Velomobile bug has bitten

I keep getting more and more enthused about velomobiles. I think they are really slick machines. I want one (or three).

Of course, we'll have to do some stuff around the house first, like build bookshelves in the office so I can get the three dozen boxes of books out of the garage, find a way to store the table and chairs that are in the garage (make use of space over the door), and find something to do with some of the other stuff that's been there since we moved out of the house on Kennison Avenue over a year ago. At some point, I am thinking that if we haven't used it in over a year, it may find its way to Goodwill or something.

I'll also have to save up some money, as the FAW+ that makes the most sense for me to buy as a first VM will cost me somewhere in the $4500-5000 range to get and build to my liking.

Still, I keep looking at sites like alleweder.jp-web/de with all the pictures and descriptions of how things work for these guys who have ridden them for years. alleweder.net is also a treasure trove of images. I don't read German or Dutch, so I have to do the google translate thing to see what's happening in the text, but I am enjoying thinking about what I want to do with my own when I can get one.

I'm thinking in terms of WWII-bomber-style nose art. Or maybe some Jackie Stewart-inspired band of Armstrong tartan. Or a bunch of rivet-sized dots of reflective vinyl all over the place. Or who knows what? My artistic imagination is not as good as what some other folks I know possess, and I don't even have the thing yet. I've got time to figure that out later.

Gripping tale

I finally got around to installing the GP-1 BioKork grips on Jenn's Globe yesterday. Her report?
Well, to paraphrase, she now has more power on her bike--she is going faster because her cockpit feel is more stable. Her wrists aren't "collapsing," so to speak, and her control of the bike is better.

Who'd a thunk a better set of grips would make her faster?

I must have been invisible.

I must have forgotten to turn off the cloaking device this morning.

There is a guy who passes me most mornings as I ride to work along Westport Road. This morning, though, I saw him before I got to Westport Road--I was on Lyndon Lane, alongside Westport Village. There is an access road that parallels Westport Road running between Lyndon Lane and Herr Lane, and he was on it heading for Lyndon Lane when I recognized his car. As he approached his stop sign, I started looking for bailout options, because it was becoming clear he was not going to stop for his sign.

Sure enough, he came out onto Lyndon Lane as I passed in front of him. I yelled several times in effort to get his attention before he saw me. I rode a few yards farther, then stopped to give him my opinion of his "stop" at the stop sign.

He eventually admitted that he didn't see me before he pulled out from the stop sign. He did say he saw the car coming the direction opposite me, leading me to think he gave no more than a cursory glance in my direction. I asked him why he didn't see me before he blew his stop sign, and he had no answer (keep in mind that, given the temperature was about 40F, I was wearing my Illuminite jacket, which is pretty bright yellow despite its many years of use). After asking that he look BEFORE he pulls away from stop signs, I went on my way.

As I rode to work, I started to wonder whether the guy realizes that, if I'm in the lane, the lane is mine, and that he is not to enter my lane from a stop sign until AFTER I pass by the intersection. Some folks seem to think they can just drive on in the lane when I'm there--in clear violation of Kentucky Revised Statutes.

I also think that there are many motorists who fail to see really obvious things like school buses. Like the woman who was arrested for hitting a school bus yesterday, insisting that the bus move, then driving away. She wasn't arrested for hitting the school bus. She was arrested for driving on a suspended license (DUI charges), failure to maintain insurance (hard to maintain insurance when one is not licensed to drive, even temporarily), and leaving the scene (never a good idea regardless of any other circumstances). In a bit of poetic justice, two law enforcement officers (in this case, U.S. Marshals) witnessed the event and stopped her.

Why do people like that still get to drive cars at all? Why are we as a society not better about keeping such folks out of the driver's seat? Your thoughts?

6000 miles of riding instead of driving!

I broke the 6700-mile mark on my way home from work tonight. I broke the 6000-miles of riding-instead-of-driving mark some fifteen or twenty minutes earlier.

I'm not done riding for the year, of course. I have no real intention of driving any more than is necessary. My threshold for "necessary" is higher than most folks' norms, to be sure.

I like the dyno headlight, but don't think it puts out quite enough light for rainy streets. I'll probably use one of the CygoLite sets as a helmet light much of the time, as they are much brighter than the dyno system.

Several friends have far more miles on bicycles this year, but their miles are typically club miles or training miles instead of utility miles. Mine aren't any better, they are simply different, but I'm still happy to have the ability to ride a bike instead of driving.

a slightly different set of numbers

A facebook friend posted a link to Mr. Money Mustache's blog post on "The True Cost of Commuting." The post opens with a vignette about a couple who decide they want to move into the author's neighborhood, based on its charm. They decide that they can justify the forty-minute commutes both will have to make getting to work and getting home--nineteen miles or so of mixed-highway and -surface street travel.

The couple thought it wasn't so bad. The numbers tell a different story.

