details from the horse's mouth, go here.)

I've decided to jump in, and have signed up for the San Jose ride. If you are willing to sponsor me, please go here and make a pledge. I think it's a great cause and will be using this as incentive to get myself in shape to do a metric century (100 km) ride. If you have questions, let me know.

Thanks in advance.

Joel

Update: 12/16/08 7:00AM

One thing I forgot last night - If you are interested there are a number of other riders who are raffling off prizes for people who donate. I'm not able to do that, but Fatty is (see the link to his site above) and as I come across others I'll post them.

New gear

2008-12-15T03:00:00.000-08:00

Sometime in the next few days I'll be moving to a new house. My new place is on the west side of the hills, which means I'll be in a better place to ride into work. Instead of being about 30 miles away and on the wrong side of the Berkeley Hills I'll only be about 10 miles away on mostly flat roads. Additionally, there is a BART station about halfway between my house and the office which has a full service bike parking facility.

Since I'll be riding farther I won't be doing it on the upright, which means I won't be wearing my work clothes. To make transporting my duds a little easier I ordered the garment bag fromTwoWheel Gear. The short version is that the bag is a full length garment bag which hooks to bike racks like normal panniers. I don't need to carry much other than some papers with me, and the bag has plenty of pockets for various things.

In the upper picture you can see the non drive-side of the bag, which has most of the external zipped pockets on it. The bag also has a zipped pocket on the top in the section that sits on top of the rack. The bag has two types of handles with shorter carry handles as well as an adjustable shoulder strap. Also, clearly visible in the pic are the day/night-glo strips on the rear of the bag. The reflectiveness of the strips is more evident in the lower pic. Also visible there are the angled hooks for attaching to the bike rack.

I just got the bag and haven't been able to test it yet, but once I have I'll write it up.

Another bike/camera post

2008-12-12T03:00:00.002-08:00

Rather than repeat the post, I direct you here to a post from mid November on Bike Hugger. The post is about a nifty little rig the author saw in Japan, where a cyclist had mounted a small camcorder (looks a little like a Flip but isn't) to the front axle on his bike.

With the right angle adjustment and a sufficient record-time on the camera this could be a really cool way to record a tour. It would require either a remote on/off (like I discussed when I posted about mounting a still camera to the racks on my Trucker) to allow easy recording of fun stuff (crazy descents, great views and the like) or an amazing amount of time and patience allowing the rider to flip through a day's worth of riding to find the segments worth keeping.

Either way, I've been thinking that a camcorder like the Flip might be a nice addition to documenting a tour. Hopefully I'll be in the shape to start some S24O tours early in the new year and wills tart playing with some of the ideas I have.

Random bike-spotting (3 in a series)

2008-12-10T03:00:00.000-08:00

Today's "bikes in life" might be a little bit of a stretch, but I think it's worth a mention anyway.

REI is my toystore. I spend too much time and too much money there. When I was looking at getting into touring I checked out some of the Novara bikes for the OTS option before finding the LHT frame I wanted. Now REI is taking their support of bike commuting from being a supplier of cool toys to something more.

Recently REI launched "Bike Your Drive", a website loaded with utility/commuter information including:

Cycling myths exposed - what it sounds like
An interactive parts guide
How-to videos
and of course - links to gear and classes available at your local REI

The site is also tied into the Green Bike Project which is a project aimed at getting more people to bike commute by offering commuter-equipped bikes for people who pledge to shift 60% of their commutes to cycling.

Like I said - the REI site is on the edge of non-cycling specific. In this case I chose to view it as a major company using its clout to encourage more people to ride.

More lighting, again

2008-12-08T03:00:00.000-08:00

I've always been a bit of a gear snob when it comes to cycling, preferring to buy cool toys rather than DIY. Specifically, I've been of the "go big" school of lighting and have felt that the multi-tool option of using flashlights attached to the bike instead of a headlight was gauche. I'm beginning to change my mind, especially as more and more high quality, low cost flashlights come on the market.

The other night I was watching TV with my dad and saw a Home Depot ad for two sets of LED flashlights. I have no idea how bright these are (either set), but if they're any good they can at least be used as "to be seen" lights. A little work with some red plastic and you've got taillights to go with the headlights too, since the one set is 5 of the things.

Another interesting option for visibility was recently featured on Urban Velo - reflective lanyards. The post is about a company (Scott's Knots) that makes to-order lanyards, some of which are made from reflective cording. The site actually has a section specifically for bicycle use, which actually qualifies them for inclusion in the bike-spotting series, where they feature seat danglers and side markers (for handlebars). Reflectors are a secondary "look at me" (see Sheldon on the subject) and I put these in the same category as reflective tape - a great, passive way to draw extra attention to your ride at night while also adding some style.

