'sconnyboy

Oh, the Places You'll Go

2012-01-22T21:40:00.002-06:00

Have fat bike, will travel.

The Horses Seemed Impatient

2012-01-19T21:41:00.000-06:00

I've never been much of a racer, but I do get into the spirit for this event. Been having some trouble with my left hip since early November; flexors, adductors and the sit bone. A real pain in the ass. Though I'd been on the mend, I toed the line concerned about not being able to get very far. Mrs. Babilonia made me promise that I would be able to lift my bike onto the roof rack the next morning, to which I solemnly swore.

The rollout at the start always begins slowly as we pull out of the Star Brewery courtyard, but builds a fair amount of steam as we near the edge of town. Lance explicitly said "5 miles per hour," but we were up around 12 by the time we crossed 32nd street and the proverbial starting gun went off. There was just enough snow on the unmaintained city path to keep the pace moderate with some sliding around. I had a washout turning onto the first bridge and racked my jewels on the top tube—a real auspicious start. Entering the tunnel under John Deere road, the prehistoric reverberation of every kind of knobby fat tire drowned out the conversation. We single filed it through a narrow gap and headed out onto the private snowmobile trails. The sheriff stopped traffic as we crossed Central Avenue, and shortly thereafter the climbing began in ernest.

The first hill was a 220-foot, 10 or 12-percent grade about 4.5 miles from the start and our first dismounted push of the day. It was followed by a series of its smaller, off-camber siblings for the next two miles.

I passed fellow Madisonian Frank Hassler in this section and wouldn't see him for the rest of the race. Started running neck and neck with Ben Oney and James Zimmerman (on his brakeless, fixed-gear Pugsley) and would trade places with them all day long.

A little over a mile of downhill respite on paved bike path before going back to the ditch. Some sidewalk, farm fields, cattle range and more farm fields. A couple of open water and snowmobile bridge crossings.

My chosen tire pressures were working really well, with the Big Fat Larry on the front at 6psi and the Endomorph on the rear at 8psi. Plenty of grip and cushion without really risking a snakebite flat.

Right around mile 14 a group of about 6 or 7 of us started the final pushing climb to Humke Road. Took a break at the top and chatted with a guy on a Moonlander whose name I don't know. He was having fun. Set off down the tarmac and was soon joined by Ben and Joe Nolan. Felt good to have a break from pushing and hit 25mph+ on the big downhill just before Sundown road. Then it was onto the gravel and down to the B road, which is the best part of the whole course. The B is a rutted double track that drops down about 300 feet at 8 percent through a picturesque woodland. Much fun in spite of the patchy ice in the bottoms of the wheel ruts.

At the bottom of the B road, I saw Joe walking back up the trail. He asked whether I had seen his gloves and I replied that I hadn't. Once I rolled out onto Girl Scout road, I decided to deviate from my plan and wait to see how firm the Heritage trail was before adding air to my tires. Cresting the hill, I could have sworn I saw a couple on a tandem up ahead. Very surreal.

Turning onto the trail, I saw what I think in retrospect may have been Craig's cheering section. They told me that I was the 14th or 15th bike to go past them. I immediately started seeing runners, male and female, coming down the trail from the east. The only person I recognized was Laurel Darren, one of the female bike racers from last year. Within a couple hundred yards, I had decided that more air would make things go faster, so I pulled over and got out my CO2. Two things:

A single 16g cartridge will take an Endomorph from 8 to about 12psi with a little left over, and another will take a Big Fat Larry from 6 to almost 10psi; and
While you may not need your gloves inside your pogies on a relatively warm day, you still need to wear them while using CO2. That stuff is cold.

Once the tires were aired up, things went mostly from about 9 to 11 miles per hour. Worth it, but James still passed me on his fixer.

A couple of snowmobiles passed me at Gun Club Road and shortly thereafter, Rob McKillip caught and passed me. Or I should say that I wanted him to pass me. With the snow all chewed up in the wake of the sleds, somebody had to make a new track. Better him than me, and it turned out that he was really good at it. I followed him all the way to the tunnel under Holy Cross road near Farley. My strategy for dealing with the hip was to stand frequently and pedal for 5 or 6 strokes and sit back down. That, and wiggle around on the saddle a lot. My quads frequently reminded me that they weren't too fond of the whole production. But so it went, and it turns out that standing will increase your speed.

Just after leaving the tunnel, I spotted a 20-something male sitting in a huge pickup alongside the trail. I immediately assumed that this was someone's cheering section until he leaned out his driver-side window and shouted:

"Go get 'em, Grizzly Adams!"

Best. Heckle. Ever.

Fan? Redneck with a six-pack of Grain Belt on the seat next to him? I may never know.

From here, the trail got a lot faster. It was largely clear of snow and downhill, so average speed picked up to something more like 14 or 15 miles per hour. Rob tucked into his aero bars and quickly opened up a large gap. I shifted up, passing James again and putting a pretty good gap between us. The speed felt great but was tempered somewhat by intermittent drifts across the trail. They were well-tracked but I still didn't relish the thought of biffing it at 18 or 20 mph, so I checked speed somewhat while crossing them.

Pulling into Dyersville there was some nice clear pavement. Then some gnarly stuff in the ditch. Then some streets. I pulled into Chad's Pizza at about 2:05, refilled the fluids, grabbed a bag of peanut M&Ms and was out the door for the return trip by about 2:12...

On the Trail of the Fox

2012-01-17T21:39:00.010-06:00

Another year, another Triple D. This time the bike field was quite large at 75 riders—about twice the size of last year. I suppose the huge upswing in the popularity of fat bikes in the midwest had something to do with that. You couldn't swing a dead cat without hitting a Pugsley or a Mukluk when we lined up. There were also a couple of Moonlanders, 9:Zero:7s and Fatbacks, along with an assortment of mountain bikes...and even a cross bike.

Beautiful day, with temps that would rise from the mid-teens to just above freezing. Solid 20-mile per hour wind out of the Southeast. We rolled out of Dubuque at about 10:10 and into the wild:

With just one snowfall's worth of base, the going was sketchy. This was especially true as temperatures warmed up and the snow became less consolidated. Less experienced fat riders were running too much pressure and had lots of trouble holding a straight line. The skinny-tire riders didn't look like they were having much fun in the loose conditions either. Me? I just constantly looked for the track of the fat bike in front of me and did my level best to stay on it.

Following the trail of the fox. Looking for it when it was lost. Wipe out. Get up. Pedal. Sit. Stand. Coast. Push. Eat. Drink. All day.

7:10; 14th place.

(If you want more reading, here's the gateway to last year's account. I think I'll write more about this year later. Maybe.)

Snowy Singletrack at Quarry Ridge

2011-12-18T11:51:00.001-06:00

The Groundswell

2011-03-13T13:23:00.005-05:00

I don't think anyone in Wisconsin knows exactly where this is going yet, but this should give you some idea of what the scale and tone is like.

Ruby the Big Red Pony

2011-02-02T08:00:00.005-06:00

This is the bike I call Ruby. It's generically known as a fat bike, a kissing cousin of the Surly Pugsley. Designed by the folks at Chain Reaction Cycles in Anchorage, it's built to the shop's specifications by Sapa Extrusions, an aluminum fabricator in Portland, OR. Sapa also make frames for Titus, Santa Cruz and others, and the build quality is quite good.

Like the Pugsley, it accommodates the 4-inch wide Surly tires using a wider bottom bracket spindle and shell, and by offsetting the rear dropouts 17.5mm to the right. This moves the drivetrain outward and allows for a full 3x9 setup without letting the chain rub on the sidewall of the tire. The compromises are a much wider Q factor and a purpose-built rear wheel.

Ruby currently uses a steel Pugsley fork with standard 100mm front hub spacing. This makes getting the front wheel on and off more of a challenge (an inflated tire can just be squeezed between the brake caliper and the other dropout, if the wheel is angled properly.) I might eventually go to the 135mm symmetrically-spaced version that Surly introduced this year.

Here's a full build list:

Crankset	Bontrager Big Earl with ISIS splines, 175mm arms; bashguard/32/22
Bottom Bracket	FSA Platinum DH CrMo BB, ISIS - 100 x 148mm
Pedals	Shimano SPD PD-M515 clipless
Front Derailleur	Shimano XTR E-type bottom-pull with Problem Solvers 'Cross Clamp Pulley
Rear Derailleur	Shimano Deore DX medium cage
Shifters	Shimano 8-speed bar ends on Paul's Thumbies
Cassette	11-28t 8 Speed
Chain	KMC 8 Speed
Hubs	Shimano Deore XT 32 hole 6-bolt disc (M755 front, M756 rear)
Spokes	Wheelsmith Stainless Steel 14/15
Rims	Speedway Cycles Uma II 559 x 70mm
Tires	Surly Larry front, Surly Endomorph rear
Brakes	Hayes HFX Mag Hydraulic Disc with 160mm rotors
Brake Levers	Hayes HFX Mag
Headset	Cane Creek S2
Handlebar	Titec H-bar
Stem	80mm Threadless alloy, 4-bolt faceplate
Grips	Ergon
Saddle	Brooks B.17
Seatpost	Easton Havoc 30.9

This is kind of a big dorky bike, but I really like the way it rides. Considering how massive the wheels are, it's really pretty responsive.

Bend It Like Janus

2011-01-31T15:00:00.000-06:00

Time for a look backward and forth. Last year was a good year for riding. 4011 miles, including 2 centuries. It also marked the end of a decade of having returned to riding regularly, during which I logged something like 28,000 miles. More than I had set out to do.

Did Bike the Barns, a couple of cyclocross races and (well, this year) the Triple D. Rode in the sun, at night, through rain, wind and snow. Logged significant mileage on the Cross Check, Long Haul Trucker and blue Trek sport-tourer; and a few on the Big Dummy and Black Pony.

Looking ahead, the next event on the list is the Madison Winter Fest CycloFrost race, which I also did last year.

Not much then until the end of April, when BALLS ride and the Almanzo 100 fall about two weeks apart.

Later in the season, I'll most likely do the Bike the Barns ride, but am also giving serious thought to the Colesburg 40 and the Unnamed Epic.

For the wintertime, I'm thinking about the 75-mile version of the Tuscobia Ultra and more than likely, a fourth try at the Triple D.

That ought to keep me out of the taverns.

More Words About Bicycles, Clothes and Food

2011-01-30T16:07:00.002-06:00

As I had mentioned in an earlier post, the confluence of a number of things that went well contributed to my finish at the Triple D this year. The weather was great and deserves much of the credit. Still, there were plenty of factors within my control that could have gone south on me but did not. Many were lessons learned from last time. Here follows a review of some of them.

New Bike
The 9:Zero:7 snow bike from Chain Reaction Cycles in Anchorage is a close relative of the Surly Pugsley. The low-pressure, high-floatation tires make a huge difference in soft snow. It can't just go anywhere, but it can go plenty of places that regular bikes can't. Very useful in the hilly early part of the race. Less useful on the paved segments.

This bike was a big improvement over the Black Pony's 26"x2.5 tires on 47mm rims. It holds a line on the mushy stuff where skinny tires just can't. The aluminum frame and single-wall rims make it substantially lighter than a Pugsley or Salsa Mukluk.

Clothing
I had obviously overdressed the first two years I did the Triple D, and for most of the training rides leading up to them. Big hat tip to Blogger member Jack London for posting in the comments this link to an article on PsychoVertical about how to dress for exertion in the cold. The outfit went as follows:

Head: Giro G10 snowsport helmet (previously mentioned here) and homemade lightweight fleece face mask. Serfas Sike-Out sunglasses and generic clear safety glasses.

The helmet scores points for ear protection but loses some for being heavy and sometimes too warm. The glasses performed well except that my eyes dried out toward the end of the race. The search for a better pair of goggles resumes.

Torso: Under Armour Cold Gear 2.0 base layer and Mountain Hardwear Transition Super Power Jacket. (Please note that I don't name this stuff.)

That's it. Both skin-tight...I normally wear a medium now, but the UA base was a small. I did get a little damp, especially early on, but changed into second base layer and added North Face arm warmers for the return trip. The jacket has some Windstopper material on it, and it really is properly named.

Lower body: Windfront briefs and strategically-placed wool sock; padded cycling shorts, Polar fleece tights and Nashbar C-Pant knickers.

No complaints.

Feet: Two pairs of thin wool socks, Lake MXZ-302 winter cycling shoes (also mentioned here) and Planet Bike Dasher shoe covers.

Feet stayed remarkably warm. One brief chill in hour 6 that went away after a brief jog. The Dashers are nice in that they are large enough to fit over the boots and give me about 10 more degrees of temperature, but too bad they aren't very durable.

Hands: Poly liner gloves inside ATV bar mits (mentioned here.)

Toasty.

Nutrition
Experimented with a number of things during the off-season and after reading Matt Fitzgerald's book Racing Weight settled on Accelerade as my primary "food." I really like the orange in spite of a strong dislike for the other flavors. I took two 24-ounce Polar insulated bottles of this inside my frame bag, with a chemical warmer to keep it from freezing. Remixed one of the bottles at the halfway point. Drank all of it, in addition to at least 80 ounces of plain water from my Camelbak hydration pack. (My advice? Stick the bite valve between the pack and your back to keep it from freezing or thaw it if it does freeze. Yes, this really works, even if people tell you it won't, which they will.)

I also ate some real food. Eight whole wheat fig bars, some almonds, a couple of christmas cookies, a banana and a few Peanut M&Ms. Some more non-foods too—3 Gu gels.

Before the race, I had about 400 calories worth of steel-cut oats, two eggs, some breakfast potatoes, toast, a banana, coffee and Nuun electrolyte drink.

Fitness and Training
I took two sessions of a class called Functional Strength Training for Cyclists from the UW Sports Medicine Fitness Center. There is exactly zero time on a bike in this class, but a big emphasis on leg, core and upper body strength and on improving balance. Most of the exercises used body weight, spine ball or medicine ball, resistance bands or small free weights. Felt real improvement by the end of the second session.

Improved strength and dropping my weight down to about 165 on race day really helped me keep moving, especially on hills.

Also rode a lot this year, including 50+ mile rides on each of the three weekends leading up to the race. Pace and endurance have both steadily improved over the last 3 years. Oh, and there was some cyclocross racing too. Helps a little with peak efforts, mounts and dismounts, but placement shall go unmentioned.

Race Strategy
Having never really been a racer, this is one thing I need to work on. The experience from this year certainly seemed to help. Still, it seems like it takes a lot of discipline to make good decisions in the heat of the moment. This went better this time than in years past, but could still use a little work.

Guess I'll just have to put in more miles...

Other Triple D posts: Race summary; race report part 1 and part 2.

Triple D 2011, Part the Second

2011-01-24T14:42:00.003-06:00

Continued from Part the First.

The Journey Home
Chad's Pizza is a quaint little joint housed in an older storefront in downtown Dyersville. I walked in with a really huge beardfull of ice and asked where to sign in. I was number 7 on the sheet and put the time down as 1:47. Frank was there and (jokingly) pointed out that I had a little something on my chin. I handed over one of my water bottles (I started out with two 24-ounce insulated bottles of Accellerade) to the staff, asking for a lukewarm fill-up of water and for the location of the restroom. Answered the call again and changed into a dry base layer and added arm warmers. Said goodbye to Frank as he headed back out. I collected my water bottle, added some water to my Camelbak, and headed out myself.

Stopping had let me cool off a bit. I went out to the bike and mixed the bottle of Accellerade from powder I had brought along (note to self: take the powder inside with you next time) and downed a Gu gel and a couple of fig bars. Then I decided that if a little bit higher tire pressure is good, then even more must be better. So I set about pumping the tires to 12 and 14 psi. This took a little while, and my fingers got pretty cold. Another strategic mistake—I lost at least 5 minutes, and my speed didn't improve except maybe on pavement.

As I rolled out onto the street, my fingers were painfully cold, bordering on numb. Passed an arriving cyclist right away, and more as I turned back onto the main highway leading back to the trail. Arriving at the trailhead, I decided that the headwind I was now encountering required the use of one of my homemade face masks. I stopped and put it on (fingers still really, really cold) and called my wife to check in.

