Dead Battery, Live Legs

The other day I hopped in my car to go to work turned the key and her the ominous click, click, click of a dead battery. (My back was sore, so sue me.)

Wonderful.

So I jumped on Blue Thunder and sprinted my way to work and still ended up getting there on time. I was incredibly sweaty, but at work on time.

This is just one of the wonderful things about knowing that you can get everything that you need to get done on your trusty bicycle. Instead of calling a tow truck, a cab or trying to get a ride from a friend all I had to do was ride down to the local auto repair shop to pick up a new battery for the car and lug that heavy sucker all the way back home. I even stopped off at the local bike shop to pick up a bike tool to add to my ever increasing collection of tools. Of course, I did get sneered at by one of the bike mechanics there, but that is really to be expected from any bike mechanic really.

It also gave me a chance to test out my bike handling with 40 pounds of extra weight in my basket, since I've been planning a little mini touring ride to Pilot Mountain.

Anyway good things happen on a bicycle.

Go mash some pedals.

Chain Guard Please

I always see one thing that is conspicuously absent from any off these urban utility bikes that fucktard-design companies squirt out of their ass whenever there is a competition they can "win," and you guessed it, it's a chain guard.

I know I took the chain guard off my huffy bmx bike back in 1994, but I now know that it was a very serious mistake and any person that actually wants to ride their bike around like a normal person wearing normal clothes knows that the biggest hurdle to overcome when trying to cycle around town is grease stains smeared across every single pair off pants that you own, or worse getting your pants stuck in the chain and toppling over into someone's garbage can and having fast food bags filled with trash thrown at you from SUV windows by smiling children.

The crappy thing about commuting by bi-cycle is that you actually have to think about what you wear. I think that it is another conspiracy from the car companies, like helmets, that almost no commute worthy bicycle comes equipped with a chain guard so you can wear what you please. Every single "urban" bicycle I see has all the amenities to haul furniture, but doesn't have anything that can allow you to wear jeans that weren't borrowed from your eleven-year-old-anorexic sister.

The only exception to the rule is 800 euro dutch bicycles. I'd love to have one, but I'm just fresh out of euros, and the $200 shipping charge isn't the most cost effective thing ever.

I guess it's too early for such radically innovative things in the United States when whether or not it's appropriate to run street tires at 98 psi rather than 99 psi is such a divisive issue in the the cycling world.

Go mash some pedals.

The Joys of Crappy Bikes

Since I'm now determined to turn that crappy mountain bike into something interesting that I might ride around on, I've been spending a few hours a day working on (aka destroying) it. The only thing I've really managed to do to it is destroy the bottom bracket, which needed to be replaced anyway and loosening up the stem, which had formally been seized up. I hadn't even realized that I could get it to raise up until now. I'd just kinda been dealing with it.

The experience so far has made me grateful that I'm working out all the kinks of doing this kind of work on a crappy mountain bike and not destroying my beloved Blue Thunder. Now I just need to either A: get replacement cranks, bottom bracket and single chain ring or B: find a really cheap cruiser style bike on craigslist and gut it for parts. I'm hoping for the cruiser.

Go mash some pedals.

The Great Basement Bike Build

I've had an old Murray mountain bike in my basement for what seems like three years, possibly even four and I just couldn't bring myself to get rid of it mostly because I've had plans for it. The plans have changed drastically over the years, but I think I've finally actually decided on something that might actually be worth doing with it. While the bike itself is a piece of shit and all the components are crap there is one pretty good thing about it and that is that the parts for this particular type of bicycle are very cheap. I found a chain ring with the right amount of teeth that I want for it running about six dollars online, which is a hell of a lot better than the $54.00 for a crank set that I was looking for. The actual good thing about the crank set is that apparently it is the only type of crank set where you don't need any specialty tools to take it apart. You only need an adjustable wrench and a screwdriver, which is awesome, because I don't have the right tools to take apart a bottom bracket. I now have a project for this bike, which will be much better than the idea of trying to turn it into a funky riding lawn mover for my push-reel mower. I've been wanting to put together a type of bike build and since I already have this frame and most of the components to already make it a working bicycle then I can just work with what I got and not spend all that much more money. 1x8 speed urban utility cruiser here we come. I'd like to turn the bicycle into a slick, internal hub gear, chopper type cruiser that I can make all fancy. More like a low rider than an actual bicycle and it will give me an excuse to try my hand at some serious bicycle mechanicdom. The other option for the bicycle is to turn it into a single speed cruiser. There really seem to be a whole lot of options for this type of build and I'm going to post my progress as I go.

 

Go mash some pedals.

