MY PEDALS ARRIVED!!

For several months, now, I've been talking about my membership on the Ergon Commuter Team, and the cool stuff I get as part of that membership. I've been using my grips for a couple months, now, and my gloves for a month or more. I'm very happy with the grips, and would be happier with the gloves if they were a bit larger so that I could remove them more readily (I got the largest size offered, and my hands are still a bit big for them--not a big *ahem* surprise for me, as I often buy XXL gloves, and would buy XXXL in some models if offered).

The backpack thing was a disappointment. Ergon's corporate offices in Germany opted to not sell the pack I was expecting in this country, so I don't get one to test. That's the way of things sometimes, so I won't hold it against the fine folks at Ergon's US headquarters in Colorado. They have been great folks--responsive to emails, excited about their products, knowledgeable and all that.

Apparently, the pedals had some manufacturing hurdles to overcome as well. The original hope was that I'd see them in March or so, but Ergon finally got them to sell a week or so ago. Mine arrived today.

All along, I had figured on putting this set of pedals on the Raleigh in warmer weather, and on the Globe in really cold months (so I could wear warmer boots and pedal to work). The Raleigh hasn't seen much use of late, as the trailer hitches I installed on the Vanguards, the tandem and my Globe work well with the Burley trailer, and most of my use of the Globe has been in times when the Raleigh would just be a bit slower than I'd like (the Globe and Vanguard are about as fast as one-another, but the Raleigh is slower than either of the others by a noticeable margin). Now that the Burley trailer is configured for the quick hitches, it won't connect to the Raleigh (the hitches use the rear axle for connection, and the Raleigh's axle is too short for this). I can use the Raleigh with the Safety 1st trailer, though, so it will get some use as a grocery-getter in coming months.

Today was the second meeting of the July/August New Rider Clinic series. When I got home from the store, the pedals were in a box on my front porch, left there by the UPS driver. I mounted them on the Raleigh, and swapped out my Shimano bike sandals for my Vibram Five Finger shoes. I wanted to really feel these pedals, you see...

I'm pleased. Quite. Pleased. A couple of friends noted the new pedals, and wondered why I would use them instead of my habitual SPD/flat dual use pedals on that bike--until I wiggled my toes in my Vibram shoes!

Ergon makes a deal out of their choice of moving the cyclist's foot closer to the centerline with these pedals. There is NO room for a pedal wrench between the pedal and the crank arm--one installs these pedals with an 8mm Allen key. The platform is large. I mean, LARGE. It's contoured, which will work quite well for their intended use, which is largely "citizen cyclists," those who ride instead of driving while wearing normal clothing most of the time rather than cycling-specific clothing (including shoes). For such folks, these pedals ROCK.

Let me rephrase that. If you really prefer pedals that involve wearing cycling-specific shoes with cleats that interlock with the pedal, you might not like these. For my almost thirteen-miles-each-way commute, I'll probably stick with SPD pedals most of the time. However, for going to the grocery store a couple miles away, where being able to wear my Five Fingers shoes has some value to me (i.e. not having to change shoes to go to the grocery), the Raleigh is going to see a fair bit more use now. I LIKE these pedals.

RAIN

Another RAIN is in the record books. I'm not happy about it, though, as I set a new-for-me record. It's the first time in eight trips that I did not finish the ride. I'm not totally sure what went wrong, and my tendency to over-analyze stuff like this is kicking in. Some of the results of my cogitation on the matter only serve to anger me more.

I had hopes for this ride. Jenn has been riding more than last year and I have been riding a lot more than last year. We rode fairly well on our trip a couple weeks ago. The bike was in fine form (although a bit heavier than I remember it being...). We knew what we needed to do to better last year's time. It just didn't happen.

The first forty miles of RAIN are often rough on me--I've nearly quit at the first rest stop on two other occasions out of frustration with my performance. I've also learned that sometimes one's supposed riding partners will simply ride off into the distance, caught up in their own excitement and adrenaline rush. I had no illusions that Jenn and I would have any riding buddies except for each other this time, although we picked up a fellow out of the Indianapolis area early in the day who kept with us until midway between the first and second stops.

I felt very good after the first stop, but could not keep that momentum going all day. I just don't have enough long-mileage days this year, nor does Jenn.

Lunch was probably the worst I've had on this ride--I preferred the prior "cold cuts sandwiches" format, as the lines--all four of them--moved the riders through the system far faster than the single-line catering job they had. Also, the food was tepid at best, and of poor quality. The catering firm had cards out on a table in the steam tray line, as if they expected folks would take cards home and do more business with them--NOT. The "macaroni and cheese" Jenn had was cold. The meat I had had been cooked, but was not very warm and certainly was not bar-b-que in the sense that it had not been prepared by basting it in sauce--one added sauce to taste AFTER the meat was on the plate.

By the time Jenn and I reached the new drink stop, I had experienced one of my signature horrible leg cramps. Both thighs and one calf had cramped at once, forcing me to hard-stop the bike and stand--in a sunny place, of course--for about ten minutes before I could move my legs again. Once we reached the drink stop, I got off the bike for a good half-hour trying to cool down. I wanted to press on, though, so we saddled up and got going again. I had a good hour or so, but by the time I reached Dunreith Fire House, the site of the last official rest stop, my pace was falling off again, and quickly. I realized that finishing the ride in the allotted time would be unlikely, and the attempt would be harder on me physically than dealing with the anger (and to admit it, shame) of calling it quits right then and there. Of course, as I stretched out on my trailer for a bit of rest before packing things up, my leg cramped again, and it was a painful one.

We got to the finish area in Richmond, where the other three riders were waiting for us. They had long since finished and showered, and I got to then be chagrined that I had kept them waiting so long. Several among our party were quite hungry, but some were not, leading to discussion of whether there would be a group meal before hitting the road for home. I was not in on this discussion, which was probably a good thing, because I would have gotten pretty surly about my need for food.

Even though the food was decent, and the quantity was reasonable for the money spent, I was still unsatisfied, and some of the table discussion hit me the wrong way. Then, of course, came the navigation for getting home from Richmond, which involved some more ego battles among others. I did my best to stay out of it, as all I wanted was to get home and be done with the day. I was in a bad mood all the way home, and am still a bit put off by the whole experience as I type this.

I may or may not ride RAIN next year. If I do, it will be under a different arrangement than this. I had wondered the other day whether I really want to do long events any more. I rarely ride the Strada that I prefer for such rides these days, since the vast majority of my bike miles are utilitarian in nature. I enjoy being on the tandem with Jenn, but we are not fast enough as a team to ride long group rides and stay with people. I don't have to decide today, though, so I'm probably better to delay that decision until I cool off a bit.

By the numbers, 1, 2, 3, 4!

Four thousand two-point-something miles. That's how far I've ridden my bicycles in lieu of driving so far this year.



I've put 4469 miles on bikes this year, according to the records on mycyclinglog,com. I sometimes wonder about that number, as the odometer on my Globe shows a few more miles than the log shows--about a hundred miles, in fact. Since I don't know whether that mileage is due to errant calibrations or forgotten postings, or something else entirely, I don't know what to do with that information. I finally figured out why the tandem odometer wasn't agreeing with others, and got that fixed (I think). I may take it out for a short spin Friday morning to verify calibration before riding RAIN this weekend.



Yes, Jenn and I are riding RAIN this Saturday. It will be our second as a tandem team, and my third on a tandem. It will be my first on this tandem, but this tandem's second RAIN (our friends Nita and Larry used it last year, before Jenn and I bought it from Nita). It's the second tandem I've ridden on RAIN. Since a tandem bike has two riders, I thought it would be fun to recognize all the twos in this--let me know if any more twos come to mind...

Anyway, we figure on setting another team best. Last year's average speed was a touch over sixteen miles an hour while rolling, with an overall elapsed time a touch over twelve hours. We took a couple of very long breaks--especially at lunch, when I was fighting hot spots in my feet. This year, both of us have been riding more on a daily (or at least weekly) basis, and we haven't had to fight the stressors of moving two weeks before the event or being on the road for two weeks for Race Across America shortly before that or the whole closing on the house thing fourteen hours before leaving for RAAM before that.



To mention another "two," this weekend will also be my second wedding anniversary. I haven't mentioned it lately, but I am still going on an unbroken string of days being happily married. Every day sets another record for me. Life is, indeed, good.

People pass out of our lives

This post contains some sad stuff. You have been warned.

David Whitney died Monday morning. He was 24. David was an up-and-coming bike racer, coffee-maker, drummer, pharmacy student, budding bike mechanic, and much much more. He died driving his car, although his bike was on the rack at the back of the car. The article in the Oldham Era web site pays scant tribute to who David was (although I must admit, such articles rarely satisfy the friends and family of the subject person).

I knew David as a nice guy who loved to ride, and who was riding well. He was exploding into his bicycle racing career--he had four podium finishes in three weekends earlier this year. He was, as I often say I am, "loving life."

On Tuesday evening, I was talking to my mother, and learned that a cousin had not been heard from since Saturday. She was not one to ignore phone messages, but she had not returned any calls since talking to her mother (my mom's sister) Saturday afternoon. Anne's husband was out of town, visiting his own family in Canada (their home is in Maryland), and also was not getting calls returned.

He had the local police break into their house Tuesday evening, and they found Anne dead on the living room sofa. I don't know when she died, other than between Saturday afternoon and Tuesday. I learned of this Wednesday morning.

