Ironman

I saw not one, but two of these on Sunday:The occasion was that I was volunteering for the Ironman race here in town, as a kayak paddler, to help ensure that all the swimmers got where they were going without mishap. I did my part--chased down a few folks who were veering off course, allowed one swimmer to rest by hanging onto the front end of my boat for a few seconds, and paddled beside one slower swimmer who was going to just make the time deadline.

There was talk of a shuttle for getting our boats back to where we put in, but it seemed like more fun to propel myself back without adding to the gasoline usage.

I was thus also able to see a need for my help breaking down and packing the stuff Ironman brings to the event so they could haul it to the next event. I had something to do before lunch time that way.

After lunch, Jenn and I moved down to the bike/run transition area, and helped there for a little while before going to her scheduled shift helping racers at the end of their event. The finish line at the Ironman is a phalanx of folks that the racer must navigate--health care folks, the team that removes racers' chips (timing system), the guys who take pictures of happy finishers, those who distribute t-shirts and hats to finishers--before being released to the care of either family members or providers of more intense health care. That was pretty cool. While I hadn't signed up for doing so, I decided to give it a shot, as it was something that needed doing.

I mentioned to Jenn that it would be cool to "catch" one of the frequent customers of Bluegrass Bicycle. I saw a couple of our folks come through, but was not in a position to help them at the time. However, one racer I helped had, indeed, been a customer. He came to town a month prior to the race to familiarize himself with the bike course, and during his ride had had a wheel failure. I sold him a new wheel that he could use for training the rest of the year, and suggested that he take his broken wheel to his home shop and try for a warranty fix. He reported that his wheel was replaced under warranty, and was glad to see me to tell me so.

Another racer I helped expressed great surprise that Ironman would be able to find so many volunteers who knew what was going on. She reported that many small running races where she lives have trouble finding any volunteers who know where basic needs can be met, yet every volunteer she encountered at this event knew what she'd need and how to get it to her or her to it.

That makes me feel good about the local volunteer community. Y'all Rock!

Tandem Tweaking

Here I am, two whole days into owning a tandem I've wanted for over fifteen years, and I haven't even ridden it. Much.

Jenn had to work late tonight, so I spent some time sorting out the steering adjustments for the forward cockpit. Larry (who had last ridden the captain's position on this bike) had a very different idea of best position for things. He never got really comfortable with the "gerbil steer" nature of the RANS design.

In the process of sorting the steering, I rode the bike a couple blocks. It's interesting how this bike differs from Bill's bike in subtle ways--this one handles better solo, surprisingly. The Aerospoke rear wheel has a different freehub sound than the Shimano hub on Bill's bike. I was a bit disconcerted to feel the front tire wandering a bit at low speeds--something I've not experienced with Bill's bike--so I'll have to examine that tire for faults and perhaps replace it. I have a spare--bought in preparation for RAIN--so I can try it to see if it's simply a faulty tire (that I can get replaced by Schwalbe should it be defective).

I have computers coming (a matched set), along with taillights. We have enough front "be seen" lights at the store that I can get one from stock. I'm fine with the pedals that are on the bike, although Jenn may opt for double-entry pedals instead of dual-use pedals for the stoker position.

The bike came to us with Mirricle mirrors mounted at each end of the handlebar. I have no real use for these, as I prefer a helmet-mounted mirror, so they will be coming off soon. I don't know whether Jenn will want them mounted on the tops of my seat, as I did with some other Screamers, but that is one option. I will likely get a helmet to dedicate to use with this bike, as is my habit, and that will have a helmet-mounted mirror.

In July, I bought a TerraCycle Fastback piece so that I could carry a two-liter water bladder. I couldn't find my Camelbak bladder before RAIN, so I kept the FastBack for when this bike is mine. My Camelbak bladder is probably in a box in a closet, and is thus inaccessible for the time being, just because there are too many boxes in FRONT of the closet at the moment. I'll dig it out soon enough, I'm sure.

Tomorrow, it will be Jenn's turn to do some adjusting. We'll get her seat in the right place and at the correct angle. We'll adjust the third brake lever to suit her. We'll mount the computers and taillights.

We might even get to ride it more than a block or two.

We are now tandem owners

I've been wanting to own a recumbent tandem for something like fifteen years--ever since I first saw pictures of a Ryan Duplex (or was it still called the Fleetwood then?). The idea of riding WITH someone instead of at the same time as that person has long appealed to me.

Fortunately, Jenn also enjoys being on the tandem, as we've found over the last couple years.

After about a year of long-term loan of Bill's Screamer, that bike went home yesterday, so that we would have room in the garage for our own Screamer, purchased from Nita yesterday evening.

We had agreed to buy the bike a couple months ago. However, Nita had suffered a shoulder injury, and wanted to keep the bike for a bit so that she could ride without hampering her healing process. Then we had to coordinate a few other things before we could bring it home.

We woke up this morning wondering why we haven't taken time to ride it yet. By the time we got home, we were thinking about getting ready for Monday stuff, and simply put the bike in its parking slot for the night. We might find time to enjoy a trip around the neighborhood this evening, but it's unlikely we'll go far as it has no lights and it'll almost certainly be dark when I get back from the New Rider clinic.