Those shoaling freds

The other day me and the wife went out for a ride to Wake Forest and back. It's a short ride with some nice scenery, so we figured it would be a good way to spend a little part of the day. It was on this ride when it happened. We'd pulled up to a busy road when a pair of freds straddling carbon wonder bikes came shoaling up next to us. They didn't say 'hello' just rode up right next to us ready to jump into traffic at the smallest gap.

Now the pair of bikes that my wife and I have are not the fastest looking things. To most people they probably look like cruisers with the high handlebars and milk crates on the back, along with all the fenders and stuff. I can't really blame people for thinking that I'm slow, but I'm not. I'm not the fastest guy on the block, but I've got a decent engine and I've done enough riding to know that most spandex clad Tour de France fantasy riders are weekend warriors stuck in a perpetual recovery day loop.

I don't really chase after people. It was only really a coincidence that they were heading the same way that we were heading. We were heading home. I'm not sure where they were heading. I was however determined to teach them a lesson if I could, so I kept up with them as leisurely as possible. My wife was with me, so I couldn't blast past them like I wanted to, so I just kept the gap consistent. Every time the freds looked behind them there I was in all my splendor, sitting tall and upright, one hand on the handlebars, wearing knickerbockers, a t-shirt and what I hoped was a big friendly grin on my face.

I'm not sure where they were going, but after almost yawning my way up a hill they tried to muscle up they decided to turn around and head back the other way.

I don't think they were really trying that hard to break away from us. My wife swears that they were, but I'm not completely convinced. Even though, they didn't seem to be putting much power into their riding, they were technically more aerodynamic, so they should have been able to go faster with less effort, especially with the light weight bikes with no accessories and they definitely didn't have a five pound chain lock rattling around in their basket.

I'm guessing that they were just tired of us chasing them, but I can't really be sure about that. I'm only inferring it because they turned around almost randomly.

The point is that I hate it when people shoal. I never shoal, because I never know how fast someone is going to be going. I usually just wait till they get going and then decide whether or not I'm going to pass them. It's really the only polite thing to do. I don't know how many times people have cruised on up next to me on their racing cycle and then had me following close behind because they're going ten miles per hour.

Be polite, don't judge a bike by its handlebars and go mash some pedals.

Bike Wreck

I haven't posted in what seems like a few weeks and the reason is fairly simple. I broke my arm recently in a fairly spectacular bicycle wreck. Fortunately only a small piece of my front derailer, a reflector and a bell were all that were broken on my bike. Blue thunder still rides.

Long story short a car break checked me while I was going about 30 mph down Hawthorne Rd. and I went ass over tea kettle onto my arm. Thankfully it was a rather quiet Sunday afternoon so there wasn't a teenage SUV driver texting on her phone right behind me, so I was able to pick myself up and limp the two miles back to my house and then on to the urgent care.

While my arm hasn't completely healed, my doctor has cleared me for riding because of the new awesome Bosco bars I got from Rivendell, which make my bike have a more upright riding style, well completely upright really with an extra hand position that equals the flat bar that I did have on it if I want to get all "areo."

The derailer still works thankfully and the thing seems to be riding fine, but I've been thinking about changing up the transmission a little bit. Too bad I have no money.

Hopefully there will be more posts to come in the future.

Go mash some pedals.

Every Honk

I was out for a little night ride with my disco lights on board to try and tame some squalling new brakes and a car that was passing me gave a quick sharp honk as he passed me.

Now I've been honked at a lot. I'm guessing it's something that people that ride scooters, mopeds and motorcycles have in common. People can't really see them at least they can't see them as well as a two ton piece of metal that can make their car insurance and their leased car become more expensive. I used to take these honks as an insult.

"Get off the rode you gay mother fucking bi cycle rider!"

The thing is that when I'm in my car (the rare occasion that I'm actually in my car) I always want to give a little honk of encouragement. I don't because I'm sure they'd flip me off, but I always feel like I should do something.

I don't take honks as insults anymore because of this. I always just try and give a friendly little wave like they were just saying hello. This way if they are saying hello I'm not the asshole and if the person in the car is trying to be a dick and thinking "Hey buddy, it's not like this thing can go any slower. I know the speedometer goes as low as ten, but that doesn't mean I can actually drive that slow" they won't get the satisfaction of thinking that they made me mad. On this particular night, I was wearing an old boonie cover with the desert MARPAT. Along with the full beard, shants, and well the bicycle, I look like a crazy Iraq war vet, or Afghanistan vet. While I'm a vet, I've been to neither place and as far as the crazy is concerned you'll have to ask my shrink. 

I see every honk as encouragement no matter what, because that is what it is, encouragement. If the person is being nice and telling me "way to go," than I can feel proud of cycling around. If the person is being a complete sociopath on his way to a stroke, than I'll be even more motivated to ride my bike, so this asshole can't get home in time to see the beginning of "Dancing with the Stars."

Go mash some pedals and fuck the haters.