Can't we all get along?

2008-12-05T03:00:00.001-08:00

A little while back I griped about the animosity directed from some bike activists towards the general driving public. Today I have a similar gripe, this time about the conflicts between mountain bikers and hikers over access to parks.

This gripe was kicked-off by this article from BRAIN (Bike Retailers And Industry News) on proposed changes to national park rules. Currently, there are few national parks that MTB riders can access, and the new rules would essentially reclassify MTBs (all cyclists actually) like other non-motorized trail users, like horse-back riders. The International Mountain Biking Association has been advocating for this rule change since 1992. The proposal drew a rapid response from the American Hiking Society, which sent an alert citing specific concerns about the rule change: namely that it would go into effect without appropriate environmental impact and public comment, and that the new rules would negatively impact Wilderness designations.

I'm not going to debate one side or the other. Frankly, I haven't studied the issue well enough to form an opinion on it. Instead, my issue is with the fact that there is an issue. What I mean is that these are two groups that advocate for expanded outdoor/wilderness activities and instead of combining efforts to make sure that their respective constituencies are getting the most out of membership they're butting heads. I fall into both camps, although not a member of either group, by being a hiker/backpacker and avid cyclist (and aspiring MTBer). I would love to know that I could take my bike to national parks that lend themselves to trail riding (my one visit to the Great Smokey Mountains National Park left me dreaming of trail riding through it) and I doubt I'm alone.

I hope that a reasonable compromise can be worked out and that the two advocates can somehow find the common ground in the middle, the place where they are both working for increased access to appropriate backcountry areas rather than fighting over who should be banned from where.

Random bike-spotting (2 in a series)

2008-12-03T03:00:00.001-08:00

Like I said last time, I will be filling this series with random places I see references to bikes in the real world (read: anything not related to cycling pros, hipsters, or other aspects of bike culture.) Today: The Economist.

First, About the Economist for those who aren't familiar:

Established in 1843 to campaign on one of the great political issues of the day, The Economist remains, in the second half of its second century, true to the principles of its founder. James Wilson, a hat maker from the small Scottish town of Hawick, believed in free trade, internationalism and minimum interference by government, especially in the affairs of the market. Though the protectionist Corn Laws which inspired Wilson to start The Economist were repealed in 1846, the newspaper has lived on, never abandoning its commitment to the classical 19th-century Liberal ideas of its founder.

"Classical Liberal", for those unfamiliar with the term, is similar in many ways to Libertarianism, and I don't want to get diverted into an economic/political argument about differences between the two. Suffice to say, The Economist is not the sort of place that biking would be covered for the sake of "being green".

The point of that was to bring you this:

PEDALLING to work each day, I spend most of the journey looking out for London’s deadly, articulated “bendy buses”. The 60-foot beasts can happily scissor a cyclist while turning, so as I speed along High Holborn I have never given much of a second glance to the buildings that whizz past on each side. (Emphasis from the original, all articles in The Economist start with the first word capitalized).

This came from an article entitled "MI6's secret tunnels: A deep, dark secret", an article in the Correspondent's Diary. The article itself is about a bunker complex in London, dug during the German bombing of WWII as an air-raid shelter for 8,000. The article covers the history of the complex, but that's not what I am interested in.

My interest was the nonchalant way the author mentions not once, but twice, cycling to work. The riding is only mentioned as a lead-in to the story which could have been done as simply by the author talking about walking down the same street. But because the author (all Economist articles are presented without an author credit, so I can't say he or she) rides to work the bike was used.

An excellent example of real-life cycling drifting into the mainstream.

Grumble...

2008-12-01T03:00:00.000-08:00

There is a gremlin haunting my commuter bike, the Schwinn. I've already written on my problems with the rear tire, and it has once again attacked me. This time I know it was a gremlin.

I rode Monday and Tuesday of last week because my truck was in the shop. Tuesday afternoon I got off BART a few stops early to pick up the truck, then drove to the Concord station to pick up the bike. Both days the ride was fine. When I got to BART the bike was fine. When I unloaded the bike from the truck at my house the back tire was soft, and by Wednesday evening it was flat.

I'm taking the lazy way out, and trying the "pretend there's no problem" option of just pumping the tire back up without actually doing anything. My hope is that there was something in the way I loaded the bike into the truck that caused the tire to flat, but I'm not expecting to get that lucky. Thankfully work takes me out of town on Monday so I couldn't ride anyway and that will give me Monday afternoon to take it apart and try to find the problem...