Back on the trail, I encountered the same icy, drifty obstacles in reverse order. Passed still more cyclists headed toward Dyersville. Maybe 20 minutes out, I passed a Canadian National freight train headed in the other direction—six huge diesel locomotives pulling well over a hundred black tank cars. It's no secret that I love trains, so this was a considerable boost (you takes them where you can gets them out on the trail.)

Rolling through this section, I could have sworn I heard someone chopping wood. Just the occasional, sharp report of a splitting maul hitting a good-sized block of oak. Okay, after a couple of miles, I figured out that it was the Tyvek number bib pinned to my jacket, blowing in the wind and making a snapping sound. Sheesh.

Just as I was arriving at the Tarley Funnel, I passed Piera, the Triple D's first female finisher. I remembered to go slow on the ice in the tunnel, and was soon rolling downgrade.

Alone With My Inadequacies
Had to stop and answer the call again, meaning that my hydration plan was working like a charm. Everything seemed fine, except that my butt hurt. As soon as I got back on the bike, it was confirmed—my ass hurt like hell, and I wasn't sure exactly why. After all, I had ridden over 4000 miles this year on similar saddles without a problem. Not my sit bones really, but the inner hamstrings where they contacted the middle of the saddle. I had a couple of theories about why this was happening. First, I think I had raised my saddle a little too high way back in Epworth when I pumped up my tires the first time. Second, all of the pushing and climbing early in the race had hit some muscles that weren't properly trained for that much effort. Third, and worst of all, it could be that after all those years of faithful service, a Brooks saddle had finally turned on me.

Thoughts of dropping out crossed my mind now, and I was standing more and looking for the smoothest parts of the trail. I soon stopped and lowered the saddle a bit, which helped some. I also used my clipless pedals to great effect by pulling up on the back side of the pedal stroke, enlisting lots more help from the front group of leg muscles. I finally settled into a decent pace somewhere around 10 mph. Slower, owing to the headwind, pain, and in the 20-degree temps, slightly softer snow. In retrospect, I think I should have gone back to 10/12, or maybe even 8/10 psi tire pressure.

Fortunately, the trail got much more scenic, and the distraction helped a little more. I kept a zombie-like rhythm, standing occasionally but not stopping. Finish I kept telling myself.

I hadn't seen a soul in a long time, when I rounded a bend just before Graf and saw someone pushing a bike. I asked, at some distance, whether everything was okay, but couldn't hear the reply clearly. I rolled up and got off, walking now with one of the female bike racers. She was clearly not having a good time at that moment and told me that her ride was over and that she had called to sag out of the race. She told me her fingers were really cold and hurt and that her hand warmers weren't really helping. Deciding at that point that she was coherent and not in danger, wished her good luck and continued on. I later tried to call the sag number to confirm that she was getting a ride out, but I wouldn't get cell reception again for a long time.

The Grind
After passing Graf, I settled into a good rhythm, with my butt feeling considerably better. Somewhere between Asbury and Budd roads, I had a brief out-of-body experience, feeling like I was floating above the trail. Gonna have to chalk this one up to some sort of runner's high, and soon I began to get concerned that I had missed the mandatory checkpoint at Durango.

It's strange how much my memory had compressed the route from previous years. Sundown ski area came into view, and I thought Durango must be right around the corner. Turns out that it's almost five miles away.

During this period, the sky was pretty overcast and I decided to switch from sunglasses to clear safety glasses. Took a brief break and did just that, ate and drank a little and got back underway. I was still having a little trouble seeing clearly, and it sure looked like my contacts were getting cloudy. The weak but persistent headwind seemed to be getting the best of them, and chilling my feet and torso a bit besides.

Finally, around the next bend, Durango came into view.

Crossed the last bridge and staggered into the Handle Bar to sign in. Traci (one of the race directors) checked me off on the list and told me I was free to go. I got back on the bike and called my wife to let her know I was about 45 minutes out.

Last Leg
The remaining bit of Heritage was pretty easy, but flat.

Passed some locals out on cross-country skis with their dogs. Rolled through the trailhead parking lot and onto a rough, narrow section to the crossing at Highway 52. It was almost dark, so I turned on my lights, but still managed to get off-trail at the crossing and onto someone's driveway...it took a short detour over a really rickety-looking bridge got things back on course. Made it through the golf course parking lot and found the course directional markings to the tunnel with the last few minutes of sunlight. I was surprised how narrow the track back through the tunnel was, and not surprised later to find out that others had missed it in the dark.

Now came the absolute worst part of the race. It was twilight, I was having a difficult time seeing through my now-translucent contact lenses, my butt hurt, I was tired, my tires were inflated too much and now Ruby and I were facing mile and a quarter of the same stupid, frozen posthole moonscape from way back at the beginning of the race. I couldn't find a decent line to save my life, so I just grinned and bore it for what seemed like an eternity. Sure, I could have let air out of my tires, but I just didn't have the patience. Never thought I'd be so happy to come to a stretch of clear, dry pavement. Called my wife one last time, giving her an ETA and asking for a bottle of electrolyte water at the finish line.

The return route through Dubuque was firmly committed to memory. Cleaned it in under 15 minutes. Rolled into the hotel parking lot and waved to the spectators looking down from the second-floor windows. Met my daughter in the lobby and my wife upstairs...hugs and kisses all around.

Official time in: 5:24, for a total of 7 hours, 24 minutes out. Time elapsed on bicycle computer: 6:57 for 67 miles. Sixth place right behind another Madisonian, Frank Hassler, who finished just 5 minutes ahead of me.

In retrospect, I could have eliminated several blocks of wasted time and picked up at least one place, but that's the kind of stuff you learn in an event like this. It's intended to serve as a training ground for those looking to break into winter bike racing. I just had no idea that I was that close to Frank. Never saw him once we had parted ways in Dyersville.

Wasn't moving too fast after the race, but felt pretty good. Seems as though my food and hydration plans had worked out well. My eyes were so dry that my vision was cloudy even after I had removed my contacts. Took a long shower, ate some real people food and went down to watch other racers come in. Shot the breeze with the other snow geeks and got a medal and $20 at the award ceremony.

Slept pretty well that night, packed up early the next day and drove home in a snowstorm.

The End.

Triple D 2011, Part the First

2011-01-22T20:05:00.011-06:00

Funny how it isn't really that much of an adventure if nothing goes wrong, but sometimes that's exactly how a person wants it to go. After failed attempts in 2009 and 2010, I got my finish in the Triple D Winter Race this year, and the bonus was that I placed in the single digits.

Before
Drove down to Dubuque the day before and checked into the hotel. Hung out with some friends, had pizza and beer, dressed the bike and watched a little TV. Finally laid down for a fitful 8 hours, listening to the Packer faithful cheer during, and party after, the playoff win over Atlanta. Got up the next morning and did my routine, got some route maps and went to the hotel restaurant for breakfast. They were really slow, and I ended up rushing through getting dressed and to the pre-race meeting. Briefly traded good-luck wishes in the lobby with another friend who was down to do the ski race, and said hi to his family.

Lots of fat bikes at the meeting. Mostly fat bikes.

The Start
The weather was ideal, about 12˚F, and mostly cloudy with little wind. It was a little different for me this year with my family and our friends accompanying me to the start. A boost, really. We chatted and took a few photos as the racers lined up in front of the Star Brewery, exchanged a few hugs, and I was off with the herd through the streets of Dubuque.

It's a controlled rollout through town, and for the third year in a row, I dawdled. Talking to Bob and Dave a little, I ended up in back as the race was about to start. I know that from a total time and finishing place perspective, this was a strategic mistake, but I like talking to people and not taking the racing part too seriously. I soon excused myself and moved up closer to the halfway point in the pack just about the time the race started.

The Trails
Forgetting to pump up my tires in my rush to get ready that morning turned out to be a blessing. The 6 psi in front and 8 psi in the back turned out to be just about perfect for the unplowed section of the bike trail that came next. Thousands of footprints had been made in melting snow a couple of weeks prior and then frozen into thousands of random bumps. This is where I began to pass people. Anyone with skinny tires or a little less experience on this kind of surface struggled. Finally, we came the tunnel—single file through the gate and then across Central Ave. and out onto the private snowmobile trails parallel to the Northwest Arterial.

Here the real fun began. After a couple hundred yards, we came to the first climb—a 15% grade pusher with an icy base. The toe cleats in my Lake boots seemed to do almost nothing. Tried to kick into the snow to get purchase, but it was mostly too hard. Bit of a struggle for a while. At the top, guys were already stopping to strip off layers, and I passed them too.

Word has it that we climbed 800 feet in the first mile, and I believe it. Lots of sketchy turns with off-camber sections, more pushing climbs, a couple of descents where I went off alongside the trail in the soft snow to keep my speed down. Passed a couple more people and eventually fell in behind Jesus Joe on his Pugsley. I had long practiced riding in the tracks of a fatbike to increase efficiency, and it was working here. Plus, there was no good place to pass and I felt like I should moderate my pace a little. Problem is, I did this for a little too long, and that was my second strategic mistake. I think I could have pushed my pace a little more at this point without exhausting myself.

(photo courtesy of Mikael Wolke)

Humke Dumpty and the B Road
I passed more folks in the fields shortly after we crossed Radford Rd. and started to pick up the pace a little. We came next to a paved path through an industrial park, and another racer (either Ben O or Curtis) caught up to me there and eventually passed me on the next section of trail west of Seippel Rd. These trails ran over some tough open farm field terrain up to Humke Rd. I had passed a few more racers but was joined by Jeremy, a member of the Iowa City crew. We chatted for a while, passing the time over two or three miles of pavement. Soon, the road curved, but the course did not—we dropped down onto a wide, well-used gravel road, and then onto a rutted, snow-covered minimum maintenance "B road." Jeremy was a little behind me, and I heard him dab or fall down immediately.

Then something really exciting happened. The B road runs downhill through a wooded area, and I wasn't braking. In fact, I think I was hooting something about how great the B road was as I leaned into a sweeping right turn. Suddenly, my front tire caught an icy rut and decided to go to the left. Way to the left, toward a precipitous dropoff at the edge of the road. Out of sheer panic, with the bike almost sideways, I clamped down on the rear brake lever and locked up the rear wheel. The yawing momentum whipped the rear end around to the right and as I put my left foot down, I came to rest, still standing and straddling the bike. Pointed back toward the top of the hill.

"You're facing the wrong way!" Jeremy yelled.

"I know."

"You meant to do that."

"Yes I did."

The rest of the B road was a barely controlled blast. Seriously, you could sell tickets to it.

(photo courtesy of Mikael Wolke)

On to Heritage
At the bottom of the hill, the B ended and another gravel road that led to some pavement, which finally came to the Heritage Trail. By this time Jeremy had caught up to me again.

The trail is more scenic than the average midwestern rails-to-trail, winding up through a river valley from Dubuque to Dyersville. The trail is used during the wintertime to connect all sorts of snowmobile trails, so it was well-packed and pretty fast. Jeremy and I tried to chat, but there wasn't really room to ride abreast. After a few minutes, we started to pass participants in the running race headed in the other direction. After another 10 minutes, I was struggling to hold 10 mph at Jeremy's wheel, so I excused myself to answer nature's call (which really needed to happen anyway) and stopped to regroup.

After eating and drinking a bit, I got back on and continued riding, which turned out to be another strategic mistake. I had failed to put any more air in my tires. Finally, after maybe 45 minutes after leaving the end of the B road, I stopped at Gun Club road near Epworth and pumped up my tires to 10 and 12 psi and raised my saddle. In the course of doing so, I was passed by 4 or 5 bike racers.

What a Difference a PSI Makes
It suddenly felt like I was riding a different bike. I went from an average of about 9 mph to well over 11. I passed all of the people who had just passed me within maybe 20 minutes, and they were all well out of sight before I reached the Holy Cross road underpass near Farley.

The tunnel was very icy inside and I nearly biffed it. Came out the other side thinking Tarley Funnel icy...bad...slow on the way back. The trail to Dyersville was level and out in the open, with stretches of drifted snow in some places, and big rough icy patches in others. At some point along this segment, I decided that my bike should now become known as "Ruby." Ruby the Red Pony. Clearly, my brain was doing its best to keep itself busy. I also began to wonder where the race leaders were. I took it as a good sign that I had not seen them yet.

Rolling over a couple of really soft drifts, I began to offer Ruby some encouragement. Come on girl, you can clean this one! Good girl, that's my good Ruby! For icy stretches, it was more easy, girl...steady on now. Soon we were rolling down a stretch of smooth hardpack downhill and picked it up to a steady 14 mph for better than a half-mile, which felt really good.

The Leader
Then I saw him, like something out of a desert scene from Lawrence of Arabia—the tiny but growing lead bike coming toward me as I neared Dyersville (though not as near as I had hoped.)

It wasn't who I had expected. I had no idea who it was, but it wasn't Lance (the race director and last year's winner.) I had the camera out, so I yelled "say cheese!" Damn point and shoot missed his reaction though. Soon after, I passed Lance, hot on the leader's tail, and two others before arriving in Dyersville.

I pulled into town past the tank and dropped onto the snowmobile trail adjacent to the road (just like on the route map), discovering very quickly that there were no other bike tracks down there. I immediately got back up on the road and followed it past the grain bins, turning left at the stop sign. I thought I had seen a cyclist in the distance who might have missed the turn and wondered whether Jeremy might have gotten lost. Nothing I could really do about it though.

I rolled up to Chad's Pizza at about 1:45 and signed in.

Coming soon: Part 2: the Journey Home.

Official results are here.

Lots of photos here.

Race reports from the other finishers:
Drew, Troy, Ben S., Dave

The Third Time Really is the Charm

2011-01-18T13:32:00.011-06:00

More details to come (likely in two parts) but the upshot is that I finished the Triple D Winter Race on my third attempt. Sixth place in the bicycle division in 7 hours, 24 minutes for 64+ miles of mostly snowmobile trail. Not bad for a gym class reject.

New bike? Fantastic.
Clothing? Much, much better.
Nutrition? Darn near perfect.
Fitness and training? Check!
Race strategy? Could use a little work.
Weather? Ideal, and the biggest key to most participants' success.

I have a few things that didn't go all that well, but overall I'm calling this one a success. Next year? Please ask again later.

For now, there are a few pictures here.

(See also accounts from 2010 and 2009.)

Update 01-20-2011 Currently writing full account and waiting for official results to be posted...

Update 01-23-2011 Part One is up. Official results here.

Update 01-24-2011 Part 2 is now up.

Update 01-30-2011 Some post-race musing about equipment, etc. here.

Out In the Wild

2011-01-11T21:35:00.003-06:00

Today was a good day to take the long way to work. About 2 inches of snow, light wind out of the north and about 24˚f. Rode the 9:Zero:7, but could easily have ridden a regular mountain bike. The pavement was clear underneath the snow. For several miles, I was the only track out there.

Took the relatively rural Capital City Trail around the southern perimeter of Madison to my job on the west side. The usual 7.5 mile jaunt through town becomes a 17 mile trip through the country. Well, 7 or 8 miles are rural, anyway:

RP Via CCT

Find more Cycling Routes / Bike Rides in Madison, WI
I overdressed again, with a light poly base layer, light wool mid layer and Gore Bike Wear jacket. Could easily have ditched the wool mid, and did just that on the way home. Much better...

Here We Go Again

2011-01-04T20:58:00.006-06:00

In less than two weeks, I'll be making another attempt to finish the Triple D Winter Race. Tried this in 2009:

and 2010:

but dropped out both times owing to really poor conditions. After last year's race, I mused a little about what happened.

Will be trying out a new clothing scheme. Less will be more. New ride too, fresh off the boat from Portland by way of a shop in Alaska:

But honestly, the benefits derived from training for this event make finishing or not finishing irrelevant. I figure it's a win for me before I even cross the starting line. The first time I did it two years ago, I was an overweight marshmallow desk jockey, and sort of complacent about my health. No direction. Working toward finishing this thing has prompted me to eat better, ride more, exercise more, drop some weight, and hell, I even take a vitamin now. I'm glad I didn't finish the first couple of times. Wanting it more has made me work harder.