Line of Sight (A Southern Fried Review)

I love watching "Line of Sight" with the audio off. It's not because I don't like the music, because the music is awesome. I can't say that Lucas Brunelle, or whatever the fuck the tech geek's name is, has bad taste in music. It's because without the adrenaline pumping sound track it's like watching guys in tight pants roller skate through a traffic jam. I know he thinks he's "hardcore" because he rides through "big city traffic," but I've seen five years old children hauling their three year old siblings through thicker traffic and families of five on one moped salmon through traffic faster and calmer than these people "weave" through strolling pedestrians. It looks fast when someone on a fixed gear pedals away like a hamster desperate to prove that he's finally gonna run his way out of that wheel, but when you notice the people with baby strollers moving the same speed through the intersections you just have to wonder whether the music is giving a little more emotional license to the scenes than the actual riding. (I'm fast. I ride on the top of track bars.)

I know that Luca "small arms" Brunelle thinks he's bad when he holds up a Tavor rifle and a bicycle up at the same time on the sands behind his summer house, but I'm from the South. I carry a .45 ACP cocked and locked on my hip all day, every day. Not just when I'm riding and even when I'm playing speed chess, except not in a stupid cycling cap. It's North Carolina, and the only thing we like more than barbeque is carrying guns, which N.C. drivers don't seem to understand unless I'm rolling by.

"Line of Sight" is like the skate videos I liked to watch as a kid, well I still like to watch them, they're idiotic, dangerous, and fun to watch. The only difference is that being an amateur skateboarder is not like being an amateur bicycle messenger. I used to deliver pizza, but I don't brag about how fast I can deliver piping hot commercial shit to people that don't tip. I never said, "I'm a professional pizza delivery driver. Not just anyone can do it. You need toes of steel, tight pants, and a stupid hat."

If I hadn't known better, I would have sworn that Bobe Jr. faggot with the plumber's crack showing was a guy I served with in the Marine Corps, except that guy was actually hardcore because he fought in a war, and didn't just ride a bicycle through New York. "Oh no the 90 lbs guy on a bicycle is yelling at me." If some skeleton on a fixie threatened me like that, I'd crush his fucking throat with the palm of my hand.

I'm not saying that I don't like the film, because I love it. I think it's hilarious. I love it so much that I'm inviting Lucas Brunelle to ride down interstate 40 during rush hour, since he loves the thrill. We haven't reached peak traffic like those cock suckers in New York, so we still drive bumper to bumper at 80 miles per hour, so let's see how hardcore you are. I'll film you.

I might even call 911 for you.

Go mash some pedals and don't be like this douche bag.

(I hope this pops up on his Google alerts)

Hauling by cycle

Over the last month or so in this fine city that I call home, people have been gearing up for large item pick up day by tossing whatever they don't want onto the curb. This should really be called freecycle day, because along with all the people tossing out gobs of amount of stuff onto the street are the gobs of people driving slowly through neighborhoods looking for items to load up into cars, trucks and trailers. It's a beautiful thing.

I threw on a hat and an appropriate tie-dyed t-shirt with accompanying sandals and went out my front door to wheel around my neighborhood looking for goodies. It's basically a DIYer's wet dream out there with the amount of stuff that people throw away, so I rode slow and took my time checking out everyone's little pile of crap. My quest was rewarded when I came across about fifteen five-gallon buckets split between a few different houses. After several trips of tottering towers of buckets knocking around in my bike basket I finally had them all safe and sound on my deck where I would later be turning them into a network of self watering containers for growing vegetables.

This is where I think the bicycle basket or in my case and over-sized milk crate comes in handy. There are definitely other more stylish ways of hauling around everything you need for the day or running errands, like panniers or a rack with a bungee cord, but the crate is king as far as I'm concerned when it comes to versatility and ease of use. A rack and bungee cord requires that everything you are carrying be small or at least easily contained. You could technically haul an armchair with some rope, but it's still just one big thing. Panniers are nice for carrying things that you are going to bring into other places, like laptops or clothing and the like, but space is limited and there is a need to balance the load otherwise you get a wonky ride. The basket on the other hand requires only that things don't bounce out. I can throw just about anything into it and I don't have to worry about precise balancing or worry about having a bunch of smaller items loose and jumbled. The buckets for instance would have been a challenge to haul without the basket. They wouldn't fit into panniers and while they could technically fit onto a bare rack with enough bungee cords it would have been far from easy. With my basket they towered over my head as I rode and provided that I didn't make any sharp turns stayed exactly where they should have been until I deposited them at my front door.

I'm not going to tell you that the crate is the attractive option, because it definitely isn't. It's the work horse, dirty pick up truck of the three choices of bike attached cargo hauling, but it's the easiest and if you ride around in the next few days you'll probably be able to find one of your vary own laying forlorn on someone's curb, just like the one I found one year ago.