Anne had been my favorite cousin. She had fought an assortment of inner demons for many years, some perhaps spawned by the sudden and untimely passing of her father due to a massive heart attack in 1973 or so. As a result, some of her life choices were perhaps harder on her body than they might have been. I don't have reason to suspect suicide at this point, but I really don't know. The autopsy may give the family some answers, or it may not.

On top of all that, my sister reminded me in a phone message last night that yesterday would have been my paternal grandfather's hundredth birthday. He had the temerity to pass on five years ago, again before the rest of us were ready to miss him. I received some pictures of him and of my grandmother (including one of her with her parents) from my father via email today, and seeing them was a bittersweet experience for me.

All of this has made my brain fuzzy for the last few days. I've not been able to focus on tasks as well as I need to do. I suppose I have a legitimate excuse, but it's still hard to not get stuff done that I really need to do. I still have been riding instead of driving, including riding the Globe with the Ergon grips for all of my transportation on Wednesday, and I even managed to get to the press conference about the Big Four Bridge yesterday. I just couldn't DO much about being there.

I need to get out of this brain fog. Maybe sleep will help. Good night.

Random thoughts on my ride home

As I worked through Crestwood on my way home this evening, a train passed by me, heading in roughly the same direction. For half a mile or so, I was matching its pace. However, it started going faster soon enough, and pulled farther and farther ahead as I pedaled toward Pewee Valley. I never could be sure, but it seemed to have an affect on traffic: For over a mile, there were no cars trying to overtake me on KY146, and rare cars between Pewee Valley and Westport Road, where I could cross the tracks, the train having pulled far enough ahead by then. It was nice to not have any cars behind me for a while, especially on that segment of 146.

I diverted from my normal route to get some beer at a liquor store I used to frequent when I lived in Douglass Hills. That store seems to have seen less profits of late--the selections are fewer than they once were. Still, they have some varieties of beer that are harder to find closer to home, so I selected some Belhaven Scottish Ale and some Fuller's London Porter to stow in my panniers for the trip home. I recently found some Thirsty Dog Twisted Kilt somewhere, and thought it was at that store, but they didn't have any.

Thirsty Dog Brewery makes a fairly decent porter called Old Leghumper, too. It's almost as good at Dark Star Porter from BBC, and about as tasty (but not quite as potent) as Arcadia's London Porter. Yeah, I'm a dark beer guy.

Once home, I went back out to get something that was already chilled, as there was little of interest in the 'fridge aside from a Woodchuck 802 Cider that I was leaving for Jenn. If you like a dry cider, the 802 is quite yummy.

I rode the Globe today, just because I could. Big number for the day is 4306 YTD, with 3840 CO2 miles YTD.

Car-Free Happy Hour--almost

Jenn and I rode the tandem to Car-Free Happy Hour tonight. We met some folks who decided it would be fun to ride as a group from the formal entrance to the UofL Belknap Campus, but...

not before having a flat tire. Not just your normal, run-of-the-mill flat tire, but a blowout. On the front. On the tandem. It was my first front tire blowout in YEARS, and the tire is flexible enough that it made the bike unmanageable immediately. Fortunately, we were only going about ten miles an hour at the time, so the fall was not so bad. I booted the tire with a folded dollar bill, as I teach in all manner of classes. It held for about eight miles. The hole in the tire was just too bad.

We were on our way home by then, on Eastern Parkway nearing Poplar Level Road. The tire simply let go--again--with no warning other than the thumping every revolution that I knew (or thought) meant I had a bulge from the failing carcass plies. I managed to keep the bike upright the second time, but we decided without even doing any more looking that the tire was not going to get us home. We weren't willing to trust it again. I called my stepfather, and he was willing and able to bring his truck to haul us home.

As it happens, with RAIN coming up in two weeks, I recently ordered a spare set of tires for the bike. I suspect that I bruised this one when on the gravel roads during our trip Tuesday, as I had noticed a slight bump in the tire when we were nearing home. I had noticed it again on our way to Car Free Happy Hour, but the tire didn't feel like it was going to give out so soon. I'll be ordering another front tire tomorrow.

Lesson 1: if you feel a bump in a tire, inspect it closely. Replace the tire rather than ride on it.

Lesson 2: dollar bills work for a while, but not as well on tandems with the extra weight they carry. Park Tool makes tire boots that work better.

Lesson 3: Maybe it's a good time to find a place to carry spare tires on the bike...

Overnight trip

Jenn and I had wanted to do more riding this year, especially since we were not doing the Race Across America thing. The Bike Virginia summer tour always appeals to me, although I've only made use of three opportunities to ride it. This year's adventure returned to southwest Virginia, the same general area I got to enjoy the first time I did their tour in 1993.

Sadly, it wasn't to be for us this year. The reasons are not really but so good; one was that I never felt the store had adequate staffing to deal with my absence, the other (and larger) was that I put off registering until I figured we'd have staff, and found that I missed the registration deadline.

Jenn, of course, had scheduled vacation months in advance, so she's off this week regardless.

Not being the best planner around, it took me until yesterday to finalize routing and destination for what became our two-day self-supported tour. Self-supported, in this case, includes things like two CPAP machines (ten or twelve pounds each), a tent, sleeping pad, sleeping bags (forecast lows in the high 50s for our destination), a change of clothing, and a way to carry some food. All of that stuff got stuffed into the Burley trailer. That trailer has developed a tire-scrubbing behavior that will need some attention--with the load, it reduced our average speeds from sixteen or better to less than twelve. Crawling up some long grades at less than four miles an hour on roads like KY 146 or US 42 or US 421 out of Milton is quite an adventure in traffic "calming."

I'm still not sure whether the destination was more important or the journey. It was good to get out on the bike. It was great to ride with Jenn, even if we were both feeling a bit out of sorts that last ten miles getting home (shifting when one is tired can be a bit less smooth than is ideal, and dealing with the captain's tired shifting is apparently an even larger challenge). We didn't fight over it, of course, but worked on dealing with the fatigue a bit and went on.

Our destination was a friend's farm in the hills behind Vevay, Indiana, not far from Bennington Pike. The road to their place used to be gravel from end to end, but got paved some time in the last ten years--at least from one end to their place. From their place to the other end (the shorter distance, of course) there is a steep hill that Switzerland County has not had the money to pave. The end of the road at the bottom of that hill features a creek crossing as well, and links to another gravel road that has its own problems--a wash out a year or two ago has closed the end nearer to our route, and the resulting lack of traffic means that the gravel is often VERY loose coming from the other end. Since all that gravel was on the shorter distance for us, we wound up walking a mile or two, including that aforementioned-steep hill, at the end of our ride when we were already tired.

I suppose well-traveled gravel roads are not as bad. This one had a LOT of loose 5s and 7s on top, with not a lot of dense-grade dust mixed in to stabilize things. It hasn't been rolled or graded or oiled in I don't know how long. There was mud from recent rains. Some folks like riding on such roads. I like staying upright on my bike, especially when the penalty for falling is gravel embedded in one's (and one's stoker's) skin.

For the return trip, we opted for the paved route. Although longer by a few miles, it was far more comfortable, and yielded better average speeds.

As much as I would like to put more about our trip on here, though, I'm tired. Jenn is off to the bus station with her older daughter, as my stepdaughter is going to study for a month or so in Quebec. Jenn's very tired, as am I, so it's time for me to get the bed ready for her return to make it easier for her to simply fall into it.

One more fun factoid: Our little tour poked my June 2011 mileage total to make it my highest month since I started recording on mycyclinglog.com. 854-point-something miles for the month, and we still have car-free happy hour tomorrow (and a few errands beforehand).

I can't help it...

As of my return home today, I have logged over 4000 miles of bicycle use this year. This includes 3561 miles of bicycling instead of driving since the beginning of the year, split among five bikes: My Vanguard, with 1255 miles, my Strada, with almost 89 miles, my Raleigh, with 525 miles (yeah, I rarely ride that one now that I have the Globe), the Screamer tandem, with 421 miles (Jenn and I plan to put a fair number of miles on that in the coming week or three), Jenn's Giro, at 48 miles, and the new-in-March Globe, with a bit over 1660 miles (yeah, it became my "it's threatening to rain or it's raining" bike, and April and May saw a LOT of wet days).

June isn't over, but I've logged more miles in June 2011 than I did in all but three months of 2010, and I'm only a few miles shy of besting one of those months. I don't know whether I'll beat my May 2011 numbers, but it's possible. I have a few days off from work this coming week, and since I fouled up and didn't get us registered for Bike Virginia before the deadline, Jenn and I will try to do some day tours on the tandem. We might even sneak in an overnight trip somewhere just to do it.

My CO2 miles are still at a bit more than 18% of the Louisville Bicycle Club's Commuting group miles. My nearest competitor among that group is more than 900 miles behind me in overall miles, and over two thousand miles back in CO2 miles. I'm sure some of the mileage junkies in the club have more bike miles, but I haven't done all that math, as they are mostly club miles which are not why I'm crowing.

More numbers games

In my recent crowing about mileage numbers, I had missed one that had been amusing me earlier in the year: how my YTD miles for 2011 compares to my miles for 2010.

At the moment, I am over one hundred miles ahead of my 2010 numbers for the end of August. By August 31, 2010, I had logged 3693 miles. I've logged over 3800 for 2011 so far, including over 3400 CO2 miles. My CO2 miles alone get me beyond my total for July 2010 by 500 miles.

At this point, it's quite possible that I'll reach eight thousand miles for 2011.