If I use my car for work, the IRS allows me to consider $.51 per mile as the vehicle use cost as a work expense. Since my 1994 Ranger was paid off within a year of my purchasing it at the end of 1999, my cost per mile is probably a bit lower. Offset that benefit with the fact that my fuel economy is not very good, though, and I could pick a random number of about $.45 per mile.

I have almost six thousand miles of "riding instead of driving" this year--I expect to reach that number early next week, and keep riding the rest of the year when I can. Six thousand miles at forty-five cents per mile is $2700 I haven't spent on keeping a car on the road.

Sure, I've used much of that elsewhere. I've eaten more, since I burn a few more calories riding than I would driving. I've bought a new bike this year, and outfitted it to be a pretty nice commuter rig. There are costs associated with biking to work--wear and tear on clothing I might not otherwise buy, the occasional replacement inner tube, and so on--but nothing that totally offsets that $2700.

Just think: For two or three years' worth of riding instead of driving, I can finance a velomobile like the FAW+!

Put that road on a DIET!

The concept of a road diet is pretty cool. It recognizes that improving congestion isn't always about adding more lanes (I'm fond of an old bumper sticker I've not been able to find in a while that read: "Adding lanes to deal with traffic congestion is like getting a longer belt to deal with obesity."). In short, the idea is to take a four-lane road and rearrange things so that there is one lane going each direction with a dedicated left turn lane between them. The extra width of pavement can then be used for on-street parking, or a couple of bike lanes, or add sidewalks, or be removed to add green space, depending on the location.

There are a couple of road diet ideas being tossed around in the area. One is the US42 corridor between Mellwood Avenue and Hillcrest Avenue. In this case, I expect road safety to improve quite a bit, since motorists who are not turning off Brownsboro Road (as it is called in that stretch--Brownsboro Road as a name is on KY22 in places, on KY1694{I think} in some spot...) are kept to one lane, and those turning left have a dedicated lane for doing so (having less chance for head-on collisions). The remaining width is going to be used for much-needed pedestrian facilities (sidewalks) and beautification.

Just coming onto the local radar is the idea of putting Grinstead Road on a road diet between Cherokee Road and Cherokee Parkway. I've had a chance to look at the Public Notice, and have a few thoughts. I'll be arranging my thoughts a bit here, planning to send them during the public comment phase which ends later this month.

Not being a computer guru, I'm not able to get the images from the .pdf of the Public Notice to show on here (any help with that? Give me some clues in the comment section). Having the .pdf as another tab in my browser, though, I can switch back and forth to refer to it as I make my notes. There is also an article in the Courier-Journal about this, but it may go away (or require passwords) soon.

In short, I love the idea. I don't know that it will slow traffic in the area enough, but it will change things a bit. There is talk of resurfacing the lanes with non-skid asphalt, which on the surface (pardon the pun) sounds like an extra-abrasive treatment to enhance lateral traction, especially when wet (the area sees inordinate numbers of crashes per year, partly due to rain water mismanagement, partly because people try to race through the turns as if they are in a timed slalom event). Highly abrasive asphalt sounds like a recipe for worse road rash for a cyclist, so I want to see a sample of such pavement and ride on it a bit before I make judgements. It may be safer for cyclists, if only because the car is less likely to slide into us, or it may be like grooved cement roads that disrupt a cyclist's directional control just a bit.

Part of the discussion at the moment is that there is no plan for bicycle-specific lane markings. Since it's a state route, one envisions the state ignoring the Louisville Metro Government "Complete Streets" policy somehow. Still, it would be good to recognize that cyclists make use of that road fairly often. Giving cyclists climbing lanes on the two uphill grades in that stretch of Grinstead would allow motorists to move at speed closer to the legal speed limit, and reduce temper flares. Of course, there will be those who begrudge every nickel spent on bicycle-specific infrastructure, but they need to get a life.

David Morse mentions that in the ten years he's lived in the area, he has never noted a car parked along Grinstead Drive east of Willow Avenue. I have seen mommywagons along the eastbound curb as the Collegiate Academy school day ends, of course, and there is the "kiss and zoom" alongside Collegiate every morning as parents drop off Child, Esquire before their morning tennis match or whatever it is that the idle rich parents do. I'm not sure what to do with that sort of traffic problem, aside from suggest that the parents teach their spawn to use public transit (gasp!) or ride bicycles (groan!) or carpool and park somewhere other than Grinstead Drive (oh, the inconvenience!).

I rarely travel that section of Grinstead in that direction--if I'm going to, say, Iroquois Park, I use Lexington Road, go through Cherokee Park, and use Eastern Parkway, and if I'm going to the Smoketown area I tend to use Frankfort Avenue to Payne Street (using whatever connector I find best at the moment), then south from Breckinridge Street. I have been known to go home from points west/southwest via Mid City Mall (the ValuMarket there has a better beer selection than some liquor stores), and I'll use Glenmary instead of Grinstead until I get to the eastern end of Glenmary where I rejoin Grinstead. Going westbound, the climb on Glenmary is a bit steeper, and turning left to get onto Glenmary is often problematic, so the ability to use Grinstead through there would help lots of folks.