Go mash some pedals.

What the bonk is that?

Today I rode 28.2 miles burning about 1900 calories. It took about two hours and twenty minutes. I'm not trying to brag. Obviously. I'm sure there are probably millions of cyclists out there that would completely crush my time. I'm only mentioning it because before my ride I only had three cups of coffee with cream, no sugar. During the ride all I drank was water. No energy bars or gels or anything like that and I haven't eaten anything since I got back from my ride, just some more coffee with cream, no sugar.

I keep reading about this thing called bonking, or rather hitting the wall where you burn up all the glycogen in your liver and you're just supposed to drop dead. The Wikipedia article I read about bonking stated that this would happen to someone who rode for more than fifteen miles and could happen in less than two hours. I wasn't pushing myself an incredible amount, but I went over both the time and the mileage and besides being a little tired I'm completely fine.

I believe that hitting the wall is possible, but only if you're a skeleton. If you have any fat on you whatsoever then your body is going to use it to create energy. It's not just there to kill your self esteem, it's there to power your fat ass through hell when the shit hits the fan. I think cycling magazines would have us believe that if you don't pump yourself full of energy bars and power gels that we're just going the keel over and die unable to support the twenty pounds of excess fat that hangs from our bodies for absolutely no purpose. Stupid fat.

I'm not trying to convince anyone to start a new diet or anything. I'm not advocating that you shouldn't eat carbohydrates. I'm only saying that you don't need to eat three boxes of pasta in order to ride over longer distances.

If you're like most other cyclists that I meet and like myself, you've got some fat on you. I'm not saying your a couch potato. All I'm saying is that you have energy to burn.

I think what people want to believe is that there is something out there that will make cycling easy, well easier, because it's really damn easy compared to running. People want to believe that with the super energy gel max they are going to be a machine practically coasting up the steepest grades and out running cars. It's not going to happen. Cycling uses muscle power that's why it's awesome, but it's going to suck sometimes. You're going to get tired and stuffing shit in your mouth isn't going to make it any easier. If you want to buy something that gets you from point A to point B without using any of your own energy, while a consistent cool breeze kisses your face like fairy elves than get in your car and pay the gas bill.

There is one thing that will make cycling easier, cycling. Go mash some pedals.

I just had to add this

I just had to add this because this guy suggests buying a $100 air compressor to dry your bike. I believe he calls it a "good investment." Now air compressors are good for a lot of stuff, but are you seriously going to go buy one to dry your bike? It's called a towel dude or possibly just the air.

It's hilarious that people believe that you need to do this kind of crap to get your bike clean. They think that if you don't do something like this it is going to self destruct. It's even funnier that most of these people probably road an old single speed for years as a kid without washing it and it would probably still work just fine now if they hadn't put it in the landfill.

Of course these are the same guys who think a $5,000 bike will make them suck less hard at riding.

Go mash some pedals.

Errand Crushing Adventure

Today I did all of my errands via bicycle. I know this sounds weird because I almost always do all my errands by bicycle, but usually they are done one at a time on separate days, because I’m a poor planner. By the time I realize that I should have been heading somewhere else, I’m on my doorstep unlocking my house. Not today however. Today, I thought ahead, mapped out a route, kind of, and then stepped out my front door into the great unknown.

I think the hard part about doing multiple errands on a bike is that I usually only know the way to and back from some place. I can ride to the grocery store and back or to the post office and back or to the greenway and back, but I’m not too good at picking out the best routes between all of these places.

The places to visit today were the bank, the central library and the post office. Errands in a car are easy, well easier, because you can just pick the route that you believe will offer the least amount of aggravation and then you go on your way, but it doesn’t really matter what road you take. One could also do this on a bicycle, but there are definitely some roads to avoid if you value your life. Peters Creek Parkway is one, Silas Creek and University Parkways are just a few of those that should be avoided at all cost. 

About half of the roads that I rode on today I don’t normally travel on, and for the most part I was pleasantly surprised. I think it’s one of the joys of the bicycle that you can really explore a neighborhood. In a car, you can’t look around and enjoy the scenery because there’s always a pedestrian just waiting to step into your path, and you need to keep your concentration. While the pedestrians can still be a danger, you the cyclist for the most part can just relax and enjoy the scenery. I discovered a new section of the city, which I will most likely visit again, and then left that to venture into the strip mall jungle, which my bank inhabits. Surprisingly drivers didn’t seem too angry that I was there, probably because they had to be vigilant about people walking around while staring at the sun. The only real danger I faced was dodging a salmoning grandmother in a tie-died shirt. I retraced my steps and rode downtown to drop off some movies at the central library and then cruised on down to the local post office near my house on the way home to drop off a thank you card. 

