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.

           

Lock Weight

So for whatever reason, I've been looking up different bicycle lock stuff. I was mostly looking to see if anyone had devised any techniques to use them to beat the crap out of people, but instead found videos of people beating the crap out of locks. The main lesson I took away from it was that my bike lock probably sucks and that pretty much every single bike lock out there sucks.

Hopefully, if you've ridden your trusty hippie-cycle for more than a year or so, or have just done some research you'll find out that any lock can be beaten by a determined thief. Do a Youtube search and you will find someone breaking your lock. Even really tough bicycle locks like the kryptonite series, can be defeated with a simple industrial strength TNT driven angle grinder. Okay, so that is pretty secure, but the point is, where there is a will, there is a way.

But, that's not the point of this whole post.

The point of this post is talking about lock weight. A heavy duty u-lock or chain lock is really heavy. How heavy do you say? Well I don't really know, so I'm going to find out.

kryptonite U-lock = 4.4 pounds
Chain lock from big box store = 4.4 pounds

Wow, same weight, who would have thought.

As far as bike stuff goes, 4.4 pounds of lock weight can seem like a fair amount of weight, but on the other hand IT'S ON YOUR BIKE! It's not like you're walking around with an five extra pounds on one foot while you run a marathon. You're on one of the most efficient means of transportation ever conceived with very low rolling resistance. Plus, having that extra weight will make you go faster when it's not on your bike.

I get shaving weight for competition, but who rides their bike to the Tour de France? The answer is no one. They keep their bikes locked up in the team van or whatever. No one is bringing a u-lock.

"Hey Bill aren't you riding today in the big race?"
"No, I had my bikes locked up to a lamppost and someone stole all of them."

People who don't race need to stop worrying about what kind of weight they have on their bike.

Besides you can always use the remnants of your heavy lock to beat the crap out of the thief that stole your bike after you track them down. 

Go mash some pedals.

Greenway Grind

            The Greenway for most people in Winston-Salem is their favorite ride, probably because there aren’t all those scary cars hunting to run you down on the scenic little hideaway from the rest of the city. I’ll admit that if I’m wanting to get in a longer ride, and I don’t really feel like exploring the surrounding country side for fear of rabid chicken attacks, I’ll pedal down the Greenway toward the Salem Lake Trail.

            There’s a couple of good spots to get to the Greenway that leads to Salem Lake. The first is the parking lot of the Market Place Mall. You know, where the 2.50 theater is. Well if you can’t afford fancy pants headache inducing 3D movies than you’ll know what I’m talking about. This would be the spot that I would choose if I was going to drive down to this ride. There’s always plenty of parking and from this start it’s about 18 miles round trip or so.

            The second spot is much more rider friendly, because you don’t have to ride down Peter’s Creek Parkway. It’s just a cruise through Ardmore while making your way over to Link Rd. turn left onto Hutton and then right down the access road to Washington Park. The gate is closed unless there is a softball game going on so if you’re going to drive then I suggest you go to the Market Place side. If you're on your ride though it's easy to ride between the gates and speed bumps. This is also a good way to go if you’re cycling and want to get to the 2.50 theater or the Market Place mall, just cross the bridge and keep to the right instead of going left past the dog park, and you’ll be there in no time.

            I prefer the Washington Park access since I don’t like the idea of driving some place just to ride my bike around that and I don’t have a way to carry my bike on my car. I’ll stick with the first excuse though.

            Until recently, the only hazard on this route was other Greenway users and the occasional deranged homeless man, but because of construction on a significant portion of the Greenway there is a detour that leads you up two monster hills and by Winston-Salem State University by one of the busiest roads in the city. I can’t see anything wrong with that. During the trip towards Salem Lake I always think optimistically “Well these hills aren’t so bad.” On the trip back, I’m cursing my mother for birthing me.

            After this little detour around the campus you jump onto a bridge and you’re back on the Greenway.

            Some people don’t like the Greenways because you have slowpoke, well, everyone and you can’t ride fast. This doesn’t seem to stop the spandex clad racers I see flying down the trail and glaring at my fenders and milk crate. The other danger is people who don’t know the etiquette of the trail. One thing is not walking/ riding two or three abreast down the trail. It’s annoying and a safety problem, since these people usually freak out, wobble and then almost knock over one of their companions when they see someone coming the other way. If you’ve got a little bit of skill you can ride two abreast, but you really need to be aware and have a plan for someone coming the other way. The walkers are sometimes even worse because they almost refuse to stay aware of their surroundings. I’ve had bells ringing, shouted and blown whistles and they’ll stare straight ahead, until I ride slowly by and their jump like a materialized from nowhere.

            Other than these very few drawbacks, the ride is pretty awesome. Around the lake itself there are only three portions that I would call hills and I hesitate to even say that, because with just a little bit of cycling know-how you can negotiate them without breaking stride. Just make sure you’re aware of anyone walking their bikes up.

            I think my favorite part of this ride is that it’s very easy to imagine that you’re on the forest moon of Endor on a speeder bike. Yes, I’m that dorky, did you really have any doubts?

            The absolute number one reason to ride this route is that you usually come across several very attractive people in very little clothing running down the trail. If that's not a reason to get outdoors more than I don't know what is.

            Anyway, mash those pedals and try out this ride. It’s a pretty stress-free way to get some mileage in. 

Here are a few photos from my last ride. You'll have to forgive some of the quality, because I've adopted a kind of drive-by spray and pray type style of shooting that I haven't really figured out yet.

 Yes, they're brifters, but they are damn convenient, so suck it.

 This is probably the only spot where there might be a real road hazard. After a downpour this path can have a foot of water over it. I've still ridden over it though.

 One handed riding while going down a hill at speed ending up on loose dirt and gravel on road tires while snapping pictures, what could possibly go wrong?

 Oh yeah, there's that whole lake thing. I think you can rent paddle boats, which I'm sure me and my wife would rock at. Just saying.

 It's pretty convenient because it's designed to fill your water bottle. On the other hand I'd been using the regular water fountain right next to it, which doesn't have a sign, so what the hell have I been drinking?

 Probably duck shit.

 The most likely place to come across a deranged homeless person.

 Hill of torture.

Hurray, bike lanes. I know they make cyclists feel safe, but I don't really like them too much. I think they reenforce the idea that cars own the road.