Another boring mileage post

As I got home from the New Rider Clinic David is teaching at Iroquois Park this evening, I hit a double whammy. 3800 miles year to date by bicycle, and a sort-of weird one. At the start of the year, I set the annual goal on mycyclinglog.com at six thousand miles. At this point, I'm obviously over half-way there, and the year is not half over. I've been watching the "average daily miles needed to reach the goal" stat with some amusement over the last couple months, as the number keeps dropping. As of now, I need to ride an average of eleven miles a day to reach six thousand for the year.

Nothing really special about the CO2 miles (as in, ridden instead of driven) number right now, except that it's over 3350. It will probably break 3400 this weekend.

It was raining a bit when I left for work this morning, but quit part-way to Crestwood. It decided to rain on me for the last mile or so, just because it could. I did manage to get to the store ahead of the heavy weather that came shortly after I opened. I was glad. There was lots of lightning, and I prefer to not ride when there is lots of lightning.


Oh, and I made the Ergon blog the other day. I had Jenn take a couple pictures that would, hopefully, show I was using the grips and gloves, and put one in a prior post. I'm still pleased with the gloves, aside from that they are a bit small (the largest they offered was XXL--I could probably wear XXXL in their sizing), and hard to get off my hands.

I recently ordered another kilt from SportKilt. It arrived yesterday. I haven't had a chance to wear it, and may not get to. I ordered a large based on the extra-large I already have that is a bit too big around for me. The large is a bit too small. We'll see what the manufacturer says about things...

Where did the weekend go?

I needed to be at a Club Ex-Comm meeting at four yesterday afternoon, so I drove to work. It would have taken me an hour and a half to get there by bike from the store, and I knew better than to think I'd get out of the store before 3:00. I missed a nice riding day.

Today, we had stuff to do around the house. Jenn has a Premier Jewelry Party coming this week, so the house needed to be spruced up a bit. It's not quite done, but we are a lot closer. We hadn't let it get too far away from us this time, which helped. Still, I missed a nice riding day.

Shortly after I got to work yesterday, my mother called me to inform me that my sister was having to have her cat euthanized. Caruso had been with her for thirteen years, and was probably four years old when he came to her. He had one of the more musical purrs I've ever heard from a cat. She is grieving heavily, as she (like yours truly) is very much a cat person. Neither of us has had children--we have had cats instead. I feel bad for her, as I know what heartache it is to lose such a close friend. I wrote on this blog in April of 2009 about losing my cat Aloysius Ebenezer Qat, Esquire, and what a friend he had been for the thirteen years I had him in my life.

We know our cats won't outlive us, but we get another, anyway. They bring us joy and entertainment in many ways. We miss them when they go, and somehow we never forget any of them. I've had some wonderful feline friendships over the years, and still think about each of them from time to time.

trying to catch up with things

Again, it's been ten days or more since I posted here. I haven't had much to say, aside from the occasional mileage boast. What I have been wanting to do, though is post a couple images of my new Ergon gloves. Sadly, I don't have any good ones yet. I do have this, though, showing off my wicking t-shirt from Commute Orlando:

I've been saying for a while that other gloves don't seem to do as well with these grips as riding bare-handed. However, since receiving the gloves earlier this week, I've been impressed at the comfort improvement, despite the distinct lack of padding compared to typical cycling gloves. My only complaint with these gloves is that the XXL size is a bit small for me, and thus takes a while to get off my hands.

It's almost disgusting for me, a long-time die-hard recumbent guy, to have put so many miles on this bike since I got it early in March (something like 1500 miles to date), but I've enjoyed having a new bike. I'm also getting spoiled on having disc brakes. This bike is my typical choice if I'm teaching (it's the closest thing I have to the bikes most of my students ride) or if I'm attending meetings downtown (easier to lock than my Vanguard). I also tend to prefer it if the weather is nasty--and we've had a BUNCH of rain this season.

Timothy made a comment on a Facebook post suggesting that I had left recumbents behind, based on the miles I've been putting on the Globe. A look at my stats for the year showed me that I had been neglecting my Vanguard too much of late, so I rode it to work today, and plan to ride it tomorrow. I won't get to ride to work on Saturday, as I have a time crunch after store hours. Still, I have half again more miles on the new bike than on the Vanguard, and it will take time to catch up. I'll have time to ride it a lot in the coming months, though. It won't take but another month or two to get another five hundred miles on it.

David Wittry has begun his New Rider Clinics out at Iroquois Park. I'm being a volunteer as much as I'm able with store hours, figuring that I can learn from him and better teach my own students. The round-trip to Iroquois adds thirty miles to my day, plus whatever riding we'll do for the class, so I get some fifty-plus-mile days every week for a while!

I'll likely ride the Globe to work on Mondays and Wednesdays for a while, due to commitments to New Rider Clinics. I get to ride the Vanguard the rest of my work days, though.

Gratuitous mileage crowing post

It's almost the end of the month. Jenn and I were ride marshals on the Mayor's Ride this morning, and of course rode the tandem to and from the ride. We stopped at Nancy's Bagel Grounds en route this morning for a bagel or three, then hustled to Waterfront Park for the shindig. On the way home, we ate at Shiraz on Frankfort Avenue, then stopped at Plant Kingdom for some flowers for Jenn to put in some pots here and there around the house.

By the time we got done with the Mayor's Ride, I had changed something like five flat tires for folks who had no supplies. I had adjusted a half-dozen seats while installing the giveaway flashing lights. Riding home, I felt really tired--more so than seemed reasonable given the output so far. However, I stopped at a convenience store and realized that part of the problem was hydration--I was underhydrated. Not enough to be a big problem, but enough to affect my available power. The quart or so of tea I drank at lunch, coupled with the liter of water I drank before getting to lunch, did a lot to get me back on the road. I was still a bit tired, but didn't feel as "off" as I had been feeling.

Now for the numbers: May 2011 has become the biggest mileage month since I started recording miles on mycyclinglog.com. My previous best effort was July of 2010, with 815 miles. I still have a round trip to work tomorrow, and I already have 820 miles for May. I have over 3300 bicycle miles for 2011 YTD, and over 2900 of those miles are "riding instead of driving" miles. By the end of the week, I will probably break the 3000 mark on that score--the more important one for me now. I'm apparently not slacking as badly, as I now have a bit over eighteen percent of the Louisville Bicycle Club's "CO2" miles (up from seventeen percent a couple weeks ago, but still down from the roughly twenty percent I had a couple months ago). The new bike has taken over as my apparent commuter bike of choice (despite that the Vanguard is more comfortable), as it's easier to manage in town when locking outdoors as an issue, and I'm using it for rainy days instead of the Vanguard. The Ryan Vanguard is showing a bit less than nine hundred miles for the year, and the Globe over 1400. The Raleigh has five hundred and some miles on it. The Strada less than a hundred (although the Strada and Giro combined show about a hundred miles of club riding). The Screamer has about 420 miles on it this year.

It's been several days...

...since I posted. I was unable to post from home, due to some browser setting on Jenn's lap top computer (the desk top unit died a couple weeks ago). There is something odd about a setting in the browser at work, making it hard to type anything there, PLUS things have gotten busy enough that I rarely have time to even look at emails or field calls related to the New Rider Clinics, let alone type out a blog post.

On Bike to Work Day, Jenn and I rode to Seneca Park to ride downtown with whoever met there. We had a good-sized crowd, including Mayor Fischer. Once we got folks where they needed to go, Jenn and I had breakfast at Toast on Market, then I had an errand in Saint Matthews (the store wasn't open when I went by there earlier that morning). On my way back to Fourth Street Live for the lunch time festivities, I found Jenn coming out of Bargain Supply, where she had been appliance shopping (we are considering replacing our range and fridge). After the festivities, we stopped in there again so that she could show me what she had found. We also ventured to another store on Market to see what they had to offer.

On Saturday, I rode the Vanguard to work, and Jenn brought out the tandem so that we could do the shop ride. During the ride, I decided it was time for me to do some service work on the tandem--the shifting was not suiting me, nor were the rear rim brakes, and there were a couple other minor squawks I wanted to address. Once done with that, we loaded it in the truck for the trip home, and as it was raining, left the Vanguard at the store. If you've been reading my blog for over two months, you can probably see what is coming.

Yep, on Wednesday (the first day I had time to do so), I hauled a trailer out to the store so that I could get two bikes home at once. This time I changed things a bit, by pulling the Burley instead of the Safety 1st, and rode the Globe to work instead of the Raleigh. It was a slight change hauling the Globe on the Burley, but it worked just fine.

Somewhere in all this, I caught wind of a plan afoot that involved riding bicycles to Lexington to greet Joe Ward during his stay in the Merkey Cancer Center fighting a form of blood cancer. It sounded like more of an adventure than the Horsey Hundred, and had potential to cost far less since we wouldn't have to drive to Georgetown and back with similar bike miles.

The ride to Lexington went pretty well. There were ten of us as far as Lawrenceburg, then two guys got separated from the main group and went on ahead. The remaining eight rode in to the UK campus about four thirty to find a sign in the courtyard below Joe's window that said NO BIKE RIDING. As we waved to Joe, one of the guys tried to lift the sign over his head. Deciding that it was too heavy for him to do so, he walked back from it. I hefted it, and found I could briefly shake it overhead one-handed, and did so for a couple of photo ops.

We went to dinner, and during dinner decided that we would, as a group, take advantage of the numerous offers to haul our bikes and selves home that night rather than ride home. There were only three or four riders interested in the return ride on Sunday, and I figured it would give me a chance to do some much-needed yard work.