This is what I love about cycling around instead of driving. If I have to drive, it just feels like I’m waiting in line. When I’m riding, I’m having an adventure, because you never know what’s going to happen and once you’re out there you just have to deal with the adversity and keep on pedaling.

Go mash some pedals.

I ride Mixed

It's not that I hate fixed gear per say, I even like it sometimes like that weird dutch bike dancing stuff, or is it Swedish? I just don't like it. I guess it would be much better to say that I don't understand it. I feel like it's the same as climbing into lycra every time you want to saddle up. It's just not necessary.

I completely understand the aesthetics of these bicycles, since they have very clean lines and are usually associated with underground culture. But, if it were truly underground, why do they care about aesthetics? This seems to me to be the complete opposite of a counter culture it's just... culture. The motto should be "we're different in a same kind of way."

Functionally, I feel that there are few places for the fixed gear bike. Tricks, if you can call them functional, seem like they lend themselves to fixed gear bikes and bike polo for that matter seems like a good fit, but for actual transportation they just don't make sense.

The one argument I hear for them is that they require less maintenance. Less parts, less maintenance seems to make sense, but they probably go through tires like crazy. Bicycles are also not complex machines. It's not that hard to adjust brakes and derailers (I'm going Sheldon Brown on the spelling) or do pretty much anything else to your bike. A community ride I participate in on most weeks has a few transplants from New York in it, and they have told us why messengers ride fixed, they're poor, and not the kind of romantic starving artist poor, but the strung out on heroin and then stealing parts and bikes from other people to make more money kind of poor. So unless you're hooked on meth there shouldn't be much problem in cracking open a library book on bicycle maintenance and figuring out how to do things on your own, and you can get really cheap tools from pawn shops where other drug addicts have sold their tool sets for Oxycontin.

There is also the supposed zen aspect of riding a fixed gear. I keep hearing this crap about not having your mind clouded by wondering what gear you need to have it in and that riding fixed frees you from that and you can be one with the universe. If you need to think about what gear your in than you're not doing it right.

In a forum, I read one person's entry who explained that riding a fixie was like driving a manual transmission on a car. Obviously this person doesn't drive a manual transmission because riding a bike with multiple gears is almost exactly like driving a manual transmission. Besides the embarrassing stalls you can still stall out on hills and spin your legs like a hamster in too low a gear. I think what this person meant to say is that riding a fixed gear bike is like driving an automatic, because in an automatic you just have forward and reverse though I've never heard of anyone describing driving an automatic transmission as a zen like experience because you don't have to do anything. Maybe a golf cart would be a better comparison since the brake and accelerator is sometimes on the same pedal.

I also hate the idea that someone on a fixed gear bike is faster than someone who has a more complex transmission. I'm sure this started because fixed gear riders would blast past some amateur-pro racer in spandex who rides an hour every month and thought that was proof that their fixed gear stallions were faster. I assure you that if fixed gear made you faster than everyone in the Tour de France would be riding fixed.

The thing I dislike the most is that I have no idea what to call my own bike. I can't just say I have a geared bike, because technically a fixed gear does have gears, two of them in fact, so multiple gears doesn't really work either, so I've decided to jokingly call my bike a Mixed Gear or mixie if you want to be derisive.

Infotainment

One of my favorite pastimes recently has been reading advice on cycling online and from handy dandy books from the local library. This has nothing to do with me actually needed advice, I just like reading all the absurd things that people write in these things. The basic summary of most cycling books would read something like this.

Cycling is a very expensive sport, which requires the highest grade equipment and multiple safety components for a person to be successful at riding down the street. Cycling is only ever acceptable if done in spandex and only on the weekends. Helmets can protect you from falls, cars and stray bullets. Everything that you ever did while riding a bicycle as a kid is unacceptable and wrong. 

I swear that most of these "cycling" books were written by car manufactures to  get people to not ride in the first place.

"Really, I need special shoes to ride down to the store and get beer? Guess I'm driving again."

In a recent book I read, there were different sections on how to dress, while engaging in different cycling activities. It basically went like this.

Commuter
cycling shorts
clipless pedals
jersey
windbreaker
helmet

Road cyclist
cycling shorts
clipless pedals
jersey
helmet
gloves

So you basically lose the windbreaker and put on some mushy cycling gloves.

There are of course the books that promote a relaxed and comfortable riding position such as having your handlebars positioned a foot below the saddle. You know for those long grueling comfortable endurance rides.

You can definitely see the marketing bleeding through around the edges from their magazine soaked minds. Bicycle magazines, like most magazines, are just one big long advertisement on how everything they are telling you is going to be the best thing that ever happened to you and the worst thing that ever happened to your bank account. These cycling books are the same. They may not actually promote a specific product, but they promote a specific way of thinking that is something we find comforting in our consumer life. Buying things will lead to happiness, and with enough gear cycling will be as easy as pissing on your feet. Anything that goes contrary to this type of thinking is suspect and therefore wrong.