Speaking of the New Rider Clinic, tonight will be Test Night. I have a couple people who will take the test next week due to work conflicts, but most will earn their certificates this evening. The total number of certificate earners for the summer will be close to thirty--more than three times the number we had last year. I may offer the TS101 class through the store in October, as there is some interest, but we'll see.

Rainy morning ride

This getting rained on during a Saturday bike ride is getting old.

A line of storms went by shortly before I left the house. Figuring that my window of opportunity was open, I got on the Raleigh and pedaled away. Jenn called me while I was climbing Houston Lane's little riser to Mount Mercy Drive, but I was more intent on getting toward the end of my ride than answering the phone. I got onto LaGrange Road, and was about half a mile from Crestwood proper when she called again. As there was traffic around me and the rain was intensifying, I kept going rather than stop to spend time on the phone that I could spend getting to shelter.

I stopped at the Dairy Queen for a bit and called Jenn back to assure her that I was fine, almost to work, and that she need not come get me. Yeah, she knows how much I like riding in rain, but it was almost over for the morning and quicker for me to ride it out than for her to come get me.

Besides, she's coming to get me after work. There is a party we are going to attend this afternoon.

Musings

In the "Let's catch up with my writing by tossing random thoughts out there" category:

The ever-thought-provoking Mikael at Copenhagenize offered some discussion on automotive design and marketing recently. He spoke at a conference on design, and while waiting his turn, listened to Chris Bangle, former head of design for BMW.

The point Bangle made, and that Mikael works with in the linked essay, is that cars are part of what Bangle dubbed, "Personal Emotional Mobility." More on that in a moment.

Bangle went on record as noting that Americans between sixteen and eighteen, an important-to-them demographic group, are increasingly "not bothering to get their drivers' licenses. These folks just don't care to drive, for whatever reason (or perhaps they figure on driving without their licenses...).

I mean, what is the matter with these kids? Don't they know that driving is as important as breathing? Oh, you mean it ISN'T?
/sarcasm

Anyway, Bangle's contention is that the automotive industry must, "...hook them back to the car."

As stunning as Mikael found that statement (and I have to agree), it is, after all, part of the marketing steamroller that is the auto industry. They are fearful of losing even a fraction of a percentage of their market for newer, fancier more expensive machinery with which our inattentive motoring public can continue to wreak havoc on society.

As for "Personal Emotional Mobility," well, yes, many of us are emotionally attached to our modes of transportation. I see evidence of this from time to time, when motorists rather emotionally express their displeasure with my slower-than-theirs mode of transport because I've seemingly cost them hours of their time in transit (knowing, as do most who read this, that it's mere seconds, and those angry motorists will just as easily make up that lost time by going even further above the speed limit in effort to reach their destinations before anyone else). I admit to being somewhat emotional about my choice of transit modes--I LIKE riding a bike. I feel happier about life when I ride instead of drive.

Yeah, Personal Emotional Mobility works for cycling as well as, if not better than for, motoring.


On another note, I enjoyed hearing Jenn the other day, as she struggled to rationalize driving to work instead of cycling. It's a sign that she really does prefer riding at some level. I suspect that she could have seen herself reaching this point in that hypothetical three-or-four-years-ago conversation (the "if someone told you four years ago that you would prefer to ride a bicycle to work instead of driving, what would you say?"), at least far more likely so than if the same conversation told her about riding RAIN in 2010. Still, it's somewhat unlike much of society, and is worth celebrating. Car-free-light, here we come!


Yesterday was the LBC Picnic. Associated with this event were a trio of rides of various distances, as is the norm. I took my Strada this time, as Jenn had some work-related reading she needed to do. It made for a weekend that accounts for about eighty miles on the Strada, which is almost a third of its miles for 2010. That bike is a lot of fun to ride--it's certainly a fast mount and is the fastest bike I've ever owned. That I've not been riding it as much reflects a couple of things: a) that I'm not doing as much club riding as I once did (I have about a thousand club miles for the year at this date), b) most of my club riding is on other bikes (at least a quarter of my club miles this year have been on the Vanguard and the Raleigh since I use those bikes for the New Rider Classes, and I often do club rides with Jenn on the Screamer). It was fun to ride some different roads, even though the small group with whom I was riding opted to re-route our return to Farnsley-Moreman a bit.

The next-to-last meeting of the New Rider Clinics for 2010 is tonight. Next week will be road/written test night. I might do some make-up work with a couple of students the following week, but that will be pretty mild stuff. Summer as we know it is almost over--although you wouldn't know it based on the temperature readings of the last week.

As of yesterday's return home from work, I now have three thousand bicycle miles for 2010.

It's a nice milestone, but it really doesn't mean that much in the overall scheme of things.

It does mean that I've ridden to work instead of driving over half the time in the last eight months. It does mean that I've done a fair bit of my errand-running by bike instead of by car. I've driven to work a few times in the last couple months, but not a lot. In April, I rode to work instead of driving, and got rides home from work (in the car) twice--once to look at houses, once because it was raining VERY hard.

May wasn't so car-free, and of course June went crazy what with my RAAM work and moving (which also affected my July riding). Now that we are officially out of the old house, the moving stuff is reduced to sorting through what's in the house and hauling stuff we no longer want to places like Goodwill or a garage sale of some sort--much of which can be done by bike.