Not bad for a little bike race in Iowa.

Done and Done

2011-01-04T20:30:00.003-06:00

2010 went pretty well. I accomplished two arbitrary but important goals right near the end.

First, I had thought it might be nice to ride a total of 4000 miles on a bicycle in a calendar year. I came pretty close in 2007 when I set out to ride 3650 and succeeded. This year came out to 4120 or thereabouts, including my first century ride (followed closely by a second) and a number of rides over 60 miles. Maybe 5000 for next year. Maybe the Unnamed Epic. Who knows?

Second, I had decided at some point that I would like to end the year at "170 pounds of mostly muscle." Happily, I now weigh 168 pounds and, thanks to a couple of strength training classes, feel stronger than I have for years. So there you go.

The bad news is that I didn't give the garden or the house as much love as they deserved, but I'll get back to those this year. I promise.

Remember Me Thus

2010-02-26T08:58:00.003-06:00

When my time comes, and I'm hoping it's a long ways off, I can only hope I'm wearing a smile like this one.

Well-written Cyclofrost coverage here. I'm in the video at about :30 and :40, but the footage is from the second race. I had already spent my nest egg by then...

(Photo courtesy of Renee Callaway, madcross dot org)

Slush and Cowbells

2010-02-21T21:55:00.006-06:00

So, I participated in the second annual Cyclofrost Race this weekend, part of Madison's Winter Fest. It was a non-sanctioned cyclocross race to benefit a local pediatric fitness program.

The festival is mostly skiing, and takes place on snow is trucked down to the capitol square, spread out on the street and groomed. It's a great surface for skiing, and even for cycling when it's cold. But today was not very cold—about 20˚F at dawn, warming to almost the freezing point by the 10:30 race time.

Pal Chuck and I entered the costume division. I was dressed as Brent Favre the Drama Viqueen (otherwise known as an old guy looking to get clobbered) and Chuck went as a pregnant nun (Nun 4U). We were joined by Pal Andy's son, one of Kid O's 5th-grade classmates; Bob Downs, national cyclocross champ and the owner of Planet Bike; and a couple of 30-somethings: a dude dressed as some sort of hipster leprechaun and a woman dressed as either an octopus or a spider, whom I promptly nicknamed Octocross.

Preriding the course, it was clear that the Black Pony with the Larry front tire was the right choice, and anything with skinny tires not so much. Even so, the nice flat hardpack we had inherited from the skate ski event quickly turned into a mushy mess as the temperature rose toward the freezing mark.

About a quarter of the way through the first lap, I pulled into the lead and stayed there until the beginning of the second, when Bob passed me right after the first barrier. I lapped all of the other racers at least once during the course of the race, but try as I might, I wasn't able to catch him. My visit to painsville became ever more fulfilling as the ruts grew bigger and bigger and my ability to hold a line—any line—got smaller and smaller. After a gruelling 30 minutes plus bell lap, I finished second about a quarter lap back. Fifth grade boy made a strong third with a killer combination of power-to-weight and weight-to-contact-patch-size ratios. He won the costume prize as a soccer playa. The field rounded out with leprechaun, pregnant nun and Octocross (I think).

For next year? Colder weather, wider rims or bigger legs. In that order.

The Earth Moved

2010-02-10T08:17:00.002-06:00

Earthquake woke me up at 03:58. Laid awake for a while trying to decide whether it was a quake or one of those new, really quiet snowplows. Turned out to be a 4.3 centered near Sycamore IL, down there bei DeKalb. The upper midwest isn't known for earthquakes, but we do have one now and then.

It Has its Rewards

2010-01-21T10:02:00.001-06:00

Why ride in the winter? This is why:

Triple D Follow-Up

2010-01-14T13:00:00.001-06:00

There are a few more reports up from Frank, Troy, Colin and Drew.

Thank You
to Pranali the PT, my Doc at GHC and the staff at UW Sports Medicine for helping me straighten out whatever was going on with my knee. Thanks to Plantet Bike and Revolution Cycles. Thanks also to Chuck and Andy for the bike mojo and moral support; to my folks for hosting Lilianna the Spoiled, Furry, Black and White Chicken; and many friends and coworkers for at least smiling while telling me I was crazy. Many thanks to the organizers, Lance and Traci, and especially to the many race volunteers that made this thing possible. Finally, my warmest thanks to my wife and daughter for putting up with this whole business.

Here are a few of my conclusions about doing this crazy thing now that a couple of days have passed:

The Good
Looking forward to and training for this has really improved fitness and motivation. I also decided back in July that it wouldn't hurt to lose 30 pounds by race day either. I managed to lose about 25 and I feel pretty darn good with the combined effect.

I also get out more in the winter now. For a number of years, I've gotten pretty sullen in the fall, and downright grumpy in the winter. Having something to look forward to mitigates that somewhat.

Also, there's nothing quite like winter riding to sharpen those mad bike skilz.

The Bad

The unpredictable conditions can be a little frustrating. Like anyone, I have my share of frustrations already, so procuring more is a little...something...I dunno, stupid? It does tend to be part of the fun though and would make an eventual finish all that much sweeter. I guess.

I also get a little obsessive, especially as race day draws near. From here I can feel the missus rolling her eyes and asking "a little!?" But yeah, it's part of the package with me.

And then there's the spending compulsively on bike stuff. This is the worst part. The Epic bags and crankset were planned, but I also got several tires, new brakes, the handwarmers, tubes, and a few other things. Some of it didn't even get used, and that's where better discipline would benefit.

The Ugly

My moisture management sucked. I got soaked. I'm not sure what to do about it, but it sounds like it was a problem for many of the participants. Good thing to research over the summer.

Really, the bike I used wasn't doing it for me. The two main issues are the tires and wheel size and its weight:

Don't know what I'll do about tire size yet. I'm toying with the idea of putting my Pugs fork on a Karate Monkey and running a fat front and skinny rear. I don't really think there's a Pugs, Fatback or custom snowbike in my future. But who knows, maybe We'll strike oil in the back yard.

As much as I like the dynamo front hub for general riding, it adds over a pound and some unknown amount of drag, even when the light is off. It is likely to go. I also had a thermos of coffee along which I didn't drink. My tools and backup clothing will also be going on a diet. As much as I'd like to be prepared for any mechanical failure, I think concession has to be made for what could realistically be fixed in the cold.

Here's to next year...

By the Ice of My Brow

2010-01-11T11:22:00.012-06:00

So, I raced in the Triple D Winter Race again this year and, well, at least it was a Double D. My goal, as last year, was to finish the 62-mile mid-January event in a reasonable period of time. Something like 10 or 11 hours. Once again, not so much, though this year was a considerable improvement for me (and many others, I'm sure) over last year.

About 10 days before the event, the long-range forecast in the Dubuque area was for moderate temperatures (20˚F) and only a 20% chance of precipitation by race day. Weather in the Midwest isn't known for adhering to forecasts though. Trail conditions improved right up until the Wednesday before the race, when a storm came through and dumped 4 or 5 inches of snow, with winds creating some large drifts. Fortunately, Friday was quiet and the snowmobiles broke a nice new trail on top of the old, leaving a packed trough down the center of the Heritage trail.

Saturday morning was clear and cold, -2˚F with a light wind out of the northwest making it feel like about -15˚. Spirits were high as we rolled out of Dubuque and headed for the trailhead. The route was altered somewhat this year to avoid the private ATV trails, which were still drifted shut.

As we reached the edge of town, we had to walk a mile-plus section of the path within the city limits that the city doesn't plow, but that gave me a chance to chat with Mr. Coleman and get a head start on my eating and drinking.

About 5 miles out, we came to the real snowmobile trail, and I started to hit my stride. The Pony did well on the hardpack down the center of the trail, and the WTB Wierwolf LT (cheers Tarik) front and Mutano Raptor rear tires hooked up really well at about 14 psi. I started to outrun the other 26" skinny-tired bikes but for the tandem crew (you read that correctly—I know, it was a shock for me too) though the fattie bikes and many 29ers had long since left me in the dust. I was running at about 9 mph average and feeling like I was working but managing quite well. And it was a beautiful day.

Then at about mile 12 or 14, I saw the tandem crew pulled over for a snack and decided that looked like a great idea. I had just stopped and said hi when we all heard and then saw something coming down the trail. A Snowcat was approaching, pulling a grooming sled. I thought, and then said out loud, "great, they're grooming it." To which one of the tandem guys said something to the effect of "I'm not so sure how great that's gonna be." Unfortunately, he was right. The groomer pulled all of the soft snow from the edges of the trail into the depression where the hardpack was and made it almost impossible to ride even with the fattest tires. What it left us was less than a foot at each edge of packed snow with a really variable hardness. The net result for anybody with skinny tires was a little riding followed by a little walking, a pattern which I repeated for the next 14 or so miles. Uphill all the way.

(kind of a lousy photo, but I really was busy trying to get through the stuff that was worse.)

I followed the trail of first the Pugsley in front of me, then a skinny-tired bike, and then a whole bunch of tracks recorded where the groomer had met all of the riders. Passed a bunch of runners and skiers going the other way, but very few snomos. Huff, puff. Zig-zagged back and forth across the trail, looking for the longest possible stretch of solid snow before getting bogged down and having to walk again. Sometimes I'd go 20 feet, sometimes 200 yards. On the bike, off the bike. Stretches where fatbike tracks had floated right over soft spots, I sank in. Very frustrating.

So yes, this event is a mental challenge. By about mile 19, I was muttering a steady stream of obscenities (okay, it was a loud mutter) and vowed that, frak this, the DDD and I were through. It was about 2 in the afternoon and about 10 above at this point, and I had to decide what to do. The combination of walking and riding made for difficult eating, and the exertion and delay were burning through my water supply. The plan had been to make Dyersville in under 4 and a half hours, but that was clearly out the window at this point. I met a skier at Epworth, and he told me that I was less than 10 miles out and that the last 5 miles into Dyersville were pretty good for cycling. So even though turning around would have meant going downhill all the way back to Dubuque, I decided to ride there and sag out rather than turn around and soon have to hunt for water.

Very soon after Epworth, I saw the lead bike coming at me from the other direction. Lance, hauling on his fatbike like the devil himself was chasing him. What do you know, a couple minutes later, Dennis followed, also going like a madman. Passed another biker or two (Cory and Nick, I think) as I struggled to the Farley underpass, where I ran out of water.

Fortunately, Dysersville was about 5 miles away, and trail conditions improved considerably. The temperature dropped and the wind picked up, so I went to a balaclava and the goggles. Saw a few more riders, including probably Adam and Ben, and for sure Frank maybe two miles out.

Pulled into town, turned left at the tank and rode maybe a half a mile on the road to the Quick and Handy. There were about 7 or 8 other bikers there, half of whom were dropping out and catching a pickup truck ride back to the start. I called the Sag coordinator and dropped out and I think I was the last of about 15 to sign the book at 3:30 p.m. Bought water, juice, cashews and beef jerky for the ride home. Realized while loading the bikes onto the truck that every inch of me was soaked with sweat. Yum.

Here I am with Z and a very nice race volunteer whose name I didn't catch. The other Mr. Z and the Decorah were in the back of the crew cab. Conversation was lively and we steamed up the windows in a hurry. Turned out I had made the right decision when we spied that damn groomer from the truck, heading back up the trail into Dyersville. Arrived back at about 4:15 p.m.

Here are the other accounts so far:

The Tandem Duo, the Shockstar, Mr. Davie Gie, Colin and our winner, Lance.

Final Bike Mileage Total

2010-01-05T09:26:00.003-06:00

3460. Not too bad. I think I might shoot for 4K in 2010...

Slogology 102

2010-01-01T11:19:00.015-06:00

I did my last training ride for 2009 on the very last day of the year. I decided to do something similar to the upcoming DDD to see how I'm doing on fitness. Last year taught me that I really needed to up the fitness, especially the Pushing a Bike Through Deep Snow part. Yeah, be careful what you wish for.

I left home at about 10:30 a.m. under sunny skies, 24°F, and a northwest wind at 15-25 MPH. The city of Madison does a really good job of clearing the bike paths, so the first 7 or 8 miles were an uneventful warmup.

Then I turned onto a short section of the Capital City trail, which hadn't been plowed after the nuisance snowfall the previous day. Still easy going.

Then took the half-mile connector to the trailhead for the Military Ridge rail to trail, about 10 miles from my house. This part of the trail is not plowed, so it was here that the real training began. I bypassed a little bit of slogging by riding through the old weigh station (several acres of plowed pavement that stands mostly unused) and fording a little stream to get onto the trail.

I think our official snow cover is probably in the 20-inch range, but we've had significant rain since the 14-inch event on the 9th. Pretty crusty but compacted and not terrible for short distances. I was very glad to find day-old snowmobile tracks on the trail itself.

Even though they really aren't supposed to be there on this section of trail.

Personally, I'd be fine with snomos on this part of the trail, given adequate snow cover. The two miles to the section that is open to them took about 45 minutes. After that, the active snowmobile trail was a very welcome change of pace, from about 3 MPH to about 8 MPH.

Next was the five-mile leg through Verona and into Riley, where I had hoped to stop for a burger and a short tapper. The trail turns northwest just south of Verona, in this case directly into the jaws of the wind. Four miles of it. Started to encounter snomos out here, but I was on my politest behavior and yielded to every single one of them. Saw a couple of skate skiers and a few people walking dogs; even walked and chatted briefly with a guy going my direction. Mostly pretty desolate though. I was really beginning to look forward to a stop at the tavern.

Too bad they were closed. I guess it pays to call ahead. So I had my backup lunch: a Clif bar (frozen nearly solid) and some mercifully hot coffee from my new little thermos. Not the most satisfying thing in the world, but it hit the spot.

So I headed for home at this point, grateful that the wind was now at my back. The Pony did really, really well on the snomo-packed trails, and the studded tires held the off-camber stretches just fine.

I stopped in Verona and got some lunch, a meatball sub, some chips and a refill for my coffee. I really shouldn't have had a meatball sub. Duh. I lived to regret it. Then I rode back to the slog section and spent another 45 minutes hoofing it back to the Madison trail system.

Once I got back to the Cap City trail, I decided to add another 5 miles to my daily total and follow it home. It still wasn't plowed, but the inch or so of powder accumulated since the last plowing was hardly noticeable except that it muffled the sound of the studded tires. This trail runs through a couple of preserves, so some of it is quite open to the wind. I eventually had to walk a couple of short sections that had drifted over, but nothing like the unplowed sections of the Military Ridge.

About 6 miles from home, the trail turned to the north and I found myself again bucking a headwind. The temperature had dropped to about 12°F by this time, and the sun had gone down, so this was rather unpleasant. I caught myself telling myself "you can do this" at one point, which is sort of a bad sign for me. Turns out that I could though, and I arrived home at about 5:15 p.m. in pretty good shape. 45 miles, approx. 7.5 MPH avg. Many thanks to the missus for indulging me the time to do this.

Riley CCT Pony
Find more Bike Rides in Madison, Wisconsin

Winter Cycling Gear I Like, Part 2

2009-12-29T12:42:00.015-06:00

Okay, so only the first thing on this list is strictly winter gear, but it's all stuff I'm using on the winter bike, so it's fair game anyway.

I thought for a long time that bar mitts or Pogies or whatever you want to call them were for sissies and that a good pair of mittens with liner gloves would always be sufficient. Wrong. I was at Farm and Fleet the other day for something else and happened across a pair of QuadGear ATV mitts for under $20, so I decided to give them a shot. Yeah, pretty good stuff. I can wear a pair of cotton jersey gloves inside these down to about zero Fahrenheit and my fingers are pretty toasty. They have little velcro-closure pockets inside for chemical hand warmers. Easy velcro attachment. Granted, they are not custom Epic Designs Pogies, and don't fit my Titec H-bars like a glove exactly, and I sacrifice some hand positions because of it, but they're a good way to try out bar mitts. There's also enough room inside to carry an extra pair of gloves, a toque and maybe a little food. Experience to date suggests I won't need the warmer pockets for warmers, but I bet they'd fit some nibbles.