The sad thing is that I believe this hyper focus on a gear centric type of cycling puts people off to cycling as much as mandatory helmet laws. No one is going to try and use their bicycle as an alternate and cheaper means of transportation if they believe that they need to get into full racing kit to go pick up some doughnuts from the local store, or go to a restaurant for that matter.

The key thing to staying comfortable on a bicycle is speed. Well, lack of speed to be more exact. Bicycle specific clothing is beneficial when someone is trying to get maximum output out of their bicycle. You build up a healthy amount of heat by doing this and hence you sweat like a monster, so high tech fabrics (polyester) that wick sweat away from the body is needed. Going slow is the real key to comfort. If I want to arrive somewhere and I don't particularly want to be a sweaty mess I just make sure I don't exceed a certain gear ratio. It means I won't kill myself trying to fly on the flats or work when I'm going down hill. I coast down the hills and cruise across the flats and I stay nice and comfortable in whatever I'm wearing.

Don't listen to the hype, go mash some pedals.

Cars are for the weak

Automobiles are two ton recliners. People climb into their money-pit bubbles and off they go into the sunset. I don't think I've ever seen a car commercial that was ever actually selling anyone a car. Car companies are always selling a lifestyle image. Attractive people flitting about exotic locals, or a father doing all the fun sorts of things that his pick up truck will allow him to do. They are the keys to freedom and wonderfulness and rainbow farts. This is the image at least.

I honestly never see anyone like this. There are obviously car people that love nothing more than rebuilding an engine in their backyard, but they are few and far between. All the people that I run into just complain. They complain about gas prices, mechanics, drivers and how far they have to drive. I meet people all the time that also seem to believe that they must be making a car payment all of the time. As soon as they pay off one car, they buy another and on and on until the end of time.

I think that the biggest ruse that was ever perpetrated was the idea that cars = manliness. This, in my opinion, couldn't be further from the truth. Cars equal weakness. What is so manly about a car? Shopping for the best accessories and style, picking out the right color, so it matches your clothes and then showing it off to other people? That's called shopping, usually reserved for women. Men chop down trees with hatchets, they climb mountains, they build houses with hand tools. When's the last time anyone was impressed with someone driving across the state? Never. It's never happened. Walking across the state or riding a bicycle across the state is something else altogether. It takes strength and courage. The most dangerous thing you'll do driving across the state is stopping for gas in a not so good part of town, which will most likely be completely safe if you didn't keep eyeballing people.

The only thing cars do is make people crazy. They'd rather sink a third of their income into a pseudo-status symbol that grows their ass and shrinks their bank account than walk a mile.

Bikes are strong and they make you stronger. Your legs will become slabs of steel that can crush a man's head, you'll have the confidence to stand your ground against hordes of maniacs in cages and you'll love yourself for it.

Go mash some pedals.

My platform on platforms

          I went on a group ride recently, which unlike other group rides I’d been on was filled with the somewhat charming sound of people clipping in and out of their pedals and placing their hard cycling shoes on the pavement to balance, like the sound of horses on cobblestones. It cemented an answer to a question I had been asking myself ever since I started riding my bike around.

          Should I go clipless?

          I don’t even have clips or cages or whatever the other alternative is either. I just have some stock black plastic pedals that I guess I was supposed to instantly get rid of as soon as I bought the bike. But, they’re still on and they work.

          It seems that most everything I read in books or on the internet usually reads something like “well platform pedals are fine, but once you get serious you’ll want to go clipless,” then it will say something about power and efficiency. I’ve even read this in books on commuting. “Just bring a change of shoes,” the books will read.

          It all sounds well and good I thought to myself. I love efficiency and more power sounds good. It will probably make cycling easier. I love easier. This was until I had actually seen them in action and decided that they were probably a huge waste of money, for me at least.

          I feel that the disadvantages to cycling shoes and special pedals outweigh any supposed pluses that they may have as far as speed and efficiency, and I don’t even think they have that in all situations.

          Let me start off by saying that I think that clip-in pedals are probably awesome for racing. No foot slipping, no adjusting, you are forced to keep an efficient pedal technique. “Yay, whatever is good for racing is good for me!”

          Well, not really.

          Where the clips fail is anytime you actually have to stop, like for traffic lights. This is what I usually see. A guy pulls up to a stop light unclips no problem the light turns green immediately and he pedals forward with his one still clipped shoe and moves to gracefully clip the other shoe in, misses, misses again, fumbles, looks down and stalls out while trying to clip his foot in and then off he goes for twenty yards and then gets stopped by another light where the process repeats itself. This doesn’t seem very efficient to me, but what do I know, I have platform pedals.