Still, anyone who is at all connected to the various cycling list servers in town knows of this road diet discussion, and has opportunity to comment. It would really be cool to have a bajillion comments feed through Bicycling for Louisville so they can walk into any discussions with "we have so-and-so-many riders who think this, this many who think this other," and influence further planning.

We'll see.

Soccer (or futbol, if you prefer), and music

As astute readers (both of you) know, I have two stepdaughters, the younger of whom is on a soccer scholarship to Georgetown College. This is her senior year there.

Jenn told me Friday morning that Saturday was "Seniors Day" on the soccer field. Jenn and Brad (the father) were to be on the field for the celebration after the game.

I have long said that I cannot and will not take credit for what Rachel has accomplished. Her accomplishments are her own, and stem from who she was well before I met her in 2007. I can be proud that she is doing well in school, and of who she is, but I cannot take credit for creating her. I was not upset that I wasn't part of the on-field celebration (although I was there to take pictures). It was good to see her. Her team won the game, which is always a plus. They looked much better as a team than when I last watched them--their efforts in practice and in the games since are starting to pay off.

Bracketing our trip to Georgetown were our two trips to the Garvin Gate Blues Festival. I've been a fan of this festival since I first learned of it in 1989. Indeed, it was that festival that got me started doing a lot of photography, focusing, if you will pardon the pun, on blues musicians as they played. I spent a lot of time and more money shooting pictures of guys playing in night clubs around town from fall of 1989 until some time in 1991 or '92 before realizing that I was not going to be able to spend the time and money to make a great photographer of myself. I got some images published, and am proud of some of those images.

I've missed a couple of the Garvin Gate festivals over the years, but not many of them.

Anyway, after work on Friday, I pedaled furiously to get home so that we could go, and we got there in time to see the Walnut Street Rhythm and Blues Band play their set. This band, largely made up of sons and a nephew of the late Foree Wells, has been playing together since they were kids, and it shows. They are TIGHT on stage. Their singer is very good, too.

After they left the stage, we were treated to a set from Karen Lovely. Wow. Her song, "Still the Rain," is nominated for a song of the year-type award, and if it doesn't win, it's up against some amazing competition. The woman has some pipes! Her voice has some hints of Grace Slick from the 'plane days, but with more dynamic range. Her album, "Still the Rain," is worth getting if you like blues, or rock, or haunting pop, or...

Saturday night's headliner was Grady Champion. After hearing Karen Lovely the night before, I was disappointed. His show was mostly a string of his interpretations of blues standards the crowd had already heard four or five times in the weekend, and while his band has talent, their show was not as moving as a show of more original music like the one I had seen the night before.

In other good news I learned at the Festival, Cee Cee James is coming to town! I learned of her music through XM radio a bit more than a year ago, and became a fan instantly. Her voice is often compared to that of Janis Joplin, and while I hear the resemblance, it seems to be more coincidental than intentional. Either way, I consider it a compliment to her. She's worth a listen or twenty. I'm looking forward to meeting her next month when she is in town.

I have a dentist appointment in the morning. By the time I get home from that appointment, I will have logged 5800 CO2 miles for 2011. My YTD total mileage is 6440.

I revised my goal for the year a couple weeks ago, having blown past my original goal of 6000 miles. I've set the new goal for 8000 miles. If I ride an average of 17.7 miles per day for the rest of the year, I'll make it. I may have to reset the goal again.

After a false start over the weekend, I got Jenn's dyno light working tonight. The Alfine Dyno hub matches her Alfine 8-speed internal gear hub, which suits my aesthetic sensibilities. It's only a minor shame that I couldn't get the white Supernova E3 Pro from Quality Bicycle Products--the silver/grey one looks pretty good as it is. Unless she rides it to work tomorrow, I should be able to mount the E3 taillight tomorrow.

My wife has a bling commuter rig. She will soon have Ergon grips to make it even nicer.

light stuff

Having made the switch to dyno lighting on my Globe (with additional battery flashers), I'm starting on Jenn's Globe next. I was able to find her a silver version of my Shimano Alfine dyno hub, and it conveniently matches Jenn's Alfine 8-speed internal rear hub on her Globe. We now have the headlight and taillight in hand. I'll cut new spokes today so that I can rebuild her wheel with the new hub over the next couple of days at home. I created version one of a bracket that will mount the headlight under the front of her basket (subsequent version(s) will look a little better, but be mechanically similar).

All this is because I've tired of keeping track of battery life on the CygoLite headlights we've been using. One of the three batteries has lost a lot of burn time compared to its rating, and while a replacement battery isn't horrendously expensive, freedom from dealing with the problem is worth something to me. Dyno systems, while still pricey, have gotten more affordable in recent years. That the lights bolt in place makes them a little more secure, especially in low-risk places where Jenn locks her bike most of the time.