Another thing I like in the winter are dynamo hubs and LED headlights. I'm currently running a DH-3N71 disk hub on the Pony, which has Ultegra-quality bearings and kicks out 6 volts at 3 watts. It's hooked up to a German-made Schmidt Edelux 2-watt LED headlight. The LED actually shines backward into a parabolic reflector that faces forward, creating a nice, even, parallelogram-shaped patch of light right where you need it most. The beam also has a sharp cutoff at its top, helping to not blind other road and path users. Think BMW headlight rather than the usual vertically-symmetrical flashlight beam you get with most bicycle lights. Here's a picture of the beam (top) in action versus the 1W Planet Bike Blaze LED dynamo headlight (bottom):

Don't get me wrong, I love the PB light, especially for its killer Superflash blinkie mode, but the Edulux is better for seeing more of what's on the ground ahead of the bike.

One thing I really like about dynamos in general is that you don't have to noodle with batteries, which tend to be sapped by cold temperatures. Something about not converting chemical energy into light energy quite as easily. I know that battery technology has gotten much better in recent years, but I just don't like dealing with them in general, whether rechargeable or disposable.

I'm also using an all-dyno powered setup on the Mo ose now, with a Shimano NX-30 hub powering a Lumotec IQ Fly headlight (truly great for the price), PB Blaze and Busch & Müller DToplight XS Plus taillight. Not supposed to be able to do all of that, but it works. Potential future Blog Gold.

The best I have saved for last. My new Epic Designs frame bag and gas tank. Another hat tip to Doug for finally pushing me over the edge on ordering these in plenty of time to take delivery for the DDD. These might seem sort of expensive, but when you consider that they're custom-made from high-end materials by a guy who really knows his stuff and feel how light the package is when it arrives in the mail, they start to seem like a pretty darn good deal. I've been carrying a couple of dry shirts, a pump, a few tools, a tube, first aid kit and thermos of hot beverage in the frame bag and eats in the gas tank.

The last likey, neither strictly winter or cycling, is the camera that's been shooting most of the photos that appear here and in my Flickrama over the last month or so. It's the waterproof, dustproof and shock-resistant Panasonic Lumix TS1. After thrashing 4 cameras over the last 4 or 5 years and dooming 2 of hem, I settled on something that might have a chance of surviving going everywhere with me for just a little longer. We'll see how that works out. It's doing well so far in spite of being subjected to this sort of thing:

Also, one little footnote regarding the previous post. I like Freddie's Revenz Lites for the kind of riding that happens around here. On the 48mm ZHI rims at about 15-18psi, they have a pretty squared-off profile, darn good gription and more than a little bit of squishiness to soak up rough trail surfaces. All this in something that weighs less and feels better than the 2.5-inch WTB Timberwolf and Continental Digga tires that I had tried on before—tires that don't carry the 336 steel stud insurance policy. Been looking at the Larry though...

Winter Cycling Gear I Like, Part 1

2009-12-20T21:34:00.005-06:00

Even though I've been into the whole snowbiking thing ever since I first threw a leg over my buddy's chrome Ross Mt. Hood back in January of 1989, only lately have I gone really nuts on gear. I've gotten about a half dozen things over the last 12 months that I really, really like and are genuinely helpful.

As a wise man once said, "When I go winter camping, I don't wear my summer hiking shoes with shoe covers. I wear winter boots. When I go snowshoeing, I don't wear summer shoes with covers on them. I wear winter boots."

I think this applies to feet, heads and most of the winter clothing a person can name.

The first thing I got was a pair of Lake MXZ302 winter boots. Yeah, they were expensive, even getting them on closeout this past spring. I had gotten a pair of the older MXZ300 model used at the bike swap a couple of years back and really liked them but for two issues: 1. they were just a little too small, and 2. they are only good down to about 20 degrees Fahrenheit. The new ones are better on both counts.

The second is a downhill ski helmet. Until this year, I've muddled through winter with all sorts of stuff covering my head. I came pretty close with a good spandex scullcap and neck gaiter, but never quite got it right. Then one day I was shopping at local sporting goods store that was having a moving sale and happened across a Giro G10 like this one:

They only had the one in stock, and it was a mere Large. I tried it on, thinking it would never fit my enormous melon, and what do you know? Just about perfect. Feels more solid than the average bike helmet, is fully lined and has very good ear coverage. Full goggle compatibility too, including a strap keeper on the back. I'm not wild about the way it distorts my hearing, but it's not much different than a pair of dog ears. A solid win, but doesn't make me any less goofy-looking:

The last thing for this post is the Nokian Freddie's Revenz Lite studded tire. Made specifically for off-road ice racing, it tends to be overkill for anything to do with commuting, until we get 14 inches of snow in one day. Worked great all of last week, and I'm hoping it's a better bet than the Surly Endomorph for the DDD. We'll see.

Even though it's full of metal, it seems to weigh a little less than the WTB Timberwolf 2.5 I used on this bike in nicer weather. Has a little more supple feel too.

Next time, a little bit about bags, lights and other sundries.

2009 in Review, Part One

2009-12-18T20:35:00.008-06:00

I know it isn't over yet, but I have a lot to say and I can type faster now, so here we go.

Back in 2007, I did quarterly updates: Q1, Q2, Q3 and Q4, but I haven't done them for the last two years.

I think we'll make Part the First about bicycle riding.

2008 saw a drop in milage in relation to 2007 from 3600 to about 3200. Most of that was pretty leisurely, with only a couple of notables. First, there were a couple of heavy-duty weeks of recreational riding in the summer, a spike in gas prices made for some very busy bike paths, and I did the second-annual Bike the Barns ride. The second notable was the decision to try the DDD and the building of the Black Pony, which I blogged here and here. That turned out to be a pivotal decision for this year.

This year was a little more intense. I'm on track to close out the year at almost 3500 miles, but the distinction is more in the speed at which those miles were ridden. This year was faster without question. Something about the DDD prompted me to start riding as though I were training for something, which I guess I am. I've dropped almost 30 pounds since last year at this time, joined a gym and feel much stronger. It's been a really positive motivator for me.

Other landmarks in 2009 include the Glare Ice Project, the Planet Trek with my youngin, Madison's first annual Ride the Drive, the third annual Bike the Barns ride, and my very first cyclocross race. Didn't buy any new bikes this year, but did reconfigure the Cross Check again:

Considering a dedicated cross bike for next season if I'm still in the mood. Maybe a nice Chili Con Crosso frame built up with my parts. We'll see.

The DDD is coming up on January 9. I'm doing it 30 pounds lighter this year, with a bike that weighs 6 pounds less, better winter boots, a winter (downhill ski) helmet, better tires and a set of Epic Designs frame bags. Should be much more interesting...I guess we'll see what the weather does compared to last year.

All Done

2009-12-09T20:14:00.002-06:00

It's finally stopped snowing now and the wind has picked up and shifted around to the North. We're all snug in the rug, though a little sore. It was a leg- and neck-gaiter kind of day.

Losing Ground

2009-12-09T12:15:00.003-06:00

Still snowing. City shut down. Typing is shaky. Have yet to see a snowplow today. Snow weighs as much as a heart attack. Might take a catnap now that I've had a big bowl of chili, a Thermotab and a couple big glasses of water. Then I'll put on my last pair of dry gloves and go back at it.

Blizzard Warning

2009-12-09T09:50:00.005-06:00

16 inches of wet, heavy, snowman-grade snow so far. No work today but for the all-day shoveling marathon. Nobody is going anywhere. Wisconsin has declared a state of emergency. Please, if you can read this, stop by the liquor store and pick me up some antifreeze.

Read more about it here

Just a Shadow of my Present Self

2009-11-19T20:14:00.003-06:00

The old Tracking Shot of the Ride to Work Shadow is always a crowd pleaser. This is along the Monona Terrace Convention Center here in Madison. Not an original idea by a long shot—here's another.

In other news, I'm working on a comparison of a few dynamo-powered LED bike headlights. Should be blog gold.

In other other news, the typing is coming along nicely and beginning to speed up a little. May be able to type at a respectable speed someday.

3100 and Counting

2009-11-17T12:33:00.006-06:00

Yeah, I know that for a long time, one of Grant's rules was "don't keep track," but it's one that I never really heeded. So, for the fourth year in a row, I find myself someplace north of 3k miles of total riding. I'm a piker compared to some of you, but I'm pretty happy with it. Might like to see what the high side of 4k looks like. Think I'll try that next year.

Which is More Important

2009-11-11T10:42:00.005-06:00

...for the bike commuter, a sense of adventure or a sense of humor? It's cheating to say "both."

Ideal was putting some barge into the lake this morning (the lake is to the left in the shot above) so it was time for the bikers to break out their mad cyclocross skilz.

This guy? Fail.

My Summer Vacation

2009-11-09T22:31:00.002-06:00

So back in July, I had a couple of days off, and that kid and I were trying to think up something to do. We talked about going for a bike ride and the idea of doing the Planet Trek came up. It's a pretty cool thing—a scale model of the solar system spread out over 23 miles of bike path. Every object has its own placard describing its stats and relative size. The sun is represented by a 24-foot circle of flowers, Jupiter is the size of a hula hoop and Pluto is the size of a marble. With the marble located in Mount Horeb, this was really too far for the ten year old to ride in one day. So without really thinking, I suggested we could do the trek in one direction one day, camp overnight and return the next. Once I said it, there was no taking it back, and the kid was determined to do exactly that.

So here she is:

and me with the Big Dummy, loaded for bear:

My first mistake was waiting until almost noon to leave the house. I had figured we could make maybe 8 miles per hour over 32 miles and be in camp by six or so with stops. Not so much.

First stop, the sun:

See how happy? It wasn't to last. We then proceeded to visit the other placards in town in relatively quick succession. Pluto, Venus, Earth, Mars, Ceres (an asteroid), and Jupiter went by pretty quickly. We stopped for a saddle adjustment on her bike and for a couple of other things:

Then there was Saturn, last of the happy planets:

You'll notice that there's quite a distance between Saturn and Neptune. Probably about 14 miles:

14 miles can do quite a little bit to change one's mood:

Of course, my mood always improves with a stop at the Riley tavern for a samnitch or two (as it did on last winter's Shakedown Cruise for a Snowbike):

The last 7 or 8 miles were uphill and rather grueling for the youngster. We were stopping at a pace of about once per mile at this point and her conscientious penchant for remaining well-hydrated made for a couple of very much anticipated potty stops. She was still doing well, but not getting any more enthusiastic:

Here we are on Pluto. Learning is fun.

The next part, between Mt Horrible and Blue Mounds, was a little farther than I thought and by far the most difficult part of the trip for the little human on the Big Dorky Bicycle. The saddle is a little too big for a kid, so her seat was sore. We stopped at a convenience store, and by some mad twist of fate, thank goodness, they had a bottle of baby powder.

Six miles and 7 rest stops later, we arrived at the turnoff into Blue Mounds State Park. Just one more 350-foot climb up a 10 percent grade to go. Oh, and then find the park office. And a site. No, really, it was easy. We bought firewood at the camp office, loaded it onto the DumV and arrived on site at about 7:30.

I didn't take many photos in camp because we were pretty busy setting up the tent and cooking dinner. Did manage to get one snap of the weenie roast:

We slept pretty well but for the nighttime raid by La Coonsa Nostra. These were not your ordinary cuddly Disney raccoons, but snarling, nasty, streetwise thugs bent on stealing our hot dog buns at any cost. They managed to figure out how to knock down the stuff I had hung in the tree in about 15 minutes. I finally ended up taking our little cooler and what remained of our dry goods to an adjacent site and asking a fellow camper to shut it in their car to be recovered in the morning. Egad.

After things settled down, I still didn't sleep all that well. Seems a little silly in retrospect, but I was worried about how I was going to get that kid home the next day. She was tired and sore and we had talked about calling the missus to sag her out.

Day broke and that kid slept until about 8, but rolled out of bed all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. We had some milk and cereal, our eggs broken having not been properly stowed. We roasted a couple of hot dogs, drank some coffee and decided to treat ourselves to a proper breakfast in Mount Horrible. After finding out that the pool didn't open until noon (thus missing the major attraction at BMSP) we broke camp and hit the road. After a very slow and careful descent out of the park, it was smooth downhill sailing toward home:

See that smile? What a difference a good night's sleep can make!

We ate brunch at a brewpub in Mount Horeb called the Grumpy Troll.
Burgers and fries tasted pretty good right about then. Outdoor seating.

Stopped plenty of times on the way back, including a bit of a layover in Riley. No bar food this time though:

We also stopped in Verona for ice cream and hunted high and low for Uranus. In fact, the idea that we couldn't locate yer-ay-nus became, as one might expect with a ten year old, the standing joke for the entire trip. We thought we had just missed it on the way out, but on the return trip we even asked a park ranger along the trail, "pardon us sir, have you seen Uranus?" The answer was "no."

Again that kid started to drag pretty hard at about 7 miles out, but with ample encouragement and not a few rest breaks, we were home by dinnertime.

The Big Dummy and the Amsterdam actually turned out to be something like the Dynamic Duo. When her stuff was too heavy to carry past Mount Horeb on the way out the first day, I just plunked it on the Dummy and we soldiered on. I have to say that it was a pleasure to ride even fully loaded on the limestone trail. The Amsterdam, while a big heavy thing, beat her little 24-inch mountain bike with its steady cruise and carrying capacity.

Given to do again (which we will, I can guarantee) I think we'll put a better saddle on the A'dam and get her out on it for a few shorter rides to accustom her to it. As it was, she was a real trooper doing 62 miles in two days. Gained a new respect for her.

Cyclocross Hurts

2009-11-06T10:31:00.003-06:00

I mean, look at that face:

Photo courtesy of Renee Callaway, madcross dot org

This was the Camrock Classic Rock of Cross WCA Cross event in Rockdale back on October 18. My very first CC race ever. Chuck and I raced the Masters Cat 4 very first thing in the frosty morning. Started out by getting lost in the road construction on the way to the race, parking across the river and riding across a pedestrian bridge and the last half mile to the course.

The Dropouts that organized this thing are pretty deep in the Masters, so my goals were to 1. finish, 2. not get lapped, 3. not break anything and 4. not kill myself. Resounding success on all 4. I finished 24th of 29 (with one DNF) and would likely have been 25 had Chuck not let the air out of his front tire on the final lap. Four laps in about 38 minutes. Prolly close to lapped, but not.

Yeah, after about the first lap I wanted very badly to stop but hung in there. A little sore the next day but not too bad. Looked at shiny new CX bikes all week but resisted temptation easily, having not that kind of scratch. Maybe a couplafew races next year if the urge strikes...

What I Did With My Spring Vacation

2009-11-05T22:43:00.015-06:00

Meet the Dinkle House. The Dinkle house is that which the Babilonia clan calls home. From the time we bought it in 1997 until this March, it looked more or less like this:

But time came for paint, and it was decided, and rightfully so, that it needed a little more love than just a coat of paint. We decided on new siding and insulation. Piece of cake.

Here are pal Chuck and I tearing off the old sheathing. My advice in retrospect would be to not try this at home. It's a miserable business in many important ways, but I'm very lucky to have a bunch of folks in my life willing to help a guy who's gotten himself in over his head. Special thanks to Chuck, Karen, Joel, Tom, Steve and Bob. Won't soon forget it.

Once the tearoff was over, it looked a little naked:

You could see all the plumbing and electrical from the street. And hear a lot more of the street from inside the house. Then came the Insulators:

Blown-in fiberglass. Rated at about R16, which is quite an improvement over the R6 or so that we had with the previous material. These guys showed up at ten past eight, were gone by noon and came in $70 under bid. Wish all construction went that way.