To change my ride a bit, I rode to work via LaGrange Road yesterday morning instead of my typical trip on Westport Road. I use a couple side streets to avoid particular stretches of LaGrange Road, most notably the stretch between I-265 (a.k.a. the Jefferson Freeway, or if one insists on calling it by it's now-better-known name, the Shameless Political Hack, er, Snyder Freeway) and Pewee Valley.

On the way to work, LaGrange Road has some other challenges. I often follow Houston Lane to Mount Mercy Drive, and that end of Mount Mercy is legally inaccessable from LaGrange Road (the crossing is marked one-way). I wound up riding on LaGrange Road the length of Mount Mercy Drive--a bit more nervy than I'd like, but something I can do once in a while.

On the way home, though, it's a little better. I can use Mount Mercy for its entire length easily enough. When I got past Hurstbourne Parkway, I stopped to call Jenn and see where she was in her day. She was still at work, so I diverted a couple blocks from my route and met her so that we could ride home together--something I enjoy doing. Her route uses New LaGrange Road from Whipps Mill to Lyndon Lane, while I tend to use Old LaGrange for that stretch, despite the detour. The detour is due to some construction to repair a drainage ditch a few hundred yards from the Lyndon Post Office. It's a couple hundred foot walk for me, but it's a nice change of pace once in a while compared to my Westport Road route.


Much noise has been made on blogs I watch over comments made by a candidate for Governor in Colorado. Apparently, he believes that being a bike-friendly community is part of a United Nations plot to somehow harm some ephemeral essence of who Americans really are, or some such nonsense. I'm not sure but what the guy needs to have his tinfoil hat recalibrated.

Miles-o-matic

According to mycyclinglog.com, on which I've been logging my miles since the first of this year, I'm about seventy miles short of three thousand for the year. That's a bit more than three days of riding to and from work. If I work the rest of the week, including Saturday, it's a cinch that I'll break three thousand for the year by Saturday afternoon.

Wow. That's a lot more than I've done in prior years, although I may have done close to that by this time last year, riding to work in N'Awb'ny as I was at the time (I noted a couple weeks ago, although I didn't mention it here, that I was one year out from having worked as a property manager, and that I'm quite happy that such a position is in my past).

Almost fifteen hundred of that is on the Vanguard. A bit more than six hundred of it is on the Raleigh. Given that those are my two primary utility bikes, that's more than two thousand miles of utility cycling, not counting what utility cycling has been done on other bikes (I've ridden the tandem to work a couple times with Jenn, and I've ridden the Bacchettas to work a couple times each). I've done some club miles on the Raleigh and on the Vanguard, almost entirely within the new rider clinic format, although I've ridden the Raleigh on a couple of club rides just to be different.

At this rate, I'll probably log a bit over five thousand miles this year, and roughly a fifteen hundred of that in "club miles." Surprisingly, I've logged a bit more than a thousand club miles so far this year. I really haven't done much in the way of club riding, what with my work schedule and the various other projects in which I've been immersed this riding season--I usually manage about twenty-five hundred club miles a year.

I've been losing weight. Not much--only twenty or thirty pounds in the last eight months--but some. Even better, I've changed my body composition a bit--trading body fat percentage for muscle mass to some degree. I feel good. The regular commuting and general "not-using-a-car" to do stuff is paying off in how I feel, how I feel about myself, and to a lesser degree in how my wallet feels (the house purchase taking care of any perceived excess money...). I've not done the calorie-counting thing, nor really worried about my dietary intake all that much. The biggest change has been riding more, drinking water instead of tea while at work, and a couple fewer beers a week.

Did I mention that we are fostering a couple of cats? Yep, we have five cats in the house right now. Aside from the occasional hissy fit, it's gone well. There is not a lot of fighting (good thing), and most of the time the family cats and the foster cats ignore each other. All five are affectionate cats in their own ways. The foster cats are here because their human moved to Hawaii, and that state has strict guidelines keeping rabies off their islands. I don't know how well either of these cats would do with the plane ride to Hawaii, so we may be finding a new home or homes for these two cats.

Meow.

First of August

Cycling-wise, the last week of July didn't turn out as I'd hoped. I didn't break 800 miles for the month--fell short by less than twenty-five miles. I got to ride to work one day this week--Tuesday--and rode another ten miles or so proctoring a road test for the New Rider Clinic my friend David taught at Iroquois Park.

Oh, well, it gives me a goal for some other month. I'll just have to remember to ride a few centuries that month.

On the other hand, by driving I saved a paltry few minutes that allowed me to work a bit more on the former house. Our lease on the house we were renting in St Matthews expired at the end of July, and getting our stuff out of there came down to the last minute.

But we now have (almost) all of our stuff out of there. There are a couple things outside that I'll sneak back to fetch in the coming week or so, but if I don't get them, I won't worry too much.

I had to work, so Jenn did the walk-through with the agent. It turned out to be a pretty cursory inspection--we aren't sure but what the guy expected to find things a certain way given the sort of tenants we'd been, saw it looked close to that and didn't look any closer, or if they really aren't worried about wear and tear on the house.

Our house, on the other hand, is over-full of stuff. Boxes and boxes of stuff. Piles of stuff. FAR more stuff than we need, or particularly want, let alone want to maneuver around in the course of doing what we do at home. I can't just get a bike out of the garage--I have to move a few things first, and put them sort-of back before I close the garage door.