The Supernova E3 asymmetric light we got her is available in two colors via my primary source--black or grey/silver. The Supernova web site shows the light in several other colors, including white, which I think would really blend in on her bike. However, she seems pretty stoked about the one she has, and methinks buying the European white one would cost a bunch more.

I think part of that is that dyno lights are still something of a niche market in this country--we are still too wrapped up in automobile-centricism to see utility bikes sell as well as, say, that deformed dog toy called a football. Even so, they make a lot of sense for folks who ride in low-light situations on a regular basis.

September is almost over!

I've been riding the Globe to the New Rider Clinic that Jenn is teaching, in part to have a bike that is a bit more like the bikes the students are riding. ALL the members of this class are riding road bikes, which is something of a first for me. I'm used to seeing a hybrid or three and a mountain bike or two--one guy in our last class had a BikeE recumbent bicycle. Jenn rode her Vanguard two weeks ago, and her Globe last week and this week.

Riding that bike at night is starting to be a hassle for her. The headlight bracket I rigged isn't working so well--her headlight is heavy enough that it points down after the bike goes over a bump or two. I already have the hub for her dyno system on hand, and expect the headlight to arrive tomorrow. I should be able to rebuild her front wheel on the dyno hub this weekend or early next week, so that she will be able to leave the battery behind by next Thursday evening. I may even mount her a set of Ergon grips by then, so that she can enjoy the comfort they offer.

On the Ergon grips thing: I found a problem with them, or, more accurately, with the bar-end plugs Ergon supplies with their grips. They don't fit smaller inside-diameter handlebars well. The plugs Ergon supplies with their grips have a core surrounded by fins that are supposed to fit inside the end of the handlebar. This makes the bar look a bit neater, and helps reduce the chance that a handlebar would act as a corer if I land on it in a crash. Some grips are closed-ended, which covers the end of the bar, but Ergon grips are not. The "fins" on their bar plugs are brittle enough that they break off easily, and the plug won't stay in the end of the handlebar.

For a while, I was noting seasonal firsts. I didn't get around to noting on here that last Friday (or Fried-day, as I'm wont to spell it) I rode to work in full rain gear for the first time this fall. I even used my winter shoe covers to keep my feet from getting horribly wet. Of course, I am discovering that my rain pants are not as good as I thought they were...

My total bicycle miles for 2010 stood at 5744 and some tenths. I expect to surpass that number in CO2 miles some time Sunday or Monday. I already have just shy of 6300 bicycle miles for 2011. Maybe next year I'll get to do some more club riding and boost those numbers even further.

It has been observed that sometimes life gets in the way of a bike ride. Such was the case for me this weekend.

Not that it was a bad thing, by any means. I was one of at least five bike shop guys on the course during the 2011 Bike to Beat Cancer, a fund-raiser for the Norton Cancer Center. There were over four hundred registered riders, and at least three hundred were on hand for the event. Having so many mechanics meant that we would have very little work to do--the riders on these events have done a much better job over the last ten years about having bikes fit for the purpose than in my earlier experiences doing similar work for the Old Kentucky Home Tour--in 2001, one other mechanic and I worked until dark on bikes that were found wanting attention by their owners on the first day, and I was working on bikes the second day before daylight--we did work (meaning more than just helping put air in tires) on probably ten percent of the bikes on the course! From what I gathered talking to other folks, the "fix-it" rate was less than five percent for this event.

Jenn had volunteered to help them with registration on Friday evening and Saturday morning. When she was done, I was getting ready to head out to my first rest stop assignment. She asked to ride along rather than ride her bike home, and I agreed, as it would give us some time together even if much of that time was focused on me fixing bikes or getting to a place where I was needed for a bike repair. It worked out well.

Our plan for today was to go to her folks' house for a few hours--have dinner, play some sort of kitchen table game, socialize, and such. We had some time this morning, so we went out to eat breakfast--by bike, as the eatery is near the Hurstbourne Parkway/I-64 interchange which is easily reached from our house (she has a cousin that works there, so we get to visit with her while we are there eating).

Coupled with riding to work most of last week, riding errands on the Raleigh Thursday morning and early afternoon, and riding to breakfast, I have been able to reach a new personal best: 6200 miles for 2011 YTD. On my way home from work tomorrow, I will pass the 5600-mile mark for my CO2 miles. I figure that my CO2 mile log will pass my 2010 total miles record some time next week.

Even so, my monthly totals for the last few months have been lower than last year's numbers. I'm not sure why this is so, although if I were concerned about it, I could go back and look at my logs and see what I was doing last year that I'm not (apparently) doing this year. Looking at the monthly totals chart on mycyclinglog.com, it appears that I was riding a LOT this time last year--more than just to work and back. Almost ninety percent of my mileage this year has been "instead of driving a car" time instead of "club" miles or recreational miles.