Plywood sheathing:

Foam board:

and finally, spanky new fiberglass siding:

This stuff is the new darling of architects everywhere, or so I am told. Six months on it still looks great and is holding up well, but we'll see whether it lasts. All the windows are aluminum clad, so it won't need a lot of maintenance. A little soon to tell whether the insulation has made a big difference, but the weather has turned cold...

They's Gonna Be Some Changes Around Here

2009-11-04T23:07:00.004-06:00

So. It's been a while. Yeah, I've been busy, but I'm sure everybody else is busy too. Must have needed a break from blogging. Having had a nudge from Mr. Stonebreaker, I'm back. And They's Gonna Be Some Changes Around Here.

First, no more pussyfooting around about who I am. My real name is listed in my profile, and you can find me on Facebook and Flickr more easily now too.

Second, I've obviously changed the look of the blog. Got kinda bored with the old one. Hope you like it, cuz it's gonna be around a while.

Third, part of the reason I haven't been blogging is that I broke my little camera back in March and have yet to replace it. No pictures, no story, as far as I'm concerned. Unable so far to accomplish the task of finding a new one.

Fourth, I failed high school personal typing and type like a schizophrenic chicken. It's really hard to bang out regular blog entries when you can only frantically peck about 30 WPM. So I'm trying to learn to touch type. Not going all that well yet.

Fifth, I've been changing my lifestyle a bit and now eat better, exercise more and have lost a bit of weight. Did a cyclocross race recently and am getting a fitness evaluation next week. No, I will not be trading in my personal life for an Ironman berth, but I will be doing a repeat appearance at the DDD this coming January.

Feeling pretty good. And I have been busy.

The Passing of a Bullhead

2009-09-30T21:02:00.002-05:00

For Robert Lloyd Olsen, a few thousand parting words.

Husband, father, soldier:

My grandfather (if you're wondering, I still look great in red socks):

Friend to dogs:

So long, pal.

At the Races

2009-02-08T21:12:00.001-06:00

At the races
Originally uploaded by Olive Talique.

A rare photo of me on a bike. Thanks Olive!

Tour de Slush

2009-02-07T22:19:00.004-06:00

Yeah, the Glare Ice Project was supposed to be Madison's premier icebike race, but nobody could have predicted 45-degree temperatures on February 7. I rode the course after work the day before and it was fantastic. The next day it had 4 inches of water on it.

I rode in the second heat, which was 5 guys and 5 laps. Got behind a guy on a cyclocross bike and had a lot of trouble passing him—I ultimately finished fourth. Somehow I ended up with the DFL trophy even though there were riders in the other two heats that got lapped. Maybe it was because I was standing in front of the person handing out the stuff after the race. Oh well, it was fun anyway. Thanks to the folks at Revolution and everyone else who helped put it on.

It Was a Pretty Good Day

2009-01-20T22:40:00.003-06:00

Glad to have grownups in charge again.

More Triple D Ride Reports

2009-01-15T08:23:00.007-06:00

Here are reports from Lance (the race organizer), Dennis , Devon, Spinner, Ben the Shockstar and Skip.

Oh, and it was also covered by the local news (video link in the upper left, above the reporter's photo.)

Slog is a Four-Letter Word

2009-01-12T21:00:00.003-06:00

slog |släg|
verb ( slogged , slogging )
1 [ intrans. ] work hard over a period of time : they were slogging away to meet a deadline.
• [with adverbial of direction ] walk or move with difficulty or effort : he slogged home through the gray slush.

Yeah, yeah, I know, long timey no bloggy. Guess I've had other things cooking.

So I did the the Triple D Winter Adventure Race on Saturday. Right up front I should mention that I was a complete adventure sport virgin before Saturday. Yes, I've ridden a bike for commuting and for recreation year-round since 1989, and even did a bike race in the summer of 1990, but I've never done anything competitively in the winter. Not so much as a 5k cross-country ski race. This was a hell of a way to start.

I built up a chinese-made Motobecane mountain bike frame (blogged earlier here) for the race. (But because I can't afford to have a bike just for winter racing, it will also eventually serve as a replacement for my current winter commuter.) All of last week, trail conditions were reported to be fast but icy. My friend Chuck kindly offered to lend me his set of Nokian Extreme 294 studded tires, which are designed for off-road winter racing. I eagerly accepted and put them on for my Wednesday and Thursday commutes. Perfect for icy conditions. On Friday, Madison and Dane County got 4-10 inches of fresh powder, but Dubuque got less than an inch. We arrived at the Grand Harbor Resort Friday night after a nice clear, uneventful drive from Madison, and after a visit to the water park with the missus and youngin, I went to bed with visions of having a really a good ride on Saturday.

Then it snowed.

We woke up Saturday to a fresh 5+ inches of powder on top of all that nice fast ice. In the words of race organizer Lance Andre, "there is no good bike for these conditions." And he turned out to be right.

Hour 1
About 40 cyclists rolled out of the resort parking lot under an overcast sky, with 20-degree temps and a light wind out of the north-northwest. We went northwest through Dubuque to a paved section of the Heritage bike trail. I ran near the back of the pack right from the start. Then we turned west onto another paved bike path on the south side of highway 32 and began the long climb out of the river valley. At the top of the hill, the bike path ended and we crossed to the westbound shoulder and continued almost until Middle Road, where the route went into the ditch adjacent to the road. Up to this point, which was about 10 miles from the start, I had been maintaining a respectable 9 mile per hour pace and dropped the 5 or 6 riders that had been behind me. Pushing the bike uphill through fresh powder over ice slowed progress to about 2 mph. My homemade insulated toe covers and chemical toe warmers conspired at that point to cook my piggies, and the toe covers had the added benefit of covering the part of the boot tread best suited to pushing. The fun had begun.

Hour 2
After another short stint on the road, the route cut onto a private ATV trail that ran through a hay field. Here the pushing began in earnest. Pushing up one side of a hill led to a not-so-controlled roll, slide or push down the next. I caught a whiff of bacon and decided it was time to stop and take the toe warmers out of my boots. I also switched from clear ski goggles to sunglasses as the cloud cover had begun to lighten. After more pushing and one wipeout, I came out into an industrial park running a couple of minutes behind the biker ahead of me. By the time I had gotten to the next off-road section a mile or so later, there was noone else in sight.

Hour 3
Next came the What the Hell am I Doing Here? moment. I found myself mostly pushing along this "trail" through farm fields, up and down hills, through a drainage ditch (mostly glare ice under the snow) and finally to come upon another rider fixing a flat tire in the company of a race volunteer and the event photographer. They told me that I was not in last place—so that, along with the sunshine, lifted my spirits quite a bit. As I continued on, the guy who had been fixing his flat passed me pretty quickly. I pushed on over another couple of hills, catching up to another rider just as we reached Humke Road. He was riding a Specialized FSR XC with homemade studded tires, which probably worked just as well as my bike, but he was having trouble with cramps. Humke runs along the top of a ridge and was windy, but clear pavement was more than welcome. Caught up to flat tire guy again , who had decided that three flats was enough and used my phone to sag out. Passed another pair of riders fixing a flat in someone's driveway. Thought that if I could just make it to the trailhead in Graf, I might be able to make it to Dyersville. After another mile or so, Humke became a gravel road and then an unmaintained track known to Iowans as a "B" road.

Hour 4
Here the route ran downhill through a wooded area, with maybe 7 or 8 inches of powder on top of a healthy sheet of glare ice. After falling about 4 times, I switched to a Fred Flintstone-esque dabfest, and then finally resorted to pushing the bike down the hill. This was by far the silliest part of the entire day. On one especially steep section near the bottom of the hill, my feet slid out from under me and I fell on my butt, sweeping a 10-foot long patch of ice clean of snow with my tights, all the while dragging the bike along behind me with one hand. Had to laugh. Had two more similar falls before reaching the bottom and the intersection with a mercifully plowed Girl Scout Road. From there, I practically flew to the trailhead near Graf to find the trail covered in as much snow as the rest of the off-road sections. This, combined with the sight of other cyclists headed back toward Dubuque prompted me to bag it and head for home. After chatting with 3 or 4 other riders coming to the same conclusion, I set out up Graf Road through Graf, headed back toward the finish at the Handle Bar in Durango.

Hour 5
I rode up to Asbury Road, took a little snack break and helping out a lost snowmobiler (I know, I couldn't believe that either) and setting upon the long climb to the Sundown Ski Area. One would think that I would have known that a ski area would be at the top of a rather large hill, but that didn't occur to me when I chose that route. The hill must have been a at least two miles of steady but not especially steep climbing. At the top, just before the ski area, a black Nissan Xterra with a bike rack headed in the other direction stopped and backed up to where I was, and a very nice man who introduced himself as Frank asked me whether I wanted a ride. It took me a second to snap out of my get to Durango mindset, but I graciously accepted. He gave me a ride back to the resort, where I had a shower, dinner, and a couple of hours at the water park with the youngin. I slept really well that night.

24.5 miles, 5 hours, 35 minutes (or thereabouts.)

Some of this might have sounded crabby, but this was a challenging event and a good reminder that nobody controls the weather. Sort of humbling, really. All tallied up, it was a beautiful day the day of the event, and I have to give the organizers credit for putting on a well-run show. Now I just have to decide whether I'll try it again next year...

Special thanks to Revolution Cycles, Planet Bike, Chuck S., Andy S., my folks (for hosting Princess Lillianna at doggie camp), the entire Triple D crew (especially Lance and Traci and Frank F.) and most of all, my wife and daughter for putting up with this foolishness.

Shakedown Cruise for a Snowbike

2008-11-30T21:24:00.008-06:00

In continuation of my effort to lay down the miles for the DDD, I took the bigfoot out for a shakedown cruise today. Yeah, it rides like kind of a big mountain bike. I did swap out the rear cassette so it's now a 1 x 8; 34 x 11-34, which ends up being a good range. I didn't put a granny on it because you might as well walk if you need anything lower than 1 to 1 in the snow.

The weather was pretty miserable for the length of ride that I did. It held just above freezing for most of the day and snowed periodically—heavily at times. Of course, it ends up being more like rain at that point and soaks your clothing. I was more or less dressed for it though and managed to stay warm until the last few miles.

The first fifteen miles were on paved trails, leaving Madison's Isthmus and heading south to the Capitol City Trail. I rode the 9-mile segment from Nob Hill to Jamestown, turning south to hook up with the Military Ridge Trail. 6 more miles of pavement brought me to the beginning of the gravel segment just east of Verona. The pavement sections had been wet but plowed, so things got a little more interesting on the snow-covered gravel. I have to say that big tires really do make a difference. I've ridden regular mountain bikes with 26 x 1.9 inch tires on this sort of surface, but you just can't beat the kind of float you get with bigger tires. You can feel the frozen footprints, but they don't slow you down much. Makes me wonder what a Surly Pugsley is like.

So I stopped at the Riley Tavern, about 25 miles out. Had a burger and a beer and watched the third quarter of the Packer game as they came back from behind to lead Carolina. (good thing I didn't stay to watch the whole thing since they ended up losing in the last couple of minutes.) Refilled my water and headed for home. Took another 10 miles of gravel Military Ridge to the paved trail and then the frontage road, eventually hooking up with the Southwest commuter bike trail. Shaved 5 miles off the return trip for a grand total of 45 miles on the day. Pretty beat and soaked to the bone upon my arrival.

Had Thanksgiving leftovers, wrote this and will soon go to bed. A good day, though not all of it made sense...

Fat and Happy

2008-11-18T11:52:00.013-06:00

I posted quite a while back that I was working on a new thing codenamed Project Why (which morphed into Project Why Not?) but have taken my sweet time getting around to finishing it. Well, here it is:

This is what I plan to ride in the DDD adventure race (or in my case, adventure ride) in January. My goal is mainly to finish.

For you bike geeks, it's a Motobecane 600HT aluminum frame with a Surly Pugsly 100 fork, Snowcat-ish 48mm trials rims, 2.4-inch tires, 1 x 8 drivetrain, Titiec H-bars, and Shimano DH-3N70 dynohub/Schmidt Edelux lighting (taillight to come.)

I have to say that this thing is quite the brute to pedal and it steers like a mattress, but the good news is that it holds a line on loose gravel in a way that suggests it will do very well in the snow. I'm guessing that we'll soon find out.

The Return of the Missing Blogger

2008-11-08T09:28:00.002-06:00

Well, I'm back. No good excuses except that I just haven't been putting in much time online. It's been too nice outside and I've been too busy with the election, the dog, the house, the garden, bikes and workworkwork. In the works are posts about the garden, Project Why Not?, hauling stuff with a Bikes at Work trailer, compost and commuting. Hopefully a couple this week...

Troublemaker

2008-09-04T09:33:00.007-05:00

Meet Princess Lillianna, the newest member of our family:

Her mother is an Australian Cattle Dog/Blue Tick Heeler mix, but her paternity is unknown. She's about nine weeks old, and after having had her for a few days, she's beginning to come out of her shell a little:

She's got a really sweet personality and is pretty darn smart. Housebreaking and socialization are coming along pretty well. More updates to come.

Just Riding Along

2008-08-26T22:49:00.007-05:00

Scenes from my big dumb bicycle life.

Lookie, I made a movie! This was shot entirely from the saddle of various bicycles, using a Fuji point-and-shoot camera. Produced with iMovie on my iMac in my iSpare iTime.

Gary Fisher El Ranchero

2008-08-18T10:49:00.006-05:00

I think we can only assume that this is Trek's entry into the longtail market that I had mentioned last week. Pretty cool—can't wait to see more.

(H/Ts: Commute by Bike and Bicycle Design)

Saturday Night Buteoblogging

2008-08-16T22:41:00.009-05:00

This redtail was hunting from atop a pole in the community gardens along St. Paul at Memphis. Right in town, maybe a mile and a half from our house.

Name That Bike Part Two

2008-08-16T22:00:00.014-05:00

I snagged this at a garage sale this morning. I bought it because the full 600 brifter group and Columbus tubing sticker made it worth risking $55. The people I bought it from told me that it had been sitting unused outside for about a year. Probably not the best bike storage strategy in Wisconsin—the chain and some of the fasteners were a little rusty—but the frame looked nice and clean. Even the tires are pretty good.

Two odd details. First, it has no decals—not a one—but for the Columbus tubing sticker, which is where things get really odd:

It's Metax. Yeah, I didn't know what it was at first either. I thought this was some low-end tube set and that the bike was maybe something banged out by the thousands in Taiwan. Maybe something from the Performance Bike mail-order catalog (it had Performance-badged bottle cages and a Forté stem). But Metax, as our pal Google tells it, is a stainless tube set.

Stainless really isn't a very popular frame material, so this narrows things down a lot. I know that one local builder was using stainless around the time this bike was probably built, but this bike doesn't seem flamboyant enough to be one of Lawrence's, and I have no idea whether he ever used Metax.

Two things might help a little. First, it has unusual rear dropouts, including a fender boss on the seatstay:

Second, it has a distinctive serial number:

Any guesses?

PS—Sorry folks, but for reasons beyond my control, the Ute review is just going to have to wait.

Big Dummy vs. Kona Ute

2008-08-07T22:02:00.008-05:00

My LBS has one in stock, so here they are side by side. I haven't ridden it yet, but I will soon. I might write something afterward. Is anyone else curious?

Update 8-12: Still haven't gotten to ride the Ute yet. I should mention that this particular example is a 2008, and that the 2009 appears to have a better bag setup.

Strange Critter

2008-08-07T21:41:00.007-05:00

Here is a Big Dummy belonging to some folks out in Denver who have set the bar just a little higher for all the utility bike geeks out there. Check out the really cool kid seating underneath the cover (click on the picture above to go to their Photostream), and oh, here's their blog.

Speaking of utility bikes, my neighbor told me that Trek was shooting some video of a prototype Gary Fisher utility bike this afternoon at the neighborhood market just down the street from us. She described it as being about the same size as the Big Dummy, but with some kind of integrated passenger seat in the stoker position, a short steel platform, and some "really cool" side bags with zippered flaps. Fat tires, disk brakes and wide upright bars. Hmmmm... isn't Interbike coming up?

PS—Did I mention that the GF had a centerstand?

