your daily bicycle log

p sure sheldon brown (RIP) has a whole tutorial on this?

i just spent 16 days with a bunch of people riding the length of thee isle of great britain (john o'groats in scotland to land's end in cornwall). mostly we stuck to quieter roads which added to the distance considerably - 1220 miles ridden in total and on an average day we did about 80 miles. we were camping in tents every night, but my mum and dad drove the whole thing in their camper van so they carried all our tents and other gear so that was a massive boon. weather was mostly okay, the only day when we got totally soaked was riding through lancashire (typical), the haul over the the forest of bowland was a glorious battle against wild, wet and windy conditions. my 14 year old son did the whole thing with us - he normally only rides bmx and mountain bikes but he absolutely stomped everyone on every single climb, he was amazing. the riding was great, but tbh i really struggled with the whole group dynamic and once everyone started getting tired and grumpy i was glad to just spend most of the later days with just my son and one other guy. anyhow, photodump in my long-neglected flickr if anyone's interested in viewing my terrible helmet hair and whiskery bad looks:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/145923930@N07/

congrats, that is a great great event. it must have been amazing to do it with your kid, too. can't wait to check yr photos.

Great work

This is not the content I expect from ilx but I find it pleasing. A stone circle! Wheelies!

so many endos!

Yeah he had an spd moment after one of those endos, landed in a heap on the floor and totally ripped the leg warmers I bought him just the day before. Grrrr!

That is a fun photostream, looks like a great trip.

hardly the most memorable moment for you probably, but the one of the geese is cool in a _is that what they actually do?_ kind of way.

Wow I didn’t check this for like two weeks!
Thank you guys!!!!

missed the old CX bike and wanted something for road/path/dirty hijinx for the summer, got sweet deal on kona rove with 650b wheels and superfat slicks. so good! the french were right!

used it for nite ride, middle of the city after midnight, barely see a regular car among the garbage trucks and taxis

that’s doin it right 👍

yeah bigtime

yeah that sounds fun as hell

night rides were actually a big part of me getting back into cycling as an adult. i complimented some random dude's classic 10-speed back in 2010 and he told me about Midnight Ridazz (LA night ride crew of Taco Tuesdays fame - "guys, please stop stealing from the 7-11 or they won't let us in")

Midnight Ridazz were founded by the biggest amateur doper in the USA. He has a lifetime USAC ban from competition, now he just tries to claim Strava KOMs all over LA. Terrible person.

and gaimon took most of them back

don't shame a dude for getting back on the bike because he did it in the presence of a jerk. keep it positive ya ding dong

brilliant summer idea haitch, i may very well get into some of that (now that evil magpie season seems to be over)

melbourne bike cru

the spotless reputation of Midnight Ridazz ruined

Won't somebody think of the Ridazz... lol

In unrelated "tech giants are horrible" news, this was particularly disturbing coming from a consumer reports POV:

YouTube have terminated my GPLama account. Apparently for three violations of their community guidelines (no reason given). That's everything gone. 2 years work. 700 videos. 17 Million watch minutes. @TeamYouTube Explain this to everyone below. You've just ended me.

— Shane Miller (@gplama) October 29, 2018

whoa -- i've watched some of that dude's videos, seems like the most innocuous unboxing/review stuff around

they've reinstated the channel but haven't communicated what the problems were - obviously there's probably not anyone to actually talk to about it

My main recall of Melbourne roads is nearly having a tram impale my rental while I tried to turn across traffic. Be careful.

― Hunt3r, Saturday, 26 May 2018 13:55 (seven months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

just fell victim to tram tracks

oh no- hope yr well and no or few damages! status check?

a load of skin came off left elbow, both knees, left calf and right hand. no damage at all to neck or helmet/head. bike front wheel is jamming against the brake and the chain mechanism is making a funny noise, but i think it’s fixable (will know next week).

next time i see a load of arse biscuits standing in the bike lane i will lose my shit at them.

thanks for your concern <3

FWIW this has happened to me also (although not quite as dramatically!) and almost everyone who bikes in downtown San Francisco. Hope you heal quickly!

thanks! a lovely bloke came out of his shop and got me bandaged up, and the hospital i went to (public health is free here) checked joint movements &c. and established nothing was broken.

I think I might be on the verge of getting a Brompton y/n

what for specifically? depending on your situation you might be better off with another folder

commuting. one of the ways I can get to work that isn't driving is commuter rail + bike the rest of the way

I guess it'd also be nice for bringing along on trips, too, as a number of airlines will let you bring them on as carry-on luggage

ah brompton then. for portability there’s no competition.

you’d want to consider things like # gears v weight, expensive light titanium v weight, etc. i went for six gears in standard metals, so it’s heavy but not too expensive. if your ride doesn’t have too many hills, you could get away with a three or two speed.