I've always heard that folks use a move to cull stuff from their personal inventories. We wanted to do this, but the last four months have been packed with other time-taking tasks and we had little time to reduce the amount of stuff we had. Now that we are in our house, we have extra incentive for getting rid of some of the things we don't use enough to justify keeping.

I have some black-and-white photography gear that is about twenty years into obsolescence. I have a few old computer towers that will be missing their hard drives but will be going to a recycling place (along with a few CRT monitors). I'll probably donate some of the clothing I no longer wear (like most of the blue jeans and other long trousers I own...).

Adding to the confusion in the house, a friend who moved out of state needed a foster home for her two cats. She had been trying to find someone who would help her, but could not--other than us. We now have five cats in our house. There is the usual occasional hissing discussion, but no real fighting so far.

Oh, and my stepdaughter arrived home from her father's house last night. I briefly got to meet her half-sister, but there was not enough interaction to give me any impression of who she is as a person. I don't feel compelled to know her--she has more importance to my stepdaughters than to me.

Overall, I'm enjoying the interactions with my stepdaughters. I've told each of them that my goal is to have a positive relationship with each of them and both of them, however our mutual definition of that evolves over time. I'm not so worried about whether they like me--I cannot control that. I figure that if I am myself, and am consistent in who I am and how I treat them as people, things will work out okay. So far, that seems to be working.

Durn, it's hot!

With public school returning to session soon, Louisville Metro is renewing their "Street Sense" ad campaign. One site where one can view the press release is of course the Ceej. Predictably, there is a fair bit of nonsense being spewed on the comments section attached to the article. A couple of intelligent folks are posting, too, trying to educate the twits, but the twits generally refuse to learn factual information.

I'm nearing three thousand miles for the year. I don't know that I'll best that number before the end of July, with a hundred fifty miles or so to go, but it won't take much longer to get there. I am likely to exceed eight hundred miles for July, given that I only need another fifty or so--two days of riding to work will get me within a grocery trip of that goal.

I'm signed up to ride with the non-partisan bike ride for attendees of the legislators' conference later this week. I'm a bit fuzzy on the details of the conference, but my part is to be bike-friendly without getting into the politics of the thing--a challenge for me, but one worth doing. That will give me a few miles on the bike, as will going to the final session of the Wednesday evening cycling class out at Iroquois Park later in the day.

As sometimes happens when I travel by bike, a motorist rolled down her window a week or so back, as we were sitting at a traffic light, and remarked that she was having trouble seeing me. I was a bit shocked, given that I was on the Ryan at the time. Mine is the one with the red reflectors:



I wanted to suggest to her that if she couldn't see me, she may want to have her vision checked, as she likely had problems that needed to be addressed, and was perhaps impaired enough that she should surrender her license if she had one.

I think about whether I'm seen. It's important to me that I'm seen, for what are fairly self-evident reasons. I get to tell whether I'm seen frequently as I ride, too.

When I'm on a four-lane road like Westport (my primary corridor for my to-work commute), I can watch in my mirror to see whether overtaking motorists see me. It's clear to me that I'm seen from well away, judging by how many folks change lanes hundreds of yards before overtaking me. If those folks can see me more than a quarter-mile away, and move to avoid confrontation well ahead of the need, why can't others?

I've long said that too many motorists have their focus too close in. They don't look "outside the cockpit" much, if at all. They fail to plan for things they could reasonably foresee if they bothered to think about stuff a bit.

Some complain about the sun being in their eyes. Folks, the earth orbits the sun such that the apparent path of the sun in our sky is predictable. As in, there is a listing called Civil Twilight based on sunset times, and the table presented is accurate to within a few moments every day. Even without knowing that such a table exists, we know that the sun sets every day, and that at times nearing sunset the angle is such that if we are driving in certain directions it will be hard to see what is happening. Intelligent drivers take action to minimize the problems this could present--we slow down, or drive in a different direction if practical, or wait a bit if practical (I've planned meals stops on road trips around sun angles, for example).

Maybe they are metaphorically blind in addition to being willfully blind. In any case, anyone who honestly cannot see a bicycle in daylight is either not looking (and is thus at fault) or cannot see well enough to drive legally (and is thus REALLY at fault). The only third option implies that the person claiming he/she can't see me is not telling the truth.

Doing a century and RAIN in one month will change one's monthly total. I now have a year-high 700+ miles for the month, and it's only the 21st. I still have ten more days to pedal another hundred or hundred-fifty miles (or maybe a few more).

The ride that tipped me over the 700-mile mark was the thirty-six mile round trip that encompassed the New Rider Clinic happening in Iroquois Park on Wednesdays for June and July this year. Adding this third session has been a very good thing for our program--there is a group of something like sixteen students that are VERY good about attending, excited about learning their skills, and looking forward to riding more. One woman in that class has already ridden a century this summer!

Although I've been encouraged to ride a club century this coming weekend, I won't have time. We still have some cleaning out of stuff to do at the old house to get it "broom clean" by the end of the month. Jenn is having some folks over Tuesday evening, so we need to sort/arrange/clean some stuff in the new house as well.

I wonder what my mileages would be if I had time to ride club rides...

brief RAIN comments

Another RAIN is in the books. Wow.