Random bike-spotting (1 in a series)

2008-11-26T03:00:00.000-08:00

For me, the best way to judge how well biking has moved into the mainstream is the appearance of bike-related content in non-bike area of the media. I'm going to start documenting this when I see it, and hopefully it will get to a point where there is too much to cover, and then we will have taken over the world and all will be good.

Today's post is going to be light because I want to set out the goal of this series. Every now and then I've been doing something random, like watching TV with my dad, and I'll see a bike or cyclist in a shot where there isn't any reason for a bike there. What I mean the bike isn't the focus, it's just there because someone thought it would be natural for there to be a bike. That, or I'll see a news report about someone from a random walk of life and there will be an innocuous mention of cycling, just because. Again, the article isn't about the person being a cyclist, but the riding flows in naturally.

Those are the types of things I want to start documenting. To me, that sort of ubiquitousness of cycling shows that the "cycling lifestyle" is drifting into mainstream culture, which is my big hope.

Today I'll start with some levity from the folks at Indexed:

WHY?!

2008-11-24T06:59:00.002-08:00

I'm sure I'm not the first bike commuter to discover this, and I won't be the last, but maybe my experience can help others avoid the problem. What problem? Going more than a month off the bike and letting little things become reasons to not ride.

The ride this morning? Fan-freaking-tastic.

I remember now what I loved about bike commuting in the Bay Area before, 4 AM wake-up and all. My plan, to "trick" myself into riding by having my truck in the shop worked beautifully and I fully expect to continue.

Why did I stop in the first place? I can't even remember.

Forcing myself to ride

2008-11-23T16:58:00.002-08:00

I've been a bit lazy since I moved, using any number of arguments to justify not biking to BART in the mornings, despite the fact that it's only a 15-20 min ride. Now I've put myself in a place where I have to ride, hopefully it'll stick and I'll keep doing it at least a few days a week.

What I did was wait until late in the afternoon on Sat to take my truck in for the smog test (to get re-licensed in CA) and service that it needs. I also declined the free loaner that the dealer wanted to give me. That ensured that I wouldn't have my truck on Monday morning and the only way to get work is by bike.

Let's see if it works.

Tired of the animosity

2008-11-20T03:00:00.000-08:00

Some thoughts:

Why do so many cyclists (or at least blogging cyclists) feel that the only way to refer to drivers is to call them "cagers"?
Why are there so many blogging cyclists who seem to want the complete annihilation of everyone who has ever or will ever own a motor vehicle?
Why do blogging cyclists seem to miss the fact that their hatred of drivers is an exact mirror of the driver hatred of cyclists that they are all blogging about?

We get it - mixing cars and cyclists on the same roads is tough. There are some (large in number but probably not in percentage) drivers who actively dislike the presence of cyclists on the road. The laws, and often law enforcement, are tilted in the drivers' favor. Cyclists are often relegated to a form of second-class citizenry and not treated with the respect we feel we deserve. The point is made.

Here's another question though - given that there are a heck of a lot more people driving than cycling are we really going to get anywhere by being rude?

Whenever "bike rights" issues come up people think about the experiences they've had with cyclists in making a decision. Most people in urban areas have encountered messengers dodging between cars and blasting across intersections without a care for the chaos they cause. Most BART commuters can tell at least one story of a cyclist forcing their way onto an overcrowded train during the times where bikes are embargoed. My own father, who knows how avidly I ride (as does my older brother, an Ironman triathlon finisher) has come home on a number of occasions and ranted about the packs of cyclists he has encountered, blocking traffic by riding three- and four-abreast in their club kit, not caring that there is a line of 15-20 cars wanting to get past.

Are these really the thoughts we want people to have of us?

I've seen too many posts on some of my favorite blogs (no, I'm not linking to them today because I don't want to call anyone out) with nasty, antagonistic, prejudicial, and most of all STEREOTYPICAL language regarding drivers. Guess what? I drive. I like my truck and it's a useful tool. I also love my bikes. There isn't any reason people can't be both drivers and cyclists.

Well, except the attitude that drivers are evil incarnate which permeates the blogging cyclist community.

Off-topic, but entertaining (to me)

2008-11-19T03:00:00.001-08:00

After seeing it pimped on BikeSnobNYC I decided to check out the Gender Analyzer for both oy my blogs. The interesting thing is that I write differently on them:

Results
We guess http://liberationcycling.blogspot.com/ is written by a man (56%), however it's quite gender neutral.
We think http://preparednessandresponse.blogspot.com/ is written by a man (75%).

I've never really paid that much attention to how I write on the two different blogs, but apparen't it is quite different. I wonder if it's something about the subject matter that leads to the shift in language.