Tomorrow is Bike to Work Day

I haven't really said much about Bike to Work Day/Week/Month this month. As I noted earlier, Bike to Work Day or Week is not so much about me as about folks who want to, but who keep finding obstacles to riding instead of driving. You've heard them, I'm sure: "I have too far to go," or, "I have to look nice," or whatever.

I ride thirteen miles each way, four or five days a week. I know of folks who double that. Many folks won't ride two miles. Why not?

My commute is far enough that it makes sense to change clothes when I get to the store. I have a place to keep several shirts, jeans, a couple of kilts, shoes, socks and such. My friend Kirk Kandle used to ride to Humana wearing a Brooks Brothers suit, or he learned how to roll it so that it wouldn't wrinkle as he rode to work in warmer weather.

When I worked for New Directions as a home repair coordinator, I needed my truck at work most days. I needed it at home on weekends. I drove to work Monday morning, hauling the bike. I left the truck at the office during the week, and hauled the bike home Friday evening, letting me ride home from work four days out of five.

Over the years, I've come up with ways to deal with many of the more common hurdles folks find as reasons, er, excuses for not riding to work. I figure a lot of the issue is that if one really wants, one can find resolutions for those challenges.

I've not driven to work since I don't know when, although I have gotten rides home using gas power five or so times in the last month. Customers notice my bike in the store and have that "A-HA!" moment when they realize they see me in my travels frequently. I feel that riding to work regularly adds some legitimacy to my statements to the effect that the highest, most noble use for a bicycle is transportation, and that utility cycling is a matter of several small choices that add up to bigger choices.

Sure, it helps that I work in a bike shop--I get better prices on parts for my commuter bike, and can trick out my rigs. But I could do much of what I do for far less if I would accept using older bikes (like my '74 Raleigh) or fewer doo-dads (the ring lock on the back wheel of my Globe is trick as all get-out by local standards, but I could make do with a U-lock if I had to).

Ride of Silence

As I mentioned in my previous post, I rode the Ride of Silence Wednesday evening. Turnout was a bit light, probably due to the wet weather we've been having.

Jackie Green recently asked if things like Ride of Silence wouldn't deter folks from riding, as it focuses on the bad things that happen to too many people. I think it worth honoring those missing cyclists, and letting other road users know that they were loved people, with parents, siblings, friends and perhaps children of their own, not just objects in the road to be gotten around as one gets to one's destination.

May Miles

As of Wednesday evening, when I got home from riding with folks doing the Ride of Silence, I topped my May 2010 miles. By the time I get home from work on Thursday, I will have topped three thousand miles for 2011, and twenty-six hundred CO2 (or bike instead of car) miles for 2011.

Just sayin'...

Objects in the Roadway

Thanks to this post on the Commute Orlando blog, I found myself reading this post from Andy Cline.

I like that the latter talks about operating on the roadway as if one is sharing a public space instead of as if one is the only user of the roadway and everything else is an object around which one has to maneuver. I have long felt that too few folks think about that they are sharing public space. They don't look beyond their own front bumper (or even beyond their windshields, some times), ignoring that others are around them who have equally-valid reasons for getting where they want to go. Doctor Cline mentions that acting as if one is sharing public space is harder to do than considering everyone and everything else on the road as objects in the road (I'll use the word obstacles, here). It requires that one recognize that others have equal rights to use the space. It also requires that one is cognizant that other road users deserve our care and attention.

With occasional lapses, I've tried to be this way for a while, myself. I suspect I came to it through being a cyclist--at least in part. I have found that being a cyclist makes me a better driver, although I haven't always been able to articulate why as well as I would like. I think part of it is this recognition that since I am not simply an object in the road (despite what some drivers seem to think), neither are they. They, too, are people, deserving of care and respect simply because they are living beings. I am compelled to pay attention to what they are doing, in part due to my lack of a cage like theirs.

Any thoughts on this?

I must be slacking

I'm hoping that third time's a charm--the first two times I posted this, I got the "your post was successful" message, only to find a blank post.

I no longer have over nineteen percent of the Louisville Bicycle Club's CO2 miles as logged on mycyclinglog.com. I'm down to about seventeen percent.

Of course, since I held that nineteen percent figure, five or six more folks have started logging miles. The weather has improved a little bit (although one wouldn't know it looking outside yesterday), so more folks feel like riding their bikes for utility.

I would like to see my mileage totals be more like ten percent of the club's CO2 miles, at my current rate of riding. It would mean that lots more folks are using their bikes instead of just recreating on them.

May you live in interesting times

...is a double-edged wish. I'm feeling it right now, as the President of the Louisville Bicycle Club, Andy Murphy, has resigned his posts (including that of Director for Old Kentucky Home Tour). The unofficial email organ--kycyclist--is ablaze with discussion, as is also the back channel among the executive committee.

There is a General Membership meeting scheduled for this Sunday. Apparently the venue that was planned has been deemed no longer available, perhaps in anticipation of a contentious meeting. Go figure. Seems like a great way to quell damaging dialog, n'est-ce pas?

The metaphorical snowball that has been formed is going to grow. I suspect something along the lines of an avalanche is in the offing.

Until now, I've considered the VP Education position I hold to be fairly low on the drama scale. I show up for meetings, toss my opinion out when I feel I have one to share, vote as I see best for the club, and generally just want to teach my classes without a lot of extra melodrama.

Interesting times, indeed...

End of April numbers post

I know, I did some numbers crowing ten days ago. Still, here are the numbers for April:

I logged a bit more than fifty-five hours on bicycles in April, and about seven hundred sixty-two miles. Since I typically log my work ride and most of my errand jaunts as round trips instead of as several separate trips, I tracked thirty-eight trips by bike. There were two days in April that I didn't get on a bike at all, and a couple during which I only went a little distance.

Compared to March, I had fewer miles. March was my second-highest monthly mileage since I started tracking the numbers last year. April 2011 was fourth by a couple miles to August of 2010.

I didn't make note of what day the Tempo died last April, but as it was in April of 2010, I can say we've been a one-car family for a year now. We borrowed a car from Jenn's parents briefly at some point, but haven't used it since we gave it back some time last May.

Jenn keeps talking about getting a fuel-efficient car to allow us to leave my truck sit more. I keep looking at what it would cost to have two cars again, regardless of fuel costs, and am thus wondering about replacing the truck with something that could pull my utility trailer (built to haul bicycles) and get better gas mileage the rest of the time. I find it hard to justify buying a ten- (or twenty-) thousand-dollar car that gets forty MPG if we can find a three-thousand dollar car that gets thirty. The annual costs associated with car use are high enough with either that I don't want to take on debt costs for four or five years to get ten better MPG at ten or fifteen thousand miles a year. If we were driving thirty thousand miles a year, it would be different. I need to sit down some time soon and play with the numbers a bit more.

We had more than thirteen inches of rain in April 2011. It's not done raining yet. I got soaked yesterday and again on my way to work this morning. If it keeps up, I'm going to be easier to convince that we "need" a second car. My thought, however, is that by the time I'm convinced to buy something, it will quit raining and we'll experience drought conditions for a couple months. As tired as I've gotten of rain, I'm not yet ready to buy a second car.

Bike Month is all but here

Bike Month, Bike to Work Week and Bike to Work Day are fast approaching!

They aren't so much about folks like myself, as I already bike instead of driving a car much of the time. They are about encouraging folks to try riding instead of driving. Lots of seasoned riders are happy to brainstorm with new riders to find solutions for challenges that keep those new riders from using a bike instead of the car. Here is an article from someone who is finding out just how encouraging the cycling community can be.

On a local scale, the folks at Bike Louisville, Bicycling for Louisville and the Louisville Bicycle Club are having some friendly competition to see who can do the most by bike. It involves tracking your bike use through Green Light Ride, but registration is easy and free. Go for it! Win the COVETED Gilded Handlebars!

Rainy ride to work

Decisions, decisions.

Jenn had a doctor appointment this morning. It was raining, and she knows I don't like riding in the rain. She was willing to haul my bike and me to work then drive to her appointment, but by the time we could have hit the road, there would not have been near enough time for her to get to Crestwood then to her appointment near the Gardiner Lane Post Office. She was willing to be late, but I saw no need for her to throw off her doctor's schedule for the morning and affect other patients over a little water falling from the sky. I've ridden in worse.

Despite my general dislike for riding in wet weather, I'm more willing to do so this year than in prior years. I'm not sure how to attribute this change. Maybe I'm getting (more) stubborn or something.

Yeah, we've had more than a little water fall from the sky. The river is well above flood stage, meaning that I will probably have to move the first meeting or two of the New Rider Clinics to higher ground.

"Do you know how dangerous this is?"

The above question was asked of me Thursday evening, as Jenn and I rode the tandem out to Mom's for a visit. As we were climbing out of the valley at Floyd's Fork on Aiken Road (always a butt-kicking hill, despite its short duration), a motorist passed us, but as he pulled alongside, he ran his passenger window down and (I think) asked the title question. I think he meant that what I was doing was dangerous, and I really don't think he had any idea of the level of irony in his asking while he occupied the wrong side of the road in an area with a double-yellow center line (and on a blind hill, at that). I, on the other hand, knew quite well what I was doing, and that where I was riding was the best place on the roadway for the situation. I've read the manual, you see, and I probably have a better grasp of the rules of the road than that driver, based on that short display of his sense of danger. I also would be willing to bet a fair bit of money that I have more bicycle miles this month than he does.