          I don’t really believe the efficiency claim either. Yes, I guess you could technically pull up on the pedal to get more power, but you can also push, pull and add resistance at any point in the pedaling process that works against the actual pedal stroke. If I’m on my platforms and I pull up too much then my foot is lightly lifted from the pedal and all I get is air resistance. It even makes it easier for the other foot to pedal because there is less resistance. If I were wearing special shoes and I lifted up too much I would be applying pressure to the top of the shoe and the pedal it is attached to adding more resistance to the other foot and causing my leg to fatigue faster from resistance that just doesn’t need to be there.

          What really kills their efficiency for commuting, or rather not riding on a closed course, is their deficiency when starting and stopping. On my last ride, I cruised gently by all the guys using clip in pedals because all I had to do was just get any part of my foot onto the pedal and off I went while everyone else was trying to hit a moving target with their big toe.

          They’re also very limiting, impractical and expensive. I can wear any kind of shoe I want. I’ve worn my dress shoes, clogs, sandals, flip flops and hiking boots all while cycling. It’s also easier to walk in all of that footwear while it seems to be extremely annoying to walk around in cycling shoes.

          “But you could get used to all of those and it would be just as good.”

          Yes I could, or I could spend no money, not look like an idiot at traffic lights and wear whatever I want.

          I will therefore not be spending any money on special shoes or pedals.

          Not that you really cared.

          Go mash some pedals.

Making my big reflective vest less dorky, maybe

I'm not the most fashion conscious person in the world. My wardrobe is almost completely filled with clothes that were given to me, found in thrift stores, and or modified in one way or another to make them more functional. It's a mixture of apathy, thrift and being just plain broke. I did however want to do something with my big dorky reflective vest to make it less dorky... maybe.

Part of me wonders whether there is a conspiracy going on to make safety equipment the most ugly, dorky looking things ever devised by man to keep people from engaging in moderately dangerous activities, like cycling around town. (Slightly more dangerous during rush hour) I mean if you had to wear a flashing yellow dunce cap to drive your car to the grocery store you'd probably just walk, or order delivery.

While I'm divided on the whole helmet issue, I do think that cyclists should be visible. I think that a rider is more likely to avoid an accident if people can see him than if he's dressed in all black and wearing a helmet. This is why I usually throw on the reflective vest when I go out on a ride. If you can't see me, you are blind. The only problem is that the reflective vest is dorky. It's more dorky than a helmet. My answer to this is patches. Yes, patches, those things that you thought were only limited to motorcyclists and people in the Army, since they seem to love them so much.

I'd thought of using electrical tape or something to write something on the back, but I thought patches were actually the best bet, and because I have no money, I use what's lying around. The Marine Corps patch I had, which I call my good ole boy repellent, the other two aren't really patches. The middle one is from an old t-shirt and the one on the end is from another old piece of clothing. Yes, it's an x-wing fighter, Darth Vader is on the front of the vest.

The beauty of this is that these vests are really cheap. I think I paid a little over $4.00 for mine at a local Harbor Freight Hardware Store. You can fill one up with patches, then buy another one and fill that one up with patches. The patches add a little bit of personality to the safety gear while reducing almost none of its visibility. For me it makes it a little easier to throw the thing over my shoulders before I go out for a ride than when it was just blank.

Though my wife thinks it will just make me a target for people to throw their car trash at. Time will tell.

Go mash some pedals.

Cycling Pants

I've been trying to adapt my clothing, so that I can jump on the bike with limited preparation and just head out the door. This is a pretty easy thing to do in the summer when shorts are king. If you are brave enough to wear long pants in the summer down here and spend time outside then "god have mercy on your soul," because it's really hot. I used to be a pants only kind of guy because you can only really get two kinds of shorts, baggy cargo and dork/ old man. I'm not a real big fan of either, so I haven't collected a bunch of different shorts over the years, but since I started cycling to get around I've been more shorts friendly, because it is freaking HOT. I'm fully expecting it to get into triple digits this year on a regular basis. Most of my shorts however are cutoffs. Old dress/ work pants that have become too faded and worn out to be presentable are great for cutoffs.

Dress pants and shirts, for the most part, are designed to be comfortable even in heat, because our culture thinks that wearing a suit in 90 degree weather is appropriate, so pants and shirts are made of wool and poly blends that breath, wick away moisture and dry rapidly.

I have a few of these in my chest of drawers, but what I don't have are cycle friendly pants. For the last year, I've tried straps, boot bands and the cutoff tops of crew socks to try and keep my pants out of the chain and keep them grease free. All of these work and don't work for that purpose, but they all still provide one more barrier against just hopping on the bike and going, so I did something about it.