4 a.m. Wake Up

2008-08-05T22:24:00.006-05:00

This is why it's my standard policy not to ride a bicycle during thunderstorms or at 4 a.m.

Project Why

2008-08-05T22:21:00.003-05:00

I really don't need to build another bike, except that none of the ones I have will serve the purpose for which this one is intended.

Feed Me

2008-07-28T21:52:00.003-05:00

I love summer. That is all.

Nicer Rack

2008-07-27T21:00:00.002-05:00

I had mentioned a while back that I was going to have a custom front rack made for the Big Dummy, and that's exactly what I went and did. We're fortunate to have a custom rack maker right here in Madison, so I was able to take the bike over and leave it with her for a couple of days so it could be fabricated and fitted. I have to say, I'm pretty darn pleased with how it turned out.

It's TIG-welded tubular and flat 304 stainless steel (which I think is the same as 18/8). It mounts at the dropout eyelets and top rack braze-ons, leaving the middle braze-ons free to mount fenders. It has a top rail and headlight mount with guard, which will accept either a bar- or post-mounted headlight (pictured below.) This rack will soon sport a wooden deck.

This adventure was more expensive than Surly's offering, but for around town I think it will be a little more practical. It was also a good opportunity to support a local builder.

As with any front rack or basket, it does change the steering a little when empty and a quite a little bit when loaded. But not in a bad way.

I'm hoping to get around to profiling the Rack Lady in the near future. Meanwhile, I've posted some more pictures in this Flickr set.

Love Salon's Love for Xtracyle

2008-07-26T21:55:00.004-05:00

Salon dot com is 'Sconnyboy-approved. Accompanying article available here. (H/T to Cleverchimp.)

A Great Moment in Bicycle Infrastructure History Revisited

2008-07-22T09:49:00.001-05:00

I know I've already harped on this, but the fam and I were out riding Sunday morning and happened to return to the scene of the city of Monona's crime against cycling humanity.

I guess that city engineering has "addressed" the ambiguity for cyclists that was built into the original design by scraping the stripe off of the pavement adjacent to the whatever-it-is and re-painting it to funnel cyclists onto the salmon-colored concrete whatchamajigger. Here we see how well that has all worked out. Granted, the folks putting in the railroad tie edging won't always be there to interfere with bicycle traffic, but just imagine that it's someone walking their dog taking up the same space. The cyclist is right back to deciding which way to go.

This street was a lot better when it was just a wide expanse of pavement with no bicycle/pedestrian facilities at all. At least everybody knew where they stood. I remain convinced that this is among the stupidest bicycle facility I've ever seen. And I've seen some that are pretty stupid.

Musical Fruit

2008-07-21T14:00:00.001-05:00

Beans, beans!
Musical fruit!
The more you eat,
The more you toot!

The green bean harvest is coming in, so it's time to put some up for the winter. I'm not much of a canner, but freezing them is pretty simple. Here's how it goes:

Pick:

That part's pretty obvious. Got two full grocery bags yesterday. Gave away about a third before we started processing.

Wash:

Dirt, bugs, blossom ends, whatever...bye, bye.

Cut:

We cut off both ends, though you really don't need to cut off the pointy non-stem end. Cut large beans into smaller bits. Some people cut them lengthwise (which is to french them—but no, not that kind of frenching.)

As you can see, we're big believers in child labor here at Babilonia Farms.

Blanch:

Now we plunge the raw beans into boiling water for two to three minutes. This arrests the enzymes that drive the ripening process and probably kills any bacteria that might be hanging on.

Icewater:

They're a little hard to see, but those are ice cubes floating in this big pot of water. We'll use it to stop the cooking process after blanching.

Cool:

Like this. Needs to happen for a period of time at least equal to the blanching.

Drain:

Separate the beans from the cooling water.

Bag:

We like the quart Ziplock size. Just about right for a meal.

Label:

Nobody likes a mystery when it comes to frozen foods.

Freeze:

I think we came out at about 10 quarts. A few more and we'll be able to heat the house with natural gas this winter.

Sunday Night Catblogging

2008-07-20T21:29:00.007-05:00

Lizbet loves her a nice fat juicy dragonfly.

Crunch, crunch. Nom, nom. Yeah, she ate the whole thing. Headfirst. She eats spiders too. Eating either does nothing to keep the mosquito population down. Durn cat.

Hangin' With Electra

2008-07-20T09:00:00.003-05:00

We've had our Electra Amsterdam Classic 3 for about a year and a half now, so it's time for a little review. (By the way, Electra Web designers, I didn't link to your Amsterdam page because I hate sites that resize my browser window for me for no apparent reason. Hint, hint.) So far, it's been a bit of a mixed bag.

The Good:

This bike sure is fun. Not only is it a change of pace, but a change of pace that reminds me of my first experiences on a bike. It's got a more laid-back ride even than many of the Schwinn cruisers I've ridden, and has really wide, tall handlebars that encourage a tall sitting position and relaxed arms. The crank-forward design makes it pretty easy to put both feet down at stops, though not as easily as with a Townie.

It's also a very pretty bike and gets lots of compliments. The paint and trim are mostly very pleasing and really do give it a city bike feel. The leather mattress saddle and ergo grips are very nice. No complaints about the Shimano 3-speed internal hub with coaster brake. The rack is pretty useful, as is the stock lighting setup.

The Bad:

A while back, the rear wheel broke 4 spokes in about a day. To Electra's credit, they covered it under warranty, so maybe this doesn't belong in the bad category. It just didn't belong under good.

The Ugly:

I realize that bike companies have to make compromises to hit certain retail price points, but there are a couple of things on this bike that could have been better. Notice that the stock skirt guards are nowhere to be seen. They were plastic, with a very flimsy set of plastic clips that were supposed to secure them to the fender and seatstay. Um, back to the drawing board for those. The fenders, chaincase and fender trim also make a holy racket like a tin can full of gravel on any but the smoothest of roads.

The seatpost is a steel swag type with separate clamp. I guess that's fine, except that with the seat angle being so slack it has bent a little in the middle, so it can't be lowered for shorter people now. A sturdier alloy post might have helped.

Bottom Line:

Overall the positives outweigh the negatives and I like the bike quite a bit. It's fun having a bike around with a kickstand and only 3 speeds. Something a person can ride short distances in regular clothes.

Given to do over again, I'm not sure I would have purchased an Amsterdam had I known that the same shop was about to start stocking the Batavus Old Dutch. That bike is a real Omafiets, complete with integrated wheel lock. Maybe next time.

Postscript:

Of course, I can never leave well enough alone, and replaced the stock front lighting with a hub dynamo and aftermarket headlamp. (The taillight is a very nice fender-mounted battery LED.) The Sturmey-Archer X-FDD dynamo hub with drum brake has worked out pretty well. I especially like the drum brake, which is very smooth, works well in all conditions and is a good supplement to the coaster brake. The dynamo function works as I had expected, though the Planet Bike 2.4 watt headlamp has been sort of a disappointment. Because it's designed to work with either a 3W or 2.4W source, it bleeds off the extra .6 watt produced by the 3W dynamo. And the beam pattern isn't that great. Word has it that PB is working on an LED headlamp, and I must say that I hope it's better (I'm sure it will be.)

Trek's 1 World 2 Wheels

2008-07-18T10:23:00.004-05:00

Yeah, I know it's mostly Trek's marketing talking, but hey, every little bit helps. I had mentioned the dealer kickoff they had hosted here in Madison in my Q3 report last October.

Woodpecker Mk.3

2008-07-17T12:36:00.010-05:00

Here's the third incarnation of Woody, my 2000 model year Surly Cross Check. The earlier version can be found at this previous post. I decided that I have enough hills on my commute to make multiple gearing worthwhile, so this version has a frankenburger 5-speed cluster shifted with a Deore DX "proto-type" medium cage derailleur and an upside-down Suntour friction thumbshifter. Plenty jury-rigged, but it works just swimmingly.

I also moved the Inoled from the stem mount to a better and somewhat more permanent position on a reflector bracket at the fork crown.

I still think the Cross Check is near the pinnacle of do-it-all mutt bicycle design. Handling, feel, acceleration, durability versatility—it's got a good balance of all of it. My only complaint is the lack of upper rear rack mounts and dedicated rear cantilever stop. Oh, and the poor design of the Constrictor seatpost binder—the stock bolt is too short to engage all of the threads and strips easily. I seldom break stuff and I'm on my second one.

Look for a write-up soon about the Woodpeckers slow cousin, our Electra Amsterdam.

Twelve Days, 250 Miles

2008-07-16T21:41:00.007-05:00

I've been riding a lot more in the last two weeks than the whole rest of the year. I've been commuting nearly every day, rode to Paoli on the 4th (38 miles) and did an 80-miler out to Arena this past Saturday. My friend Chuck seems to think I was punishing him for dragging me along to the 2006 Horribly Hilly Hundred, but the honest truth is that I had a bug up my nose to rephotograph something I had shot back in August of 1993. Never did find it.

What we did find was plenty of water, most of it standing in farm fields. Of course, there was one place where it was over the road, with a measly Road Closed sign maybe 100 yards prior:

So Chuck says "should we try it?" to which I replied "sure, let me know how it goes." Cost us a mile or two of backtracking, but we got around it. So that was fun.

Lately though, everywhere I go, there seems to be a bunch of bikes there. Used to be it was just me and a few other bike geeks out there, but now it seems like every Tom, Dick, Harry, Sally, Lois, Frederica and their cousin's uncles sister's boyfriend's cat is out there with us. What the hell?

See? Even on the nicest days, there used to be like about three of us on this little island in the middle of this intersection, and now these fools are trying to stuff like a dozen or more onto it. This is without mentioning the bike paths, which are also crowded:

Must be some kind of new trend. I'll be glad when it's over and I can have the bike paths to myself again.

Surly Big Dummy Availability

2008-07-16T11:14:00.006-05:00

Looking at my stats, seems like there have been a quite a few folks trying to figure out when the next batch of Big Dummies will be available. I don't have an inside line, but I can direct you seekers to the Surly blog post that sounds like August, and an earlier post that said

More Big Dummy framesets are slated to be ready around August/September, with another batch coming just a few months later in November/December.

So, there's that.

In other news, the Rack Lady has finished the custom front rack for my Dummy. Can't wait to see it.

More Than You Wanted to Know

2008-07-09T19:07:00.004-05:00

I know that this tagging business went through the Land of Bikegeek a while back, but nobody got me. Recently though, my friend Heather from way back tagged me with the Meme of Fives, so here we go:

First, the background.

Post the rules of the game at the beginning.

Each player answers the questions about themselves.

At the end of the post, the player then tags five people and posts their names.

Let the person who tagged you know when you’ve posted your answer.

Create an arbitrary rule to keep with the whole fives theme.

What were you doing five years ago?
I barely remember what I had for breakfast today, but I do remember working the same job I have now, riding my bike a lot (but not as much as now—only 1828 miles for all of 2003), and bringing up baby (who was in preschool at the time.)

On the home front, we gutted and rebuilt our one and only bathroom—new floor with those cute little hex tiles, concrete countertop, new drywall and paint, hand-set tile tub surround, new fixtures and new cabinets. Great once it was finished, but I'd rather not ever have to bathe in our basement washtub ever again.

I was also having quite a bout with anxiety and depression, which has greatly improved in the intervening five years. Hope that's not oversharing.

What are five things on your to-do list for today?

Live through another bicycle commute to and from work.

Figure out how to merge GIS shapefiles of 17 counties and about 220 Zip codes onto a map of Wisconsin and make it look presentable in Adobe Illustrator.

Check on the garden after work.

After checking the garden, take the Big Dummy over to the Rack Lady's shop and talk to her about making a custom front rack for it.

Watch a Netflixed DVD of I Am Legend (though movies are not a typical Wednesday night thing.)

What are five snacks you enjoy?

Raspberries right off the cane;

Peas or beans right there in the garden;

Peanuts, preferably with dried apricots;

Sugar River Dairy vanilla yogurt with wheat bran, Grape Nuts and honey;

Graham crackers.

What are five things you would do if you were a billionaire?

I have no point of reference for answering this question, which is okay, because

it ain't gonna happen,

So why speculate?

And even if it did happen, I'm afraid it would likely push me in directions I find unappealing,

Just like it would have done with Dietrich Bader's character in the movie Office Space, who reckoned that if he had a million bucks, he'd do two chicks at the same time.

What are five of your bad habits?

Procrastination (it took me weeks to sit down and do this list.)

Pontification.

Hoarding stuff, especially anything to do with bikes.

Taking on more projects than I can finish, which goes hand in hand with sometimes having screwed-up priorities and accumulating too much crap (see #3 above).

Nose-picking (and, apparently, oversharing.)

What are five places where you have lived?

In a house on the edge of a 40-acre wood;

In a high-rise college dormitory (UW Milwaukee);

Numerous Madison apartments;

Behind Mother Fool's, and

Currently in a 750-square foot bungalow on the near east side of Madison.

What are five jobs you’ve had?

Sign painter

Retail clerk (hardware store, Toys R Us, camera store and bike shop)

Seed corn sorter, dryer bin loader, detassling foreman.

Carpenter's apprentice

Graphics dude

Five people I tag (though I happily excuse anyone already tagged from having to repeat):

Tarik
Doug
Tex
Darwin
Emily

I'd also tag Chuck and Andy, but neither of them have blogs...

Hot Bike-on-Bike Action

2008-06-24T21:47:00.004-05:00

As I've mentioned before, it turns out that you can tow other bikes pretty easily with an Xtracycle. Here are a few more for the record:

I lent the Xtrakoram to theBicycle Federation of Wisconsin so they could show it off at an event (the Midwest Renewable Energy Fair, to be exact.) I had ridden the Cross Check to the bus station, and here the Xtrakoram tows it home.

I've been having some trouble with the Amsterdam, so here's the Big Dummy towing it to the shop for some warranty work.

and the Coop duh Gracie: The Big Dummy tows the Xtrakoram. How do you think it got to the bus station?

Dangit, Missed it Again

2008-05-22T09:00:00.003-05:00

I had completely forgotten that yesterday was Drive Your Bike to Work Day:

HOW DO I PARTICIPATE?

That's easy! Just hoist your bike onto the roof of your car, and drive it to work! Do it in honor of Bike Rack Awareness Week!

So the poor car sat waiting patiently all day in the driveway with its bike rack perched on top, and yours truly just spaced it out and rode. Inconsiderate lunk—I could kick myself!

(H/T to Maynard)

Mama Bakfiets Race

2008-05-21T13:32:00.006-05:00

Okay, now that I've stared blogging and I can't stop. Check this out:

Top that, Prius jockeys.

(Complete story over on Amsterdamize, with hat tip to transportfiets.net.)

Pretty Much It

2008-05-21T13:25:00.006-05:00

Judging by the amount of traffic on the bike path recently, I think this says it all.

Surly Big Dummy Review, Part 2

2008-05-21T10:00:00.001-05:00

The Build

Well, there it is. I have to say that it went together really well. I did have to clean some powdercoat out some of the threads, but like I had mentioned in Part 1, I have the taps for those, so no big deal. Everything else fit without modification—the dropouts, the fork, the disk tabs, the seatpost—all of it. Surly's builder has excellent quality control as far as I can tell.

The disk brakes were a bit of a challenge. They're Hayes HFX Mag Hydraulics, which are great except stock lines come only in 900 and 1600 mm lengths. For the Big Dummy, the rear needed to be 2200 mm. After a couple of failed go-rounds with a couple of local shops, I e-mailed Hayes tech support. Four e-mail volleys with a very helpful young man and $40 on the ol' Visa card later, UPS dropped off a box containing a one-off line from the factory, complete with permanent crimp at the caliper end. Problem solved.

Then I had to juice them up. Quite unlike a car, but honestly, much more fun

I also added this little hinkeypunk to keep the contents of the Freeloaders (the Xtracycle's side bags) from messing up the rear caliper. This is more of a problem with mechanical disks, but I had the part, so why not? Anyways, the hydraulics are great. Much better feel than a long cable to the rear brake in on my other Xtracycles. Front and rear are very similar in feel and power.