In other riding updates, I've really been enjoying the Ergon grips on the Vienna. I noted a while back--here or on facebook--that they feel better without gloves than with any of the gloves I now own, so unless it's cool enough that gloves make sense, I ride bare-handed. I haven't heard a timeline on getting my Ergon gloves to try them with the grips--they are claimed to be designed to complement the grips--but I'm looking forward to seeing how they do. I have been told to expect my pedals late in May. No word on the backpack, yet, sad to say.

I can't fuss. I don't have to pay money for this stuff. I would like to be able to write about it, though, since that is my part of the Ergon Commuter Team deal.

I haven't crowed about numbers in a few days, so here goes: Total bike miles, YTD: 2376. Total CO2 miles, YTD (as in, instead of driving a car), 2007. Yes, that's two thousand seven miles instead of driving a car so far this year. That's a bit more than nineteen percent of the Louisville Bicycle Club's 10311 logged CO2 miles YTD. With only 590 miles for April so far, I probably won't break last month's 806 miles, but that's okay. There were four months in 2010 that saw me go more than six hundred miles, and I'll best two of those months (April and September of last year) by the end of this month.

The 1978th anniversary of the First Zombie Uprising!

To quote P.Z. Myers:

Y'all remember what many of our neighbors are commemorating this weekend: the first Zombie Uprising of 33AD.

⁵¹ At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, the rocks split ⁵² and the tombs broke open. The bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. ⁵³ They came out of the tombs after Jesus' resurrection and went into the holy city and appeared to many people.

It's funny how this amazing awesome story didn't make it into any other historical accounts. Somebody ought to turn it into a novel — you'll have both the evangelical Christian audience and the graphic horror audience at the same time! Think how much fun the book signings would be!

 Yeah, I have been accused of being an iconoclast. So sue me. Just don't try to eat my brain...

Stormy

We weathered the weather events without harm. There was a CATV wire or two across my driveway this morning, and I'm sure I'll find a few extra twigs scattered about the yard when I look more carefully, but the house is intact, as are our trees.

The next-door neighbor was not so lucky. There is an apartment building next door to me, with four or five units. A tree near my garage lost a branch about a foot in diameter, and it landed on the windscreen of one of the tenants' cars. I'm not sure how much damage was done (I didn't get in and poke around enough), but I don't think it would be a total loss.

Lots of folks in the path of this storm had no electricity, at least for a while. I figure I'm fortunate, and I'll accept that good fortune.

The bike ride to work this morning was uneventful, aside from a bit of crosswind that sometimes made for interesting traffic interactions.

Now that such comments are out of the way, I'll get to the over-the-weekend stuff I've been meaning to put down--I've spent much of the last two days busy with after-weekend follow-up stuff and the assorted fire drills at the store, and haven't had time to put my thoughts in order for this blog (not that they are in any order now...).

Jenn and I drove to Lexington Friday afternoon for her League Cycling Instructor seminar. I went along as an assistant to the instructor, and to soak up some newer ideas for my own teaching. It's a long weekend of class work and parking lot drills, with not much riding otherwise (I had accumulated about twenty miles over two days). However, the candidates learned quite a bit about themselves as teachers and about teaching their eventual students. We met some new friends in the bargain, so it will be a good thing overall.

The League of American Bicyclists has made some subtle changes in their programming, in that candidates who complete the seminar are not fully considered to be League Cycling Instructors until after they have helped teach a few classes post-seminar.

And, yes, Jenn will soon have her full LCI status.

Road Diets

Several years ago, I happened on a bumper sticker that read something like: "Adding roads to reduce traffic congestion is like getting a longer belt to deal with obesity!" With this in mind, and for all the reasons one can find on the CART site, I am going to be at the School for the Blind in support of changing the way Brownsboro Road is used in the Clifton area.

I've been surprised at the lack of vitriol seen in the comments sections of a couple of articles on this in the CeeJ. Usually some car-obsessed clown will insist that "roads are made for cars" (never mind that this road opened long before cars were common) or some such drivel supporting his presumed right to go forty-five or faster in a thirty-five zone. I fully expect some of that sort of nonsense will rear its ugly head before it's all said and done.

I also saw a comment below this post in the Commute Orlando blog (itself a worthy read) saying that someone in California had found his average car speed to be seventeen miles per hour of use. That Commute Orlando post describes how energy is used in this country, based on a study done by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. It's pretty appalling to think that we as a society are happy to waste that much energy in just getting from point a to point b.

Are they serious?

A woman stepped out to get her mail, and was hit by a car. According to the CeeJ, the motorist will not have charges filed against him.

Seriously? No charges filed? Really? The law won't do anything to this driver for ignoring the fact that people may reach out for their mail on their residential streets?

The driver even admitted to having looked away from his path, for crying out loud! It's HIS FREAKIN' FAULT!! He was probably going too dratted fast, too!

I get sick of folks using my neighborhood as a speedy cut-through. I realize that it's a short-cut from Washburn to Lyndon Lanes, and is useful in that way. I don't much like it, but I can't change that. However, that folks go through here at speeds over forty miles an hour (listening to their engines, I can tell they are going pretty fast) is criminal. Kids play in this neighborhood. People are backing out of driveways.

I suspect that part of the reason that charges won't be filed is that there is a gaping hole in our law. Police are not able to charge a motorist appropriately when the motorist's behavior is so egregious. There was a push for a bill a couple years ago that would have helped correct this, but it fell short. Maybe we can dust it off and push for it again.

A day early

Okay, so my predictions were off by a day.

I broke the two thousand bike miles mark on my way to a friend's house this evening. About two miles later, I broke the 1700 "miles instead of driving" mark.As I type this, the Louisville Bicycle Club's CO2 miles are at 8550. I have twenty percent of those miles. It's almost embarrassing.

Today's riding: I had a meeting scheduled with Rolf Eisinger and Andy Dyson, to discuss education programs for the upcoming season. Since I was going by, I dropped off some fliers at Parkside Bicycle and Bardstown Road Bicycle shops, then went downtown for the meetings.

After the meetings, I rode to Santa Fe Cafe at Third and Haywood for lunch (always a good lunch there!!), then to the UofL campus to be on hand for my older stepdaughter's receiving an award for her excellent scholarship in her French classes. Since I had time, I then rode to Clarksville Schwinn to drop off some fliers, then home.

The fliers in question are paper versions of this schedule of classes that the Louisville Bicycle Club will be teaching this summer. I'll be teaching a fair bit on Mondays, with help from several other League Cycling Instructors, and David Wittry will be teaching the Wednesday evening classes once again.

Once home, I changed clothes, changed bikes, loaded some tools and a repair stand in a trailer, and rode to a friend's house to do some work on her bike. She is doing the Redbud Ride next weekend, and had been told her bike needed attention. I won't be at that ride, as I'll be at the LCI seminar in Lexington.

On my way to her house, I crossed the milestones mentioned above.

I just keep on logging the miles. Eventually, I'll get somewhere.

At current rates, I'll break the two-thousand-bike-miles mark Friday. I have at least twenty miles' worth of errand-running to do Thursday, which puts my two-thousand-mile point somewhere along my homeward route Friday evening. I may have to do the math and be watching my odometer that trip.

I opted for my Anchorage route getting home last night--it's a little calmer, traffic-wise, and has better wind protection than going home on Westport Road. I take Altawood Court to get off a stretch of LaGrange Road that is just unpleasant. As I cruised through Altawood, I startled some deer. I saw at least seven or eight of them, jumping a fence to get TO the road where I was approaching, then rushing off in all directions (some re-crossing the road a time or two, just to run more, I suppose). Two or three rushed off to my right, and four stopped in the yard to my left and stood to watch me pass by them. I guess since I was no longer moving toward them, they figured they could afford to see what I was going to do rather than keep running. A couple of them were small--as if they were not fully mature but were old enough to have lost their spots. I passed within about thirty feet of one of them, and the farthest of the four was no more than forty feet away from the road.

I like seeing deer--they are pretty. It's also true that I have mixed feelings about being that close to them--whether or not I'm on a bicycle. I don't want them to feel so threatened by me that they kick me, nor do I want one to not see me and jump into my path at the wrong moment. I usually don't have to worry about that, as they are pretty wary critters.

However, I came closer to one a dozen years ago. I was on my way to work, riding on Aiken Road near its bridge crossing Floyd's Fork. Two deer were running parallel to the roadway, but opted to cross the road to get into woody cover. They crossed ahead of me, but one forgot about the wire fence she had to jump, and ran into it twice, bouncing off and down the embankment so that her rump was within a few feet of me as I passed on the road. Had I crowded the fog line, I could have slapped her rump as I passed (and would likely have been kicked across the road for doing so--unwelcome hand-to-body contact between males and females is never a good idea).

Wind-ed, and another "gripping" tale

As much as I try to not gripe about weather, I'm going to gripe about weather a bit.

I'm tired of wind for the moment. It seems that I often have a headwind on my way to work, AND it turns around to give me extra challenges on the way home.

To be fair, it's probably coming from the north enough that it slows me in parts of each trip. Still, a 15-knot wind gusting to 25 or 30kts from varying directions is a bit more than I would say I enjoy.

At least the heavy rain yesterday hit while I was at work instead of on my bike. I didn't have to hole up in a store or something until the worst passed--which took a while.