2011, the first 6000 miles

I reached the 6000-mile goal yesterday morning, on an errand-running trip in Saint Matthews. I was riding the Vanguard, pulling the Burley trailer.

When I got home from that errand, I decided it was time to put new(er) tires on the trailer. The original ones were showing the effects of some misalignment issue that I had not gotten around to resolving. I took the wheels off the trailer for the first time since Jenn found it at Goodwill, and discovered that someone had installed the quick release skewer springs incorrectly, which prevented the axle seating correctly in the frame. I also found that both hubs needed to be cleaned and repacked with grease, so I fixed those issues before reassembling the trailer. It pulls a bit better now. I'm not certain the alignment is right, yet, but I'll work on that more soon.

Our fourth New Rider Clinic began last night. We have a much smaller group of students, but I'm good with that. This group will be a lot of fun, I think. I often ride the Globe to classes, to enable me to better demonstrate things in ways that students can copy on their own bikes. Jenn rode her Vanguard to class last night, which gave me a chance to compare my dyno-powered light to her NiMH-powered light (which is the same model as the one on my own Vanguard, and the one I moved from my Globe to her Globe until I can get her a dyno light). The dyno light is not as bright by a large margin. I got spoiled on the battery light--and I LIKE having that much light. However, the dyno light's pattern is better in terms of not blinding other road users (I have the asymmetric version). I'm okay with that, especially since I get the trade-off of not having to keep track of battery charge status.

today in my history

Today is my stepfather's birthday. Jenn and I got to enjoy dinner with my stepfather, my mother and sister. Dinner was paella (Yum!) with sangria to drink, followed by an amazing cake that I'm not enough of a foodie to describe well. It was a good time to celebrate my stepfather as a person.

Today is also the twenty-fifth anniversary of my last motorcycle ride. I still remember riding it at a moderate pace on the road through Sleepy Hollow, and feeling uneasy about over-correcting when I realized I wasn't leaning hard enough into that curve, looking at the edge of the road and the grass beyond, thinking I'd have enough room to slow the bike to the point that I could safely return to the pavement.

I didn't see the tree stump hiding in the grass and leaves. My front wheel hit it just left of center, from what I could tell when I went back to examine the site a week or so later. I bent the frame of the bike badly enough that the bike--a Yamaha 360cc four-stroke--was a total loss.

It was a heck of a helmet test, too. The next thing I remember after the realization that I was about to leave the pavement was standing, looking at the road, my helmet to one side, my sunglasses to the other side and the bike behind me in the weeds, thinking, "What the heck just happened to me?"

Examination at a "doc in the box" found that I had a concussion. I got to spend a night in hospital for observation. I was scheduled to show for work at UPS the next day--which got put off for a week. I didn't have any medical insurance at the time, which made the event one that left a lasting impression on my job choices ever since. Fortunately, my bills were not as bad as they might have been. I was able to work out a payment plan with each of the agencies involved in my care.

There are several little stories surrounding my hospital stay. Perhaps I'll share them in the next few posts.

A few years later, I decided it was finally time to destroy the helmet I had worn on my last motorcycle ride. I had gotten a bit better with a hammer by that time, and figured that setting the helmet on a concrete floor and striking it with a 40-ounce dead-blow ball peen hammer would do something to it. Ten or twelve hits, as hard as I could swing that hammer, did far less damage to the helmet than the one impact with my head inside the thing.

It has not been difficult for me to justify wearing a helmet since then, either.

late summer catching up post

I've taken almost two weeks off from typing anything. I've found that many of the thoughts I wanted to express were not worth the time to put here, and haven't done anything about coming up with bigger thoughts.

That said, I'll toss out a few thoughts, small and smaller, in no particular order:

The 34th Old Kentucky Home Tour happened over the weekend. The weather was near-perfect, if not absolutely perfect. Few riders had enough mechanical difficulty that they needed help from the various bike mechanics on hand (although there were a couple of broken spokes discovered Saturday morning, and I hadn't brought means to make replacements). The Tour's riders have come a long way from the 2001 event, when two mechanics fixed over ten percent of the bikes in use that weekend (I know this because...), working until after dark on Saturday and starting before daylight on Sunday to get folks' bikes working again. There were two crashes to my knowledge, but I don't have accurate details on either to share, other than that one factor in one crash was that the guy's tires were beyond worn out (I've used the term "thread pattern" to describe tires like these before).

Immediately after the Tour, a few people got on the list server and praised Club President and Tour Director Andy Murphy for his job, one mentioning hurdles Andy had to overcome to make it happen. The tone of the email could have been interpreted to imply that some of the hurdles had to do with the volunteer cadre. I wonder whether that poster was referring to the numerous problems that arose because Andy Murphy abruptly resigned his post on May 9th, leaving the volunteers wondering if there would even BE a Tour this year? Or was he referring to the damages done to sponsors, some of whom left in mid-May? Or the extra work the Sponsor Liaison had to do to find replacements for those sponsors? Or that Murphy refuses to (or is incapable of) recognize that there is much to be done in terms of repairing the damages done by his abandonment of the Club and its beloved Tour? Or, well, the list goes on.

