Showing posts with label riding bicycles on ice. Show all posts
Showing posts with label riding bicycles on ice. Show all posts

17 February 2021

As Smooth As The Icycycle

 If Shakespeare's Macbeth were working today as a meteorologist, his forecast might be "Snowstorm and snowstorm and snowstorm."

At least, that's how it's seemed for the past couple of weeks.  And Texas is sending some more white stuff and ice up this way, I hear.  

So, in response to commenter "Jay from Demarest," I am outfitting one of my bikes for the weather.





Hmm, it might not make the NYC Transportation, Sanitation and Police Departments happy.  But I might've liked it last week on the Coney Island boardwalk--or even on the icy patches dotting the bike lanes.

An engineer who identifies himself as The Q (an unfortunate moniker in times like these, wouldn't you say?) wanted to ride his bike across a frozen lake. Ever the tinkerer,  he replaced the wheels with circular sawmill blades.  When he tried to cross that lake, however,  the blades cut through the ice, making it impossible for him to ride on the surface. So, he took the bike back to his workshop and fitted less-sharp metal bits to the blade's teeth.  That did the trick:  His vessel--which he dubbed the "Icycycle"--took him to the distant shore. 

While we don't know his name, some of us have seen "The Q"s work:  Two years ago, he replaced a pair of conventional bicycle wheels with ones he fashioned from multiple running shoes affixed to large spokes.  What the purpose of that was, I don't know, and he admits that the ride was bumpy.  He claims, however, that his "Icycycle" rides "as smooth as ice."