Yesterday's ride to work was on the Globe, with the Ergon grips. The more I ride those grips, the more I like them on that bike. The differences between them and the stock grips are subtle at first, but become more significant with time. The Ergon grips are much stiffer than the Specialized ones, giving me better support (helpful for one who weighs over 220 pounds). They also stay where I put them, whereas the Specialized ones were twisting on me at times (maybe I'm putting too much weight on my bars?).

Since I had the Globe at the store yesterday, I got to show off the grips to a customer who had his bike in for its 90-day checkup (always a free service with any new bike sale). He got intrigued at the idea, and wanted to see what other grips Ergon offered. I showed him the ones I could get through Quality Bicycle Products, and he opted to have me order a pair for his Rockhopper.

I know full well that being part of the Commuter Team means I try to sell the product line. It was cool to see how it works as a bike shop guy--again. I often get to sell stuff to customers because I use that product myself--the "knowledgeable authority" advertising bit at its best, personal level.

It's back on the road!

After something like six months out of service, I have finally gotten around to reworking the Bacchetta Strada so that I can ride the thing instead of having it sit in the garage all the time.

In September of last year, I was almost home from work, having commuted on the Strada for a change of pace, when the right shifter broke. Since I was within sight of my house, I wasn't too upset--the same part of that shifter had broken before, and I knew what was going to be involved in fixing it. Since most of my club rides get done on the tandem with Jenn, anyway, I didn't feel rushed to get the repair done.

Some years ago, I pondered the idea of converting it from the B-Pivot steering system to the rigid riser found on the Corsa model. I got a blemished fork from Bacchetta at that time, and opted to save it for future use. Somewhere along the way, a friend gave me a Bacchetta handlebar he had bought for one of his projects that got canceled before the bar got used. Using these parts meant switching from the Ergo levers that were part of my Strada from the concept stage to bar-end shifters much like those used by triathletes (and similar to those on our Vanguards). Campy bar-end shifters are not inexpensive, of course, and not always available. I got a set a month or two ago, though, and a set of brake levers that are similar to those found on the Corsa bikes from Bacchetta.

Then it was a matter of carving out the time to do the work. I knew roughly how long it would take me to install all the parts, all the cables, the new cycle computer (the old one being integrated with the shifters), and tune it, and wanted to do most of it in one session. As it turned out, when I started doing actual work, I didn't have all the stuff I needed, so it became three sessions instead.

The first session was installation of the fork and BFT (Bacchetta Fine Tune--their headset pre-load system). Second session was installation of the controls on the new handlebar and cable work on the derailleur systems, as the brake cables I had were right for the old levers not the new ones. I found myself with some extra time on Sunday (see the post about finding the dog's home), so I took advantage of that time and finished with the cockpit work on the Strada.

Then I got to take it out for a ride--its first in over six months. The bike felt GREAT under me.

I also have been firmly reminded that I don't use my quads as much on other bikes as I do on the Strada. I was much slower than I normally would be on that bike. Still, though, it handled well. I like the new control arrangement. It's going to be a fun bike again!

best possible outcome, a few days later

I mentioned the other day that Jenn had found an apparently stray dog. The beagle or beagle mix female has a name--Cloe--and she belongs to a woman a few doors down the street from us.

One of Jenn's daughters had the dogs out for a walk, literally two hours before our appointment to take the stray to the Humane Society for them to find her home instead of us. A neighbor approached her and said something along the lines of, "That's my daughter's dog!! I'm so glad to see her!"

I have been walking Cisco in this neighborhood for eight or nine months, now, and had never seen this dog. However, now we know where to take her if she shows up again.

NEW GRIPS! and end of March mileage numbers

 As noted, I have had a chance to ride my new Ergon grips a bit. I put thirty-five miles or so on them Wednesday, and a round trip to work yesterday. In short, I'm quite pleased. The stock grips on my Vienna were not bad--they certainly look like someone learned from the same school as got Ergon going--but they lacked some support on the "wing." The stock grips tended to spin on the bar just enough to be problematic over longer rides, too. The Ergon grips have a built-in clamp that prevents such spin, and a firmer "wing" to better support the heel of my hand. The subtle reshaping closer to the thumb also makes a difference in my hand comfort.

I went ahead and ordered a pair of the BioKork grips for the Raleigh. My least favorite thing about the Raleigh is the mountain bike grips that are on it now--they have never been but so tolerable, especially over any distance. The BioKork have an assortment of features that appeal to me--the raw materials are more carefully selected than what is in most grips, and of course they are Ergon grips, thus more comfortable than most if not all others out there.

Now to find the old headlight brackets for that bike, as the CygoLite I was using on it is now on the Vienna. I can't justify buying a new dyno-powered light for that bike just yet, even though the Dynohub on the bike puts out the same voltage and wattage as many of the newer dyno-powered lights are designed to take. Maybe soon, though--I like the idea of lights with no battery recharging issues. The long-range plan for the Vienna (and for Jenn's Live) may eventually include dyno hubs and lights.

And now for the numbers:

Total bike miles 2011 YTD: 1785
Total bike miles that might have been car miles: 1547.
Total March miles: 806 (second highest number since I started recording over a year ago--highest number was July 2010 with 812 or so)

Yeah, I almost went out for a fifteen-mile ride after I got home last night. I figured I had another goal for next March this way, though.

Total miles for 2010, January through the end of May: 1838. I'm about two months ahead of where I was last year. We plan on doing a fair number of club rides and other preparation for things like Bike Virginia and RAIN, so I'll be putting out some pedaling in the coming weeks.

Mileage obsession, part IXLDIC or whatever...

I keep trying to not obsess over my miles this year, but the numbers are really fun for me this year.

Assuming my normal ride to work tomorrow, and home again, I will have a bit over eight HUNDRED miles for March. My top mileage month in 2010 was July, at 815. I don't know that I'll best that number, unless I go for a joy ride after work. Without any joy riding, I'll come up short on 1800 miles for the year by about fifteen. My "instead of driving" miles are now over 1500, but probably won't break the 1550 mark before Friday.

I had set a goal of 6000 miles for 2011. I'm 29% of the way there. If I average 15.31 miles per day for the rest of the year, I'll reach that goal. It looks as if I'll overshoot that goal some time this fall. Time to make a new goal...

Stray Dog

A stray dog found us last night. Jenn was walking Cisco in the neighborhood, and this beagle-mix was wandering around.

She seems a nice-enough dog. She pays absolutely no attention to the cats, although she prefers their food to Cisco's. She was somebody's pet, and I hope they want her back.

Jenn took her to our veterinarian, in hopes that she had a microchip. Microchips are a nice idea if your animal can get loose and you want it back. This dog didn't have one, though.

We are not able to keep her. We don't have the time to manage another dog for anything more than a couple days at a time. I'll be taking her around to a couple nearby places in hopes that someone recognizes her, but if we don't find her people in the next few days, I must find another home for her.

My grips are here!

As I was promised in a recent email, my Ergon GP1 grips arrived yesterday. I'll be putting these on the Vienna, as I think the BioKork ones I have coming later will look better on the Raleigh.

I even got a couple of Ergon stickers, one of which will likely find its way onto the underside of my tool box's lid with the growing assortment already there. I haven't decided what to do with the other sticker, but I'm not in a big hurry for that.

I have some errands to run today, so I'll put the grips on the bike before leaving. I'll be on that bike today, as the rain gear works better on an upright bike than it does on the Vanguard. I'll see how the grips feel, and let you know.

Both of you. (;-)

The Safety Myth, revisited

The Safety Myth, by the Lazy Randonneur, has been an interesting read. As a bicycle safety instructor, I think about my own safety, the safety of my students and the example I set for folks a fair bit. As a bicycle commuter, I am compelled to deal with the idea that negative outcomes can be a reality, and I must do what I can to mitigate the risks so as to avoid those negative outcomes to the extent I can justify.

A several of caveats, here: 1) When it's below 50F, I'm probably wearing a jacket made of IllumiNITE, unless I expect rain, in which case I'm likely to be wearing a "don't you effing DARE hit me" yellow rain jacket by Endura, which also has reflective spots on it here and there.I figure I'm going to wear the jackets already, so they may as well be easier to see, since I often ride in low-light situations. I'm not able to honestly berate anyone for "dressing like a traffic cone," as some riders like to do.

2) When I walk the dog, I often wear a vest with highly reflective stripes. Our neighborhood gets used as a cut-through between Washburn Avenue and Lyndon Lane, and those motorists rarely observe (or care about) the 25-MPH speed limit or the stop sign seventy feet from my mailbox. Making myself easier to see at night is part of my effort to let them know that there is more to the neighborhood than their access to another street (which probably falls on deaf, or more likely obtuse, ears).

3) I am alive because I was wearing a motorcycle helmet at a key moment in my life, but that key moment would have been far less treacherous had I done a better job of controlling the motorcycle I was riding. Fully cognizant of this, I wear a helmet when I ride bicycles, in part because I like having that modicum of cranial protection afforded by the piece of Styrofoam atop my head. As an instructor, I wear one (properly adjusted) to set an example. I'm also compelled to wear one when acting as a Club officer and when participating in Club rides, due to our Club's insurance policies (and yes, I dislike how insurance companies run our country). It also happens to be a convenient place for my rear view mirror (a locally-produced mirror, at that).

4) I'm known for being fairly safety-conscious. I encourage use of eye protection more often than typical folks (don't ask me why you hear a voice of experience...), I acted as a Safety Adviser in at least two workplaces. On a youth camping/canoeing trip on which I was an adult volunteer, I was mildly kidded for being "safety guy," after a few days of being perhaps more watchful than was necessary.