This aside from the fact that the poster who was cheering so hard for Murphy on the list was also the same guy who irresponsibly asked that the remains of the Club's Executive Committee consider having Murphy succeed himself as Club President, which had the direct effect of keeping any other potentially stronger candidates from offering to serve (this during a particularly tense Club general meeting in May).

On to more amusing things. My teammate on the Ergon Commuter Team, Jeff Moser, put up his comments on the Ergon GR2 grips he's been using this season. As my readers know, I like my Ergon grips quite well. It's good to read Jeff's comments, especially since he has had a favorable experience with them.

Also more amusing than mud-slinging about the Tour: As of Thursday evening of last week, I had pedaled over 5900 miles in 2011 to date, with over 5300 of those miles utilitarian in nature. By the end of this week, I will surpass the original goal of 6000 miles for 2011, and be on my way to the revised goal of 8000. I could ride less than a mile a day for the rest of the year and still break that 6000 mile mark!

In my role as a cycling educator, I tell students that we steer our bikes by leaning them, and control the lean with the handlebars (steering mechanism). We control the balance of the bike by leaning it in and out from under us. Pondering on this during my morning commute today, I realized that training wheels on kids' bikes are a bad idea. I already knew that things like the Specialized HotWalk are better learning devices than bikes with training wheels, but wasn't sure why. It occurs to me that on a bike with training wheels, the rider steers with the handlebars, instead of leaning the bike, which is counter to how it works when the training wheels are removed. It takes those young brains a bit of trial and error before they learn the tactic. Putting the kid on a bike without pedals gets them doing that from the start.

Speaking of education, we have one more New Rider Clinic to do this season. It starts this Thursday.

I'm slipping!! Well, maybe...

August is the second month this year that I've turned in fewer miles than the same month in 2010--July being the other. In the past month, there were two Saturdays and three Sundays that I logged zero bike miles, not to mention two week days (in the same week, no less). Seven days in one month that I didn't ride is not that unusual for me, but apparently I usually ride more on the rest of the days than I did this past month. Even so, six hundred ninety-six miles in a month is not reason to beat on myself.

For July of this year, I missed last year's record by twenty-five miles or so. I was about seventy short for August 2011 compared to 2010.

On the other hand, I've already ridden more miles this year than in all of 2010, with four months yet to go. I broke that record on my way to work this morning.

A different sort of number

As the Louisville Bicycle Club Vice President for Education, I oversee the Club's education program, which aims to raise the skill level of cyclists throughout the community. Our education program also has an advantage for the club, in that it brings us new members who contribute mightily to the club's other programs.

Last year, we expanded the New Rider Clinic program to three sessions of eight classes each, up from two sessions. We had a great group turn out for the Wednesday evening series at Iroquois Park, perhaps celebrating the first year for that alternate evening.

Last year, we also gave students a new incentive for completing the class: Every student rider who attended at least six of the eight weeks, and who passed the road and written tests for the League of American Bicyclists' Traffic Skills 101 course earned a one-year membership in the Louisville Bicycle Club (or one-year extension of existing membership) and a Club jersey. We awarded memberships and jerseys to something like thirty-five or forty people in 2010.

For 2011, the teaching year got off to a rough start. Two of the first three or four nights of the May/June class got rained out--one with torrential downpour and high wind AFTER we assembled (I eventually found out that everyone had gotten home in the right number of pieces...). An ongoing computer problem hampered my efforts at organization, and I was unable to get my head out of my behind enough to do things correctly the last night of the class. A couple days later, I learned of the deaths of a good friend and a cousin, further disrupting my efforts to recover from the disorganized manner in which I mishandled that class. I assisted David Wittry some with his Wednesday evening series at Iroquois, and substituted for him one night--the night we had to cancel the last drill we planned and get folks home before the tornado came along and mangled a bunch of barns at Churchill Downs (among other damage caused that day), just a few miles north of where we were.

We recovered from those hurdles for the most part, though. About two dozen folks graduated from those two classes. Then the July/August class began.

Jenn sat for the League Cycling Instructor seminar in April of this year. To be a full-fledged LCI, she has to teach a couple classes under supervision of a seasoned instructor (it's okay for me to be that instructor) or co-teach with another LCI-IT. I offered her the chance to teach this class herself as much as possible, with my presence as supervisor/mentor/helper. She started with close to thirty students, with perhaps forty folks dropping in and out of the class over the eight week session. Her retention rate? Twenty-six folks earned their certificates and jerseys last night!!

Numbers yet again!

A bit of other stuff, but first, the numbers.