Call is going out:

http://coloradogravelgrinderchampionship.com/pony-xpress/details

May 18, 2019. I'm hoping to lasso a gbx, as much for wanting to meet a legend, as anything else. :^)

i've had a lot of... dreams and setbacks as i've ventured through the last couple years, but i'm confident i can make it through this one. i'm comfortable being a reliable 50+ ally, as opposed to "ima set a pr" guy, though if asked to pull or die, i'll ride til i die.

Anybody wanna walk through the process of doing this? i'll be on a minimally loaded drop-bar, tubeless, 26x2.1" mtn bike. This kinda monster-cross shit is considered "fashionable" by my understands.

hope all are well. i see most of yall through strava and the fatmantis group, but while few, we are strong.

also:
"NEW for 2019 Class 1 Ebike for 85 K distance with later start time (no age or gender classes )."

that gravel ride looks terrific hunt3r, very jealous - you'll have a blast on that!

i've been upping the miles here in an effort to tire my son out. it's not working at all, it's absolutely killing me while he's just getting fitter and faster all the time. i had a virus over the last six weeks so i did manage to get some time just sitting on my arse, but i think i'm over that now and it's all beginning again. 100 miles last monday, and then 55 yesterday up four of the big climbs in the area - we were going to do another couple as well, but thank the lord we ran out of daylight :D

main riding goal this year is mountain mayhem which is the longest running uk 24hr mountain bike race. i'm not really into racing at all anymore (i'm soooo slow) but they've just dropped the lower age limit to 14 so we're doing it as a pair. with any luck i'll just be able to do one lap and then let him ride the rest - seriously i'd just be slowing him down, he's just ridiculous

viewing a kid's increasing capacity is always amazing, that is v cool.

hunter! I'd actually tentatively planned on targeting the pony express as my first gravel event / goal to keep me honest (standards have uh fallen very far). It'd be great to see some other mantii show up too

encouraging news, i'm checking the forecast already. i'm not much of a mudder no matter what my enemies say.

i'm not much of a cyclist these days, tbh, so having some incentive to get back in the saddle would be nice

http://66.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m2xhzsfNBN1r0wqrdo1_500.jpg

i did lol

http://66.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m2xhzsfNBN1r0wqrdo1_500.jpg

http://66.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m2xhzsfNBN1r0wqrdo1_500.jpg

i so rarely image-ify here i've forgotten the commands...

Rode a bike a couple days ago after being out of town for months. During those months I also lost weight and I could feel that on the climbs!

Only now I have to keep the weight off. When I complained about this to a couple girl friends of mine the lack of sympathy was palpable. Understandably.

if i could lose the weight i've gained in the past 1.5 yrs, i'd be like, _faster_. which would be cool, but my body and mind are distracted by other battles, too. my power isn't terrible, i guess. not willing to deprive yet.

I'm entered for a time trial on Sunday. What with my calf injury this time last year destroying the whole season and a general loss of enthusiasm for racing (and the necessary training), I'm not really in top shape for this. I've only been on one proper bike ride in the last five weeks or so (and I got dropped then). I haven't done a race for about 18 months. I haven't touched my racing bike since the start of November and have no idea if it's ready to roll and my aero bars are presumably buried somewhere in my shed. On top of that, I picked up a bizarre big toe injury a couple of days ago while sitting down and working at my laptop - somehow I must have bent it too far backwards. Having to hobble around everywhere at the moment, hopefully won't stop me cycling. The weather forecast says 6C with a 41mph crosswind. Oh joy.

i do not want to _ride_ in a 41mph crosswind.

i have an aaaancient rear disc that takes up to 10sp if you want it though, could be adventurous.

i just found the aPower metric on golden cheetah, i want it injected in my veins. (lol it claims to normalize your power readings to sea level where i'm totally a viking).

Towed Barry Bonds today

:o

yeah that needs expanding on!

how did yr tt go nbs?

Group of four pulled up and sat on my wheel in the Presidio. Went our separate ways but ran into one of them later during a stop. He came up "hey, do you know who that was? That was Barry Bonds. Yeah, he saw you and said 'let's reel that guy in.'"

Bonds rides a lot around here, seen him a few times.

His significant other is a pretty big deal in the cycling world:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mari_Holden