In the roughly forty thousand miles I've ridden on bicycles over the last twenty years, I've not done a helmet test. Yes, I've fallen from my bikes--three or four times. Yes, at least two of those falls were my own stupid fault and nobody else could be blamed. In all cases, the minor injuries I suffered were to: a knee (once), some skin near my ischial tuberosity (one other time), and my over-inflated ego (each time). This is not to say I'm any manner of superman--quite the opposite, actually. I'm not an overly-timid rider, but I don't ride recklessly, either. My point is that cycling is pretty safe, especially when compared to other fairly mundane activities. I'm not but so sure I really need a helmet most of the time.

A helmet is an object of last resort, and when one needs that helmet, one doesn't have time to say, "Wait! Let me don my Skid Lid(tm)!" However, simply wearing a helmet does not make one safe. Taking The Lazy Rando's definition of safety (lack of significant negative outcome) as workable, I find that one's attitude is far more effective, and that wearing a helmet as part of that attitude is the only way the helmet can do any good whatsoever.

In The Safety Myth, Vik discusses mitigating risk versus increasing safety (the latter being far harder to quantify). He talks about how one can focus on specific risks one faces as a cyclist, and take appropriate action to mitigate them. Doing things like riding a street two blocks to one side of the larger road to be dealing with slower traffic, choosing lane position to be more visible to overtaking road users, or riding the bus on his rare very-low-visibility days is more sensible to him than paying $300 extra for a dozen blinky lights all over the bike.

Let's face it. No matter how many flashers and reflectors I mount on my bike, some twit motorist is going to tell me he couldn't see me. It's happened. I suspect that those same motorists would have trouble seeing an ambulance in full "I've got to get there to help your neighbor five minutes ago!" mode. Someone who will not see won't see me (and despite that you and I agree that such a person has no business at the wheel of a motor vehicle, society apparently disagrees--we keep letting such idjits drive).

Part of the point is that bicycle use is pretty safe, when it comes down to it. A couple years ago, a short quiz popped up online that gives us a sense of how safe cycling really is. The answers may surprise you, or may not.

More random thoughts in a couple of days...

Safety myth?

As one who thinks a fair bit on the topic of safety, a reference to "The Safety Myth," by The Lazy Randonneur caught my eye. It's a long read, but worth it.

It's thought provoking, and I'll have to get back to my thoughts on the topics raised. In the mean time, have a read, and let me know what YOU think.

Both of you.

Weekend riding, and the resurrection of another long-time bike

After helping with the Bicycling for Louisville office move yesterday, we had thought to ride out to Bluegrass Bicycle for the Saturday afternoon club ride. However, Jenn just wasn't up for that, so we wandered a bit on the way home from Second and Broadway, stopping for some browsing at Kathy Schmidt's Crescent Hill Trading Company, and what became a big grocery shopping trip at the Kroger on Hubbards Lane (good thing we had the two trailers with us...). Once we got home, we decided to have a date night of sorts and went out to eat at Taj Palace on Goose Creek near Westport Road. It had been a while since we had eaten there, and we enjoy their food.

We had also thought about riding the Honest Abe century out of Iroquois Park this morning, but neither of us was ready to deal with the wind for a hundred miles today. It's one thing to ride into a ten- or fifteen-knot wind (at ambient temperature close to freezing) for an hour en route to work, but quite another to ride into it for half of a hundred-mile day. We opted to ride to the 2:00 PM Heine Brothers' ride instead.

Before riding to that, I went out alone to get some dog food, cat litter and bird food at Feeder's Supply and some odds and ends at Whole Foods. I got home in time to change metaphorical gears and prep the tandem for the three-mile hop to Saint Matthews and the twenty-two mile club ride.

Once home from the ride, I spent some more time tinkering with my Bacchetta Strada. I had not ridden this bike since its right shifter broke in September of last year. I've had the parts to fix it for a while, but hadn't gotten around to doing the work. Last weekend, I decided it was time to have that bike back on the road, so I installed the new handlebars and shifters I had sitting in various parts bins (I had installed the new fork a couple weeks prior).

To clarify a bit: My Strada was built from a frame kit late in 2002, using Campagnolo components as much as I was able. Since I was, even then, a shop guy, I bought Record Ergo Levers, derailleurs, crankset, hubs (eventually an additional set of Centaur hubs for the spare wheel set), headset and bottom bracket. The bike won't accept Campagnolo brakes, so it has a set of Tektro Mini-V brakes on the rear and the proprietary Bacchetta brake on the front. I had broken a right shifter lever (the downshift lever, inside the brake lever) near the end of Ride Across Indiana in 2005, so when it happened to me again last September, I knew exactly what had happened and what I was going to have to do about it.

Since most of my club riding is done on the tandem with Jenn, I waited to get the parts until a month or two ago. I also started thinking more about changing from the Ergo levers to bar-end shifters and Avid Single Digit levers. I have a Bacchetta carbon fiber fork from a Corsa that was scratched in shipping, and the Bacchetta Fine Tune headset adjustment system to replace the B-Pivot I've had on the bike since the first one broke in 2005. The idea was to make the front end a bit lighter, and get away from the Ergo levers (which were chosen largely as a proof of concept thing when I built the bike in 2002). In conjunction with the Ergo levers, I was using a Campagnolo ErgoBrain computer--that had far more features than I ever used--that was integrated with the shifters so as to give me a visual indicator of what gear I was using at any given moment. It was cool in a gee-whiz gizmo sense, but was starting to be problematic and sometimes inaccurate in its information display.

Since I have almost fifteen years of experience with bar-end shifters on my Ryan, I decided it was time to try them on the Strada. I figure that I can sell the Ergo levers on EBay or something and recoup some of my outlay for the new shifters.

So, now, the bike has a stiff riser instead of the B-Pivot, regular brake levers and bar-end shifters instead of the Ergo combination levers, and will have a different cyclometer. As part of the conversion, I changed the brake and shifter cables and most of the casings.

I took the bike out for a couple of blocks as a brief shake down run, and was pleased. I have a little bit of minor adjusting to do with regard to the brake lever placement and cable routing, but I'm largely pleased with the new controls. I've ridden Jenn's Giro some over the last month or so, and have always felt it rode much like my Strada, but I am looking forward to putting some real miles on this bike again.

How fast is that cyclist going?

A recent post on the most excellent Commute Orlando blog got me to thinking about riding pace during my commuting.

My average speed during my commute varies in the twelve-to-fifteen-miles-an-hour range. One big factor is wind--I often have headwinds slow me down or tailwinds that help me move faster. I have to stop for traffic lights, which affects my overall time AND my average speed.

And regardless of my overall average speed, it takes within ten minutes of the same amount of time to get to work. If I assume that it will take me an hour, and enjoy extra loafing time I earn by going faster due to a tailwind, that's fine.

One thing about my speed, though: regardless of how fast I'm going, I'm never going to go fast enough to suit some motorists. To their way of thinking, anyone not going a little faster than they are is in the way--period.

I remember feeling that way as a motorist, myself. I still get that way at times when I know the road ahead to be clear, but some motorist is idling along at ten under the speed limit. I mean, if you don't want to go as fast as you legally are allowed, why drive at all? Why not ride a bike instead? Seriously, though, what I find most frustrating is motorists who are not paying attention to the road around them. I get that we as humans tend to act in our perceived best interests, but ignoring other traffic seems to be anathematic to that concept.

I am, not surprisingly, far more tolerant of bicyclists than many motorists when I'm in my car. I will often intentionally hold other traffic back rather than allow a motorist behind me to pass a cyclist in a dangerous manner.

I can go twelve, or eighteen, miles an hour, and the motorist behind me doesn't know the difference. His speedometer is not but so accurate, and differentiating those two speeds is hard to do for most folks. I could be going five miles an hour for all he knows, and he seems to think that's all I'm doing judging from how much longer it takes to pass me than he allows. If the motorist coming the other way has to swerve, slam on her brakes, flash her headlights or honk at you for passing me, you really needed to wait a bit and pass when it's safer to do so. You don't need to honk your horn at me, either. I know you are there. I know that having to actually think about getting past me interrupts your iPhone text messaging session or your daydream, and that having to think angers you.

Yeah, you are angry about having to think instead of being able to dreamily go on your way, blithely ignorant of the damage you can cause. I'm angry too, though. I'm angry that so many motorists are so willfully ignorant of the problems they cause by not paying attention to their driving.

The mileage obsession continues

I mentioned a couple days ago that my month-to-date mileage for March has surpassed all but four months of 2010. As of my arrival at home this evening, it's down to three months of 2010. In September I rode 604 miles, and I've ridden 608 in March this year. In April of last year, I rode 612. I'll get beyond that marker tomorrow, just going out for a casual spin.

I have about thirteen miles to go to reach 1600 miles for Year to Date. If I ride twenty tomorrow in the course of getting from place to place (i.e. shopping), I'll break 1400 "instead of driving" miles.

This mileage obsession is going to get old, I'm sure, but it's fun for the moment.

I got an email from Ergon today, with a UPS tracking number. The enclosed packing list shows some decals and a pair of grips. More to follow, I'm sure...

New utility bike for young families

One benefit of being in the bike business is that I learn of cool stuff from time to time. In a new issue of Bicycle Dealer, I spied an ad for Zigo products. They offer a 3-speed or 7-speed bike with a detachable kid pod that mounts in lieu of the front wheel (which comes with the bike for solo use).

The pod also folds for storage, accepts an optional front wheel for use as a jog stroller and can be converted to a trailer for use with a more conventional bicycle. The features list is pretty impressive.