The Ride

Yes, it is decidedly much more like a regular bike than my Xtracycle conversions were. Having a wheelbase about 15 inches longer than the average bike, it's still not nimble, but the folks at Surly really did get the finer points of the geometry right. The steering has a light, normal feel and the frame feels stiffer and more solid than a conversion. Things do get a little strange in low-speed, tight-radius turns, but hey, we're talking about an eight-foot long bicycle.

Pedaling out of the saddle also has a different feel than a regular bicycle, but it's fine. Quite stable, and better again than an Xtracycle conversion.

Oh, and for those of you concerned about weight, this thing is a moose. I think the frame weighs almost as much as my road bike. With the freeride wheels, Big Apple tires and big dorky handlebars, not to mention the Xtracycle bits, it's probably tipping the scales at close to 45 pounds. But the point, of course, is not to race this thing but to wring more utility out of it than a normal bicycle. I love it.

Part three will be a bit about hauling and a bit about buzz. See Commute By Bike and Dirt Rag for more ride reports, and Vik's Big Dummy Blog if you want to know just plain everything about Big Dummies.

What To Do With the Money?

2008-05-21T08:43:00.003-05:00

Maybe I should get a pulse jet engine for the Big Dummy.

Ding Dong

2008-05-20T22:04:00.002-05:00

The witch is dead. I finally sold the Green Albatross today. Hooray! Hooray! Went for a fair price to a good home. Imasohappy.

Well, I'm Back.

2008-05-19T13:31:00.003-05:00

April and May must just not be the best time of year for me to blog. The same thing happened last year too. I think it's the combination of doing our taxes, designing the print version of the Bicycle Federation of Wisconsin's Ride Guide booklet, starting plants and spring cleaning. Add to that a death in the family, and man, I just didn't feel like it.

But enough bellyaching. Coming soon: part two of my Big Dummy review (it's finally on the road), a brief review of the Electra Amsterdam, some thoughts about compost, gardening pictures and maybe a step-by-step of our new rain barrel setup. Exciting, huh?

Grew My Own

2008-03-25T22:23:00.005-05:00

Here's a stone that should kill a coupla birds. First, most of my readers probably already know that I am indeed not the latin lover type, in spite of my online pseudonym. Mauricio was a mechanic at the banana plantation in Gabriel García Márquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude. I am a standard-issue white boy. He was followed everywhere by a cloud of little yellow butterflies. I am swarmed by them only when I stick a cabbage plant in the ground.

Second, the photo above is my contribution to lowbrow cycling's facial hair fetish, best documented over on HTATBL and by Hurl. Other examples include Nano, Patch, Tarik, Tex and King Tony.

The balance of the Big Dummy review is coming, but I've been really busy and am waiting on a couple of parts. Soon, my pretties.

No I'm Not

2008-03-21T21:13:00.001-05:00

79%LUSH

Really.

Thanks Hurl.

Requiem for an Ugly Winter

2008-03-19T12:35:00.008-05:00

Okay, I'm guessing we all know how to do it, but let's walk through the process just in case: put your thumbs in your ears, fully extend your fingers, pinch your eyes shut, wrinkle your nose and blow a raspberry with such slobbery force that a little air escapes from the nether region. So long, old man winter!

I have to say, I'm looking forward to a few things as spring arrives, like:

Being able to ride a bicycle without studded tires

Streets of normal width, allowing parked cars out of the lane of traffic

An outdoors with green stuff

Coats, hats and mittens that rest politely in the closet

Wearing only one pair of underwear and socks at a time (dare to dream)

Happy First Day of Spring!

A Very 'Sconny Shopping Trip

2008-03-15T08:31:00.008-05:00

So here it is, a Saturday morning, and I'm looking into my basket down at the market. Golly, that sure appears to be what the rest of America must think we eat all the time here in 'Sconsin. Yogurt from the Sugar River Dairy, whose production facility in Albany, Wisconsin was previously a three-car garage before being carefully converted to a Grade A Dairy; milk is from Crystal Ball Farm Organic Dairy up in Osceola, where the DeRosier family has about 100 Holstein cows and a state of the art bottling facility right on the farm; and a sixer of Spotted Cow from one of my two favorite breweries of all time, the New Glarus Brewing Company down in New Glarus.

Then I stopped at the neighbor lady's on the way home and picked up our egg CSA share, along with a bonus liver sausage:

The ol' Timbuktu bag was getting pretty heavy by then. The missus tells me that up in Sheboygan, they eat the liver sausage on toast with grape jelly. Guess I'll have to pick me up some grape jelly.

But the best thing is that spring must be just around the corner—my favorite seasonal beer is back in stock:

Lake Louie Milk Stout. Mmmmmm. Better wait until after noon to have one though...

Take the Test

2008-03-13T08:55:00.001-05:00

C'mon, it only takes a couple of minutes!

Big Dumb Parts List

2008-03-12T20:43:00.013-05:00

So Hasty! gave us a pretty good idea how he's building up his Big Dummy, so now it's my turn. Here it is:

Crankset	Suntour XC Pro triple 110/74 bcd square taper, 170mm arms; bashguard/38/24
Bottom Bracket	Shimano Sealed Cartridge (probably a BBUN-72)
Pedals	Nashbar-badged Wellgo ATB Beartrap
Front Derailleur	Shimano top pull
Rear Derailleur	Shimano Deore XT Long cage 8 Speed
Shifters	Shimano Deore DX Thumbies
Cassette	11-32t 8 Speed
Chain	KMC tandem/recumbent 8 Speed
Hubs	Shimano Deore 36 spoke 6-bolt disc (M756)
Spokes	Wheelsmith Stainless Steel 14/15
Rims	Syncros DP32 Aluminum Black Anodized
Tires	Schwalbe Big Apple 26 x 2.35
Brakes	Hayes HFX Mag Hydraulic Disc with 203mm rotors
Brake Levers	Hayes HFX Mag
Headset	Cane Creek S2
Handlebar	Nitto Albatross CroMoly 56cm
Stem	Salsa Aluminum
Grips	TBD
Saddle	Brooks B.17 or B.67
Seatpost	Syncros or Thompson Aluminum 27.2

The two snags I know of at the moment are: a. whether I can find a Hayes brake line long enough to reach the rear brake (probably a 2500mm) and b. whether I have a decent top-pull front derailleur in stock with a 28.6 clamp. If any of you experts knows anything about the former, I'm open to suggestion.

Meanwhile, I haven't gotten the frame back from the LYBS yet, but will soon. Spring's a coming, so I hafta get it in gear.

Surly Big Dummy Review, Part 1

2008-03-06T23:03:00.008-06:00

The Dummy Has Landed

Ever since the first time I looked at an Xtracycle Free Radical up close, I thought that a one-piece frame would really be the best way to build one. I told the folks at Xtracycle so back in July of 2005. (I knew they were already working on something, but I thought a little encouragement couldn't hurt.)

So it took a while, but I got the call from Erik's today to pick up the manifestation of that idea, Surly's Big Dummy. I had really wanted to pull another cargo stunt and haul it home on the Xtrakoram, but street and path conditions are still terrible. So I drove. Just so anyone thinking of getting one of these things is forewarned, it comes in a really huge box—six by two by one feet. It is therefore expensive to ship and difficult to haul. Fortunately, it fit in our Subaru wagon, but only after folding down both back seats and sliding the passenger-side front seat most of the way forward.

The fit and finish are workmanlike, as good or better than the other two Surly bikes I own. The TIG welds are clean and the powder coat is uniform. Cost-effective and durable. I'm going to have my localler LBS face the head tube and clean up the crown race on the fork, but that's probably about it. The bottom bracket threads are very clean, so I won't have them chased, and I probably won't have the shell faced since I'll be using a sealed cartridge bottom bracket. I have taps for the smaller threads, so I could chase those myself. Again, the powdercoating job is so neat, it doesn't look like I'll have to do much.

I have to say, this thing has brazeons galore. It has stuff on it that I can't put a name to. Like here:

Two seatstay bridges, upper and lower, I suppose. Now, on the one closer to the axle, the brazeon is for the fender bracket. But what's the brazeon for on the upper seatstay bridge? I'm not complaining, it's just new and different. Same goes for the brazeons on the forward v-rack sockets.

Here are the rear dropouts. Semi-top routing and derailleur hanger on the drive side; ISO disk mounts, Rohloff tab on the non-drive side. The symmetrical eyelets are for fender stays.

All of the cable guides are the cable-tie (Ziptie) compatible type. I'm not sure yet whether I'll like having full-length housings for the derailleurs, but it will probably be fine. I'll be using hydraulic brakes, and this is the only way to go for those. I like the routes Surly has chosen. More on that later.

More on everything later....

PS—I've been writing about the Big Dummy since it was first announced:

Xtracycle's Big-Dummy 02-06-08
Waiting for Dummies 01-05-08
Early Big Dummy Reviews 09-30-07
Clever Big Dummy 03-27-07
New Dummy Photos 01-26-07
The Big Dummy 11-26-07

Update 05-21-2008 Part two.

Let Us Ride Our Bicycles or We Won't Bear Your Children

2008-03-06T08:19:00.003-06:00

Faced with draconian new cycling laws and the effective criminalisation of their daily school run, [Japanese] mothers have unleashed their most powerful weapon. In a country already suffering the lowest birthrate in the developed world, young women are threatening to stop breeding beyond their first child if the tradition of sannin-nori — or “three-on-a-bike” — is outlawed.

I love the smell of a revolt .

On the Rocks

2008-02-28T14:47:00.009-06:00

I'm not normally one to spend a lot of time grousing about the weather, but I think I can safely make an exception for the winter we're having right now. It's been a bitch, plain and simple.

Whether it was the first freezing rain-sleet-snow-hard freeze back on December 1, the 13-inch near-blizzard on February 6 or the rain-freezing rain-sleet-snow-hard freeze we had back on February 17, (a record 1.3 inches of rain) when I spent 3 hours helping neighbors unplug four storm drains so the street flooding would abate, it's been the worst I can remember. We've gotten over 87 inches of snow overall (the old record was 76.1 for the entire winter of 1978-79) and we still have March and April to go. If we end up getting average snowfall for the rest of the season, we're on track to end up with a total of 100 inches.

What the hell is this, did I die and end up in Buffalo? It's like Old Man 'Sconny Winter is playing the Rumble in the Jungle's Ali to our Foreman—for the last four or five years it's been pretending to be on the ropes; all oh, I just don't have any snow left and sure, go ahead and wear your short sleves in December or woe is me, Global Warming—and then this year, just when we're thinking our winters are some kind of cakewalk, POW! Right in the ever-lovin' kisser. We went right on our butts and are gonna be lucky to make it to the count of nine.

My neighbor across the street, a firefighter and EMT, was telling me yesterday that it's really staring to take it's toll. Between the cabin fever and the general difficulty getting around if they do leave the house, people are starting to get sick or lose their grip on reality. I've noticed that motorists now treat red lights as more of a suggestion than a hard-and-fast rule. Why? I presume because this is what passes for good driving conditions lately:

On most side streets the ice cover has become so rough they're are like lunar landscapes, but with water and more gravity:

Potholes the size of kiddie pools are showing up in the pavement all over town. The bike paths, on the other hand, remain either hardpack snow (good) or rutted ice (baaaad):

Me? I haven't been riding much. Well, I have, but it's been mostly on the bus. When I do ride the bike, I take some extra precautions, like wearing Get-a-Grip Ultra traction devices over my Lake winter boots:

(Got a pair of MXZ300 bootss at the Swap for $50—they're good down to about 10 degrees f with a couple pairs of wool socks. I wear an 11, and these are 12.5's, which still aren't quite big enough. But I digress.)

If any single picture could tell the story of the winter we're having, this would be it:

Here we have a 50-gallon plastic pickle barrel at the corner of Winnebago and Riverside that would normally be two-thirds full of salt sand, but this winter it's empty before the end of February. Uff da.

Wow, I sure feel better now.

Lookit That

2008-02-27T21:36:00.004-06:00

What's this? Why, it's Pal Chuck taking the wraps off of his new Surly Big Dummy frameset. Lucky dog got one of the batch of 18-inchers that came in last week. Not to worry though, rumor has it that the 20-inchers aren't far behind.

And Chuck isn't the only lucky dog (whose official story is here.)

Decisions, Decisions

2008-02-25T08:08:00.002-06:00

One could apply this to so many things. If only I'd have seen this before purchasing that dual-suspension mountain bike...

(from toothpastefordinner.com)

Bike Racks? What For?

2008-02-24T21:56:00.003-06:00

Revolution Cycles hosted another swap this weekend (the first one was back on December 9). There are no bike racks in front of the store, only snowbanks. But that worked.

Primaries, 'Sconsin Style

2008-02-20T13:10:00.008-06:00

I was wondering how long it would take before the media noticed the real story of the 2008 primary season, but apparently today is the day. Madison's Capital Times ran a piece today about the disparity in turnout between the two parties:

[W]hen the votes were counted, the turnouts in the Democratic and Republican primaries were dramatically different.

More than 1.1 million Wisconsinites voted in Tuesday's Democratic primary between Obama and Clinton.

Only around 400,000 Wisconsinites voted in the Republican primary between McCain and Huckabee.

[...]

More than 73 percent of Badger State voters who went to the polls Tuesday voted for a Democrat, while less than 27 percent voted for a Republican.

[...]

The Democratic trend was so lopsided that, while Clinton lost badly in the Democratic primary — trailing Obama by a 58-41 margin — she still got more votes than were cast for all the candidates in the Republican primary.

So, that's significant, but where I live, it got even better:

In some isthmus wards of the city of Madison, the Democratic bias bordered on the surreal; for instance, in Ward 34, which votes at O'Keeffe Middle School, a total of 1,974 Democratic ballots were cast compared with a mere 55 Republican ballots.

That'd be the missus and myself in with that 1,974. Lordy, McCain's 29 votes barely beat Kucinich's 22, and he dropped out a coupla weeks ago. Ron Paul and Mike Huckleberry got 12 apiece and Kitten Mittens Romney had to settle for 2. (Complete Dane County results are available online.) The new voter registration tables were busy all day long, all over the state.

But that may not have been the worst of it for the GOP:

In Ripon, the Fond du Lac County home of "The Little White Schoolhouse" where the Republican Party was founded in 1854, Republicans almost always win by comfortable margins. In November 2004, for instance, George Bush beat Democrat John Kerry by a 3-2 margin. Yesterday, however, Democratic primary turnout beat Republican voting by a 2-1 margin.

So who did Ripon favor on Tuesday?

The likely nominee of the Grand Old Party, John McCain, won 346 votes to 240 for his conservative challenger, Mike Huckabee. Democrat Hillary Clinton had 451 votes. And the winner of the birthplace of the Republican Party, with 789 votes — far more than the combined total for the GOP contenders — was Barack Obama.

This should be interesting.

Ever Driven Through a Whiteout?

2008-02-15T22:27:00.004-06:00

I have. This is what it looks like from a distance:

and this is what it looks like close up:

Now try to imagine how little you'd be able to see were it actually snowing. At night.

I've Never Felt Like Lance Armstrong

2008-02-15T14:46:00.005-06:00

Until today. At the opening of his new shop, Mellow Johnny's, he said this:

This city [Austin, Texas] is exploding downtown. Are all these people in high rises going to drive everywhere? We have to promote (bike) commuting.

That really makes it sound like the guy is an advocate for transportation cycling. His shop could have been geared toward snooty high-end racing, but instead he's chosen commuting. Good on him, and hopefully good for us.

H/T to Bike Hugger and Commute by Bike.

That Made a Mess

2008-02-06T22:27:00.000-06:00

We got another foot of snow today. Emily the Albatross wrote a little bit about it earlier. One of the more interesting events was a traffic jam on Interstate 90 between Janesville and Madison. I just got done watching the local 10 o'clock news, and they reported that some people were still stuck, and had been since 1 o'clock this afternoon. The national guard and local snowmobile clubs have been mobilized in addition to the regular rescue workers.