This morning, as I pedaled to work (and pondered the C-J editorial board using the word peddling instead of pedaling...), I broke a new record for myself. Well, to be honest, every time I swing a leg over a bike I seem to be setting a new personal record, but to have pedaled over five thousand miles instead of driving by this time in the year is something of a milestone.

Yes, that's right--five thousand miles of bicycling instead of driving. I've accumulated a bit over 5600 bicycle miles for 2011 YTD, which is almost a personal record in itself, let alone that there are still four months remaining for the year (last year's 5700 miles was a personal record for a full year). With four months to go, I suspect that 8000 miles for an annual total is possible.

I know folks who have ridden more, of course. Still, a personal record is a personal record.

I had set my goal for the year at 6000 miles. According to mycyclinglog.com, I need to ride about three miles a day to reach that goal. It has been fun to watch that number drop faster and faster as I approach the 5500 mile mark, but I'm going to overshoot that goal in a few weeks.

Thursday evening last week, Jenn called to tell me there was a puddle of anti-freeze under the front of the truck when she came out of the office. Having gone through some fair bit of cooling-system repairs a year and a half ago, I knew that the radiator had a pinhole leak and would eventually need to be replaced. Based on that, and on seeing the puddle once the truck got home, I bought a radiator for it, installed same, then dug out the pressure tester to make sure things were in order before filling the system with water. Ready, fire, aim. I should have done the pressure tester bit first. That hissing noise I heard as I watched the pressure reading drop wasn't coming from the radiator, of course, since it was new. It wasn't coming from the freeze plugs I hoped had failed. Oh, no. It was coming from the edge of the head gasket. Okay, do some math. Head gasket set, with intake gaskets and others needed for the change will cost about $150. It would probably take me four or five hours to change the gaskets. My Haynes manual for this truck is in a box of books packed before our move to the current house, and it would take me more time to find it than a replacement would cost ($15 or so).

Some other math: If I really want to make the truck road-worthy, the head gasket fix would probably be best replaced with a replacement engine. The transmission (the third one for this truck...) will probably last another twenty to forty thousand miles before its synchronizers give up--a common malady for this transmission. The truck needs tires by this winter. The air conditioning does not work--who knows how much that would cost to fix--and as a result, the defroster is far less effective than it might be. Those are the high points.

When I bought this truck, I had most recently owned a Thunderbird Super Coupe. THAT was a fun car. When I wrecked it, though, I had some time to think about its replacement, and found that I was driving far less than I had been when I bought the T-bird (I was riding to work pretty often by then). When I was driving, I was usually hauling a bike or three. I was usually alone or with one other person. I didn't want to futz with connecting my trailer every time I hauled a bike somewhere. The Ford Ranger I eventually bought was a good choice for me then, and it's remained a good choice in the eleven-plus years I've had it. Sure, it's had its problems--the transmission died in 2005, and its replacement died on me in Virginia the following spring. I've replaced three of the rear spring mounts in the last two years. The clutch installed when the first transmission died didn't last as long as it should have (I've had clutches last 150,000 miles on other vehicles). Still, though, it's been handy to have a small truck instead of, say, a sedan or microcar like the Smart (much as I am intrigued by the Smart).

I'm not able to go car-free. There are too many times I want to haul a kayak, or several bikes, or something. Jenn is not ready to go car-free, nor would I try to make her do so (despite that she likes riding to work much of the time).

We haven't decided what to get to replace the truck. A sedan is a likely option, given that I could also buy a Draftmaster rack for hauling the various bikes around. I still have the utility trailer I built to haul bikes when my car was a Toyota Celica Supra, and I could build sides for it easily enough (the better to move my younger stepdaughter to and from college). Jenn would be happier with a sedan than a truck, I suspect, based on conversations we've had to date.

Decisions, decisions.

two weeks since my last post? Sheesh!

I've now had my dyno hub and light for two weeks. I've ridden home from the new rider clinic with it twice, although I haven't had much more opportunity to use it. I like it so far. It's not as bright as the CygoLite Dual Cross Pro battery light sets I'm accustomed to using, but the light placement is better, so I think I'll be fine with it. I may put one of the Dual Cross lights on a helmet for more ability to get motorists' attention, but then again I may not.

Last weekend, we had a little storm come through town. Louisville fared better than some--there was a small matter of a stage light truss collapsing in Indianapolis and killing some concert-goers there--but many folks in the area were without electricity for three or four days. Our power was out for forty-eight hours or so. The second half of that time we used a borrowed generator to power the refrigerator and the CPAP machines Jenn and I use when we sleep (pressurized filtered air being WONDERFUL for keeping apnea at bay and giving one a respite from allergen-filled air that is common in our area).

It looks as if I will break the 5000-mile mark of bicycling instead of driving by the end of this month. We'll see. The Globe, with its Ergon grips, has a bit more than two thousand miles on it. The Vanguard has a bit more than 1850 miles for the year to date. The Raleigh, with ITS Ergon grips (and now pedals) has a bit more than 550 miles for the year to date. The Screamer, which hasn't been out since RAIN, has something like 750 miles on it for the year. I have about 125 miles on Bacchetta bikes (my Strada and Jenn's Giro 26) for the year.