Almost makes me wish I was twenty again.

No, not really. Maybe in a few years one of my stepdaughters will want to have kids or something. Or, maybe not. That's not my decision to make. I would enjoy being able to sell a fleet of these things, though. It would be cool to see a bunch of them cruising around town.

Milestones

It's been a while since I did a "firsts of the season" post.

I've been hearing what I thought were red-wing blackbirds for a few days, but today I saw my first one of the season. I've heard folks jokingly call them "Sergeant birds" for their tendency to perch on a fence and act bossy with their red and yellow patches on their wings. I always enjoy seeing them this time of year--they are a harbinger of spring as surely as are robins (which I've been seeing and hearing for weeks).

There has been some hawk activity near the house--we hear one or several almost daily. Jenn spotted one perched on a swing set in a backyard along our route home after our Sunday brunch, watching for its own meal, I am certain.

Today was also my first ride to work in short pants for this season, although I've ridden in short sleeves several times by now.

A couple other neat sightings over the last few days: On Rollington Road, there was a dead animal--not sure whether it was a raccoon or opossum--but twice this week I've gone by as a turkey vulture was having a snack. Each time, the bird acted as if to fly away, but stayed in place as I rode by well toward the other side of the road. Each time, a take-off in the direction the bird was facing would have put the bird in my path, and I really don't want to collide with the head of a turkey vulture as he or she is taking off. This morning, I passed the bird and there was a car not far behind me. I didn't get to see how the bird dealt with the car passing by--I was busy watching where I was going through a series of road patches and minor pot holes and making sure the motorist was far enough away from me.

I've seen several deer over the last few days--once as many as five--and those on my normal commute routes. It must be something about their daylight clock time being close to my commute time. I doubt I would have noticed the deer had I been in a car.

I logged my commute today, and poked around at some of the stats available to me at mycyclinglog.com. I'm really having a good time with the numbers so far this year! So far in 2011, I've ridden 1559 miles (I keep finding myself tempted to go for a ride around the block to get that extra half mile or two miles...) and logged 1352 miles instead of driving a car. In March alone, I've ridden over 580 miles, and the month is far from done--which puts my monthly mileage for March ahead of all but four months of 2010 (and likely to beat two of those four). If Jenn and I ride the century we intend to ride this coming Sunday, that might make March a record month for miles (although I doubt it--I rode more than 800 miles in July of last year). Last week, I rode more than I did during all but two weeks of 2011--and one of those two weeks was the week we did RAIN. As of today, I've already bested something like twelve weeks out of the fifty-two in 2010, and it's only Tuesday!

I'm getting to ride a LOT.

I think Spring has Sprung

It's officially Spring, now, anyway. And what a day!

Temperature on my way home--after dark--was 72F!

And, to top it off, I broke the 1500-mile mark for YTD on my way home!

Detail-ish stuff:
We opted to drive hauling the tandem to Prospect Point for the Metric Century Timothy had on the club schedule. I have been on all those roads before--the route was described as the Ironman course loop in reverse--and knew it would involve a hill workout that Jenn and I both needed. We had a great ride, with an average speed somewhere in the mid-14s, despite our mutual lack of hill training (our average speed on RAIN last summer was in the mid-16s). It was a bit chilly at the start, but I was moderately comfortable in two thin jerseys, one pair of tights, and cycling gloves most of the day. I got a bit warm at times with two jerseys, but cooled off on the next downhill section. Note to self: explore the option of keeping a pair of cycling shoes on the tandem for Jenn. She left her shoes at home. Again. Borrowed shoes are not ideal for one's stoker.

Shortly after we got home yesterday, my sister called to invite Jenn and me to have Sunday brunch with her, my mother and stepfather at Ramsi's Cafe on the World. Having eaten brunch there before, we were quite happy to accept the invitation! We met there at 10:00, and had a great time socializing and catching up on the little day-to-day stuff, and the food was tasty.

The first time Jenn and I had brunch there, it was not crowded at all. Apparently the word has gotten out--it's a GREAT brunch buffet, with lots of vegetarian and vegan options and an array of food that isn't the drab dull Shoney's or Frisch's fare. Yes, there are some of the "standards" of a breakfast buffet, but there are also some more interesting choices.

Jenn and I briefly discussed whether to ride the tandem or our commuter bikes, and both wanted to ride the tandem.

The Louisville Bicycle Club has a standing 2:00 PM Sunday ride, with one per month starting at Baptist East/Milestone Fitness Center's parking lot off Bowling Boulevard. We had a club General Membership Meeting scheduled for after the ride, and an Executive Committee meeting for after that. Jenn didn't feel well enough to ride--not sure why--so I  left the house at almost the last minute to do the ride by myself. In my  haste, I opted to ride the Globe this time--partly because it was easy enough to get it out of the garage, partly because I figured the ride would be crowded and I didn't want to herd the Vanguard around in all that, partly to let some folks see the new bike. I was pleased with the bike's performance--I was cruising out River Road in the high teens, and could get over twenty miles an hour easily enough most of the time. I was certainly not the fastest rider, but I didn't embarrass myself for being on a heavy bike like the Globe has become.

After the club meeting and ex-comm meeting, I rode with LBC President Andy Murphy for a bit so that we could both vent about some stuff and talk about ideas we both want to pursue. We went our separate ways in Cherokee Park, and I turned for home. After a quick stop at the Kroger on Hubbards Lane for an evening snack, I finished my trip home.

The new bike now has 282 miles on it. I have 1500-something miles YTD. Last year, it was some time in MAY before I crossed that milestone!

Some time in the next two weeks, I should be getting my Ergon stuff. I can't wait. I'm looking forward to trying the grips and gloves to see if they are more comfortable than the grips on my Vienna with the Specialized gloves I'm using. To be fair, the Specialized full-finger gloves are a bit small for me, and that may be part of the reason for the discomfort. I had a conversation with the folks at Specialized, and have expressed that their XXL gloves are pretty snug. They admit that their hand sizing is a bit on the small side. They don't offer XXXL, though...

My newest bike

Being, as I am, a self-absorbed American, I have to step away from the horrors the Japanese folks are facing and talk about me.

Or at least about my latest bike. I finally got around to taking some pictures of it today, in daylight.

I like how the gray/brown color works with the black accessories. If the crank arms were black, I'd like that even better. I was a little concerned that the grips and seat were going to be lighter than they are. They aren't too bad, but I still think I'd prefer they be black or darker gray. I'll be getting Ergon grips--probably these guys--for this bike at some point, and they will be darker.

This is the first time since 1992 that I've had a front pannier rack on a bike. I still have the old Blackburn LowRider I mounted on my Linear that year, but I haven't mounted it on anything since then. These pannier racks are the Axiom Adventure series, and mounting them in conjunction with the Planet Bike fender was a minor challenge--more so on the left side with the brake caliper in the area.

A commuter bike gets locked to stuff. For my Vanguard, I keep a six-foot cable with padlock in a pannier pocket. The Raleigh has a coiled cable that simply hangs over the handlebar and stem when I'm riding. For this tricked-out Vienna, though, I felt it worth getting one of the very Euro Abus wheel locks. This one has the ability to add their dedicated cable, shown here:

I couldn't bring myself to mount the faded panniers I've been using on the Raleigh on this bike, and didn't much care for moving the big blue companion set that lives on the Vanguard over, either. So, since it is a new bike, I got some new panniers--a set of Axiom Cartier DLX model. I like them okay so far--I don't expect the durability of the Arkels some of my friends have, but also don't have the investment in them. As a wish-he-was-more-of-a-backpacker, I know how to keep stuff dry in a bag like this--it's a bag of bags. Simple zip-lock bags help keep stuff organized and dry. It would be nice if the inside surfaces of these bags was a brighter color, though. I like the asymmetrical top flaps on these bags. The lock fits in the side pouch on the left bag, and the right bag side pouch holds the flat kit.

One of the fun details on the Globe bikes is their head badge. Owners can put just about anything of the right size in there--a picture of a favorite cat, cartoon character, or in my case, a  business card. This one was in there for a couple of very wet rides to and from work. I figure it'll get replaced from time to time, just to have a decent-looking one in there.

And, no, I haven't gotten around to taking out the wheel weights, er, spoke reflectors.

Bicycle as emergency vehicle?

I've not posted much about the seemingly endless tragedy folks in Japan are facing right now. It's overwhelming to me to ponder such levels of disaster. It's simply heartbreaking to think of the human toll being faced by friends and families of those known dead, or simply missing with no knowledge of their whereabouts. As a cat and dog person, I also think of the heartache folks feel about their missing animals, and the panic so many of those animals felt in their last moments. This is to say nothing of the dangerous situation with their nuclear power plants...

As with many such horrific events, the news coverage gives us glimpses of deep human strength. It also sometimes shows us that normal, everyday actions can seem enormously dramatic. Witness the 83-year-old woman who was alerted by the tsunami sirens and got on her bicycle to ride to safety.

To too many in our culture, it seems odd that someone that old would decide that her fastest, best mode of transport to reach a safer place would be a bicycle. I don't think it odd at all, myself, but a bicycle is my first choice in personal transportation. It seems perfectly reasonable to me that a person who has ridden as a primary transit mode for many years would think of a bicycle before getting in a car. It is far more mobile in tight quarters, and can be pushed or carried around obstacles that would stymie a motorist.

Yeah, I'd want to save my bike first, before the car. I wouldn't have to depend on a gas station with the bike.