It was my slowest RAIN yet. However, it was a day of firsts for us: Jenn's first RAIN event (mindful that when she and I met less than three years ago she hadn't been on a bike in over fifteen years), it was my first RAIN on a tandem with a "significant other" as stoker (my first RAIN event was done on the same tandem, but with Larry as the stoker), it was my first RAIN "flying formation" with another tandem (at least part of the way)...

And it was a heck of a way to celebrate my first wedding anniversary!

It didn't all go as planned, of course. One lesson learned is that each of us has to take ownership of making sure our gear is loaded into the car--in this case, Jenn's cycling shoes didn't make the trip. The only other shoes she had with her were her Vibram Five Fingers Classics, which were NOT going to work, especially on SPD pedals. After some fretting, we noticed that Nita's pedals were "dual use" models, allowing for use with street shoes. Nita loaned her Teva sandals to Jenn, we found another rider who had a pedal wrench we could borrow long enough to make the physical switch of pedals, and off we went.

I'm sure Jenn's output was reduced a bit by her not having ideal footwear. Even so, I always knew she was putting effort into the system.

Larry and Nita rode her Screamer, and logged a rolling average some mile and a half better than ours. I'm okay with that--both of them have been riding long miles more than either Jenn or I have this year. Indeed, almost all of my miles are utility miles this year, and I've had two days this year that saw me ride more than sixty miles--one of them being RAIN. Jenn's "training" for RAIN wasn't even as extensive as mine.

Our rolling average of 16.43 for the 158 miles my cyclometer recorded (Larry insists that it's 162 miles per GPS) is fine by me. We didn't crash, did not SEE any crashes (I was VERY glad to not see a repeat of last year's car-vs.-motorcycle incident), and aside from the pedal/shoe stuff had no bike problems.

Phew! I'm still tired.

Time to get on a different bike and go to the grocery store.

Ride Across INdiana this weekend

Warning: blog post topic wanders (or should I say, "meanders?").

In a bit more than thirty hours, I'll be setting up for RAIN. This will be my seventh in the last eight years (I missed 2006 due to a work-related SNAFU).

This will be an interesting trip on RAIN for me. I will be celebrating my first wedding anniversary by riding a tandem recumbent bike 160 miles or so with my wife.

I think it's cool to think that three years ago, she hadn't been on a bike in over a decade--perhaps over fifteen years. Now she's excited about riding 160 miles in one day. She rides to work much of the time (on her own Vanguard, now!). We use bikes for much of our errand-running--something I'm not sure she had even considered three years ago (we met a bit less than three years ago). It was almost like some part of her said, "Wow, this is a great way to do things," as I showed her my own modus operandi (and how my own methods have changed over the last three years).

Yeah, I've been a sometimes-bike-commuter for over fourteen years--indeed, I have used a bike for transportation (albeit sporadically some years) since I was a kid (I rode my bike to work for my first job--pretending to be a fledgling bike mechanic--as a fourteen-year-old). In my late teens, I still used my bikes for transportation when it was necessary (although like many in that age group, I LOVED to drive a car!). I lived in Denver the summer after I turned nineteen, and didn't have a car there at all. I could sometimes drive a car my aunt had, but typically rode instead.

I haven't always thought about being car-free, and I still have things that are most easily done with a car. I'm kind of enjoying the "car-free-light" life, though. Jenn and I are managing, for the most part, with only one gas-powered vehicle these days (one car has been out of service since April, and we haven't gotten around to fixing it simply because there has been too much else happening). We borrowed a car from her folks for a week or two, but used it little enough that I haven't really missed it since we returned it to them some weeks ago.

Oh, well. Lots to do yet in preparation for tomorrow. Off I go...

Finally, a long-mileage day!

With a sense of "what am I doing here?" and a sense of "I can do this, I ," Jenn and I rode the LBC "Pretty Good First Century" today.

In Tom fashion, I rode to the ride (and since we were on the tandem, Jenn rode as well...). A bit short of ninety miles into the official ride, we were done enough that we split off and rode on home. Jenn was having some heat issues, I was getting very tired, and we still had to get the bike (and ourselves) home, so we split off when the ride crossed Kentucky Street and worked east--Mad Dog course rules be damned, as we covered more than a hundred (107, to be more precise).

With this ride, my mileage for July exceeds my mileage for all of June, and the month isn't half done. Next weekend will be another high-mileage weekend, as we plan to do RAIN.

After today, we are having to re-think whether either of us is really ready for 160 miles in one day. However, the plan is to take the tandem and my Strada, so that if Jenn decides to stop at some point I can finish the ride on the single bike. We'll see how things go--I find the tandem tiring sometimes, although I think it's a function of lack of miles on the bike rather than anything specific to how the bike is built.

In any case, I'm now tired enough that I need to go to bed a bit earlier than usual. I have a lot to do tomorrow before teaching the class on tire repairs in the evening.

Other thoughts for today

While thinking about and writing my last post, I also got to thinking about convenience. I do a lot of thinking about why I ride instead of driving, as I am asked that from time to time in face-to-face discussions. I keep coming back to that I enjoy riding more than driving, even when I can discuss the long list of other benefits.