I made cycling knickers or capri pants or whatever you want to call them.

The bad thing is that I made them out of some old "summer weight" cargo pants, which were made out of cotton. Now if you spend a lot of time outside, cotton is the devil. It soaks up moisture and never ever, ever dries while you're wearing it, but unfortunately it was the only thing I had that I was willing to butcher.

Here is the result.

 These are actually hanging up to dry after a 20 mile test ride, so they look like crap, but this is what they look like. They hang down to about mid calf and when I'm on my bike they are higher than the crank and the chain, so I don't have to worry about them getting snagged or covered in grease while riding, them getting covered in grease while getting on and off is another story.

They were fairly simple to make. You cut them off at the desired length, turn them inside up, fold up the end of the leg where you want it to be hemmed, pin that thing and then run that thing through your sewing machine. With set up and everything, I think it might have taken me an hour. The actual sewing takes about five minutes. I chose to do two lines of stitching to give them a little bit of added strength.

 Here's a picture of the inside of the leg.

Overall the pants are pretty comfortable and they definitely make riding more hassle free. I'm not sure how much better they look than strapping your pants to your ankle, but they require less equipment than regular pants.

In conclusion, I think I'll be hunting around the thrift stores for some wool or poly blend pants to hack into some more riding pants.

Keep mashing those pedals.

Helmet or not to helmet, that is the question

            I've found that there is a tendency for people to get over zealous when it comes to certain subjects. They learn something on the internet, read an article and it changes their life forever and they insist that everyone else must now follow this golden rule that has been handed down by the safety gods for our own personal wellbeing. Anyone who doesn’t follow this rule is therefore a heretic and should be stoned or at the very least mistrusted. This rule is usually inversely proportional to whether it actually affects other people or not, meaning that if I follow this rule or don’t follow this rule it will effect no one, but for some reason I feel that everyone should do it regardless.

            For cycling this rule is “helmet, or not to helmet,” depending on where you line up.

            So, here is where I stand on helmets, I don’t care.

            I’m sure there are plenty of people that feel the same way, but those aren’t the people that fill up internet forums. I just read a very civil conversation on an article’s comment section that included name calling, profanity and the postulation of the location of one's head in relation to their rectum. All this over a safety device that only affects the user.

            I wear a helmet most of the time now, but that’s only because I listen to an MP3 player while I ride, so I’m doing risk compensation or whatever it’s called. I’m doing something stupid, so I do something safe to make up for it. Like saying one of those born again Christian prayers after you go to prison for murdering your family, still counts, see you in heaven.

            I’m always baffled by people’s vehemence regarding personal safety. If someone I don’t know or care about in California or better yet New York City (insert southern accent) slams into the back of a stopped pick-up truck full of barbed wire and isn’t wearing the proper body armor for cycling and bleeds to death while the driver cruises around town oblivious that a 30-pound cyclist has fallen into his pit of death, than what do I care.

            Wearing a helmet might protect you when you mow down a pedestrian on the sidewalk, but unless that pedestrian is also wearing a helmet than that person will be severely injured.

            Now if you are hit by a car, the helmet will be absolutely essential in making it easier for the paramedics to collect your teeth so that you can be identified via dental records.

            “Hey Bill how are we going to identify this idiot?”

            “Just look for the crumpled Styrofoam. You can usually find their jawbone near that. It’s usually at one end of the bloody streak flecked with spandex.”

            “Oh here it is, that was easy.”

            “Told you. You learn these things.”

            Let’s do some math here to see if a piece of foam wrapped around your skull will make a difference if someone hits you with a car.

            According to a New York Times article in 2004 (yes I know it’s ten years old, but still who doesn’t drive an SUV, I’m in the South, remember), the average car weight is over 4,000 pounds, so for the ease of science let’s convert that to kg, what are kg, I have no idea, but it’s what scientists use (insert southern accent). Four thousand pounds is 1814.369 kg.

            Let’s say that the car is going 35 miles per hour and we’ll convert that to meters per second squared, which is what science uses as a standard measure for acceleration. So 35 mph will be 244.81 meters per second squared.

            We multiply both those numbers and we get…444175.372 newton’s of force.

            Well, what the hell is a Newton, I live in America god damn it (insert southern accent)?

            In American, the above number would equal 99854.59563854612 pounds of force or about 50 tons.

            Most bicycle helmets are tested by putting about a ten-pound weight in them and dropping them from about six feet.

            So when the SUV knocks your head off, your skull will still be intact, it just won’t be attached to your body.

            Maybe I’ll stop wearing my helmet all together. They look dumb anyway. Back to the original point though, how does me getting splattered by an SUV have anything to do with anyone else other than me and the driver? That's a Chinese riddle for you.

            Go mash some pedals. Helmeted or otherwise.