I had set a goal of 6000 miles for 2011, and will likely reach that goal some time in September. I'm going to have to set a new goal at some point, and think my next goal will be 7000 CO2 miles for 2011. I'm over half way there already. Almost 90% of my miles have been utility-based rather than club miles or leisure miles. I don't do much riding for the heck of riding these days.

In other news, my mother entered three of her artistic quilts in the State Fair. Two of them earned red ribbons (second prize). Sadly, I don't have a link to pictures of the quilts to share here. They are on her facebook picture page. If I can figure out a way to link them here, I will. They are pretty neat quilts. I'm quite impressed with her art--it's her first time entering in this sort of competition, and she has been making quilts like this for about a year and a half. I have a couple of her works hanging in my house (one was given to Jenn as a birthday gift, the other to both of us during the December gift-giving season). I like looking at them as I move around my home.

More light conversation

I've been doing some reading on dynohubs recently, as I got ready to select the hub and light I bought for the Vienna. One thing I was pleased to learn is that the DynoHub on the Raleigh will power any of the modern lights--indeed, it will supposedly power the headlight/taillight combinations from Supernova and others.

I don't really see myself using the Raleigh for as much night riding as I once did, especially now that I have a really, really nice headlight on the Globe Vienna, so my old idea of rigging a converter and voltage regulator to the output from the DynoHub and powering headlight batteries now seems far too complicated. All I have to do is mount an off-the-shelf headlight that has a standlight capacitor (as does my Supernova E3), and I'm set. The E3 has an internal voltage regulator, so it accepts the output from the Raleigh's hub without complaint (or so I'm told). Maybe I'll find out some day. In the mean time, it has my state-of-the-art-circa 1995 VistaLite lead-gel battery with two halogen lights set, that got me through a season of commuting from my folks' house near Long Run Park to my then-new job at some bike shop in Middletown...

Here's how the bike looks now:

It looks a little busy up front with three headlights, but I can't bring myself to remove the stock lamp fixture. If I had the right bulbs for it and the stock taillight, they would probably work. I checked the hub several months ago with a volt meter, and got a nice, steady signal from it.

En-Light-ening, behind the scenes

Other recent purchases worthy of note for commuter-types: I was toying around in the Quality Bicycle Products online catalog the other day and happened upon the Portland Design Works Fenderbot taillight. Some claim the PDW 'bot series to be far superior to my old standby the Planet Bike SuperFlash rear lights, and I'm sure they have reason to think so. I still like the SuperFlash, and have at least ten of them in service on various bikes and trailers. I also have some of the Radbot lights--two on my Globe, one on Jenn's Globe, and one on my Bacchetta Strada (at the moment--it was on Jenn's Globe until we added her seat bag containing her spare tube and other essentials). The bag on Jenn's bike takes up enough room that a second taillight would not fit on her seat post.

I'm a fan of having two taillights--typically over/under, typically one on flash/one on steady (unless in a group of cyclists, in which case I'll go to one on steady and avoid causing problems with a flasher). The idea is that the flashing light gets the attention of other road users coming at me from behind, and the steady one makes it easier for them to get a distance fix on me. If one goes dark from battery failure as I ride, hopefully the other will remain alive.

The Fenderbot appealed to me as a possible fix to have more taillight on Jenn's bike, then. I got a couple of them, figuring on adding one to my Raleigh as well.

The Fenderbot requires that one drill two holes in the fender--one for the attaching bolt/nut, the other for the anti-rotation pin. PDW thoughtfully provided a drill template disguised as part of the (recyclable) packaging, to enable one to get the holes in the right place relative to each other. Installation would likely require removal of the rear wheel, due to the nature of most fenders and close clearances. The light looks like it would work on formed fenders like the Planet Bike stuff or steamed board fenders (i.e. bamboo fenders). It has a different lens than the Radbot, but the LED looks about as bright. This is the PDW image of the light:

...and the Fenderbot on my Raleigh--note also the Ergon pedals:

I've been thinking about what to do with the headlight set I've removed from my Globe, now that it has a dyno light. I toyed with the thought of mounting it on a helmet--the better to roast the retinas of motorists who wrong me on the road at night, or dissuade them from pulling out in front of me from a driveway or side street. I then remembered that Jenn rode home from this most recent New Rider Clinic using the headlight on MY bike--her headlight is on her Vanguard, not on her Globe. As mentioned, her front cargo platform makes headlight mounting a challenge--handlebar-mounted headlights get blocked if she puts a typical bag-load of work stuff on the platform. A little tinkering with the helmet bracket I got for the CygoLite led me to this solution, attaching the helmet mount to her deck with zip ties:

She'll be able to see where she's going at night, now. Even if she has a lot of stuff on her cargo deck.