One of those benefits is the perceived convenience. I see it as more convenient for me to ride a bike when doing my errands. The time involved isn't a big difference--it takes me perhaps twice as long to ride as to drive within a five-mile radius, and about the same amount of time within a two-mile radius. My ride to work--all eleven miles of it--takes me less than three times as long as I can do it in a car.

However, in that extra time, I get to: a) exercise, burning carbs and fat grams instead of petroleum, b) think about stuff that I wouldn't have time to ponder when driving thirty-plus miles an hour (not that others don't let their minds wander...), c) re-allocate gas/insurance/car upkeep money into the grocery and bike parts funds (I far prefer eating to filling the gas tank).

I also get premium parking spaces, often right at the door of whatever shop I'm patronizing! It's nice to not have to walk across acres of hot asphalt parking lot to pop in to the local grocery store, although one could say I'm paying for that by riding my bike for more minutes than the guy who is walking across the parking lot. I figure I'm more acclimated to the heat by riding, so it doesn't bother me as much, so I'm ahead. Or I think so, anyway.

In my errand-running today, I hit on an idea that solved a problem I've been perceiving for some time. The problem: convincing motorists that it's a good idea to stop with their front bumpers above the Stop Bar (that foot-or-so painted strip across the lane at a stop light). I had dropped off some paperwork at an office off Millbrook (near the Northeast YMCA), and my next stop was the ValuMarket on Whittington Parkway. Rather than ride Hurstbourne Parkway all the way to Whittington, I opted to use the roadways within the ShelbyHurst development that used to be called Shelby Campus for the University of Louisville (and which was Kentucky Southern College before that). Recent construction has changed the entrance of the campus to be directly opposite the Shelbyville Road end of Whittington Parkway, conveniently enough.

As I neared this intersection, I was passed by a guy in a pickup truck. He reached the light, and stopped with his back bumper above the stop bar. The light is set up so that it will only offer a green if its sensor is tripped, and his truck was not over the sensor at all. I pulled up beside him, and suggested that he'd get through the light quicker if he backed up over the sensor, and that the stop bar was a guide as to where the sensor is so that he could use that information on other intersections as well. He genuinely seemed to appreciate the information, telling me that my tactic was well-received. It didn't hurt anything that almost as soon as he backed up, the light turned green for him. I was in the process of getting back in line behind him, and the short light there almost caught me, but I made it under the yellow...

Parenthetically, one of the things I like about the new house is its proximity to ValuMarket. It's a great, locally-owned grocery that stocks a much wider variety of food stuffs than any Kroger I've seen, preferring to simply stock one row of a given item than six to allow for better selection. They have a lot of things I have no idea how to prepare, but that they have such things makes them stand out as local merchants.

Sure beats going to Kroger. It's a fifteen-minute bike ride home from ValuMarket with a trailer full of groceries, by the way.

musings on what it means to be a Vehicular Cyclist

Earlier this month, Mikael at Copenhagenize posted on Vehicular Cycling as a philosophy. His posts usually make a LOT of sense to me, and the two or three of you who read my musings often enough know I quote him from time to time--probably more often than most blogs I read.

In this post, he explains Vehicular Cycling in ways I had not considered. Prompted by this, I pondered my own outlook on VC, as I certainly consider myself a Vehicular Cyclist.

He has a lot of valid points. More or less separate infrastructure for cycling, even to the exclusion of cars from certain urban areas, would be wonderful. I would love to see bike lanes like those in Copenhagen in Louisville--all over the place, used all the time, cleared of snow before the main roadways, and all that.

I'm pragmatic enough to know that just about any philosophical position will have inherent compromises, though. VC is no different, to me, as there is a severe lack of political will to create the infrastructure like that in Copenhagen, let alone the dollars to do so. There is, in many places, a severe lack of room to emulate the Danish model. We are a young country by European standards, and much of our cityscape has been fashioned in the post-World-War-II era, with the assumption that if you were you would drive everywhere instead of walking/riding public transit/bicycling. There simply was no impetus for leaving room for bicycles in the traffic plan, such as it was. VC is thus a compromise, cognizant that unless our politicians develop brain functions more complex than, "I must work to be reelected to this office or a higher one," and the citizenry who bother to vote develop more of a conscience than to simply say, "it's so much more convenient for me to drive than to walk/ride/cycle, I won't vote for anyone who threatens my status quo as a driver!"

In the comments attached to Mikael's post, Anna opined, in part:

My opinion on this is different, because I can partially understand this behavior. It is not that "vehicular cyclists" are against bicycle infrastructure (although they might not know that themselves), but they are against crappy bicycle infrastructure.

I could not agree more. "Crappy bicycle infrastructure" is far worse than nothing, in many ways. Creating it, municipalities say, in effect, "Cyclists are inferior/second-class road users, so we leave them with inferior lanes so as to discourage them from using the roadways. Let the trash/debris/detritus from the traffic build up in the lane we leave them, further discouraging them from obstructing traffic with their fly-weight machines. Then rail against them even more when they refuse to use obviously-more-dangerous-than-necessary lanes we made for them." Sort of a parallel to the Jim Crow laws, in a way, if you will allow the analogy.

An anonymous respondent typed, "This is a strawman depiction of Vehicular Cycling." To some degree, I agree. Another opinion was that realists like Anna, whom I quoted above, are quite different than hard-core Vehicular Cyclists who decry ANY bicycle-specific infrastructure.