Now I don't feel so bad about my hour and forty-five minute bus ride this afternoon. At least I got home before Metro threw in the towel at 7 p.m. and pulled the busses off the streets. Glad I didn't try to drive today.

Xtracycle's Big Dummy

2008-02-06T09:09:00.000-06:00

It had escaped my notice for some time, but Xtracycle is now offering a complete Surly Big Dummy bicycle at their online store. At $1799, it's not cheap, but it's quite a nice spec—3x9 Sram drivetrain, Schwalbe Big Apple tires, disc brakes and a Brooks saddle, to name a few. They're offering 55 bikes total, split into 4 sizes. I'm guessing they'll go quickly.

A little more information is available on Xtracycle's blog.

Hard on the Equipment

2008-02-05T22:38:00.000-06:00

This has been an unusually nasty winter up here in Wisconsin. So far, we've had plenty of cold and over 60 inches of snow. Another 4-12 inches (depending on who you ask) is predicted for tonight and tomorrow. A wonderful forecast for a city looking at the possibility of a labor dispute with its snowplow drivers. The record for snowfall in a season stands at 78 inches. A mere stone's throw.

Between the snow, the cold, the rain and the road salt, I haven't been riding much. Monday morning I pulled the Moose out of the garage and discovered that one of its brakes was dragging. Wait, make that two of its brakes—front and back. Applying the brakes worked okay—at least one caliper was working on each wheel. Of course, to get going again meant prying the other caliper off the rim, a task best undertaken while stopped. So I rode the whole commute braking only when I really needed to, and the Moose came down to the bike cave for a little TLC.

The Bike Cave is in an advanced state of renovation (been doing that instead of blogging, in case you're wondering) with pink foamboard insulation and studs waiting for wiring, fiberglass bats and drywall. The lights are working fine though, so I sat down to fix the brakes. After removing the cantilever bolts, I wrestled the first caliper off with a slipjoint pliers to find this:

Eeewwww. I cleaned the post and the inside of the caliper with some emery cloth, filled the spring cavities with grease, slathered the post and caliper bushing with Phil's Tenacious Oil and put everything back together. Looking at it though, it sure seemed like the moisture must be coming in at the bolt end of the post. So I found some stainless fender washers, buttered them up with grease and put them in between the bolt and the caliper. Much better.

I really hadn't realized how far downhill the modulation had gone until I rode in today. Smooooove.

A while back, I had also noticed that the rear wheel felt like it had gone out of true. I looked it over and discovered that the sidewall of the long-suffering IRC Blizzard studded tire was pulling loose.

So I bought a Nokian Mount & Ground W160, put it on the front, and put the still-good front Blizzard on the rear. Another huge difference. The Nokian is a 1.9-inch tire and is not as knobby as the 2.125-inch Blizzard, but the black sidewall of the Nokian looks much thicker than the Blizzard's skinwall. There also seems to be quite a difference between 160 and 122 studs, and it seems like the Nokian's studs are more firmly embedded in the tire. Steering seems noticeably more sure-footed. I'm quite pleased.

I cleaned the chain and mounted a new Lumotec IQ Fly LED headlight and Busch&Müller DToplight XS Plus wired taillight. More on those in a future post.

We're ready to make the push to spring.

It's Not Snot

2008-01-31T23:11:00.001-06:00

Somewhere below 15℉, something interesting happens to winter cyclists who wear a balaclava:

I like to call it a chincicle, an obvious combination of chin and icicle. But not everybody sees it that way. Bike Snob NYC writes:

Cold one today—in fact my hands are too cold to move so I’m typing this with my snot-sickle.

and Skip Bernet over at Surly goes a little further:

it's cold here in Minneapolis. Here's some proof. Hinzey rolled into the Q'b farm today on his LHT with a champeen snot-sickle hangin' off his face mask. Grody. Also, the top tube of his bike was glazed like a donut from his effluent. I don't know about you, but I usually can't swim in that kind of personal goo.

Thing is, they're not made of snot.There might be a little DNA in there, but they're almost entirely water. Check out this natural gas furnce exhaust, shot on a day when it was cold enough to form a chincicle:

Natural gas furnaces don't produce mucus, just water vapor. In fact, whether you're burning petroleum products or flapjacks, water vapor is one of the byproducts. When it's cold enough, a little bit of moisture freezes near the source and additional water vapor starts to build up and form an icicle. Consider it evidence of the need to drink water when exercising, even in winter.

Even though it's a little uncomfortable to pull a chincicle off the old beard hairs, it's a whole lot more comfortable than riding one of these:

Rated PG

2008-01-30T22:56:00.000-06:00

No, seriously. Kenny Bloggins describes it best:

Not quite as entertaining as the Shizzolator of a few years back, this link allows you to plug in a URL and it will rate that website so that you'll know if it's too tasty for sensitive shut-ins and children who have been living under a rock.

Why? Because:

This rating was determined based on the presence of the following words:

shoot (3x) hell (2x) pain (1x)

Gee whillikers Beav, can you imagine what would happen to my rating if I threw in a real fucking swearword?

Oops.

Back below zero and off the bike again today. I'll probably ride on Friday.

The 45-Degree Swing

2008-01-28T11:18:00.000-06:00

It was -5°f when I rode to work last Friday morning, and 40° above this morning. Went from almost-numb toes to a good sweat in spite of a rather dramatic wardrobe adjustment. It's been snowing every two or three days, and I think the city has thrown in the towel on removing snow from the side streets and bike paths. Light rain is predicted for this afternoon and 2-4 inches of snow tomorrow. What fun.

My attic insulation project is now complete, and seems to be helping a bit. I sealed around the chimney and added fiberglass to bring the total R-value up to 57 from 39. I think anything more would take us into the land of diminishing returns. I'm also finishing the inside walls of the basement, adding an inch of foamboard, metal studs, fiberglass insulation and drywall. Hoping to finish before the Big Dummy arrives.

Speaking of cycling, I'm considering entering the Triple-D (Dubuque-Dyersville-Dubuque—think Paris-Brest-Paris, only shorter and much colder) if it happens again next year. Perhaps a nice summer might return to me my sanity.

Still Winter

2008-01-22T22:02:00.000-06:00

Eight more inches yesterday. Fifty-three so far this year. Must rake roof again soon.

Five above this morning. At least it was five above and not five below. Wearing so many clothings, I feel like the Michelin Man.

Had the Packers won on Sunday, winter would have seemed at least two weeks shorter. River frozen. Haven't ridden bicycle in four days. Potatoes running low. Sanity reaching thin...slideshow boring... losing .... losing ........ ..... ... consciousne

Riding to Work in My Barn Boots

2008-01-10T22:10:00.000-06:00

Can't find my regular winter boots right now, so here I am on the way to work in windfront tights and wellingtons. Class.

Waiting for Dummies

2008-01-05T09:13:00.000-06:00

Surly has announced that the first Big Dummy production run is complete and ready to be boxed and shipped from Taiwan. They expect delivery about the middle of February. They've also published an extensive spew that covers ride characteristics, loading tips, recommendations for components and other miscellany. Worth a read if you're thinking about getting one or trying to decide between a Big Dummy and a Free Radical conversion. Surly has also released a geometry chart (warning: PDF) for the current version of the Big Dummy.

I've currently got a Dummy on order and am getting a mutt group of parts ready to slap on when it arrives. The spec so far includes

• Wheels: 36-hole Shimano M756 hubs (those are the high-flange disc ones with the 6-bold IS mounts) laced to Syncros DP32 freeride rims. Schwalbe Big Apple or Maxxis Hookworm 26 x 2.4 inch-ish tires.

• Brakes: Hayes HFX Mag hydraulic discs with 8" rotors

• Bars: The big wide Nitto Albatross cro-mos pearched on an uncut steerer with a dual-stem setup. I anticipate a porteur front rack setup similar to this one.

• Drivetrain: Garden-variety 3x8 derailleur; Suntour XC Expert triple crank, 8-speed cassette, tandem chain, XT derailleurs, Deore DX thumb shifters.

• Other: Brooks B.67 saddle, Cane Creek S2 headset. Other details TBD.

So there it is. I'll have a Free Radical and a GT Karakoram up for sale sometime in March. Meanwhile, I have errands to run, photos to shoot and insulation to install. Better go.

Q4 2007 Report

2007-12-31T17:19:00.000-06:00

So here's the last one, October 1 to December 31, 2007. If you want to catch up on the whole saga, be sure to check out the Q1, Q2, and Q3 reports at your leisure.

Cycling:
My mileage goal for the year was 3650, and as of yesterday's ride, I'm at 3651. That's 901 for this quarter, the last 197 of which were in December on a big dorky mountain bike with studded tires and a really uncomfortable saddle (should have counted the December miles double.) Most of the rest of the remaining miles were on the Woodpecker and the Trucker, and a few on the road bike and the Xtrakoram.

Coming attractions include a Surly Big Dummy (on order, due in February), a long-overdue Electra Amsterdam review (no, I hadn't forgotten), hopefully some hub dynamo lighting information and a new sewing machine capable of stitching canvas for homemade bags.

Gardening:
Not much happened with gardening in the last few months. I did build a new raised bed in the back yard in October, which is now under a foot of snow.

As is our community garden space.

Not like it was in July:

I've been getting seed catalogs in the mail and am making a list for next spring. I think we're going to replace the pear tree with some berry bushes. Maybe gooseberry, honeyberry and everbearing raspberries. We'll see.

Made a perfect score on my Master Gardener exam, and have only to finish my volunteer hours.

Resolutions:
1. Replace your incandescent light bulbs with compact fluorescents. This is pretty much over with. I think we might replace a few more, but the existing arrangement, along with our new refrigerator, seems to be saving us quite a few kWh.

2. Retrofit your home for energy conservation. The insulation projects I'd talked about in previous quarterly reports have seen some progress. In the attic, we moved all the stored items downstairs for a day so I could tear up the decking and add more fiberglass. I also sealed around the chimney with RTV silicone and caulked the plumbing penetrations. Then I re-laid the decking and put the stored items back. We'll soon put the Christmas decorations back up and seal the hatch for the remainder of the winter.

For the third fall in a row, I dug down 4 feet along the outside of the foundation and added foam board insulation, clad above ground level with fiber cement board and stucco. This project is nearly complete.

Inside the foundation, I'm planning to finish adding foam insulation, steel studs, fiberglass insulation and drywall to the last 30 percent of walls that are still bare concrete block. I moved some plumbing last week in preparation for this project, and hope to have it completed by mid-February. The plan is then to get a chest freezer for some additional food storage.

The small cellar-like cold room I built in the basement for storing certain vegetables works okay, but isn't really cold enough in the fall to keep squash and the like from spoiling. Hmmmm.

3. Cut back on your gasoline consumption. We managed to put less than 8,000 miles on the car this year, down from an average of just over 11,000 per year.

4. Plant an organic vegetable garden. This went pretty well. We'll be moving to a new community garden plot next year. With the pear tree gone, there should be more sun available in the back yard for a bigger garden at home.

5. Compost your food waste. Made a lot of compost this year. Hope to blog the operation sometime this spring.

6. Take up a handicraft. I've been thinking about doing more woodworking. In my spare time.

11. Come up with some new resolutions for 2008. 'Nuf said.

So that's it for 2007. It was, all things considered, a pretty good year.

Last Ride of the Year

2007-12-30T10:19:00.000-06:00

Went out yesterday afternoon for the last ride of the year. Thanks to the 32 inches of snow we've had so far this month (second-highest December since record keeping began, right after 35 inches in 2000) the streets are still a mess. Here we see a vehicle parked overnight pretty much right in the lane of traffic (click for big.) Wish I could say that this is an unusual occurance, but it's like this all over downtown Madison.

In spite of having full fenders and a big ol' mudflap on the Moose, it ended up with a coating of salt all over the drivetrain after about a mile. Time for a bath and some lube (chicka-chicka, bow-wow!)

I started out thinking I'd go about 4 miles, but ended up going all the way around Lake Monona. Here we are at the Olbrich Thai Pavilion. Went twelve and a half miles, for a December total of 203—all of it on this bike.

And here we are again at the Madison Brass Works sign. When I stopped to take this, I had forgotten that unlike my tires, my boots do not have studs. Fortunately, I fell onto a harmless snowbank.

Keep Yer Lousy Twenty Bucks

2007-12-29T10:03:00.000-06:00

In other news, the Bicycle Commuter Act was stripped from the recently-passed federal energy bill. It would have offered a $240 tax incentive every 15 months to people who regularly commute by bicycle. This would have brought bike commuters some parity with other vehicular commuters (see below.)

Back in June, the resident Libertarian crackpot our local cycling list (actually, that would be an insult to Libertarians, so let's just call him a crackpot) had this to say:

If I read the last message [...] correctly, there might be a $20./mo tax benefit from riding a bike to work? As if that could be checked or enforced? But regardless, just think of the small percentage of American tax payers even able to take advantage of such a "special interest tax break"! Indeed, this isn't one to "big business"—"big farmers"—"big universities"—or other bignesses—but, folks, let's be consistent—this is an unfair special interest tax break under the guise of "social engineering."

Usually I know better than to feed the trolls, but I couldn't let the less-informed think that such was the case:

Perhaps you should familiarize yourself with the federal tax code. Other commuters already enjoy the benefit of tax breaks to cover the cost of commuting. Transit, vanpool and (drumroll, please) parking are already covered. And guess what's more? Their monthly benefits are far higher:

Up to $105/month for transit expenses;
Up to $105/month for vanpool expenses; and
Up to $205/month for parking at or near an employer’s worksite, or at a facility from which employee commutes via transit, vanpool, or carpool

Kinda makes 20 bucks a month seem paltry, doesn't it? This may indeed be "social engineering," but not really in the direction you were thinking.

And no need to take my word for any of this of course. Just Google Section 132(f) of the federal tax code or "Commuter Choice Tax Benefit," or check out this handy table.

Personally, I think tax breaks for bike commuting are every bit as worthy as those for transit, vanpooling, and even park-and-ride costs. Unfortunately, House Republicans were having none of it. According to Rep. Doc Hastings (R-WA):

[...] Mr. Speaker, [this energy bill] gives a tax credit to people for riding their bikes to work. I am sorry, but gas prices and climate change aren't going to be fixed by making people ride their bikes to work. This isn't a plan to make America energy independent and to free us from foreign oil. It is just a dream for the political left in this country. And let me repeat, Mr. Speaker, it raises taxes, it is anti-nuclear and anti-dams, it forces people out of their cars, and gives tax credits for riding their bike to work.

I find it creepy that Doc somehow knew it's been my longstanding ambition to boot hardworking Americans out of their cars by day while cuddling and spooning Fidel by night. The Honorable Doc's collegue Rep. John Boner (R-OH) made similar claims in his speech on the house floor.

Maybe they're right. Maybe bicycle commuting won't solve America's energy problem. So if only we could harness the hot air they produce to generate electricity. Perhaps they could even reduce our carbon footprint by shoving lumps of coal up their puckered Republican pooholes and waiting for the inevitable diamonds to form. Talk about killing two birds with one stone— we could become energy independant, sequester untold tonnes of carbon, and become the world's leading diamond exporter.

The cruel irony here is that the Hummer loophole remains in the legislation:

[...] the bill failed to kill the special federal tax deduction for Hummers. And Yukons. And Suburbans. Any SUV big enough to get single-digit city mileage is deemed a work vehicle, and anyone smart enough to claim a business use (think real estate sales or a hair salon) gets a tax deduction for buying one, up to $100,000 (yes, you read that right).

So realtors and dentists can still write off their Escalades and Armadas. Good for them. What mystifies me is that the passage of this bill is somehow viewed as a victory by environmental groups. I just don't see it. Sure, there's an increase in CAFE Standards, but it's so modest that it's the moral equivalent of doing nothing.

By not owning a second car, I'm already saving way, way more than what the tax benefit would have offered. So the Feds can keep their crumbs as far as I'm concerned. The real lost opportunity in this is for bike shops, who might well have gained something in sales and service revenue. All the more reason to visit the LBS...