Yeah, I've heard that one before, too. I went through a brief phase of that myself, some years ago. I quickly figured out, though, that Multi-Use Paths (MUP) have their place in giving folks a place to ride as leisure riders, or semi-neophyte riders, or those of us who have the skill set and the confidence to ride on the roads but who want a low-stress alternative for a different style of ride, or whatever.

Since I'm all about getting folks on bikes, I figure that having a place for those with less of a chip on their shoulders than I to ride is a good thing.

Just don't tell me I have to ride there to the exclusion of roads that take me where I want to go.

We are a 'bent-up family

...and that's with the two of us!

The stable currently consists of the following bikes, roughly in order of their acquisition: my 1996 Vanguard, my 2002 Bacchetta Strada, Jenn's 2002 BikeE RX, her 1980-something Peugeot mixte-frame commuter, my 1975 Raleigh Superbe three-speed, her 2009 Bacchetta Giro 26, and her 1995 or-6 Vanguard, shown below:






Jenn's employer is big on United Way as a charity. There was a United-Way-based fundraiser at her workplace on the 30th of June that involved showing off rides, so we dolled up her birthday bike for the occasion. We mounted a good rack, a set of Axiom waterproof panniers, Planet Bike fenders, Planet Bike taillights and forward blinky light, Cygo-Lite Dual Cross Pro headlight set, a Delta AirZound horn (LOUD), and a Planet Bike rack trunk. Shown are two of the limited-edition RAAM Polar bottles that we managed to score during our trip.

In the long-range plans for this bike, I intend to upgrade the fork to accept modern linear-pull brakes, install such brakes front and rear, and modernize the drive train. I'm toying with getting SRAM X-7 rear drive parts, now that the 2011 model is ten-speed. The SRAM mountain derailleurs are compatible with the bar-end shifters of their road/time trial groups, so I can go that route with a compact crankset and give Jenn all the range she needs with two chainrings instead of three.

Oh, yeah. Not in the list, but in our garage nonetheless, is the younger stepdaughter's BSO, given her by her father several years ago. It's far too small for her now, but she is not ready to part with it.

Another Moving Experience

I've said it before: A change of address is a moving experience.

And of course, all the boxes have been emptied, the dishes and clothes put away, the books alphabetized, the rental house cleaned and ready for its next tenant.

If you believe that, I've also got a bridge to sell you. You can make money on this one, too--it goes up and down in the middle, so you get to charge a fee to get across (or threaten to interrupt travel if someone doesn't pay...).

I don't know if I've mentioned that Jenn's birthday was last weekend. We were on our way to Annapolis in the last few hours of RAAM at the time, so we didn't get to celebrate properly on that day. However, on our return home last Monday, she got her big birthday present from me: a Ryan Vanguard much like my own. She zoomed around the block on it, then put it back in the garage as there was so much work to do (on the houses and on the bike).

Last week, she called me about getting it set up to be her commuting rig. Her employer is big on United Way stuff, and is doing a fund-raiser this week in which employees show off their rides and garner votes. Jenn figured this was as good a time as any to trick out the bike, so we went through a few catalogs and accessorized for the hard-core cycle commuter.

I got to put the toys on the bike yesterday, in between sessions of preparing for testing my riders in the New Rider Clinic and dealing with little things on the new house. Jenn got to do a bit longer ride on her bike last night, despite not feeling well. I fine-tuned the handlebar placement a bit, and may need to shorten the seat-to-pedal distance a bit, but we got it mostly right the first time. I rode the bike briefly before moving the seat to fit her, and was quite pleased with how an unladen Vanguard feels after riding my heavily-outfitted bike so much.

She now has: a rack (Axiom brand, with some ridiculous weight capacity), a Planet Bike rack trunk (into which she can lock her lights rather than tote them inside when she's at work), fenders (Planet Bike), taillights (Planet Bike Super Flash), a be-seen headlight (Planet Bike Blaze half-watt flasher), headlight set (Cygo Lite Dual Cross Pro NiMH), and a Delta Airzound horn. We also got her a set of Axiom Typhoon panniers, into which we could pack a week's worth of laundry.

Will she win? Who knows? She'll get a few votes, just because there are a few folks at her workplace that are willing to buck a trend. She works in a four-story building, and is known as the one office worker that rides (some of the cafeteria help ride some times, but Jenn is the only office person there who rides regularly).

With the move, my internet access has been interrupted for a few days. I'm typing this during a break at the store, but must get back to work. Sadly, I won't be able to make it to Car Free Happy Hour this evening, and will likely miss Drinking Liberally this Thursday too. One of the things I liked about the rental house is that I could walk to a nice tavern like Brendan's or BBC, enjoy a beer or too many, and stagger home without having to drive or even ride a bike.

I'm back home

...but still VERY busy, catching up on stuff that didn't get done while I was gone and stuff that needs to be done for upcoming projects. I don't know when I'll get time to go through the recordings I made of my various thoughts during the trip, but I hope to do so soon.

In short, Team Type 2 finished Sunday morning, at 7 days, 15 hours and 10 minutes, two whole minutes ahead of the last finishing team in our division. Given that we had one team member and one crew member go into low-blood-sugar-related urgencies, several team and crew members fighting intestinal bugs (at least four shifts of racers went out missing a rider), some severe weather we didn't face last year and a couple of other extra challenges this year, I'm not upset. We learned a lot. Would I do it again? Perhaps. I have some conditions I would place on future participation, and Jenn and I will talk about those in the coming weeks.

Most of the race is a blur for me, but I remember being in absolute awe at what scenery I had opportunity to see out the RV windows, especially in southeastern California and Arizona. We were in the area of Monument Valley part of the time, and I couldn't help but think about geological time and how many centuries it would have taken to create the rock that became Monument Valley, and how many more to remove what had been removed to leave the magnificent sights that remain. I also thought about seeing that rock, over there, and thinking about how a century or so ago one would think in terms of "it's going to take me a week to get to that rock on foot, and I'd better have enough water with me to get there and to my next water source..."

In the short term future, I am:

Moving! We closed on the house less than fourteen hours before leaving for California. The moving party is scheduled for this weekend should anyone reading this in time feel like joining in the celebration. Food and home-made ice cream will be available, as will an assortment of beverages--some adult in nature.

Working like crazy to catch up with various things at the store. I am sure I have an assortment of item descriptions to fine-tune, in addition to doing some repairs that were waiting for my touch.

Getting ready to do RAIN in a few weeks. I was seriously preparing myself to say I wasn't ready, and to offer to drive support for Larry and Ed instead of riding. I've been talked into considering having Jenn on the back of the tandem and going a bit less than twenty miles an hour all the time, but I have to discuss it with Jenn before deciding. 160 miles in one day is simply a long day on the bike in that light. I remember struggling with some grades late in the day, and zooming up others, with no good reason for different performance levels on an hour-by-hour basis. We'll see how the discussion goes this evening...

If I don't have time to make blog entries, I know those of you who care will understand.

Are we ready to RAAM?

Yep, we are all but off to the races!

Final load-out is happening in another hour or so. My gear is already loaded, one of the perks of being a driver of the Rider RV.

It's been a very busy couple of days, to be sure. Tech inspection went very well--only one minor point, and that was a burned-out light bulb in one vehicle's taillight.

Of course, with preparation for something like this, there is always the list of forgotten stuff, stuff that everyone thought Henry was bringing, but Henry thought someone else already had it there, and so on. Part of the "busy" is dealing with that.

Then there was the dinner problem. To be fair, it was a case of inaccurate expectations. The hotel where we stayed in Carlsbad was not equipped nor staffed to deal with sixty hungry riders and crew, so dinner at the hotel didn't work very well. The barbeque I had off-property wasn't bad, but it wasn't the best I'd ever had. It did beat going hungry.

RAAM is about the riders, though. I'm here doing something I do reasonably well to make it so the riders can do their part. They get to show off soon. 2:00 local time this afternoon is race start. Their bikes are ready. Their legs are ready. Their hearts are ready. The "hay is in the barn."

We are ready for RAAM.

California, here I am

It's been a tumultuous couple of days for me. The closing, scheduled for Tuesday morning 8 June at 10:00, almost got pushed back until after my trip. This was not an option, for several reasons, not the least of which being that the seller had all her household belongings packed for travel.

Even a few hours' delay would have killed the deal for me. It was quite the emotional roller-coaster. It did finally happen, though. We closed on the house Tuesday afternoon. It's ours (well we share ownership with the finance company, but...). Jenn and I spent Tuesday night there, and got up far too early (and not early enough) so that we could fly to California Wednesday morning.

Several folks' flights were delayed, so we didn't get as much done Wednesday afternoon as we wanted. I spent some time working with another RV driver on our crew, building her confidence level in the unfamiliar-to-her environment of a vehicle with about four times the shadow size of her normal car. I spent some time later working on the Team Type 1 race wheels--installing Tufo Tubular Rim Tape instead of traditional rim cement and getting the team tires ready.

I spent almost all day building bikes for the race. Several of them desperately needed cleaning, despite team emails to the riders suggesting that they clean their bikes before shipping them for the race. Once the bikes were cleaned, we applied electrical tape panels then reflective tape on the electrical tape (so the reflective tape could be removed later without harming the paint schemes). We replaced a fair number of cables, some chains, a cassette or three, and a tube or two, then added lights as required by RAAM rules.

It took a while to do all this--Team Type 1 racers each have two bikes (road and time-trial styles) and Team Type 2 has road bikes (save for one rider who brought two bikes), for something like twenty-five bikes for three mechanics to build, tune, and kit out for the race.

We had a team meeting later in the evening, and were reminded of the importance of observing several key rules of the race. Some of us were assigned debit cards for specified purchases, we clarified a few other operational issues (showers are inside the RV, instead of a less-than-satisfactory outdoor shower system, for example) and some introductions were made. It's going to be an interesting trip. There will be some photo sessions tomorrow, followed by official inspections over safety issues and a couple of meetings so that RAAM officials can assure themselves that all racers and crew have had opportunity to hear about any changes to the rule book, the route book or anything else they think we need to know.

My mental clock is on some unknown time schedule. It's going on 3:30 EDT as I type this (12:30 in the morning out here), and I'm tired. I'll probably have stuff to edit into this post at some point. I hope I can remember it when I'm in a place to post it...