In The Saddle Again, With Or Without Yogurt

Oddly, I think that might have been the reason why I didn't feel any pain in my knee.  Riding fixed forces you to spin at a more or less even pace; sudden power surges are difficult and even dangerous, especially in traffic.  Now, my ride was flat, but still, I felt good about it.

Perhaps even odder, the pain I felt was around my lower back.  I'd been doing some excercises the physical therapist recommended for loosening up the muscles in my leg and hip.   Then again, those exercises had been about the extent of my physical activity until today's ride.  So, perhaps, my body still has to re-adjust to normal activity.

Well, I'm glad I got out, anyway:  It was a mild day for this time of year.  So my ride was pleasant, even under a threat of rain that didn't materialize until I got home.

However, there was one disappointment.  Along the way, I hoped to pick up some fresh Greek-style yogurt from Kesso Foods, which makes the stuff.  Alas, they were closed by the time I got there.  I knew they closed earlier on Saturday, but I didn't know how much earlier.  Oh, well.

 Fage yogurt is nice, but Kesso's stuff is like creme fraiche by comparison.  Even people who dislike yogurt will eat Kesso's:  I think yogurt-haters dislike the slimy texture of other kinds of yogurts sold in stores.  Kesso's sells the stuff plain, or with various toppings.  (My favorite is their sour cherry with almond slivers or crushed walnuts.)  They also sell various Greek and other Mediterranean foods that you won't find in your local Pathmark or Safeway.

All right..enough about culture for now.  I did, as a celebration, treat myself to one of my favorite takeouts:  The King of Falafel and Shawarma.  Life is good, again.

P.S.  I'll soon have more posts about the bikes of  my past!

Today I took my first ride since going down last Thursday.  It was a short ride--only about seven miles.  But I did it on Tosca, my fixed-gear bike.  

Before Martina, There Was Nancy

Every once in a while, an athlete comes along who completely dominates his or her sport, at least during his or her career.  I'd say that in my lifetime, there were four such athletes:  Eddy Mercx, Martina Navratilova, Wayne Gretzky and Michael Jordan. 


(With all due respect to Lance, I think Eddy was the most dominant cyclist because he won every type of race that existed while he was competing.  Like Mercx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain also won the Tour de France and a variety of other races.  However, they never seemed to have the same aura of invincibility Mercx had in his prime.)


Of the four, perhaps Navratilova's timing was the most fortuitous.  She came along during the 1970's, when women's sports first started to achieve anything like a wide audience, and was at her peak during the early and mid 1980's.  


Recently, I learned of another great athlete who may have been on the other side of the mirror from Navratilova.

Nancy Burghart accepting the trophy for her 1964 National Championship from USI President Otto Eisele Jr.

Nancy Burghart (now Nancy Burghart-Haviland) won eight US National Championships during the 1960's.  She was one of the most versatile riders of her time, as she also won pursuit and sprint championships.  Nearly any time she mounted a bicycle, people expected her to win, much as they did when Navratilova entered a tennis court.


Some would say that Burghart had the misfortune of racing at a time when relatively little attention was paid to cycling, and to women's sports, in the US.  However, she garnered great respect from both the men and women in her sport, and even got some overseas press, which was no small feat in the conditions I've described, and in the absence of the Internet and 24-hour news cycles. 


During Burghart's career, the traditional cycling powers of Europe and Japan did not take American racing very seriously.  However, one could argue that, even then, American female cyclists were among the world's best.  In countries like France, Italy and Japan, bicycle racing, and the media that covered it, were focused almost entirely on male racers.  This could only have stunted the development in women's racing in those countries.  On the other hand, bicycle racing in the US during the three decades after World War II was entirely an amateur affair.   Some have argued that this is a reason why male and female racers were on more or less equal footing, and may have been what allowed women's cycling to gain more prominence in the years before Greg LeMond won the Tour de France.


In my research, I found another interesting detail about Ms. Burghart:  She was born and raised in the Jackson Heights section of Queens, barely a couple hundred pedal spins from the Kissena track--or my apartment.  That track, of course, is where any number of American racers have trained as well as raced.  And it's also where the trials were held for the 1964 Olympic team.


In 1957, when she was 12 years old, she won the Girls' Midget title.  Her twin sister Melissa also competed in the race, and others Nancy rode and won.  It would have taken plenty of determination for an American boy to pursue a bicycle-racing dream at that time:  Imagine what it must have taken for two girls!


From what I've gathered, Burghart-Haviland now lives in Maine.  Given her role in cycling, and American sports generally, I am surprised she isn't better-known.

Times Square For Two

Today I went to my physical therapist.  It was strange, in a way:  I had gone to him in the summer and early fall of 2007 for another, non-bike related, injury.  But, it seems, a whole lifetime has passed for me since then!


Anyway, he did a few tests, had me do some stretching exercises (My pelvis has become rigid during my inactivity), iced my knee and gave me a printout of the exercises I should do at home.  


I could actually feel my knee getting better--or at least giving me less pain--through the course of the session.  I've scheduled another session for last week, and he believes I may not need another after that.


His practice is literally around the corner from Grand Central Station.  So, after the session, I went for a walk through the area:  by the Chrysler Building and New York Public Library (two of my favorite buildings in this city) and into Times Square, the theatre district and Restaurant Row. Along the latter, I saw this curiosity locked to a parking meter.

It reminded me of the difference between a tandem and a two-seater.  People often use the terms interchangeably.  But this bike shows me that they're two different animals, so to speak.  To me, the bike I saw today is a two-seater.  It's not a bike built for two, which is more or less how I would define a tandem.  Also, the rear rider is a passenger, not a "stoker," or someone who pedals along with the "captain," or rider in front.


That said, I don't mean to denigrate the bike.  It's a rather nice Marin mountain bike from, I'm guessing, some time in the early '90's.  I feel confident that my guess is educated, for I had a Marin mountain bike around that time.

Anyway, the way rear setup is interesting:  A threadless stem is clamped around the seatpost, and there is a "platform"  on top of the Blackburn-style rack in the rear, as well as "guards" along its sides.  I suspect that the usual passenger is a small child.


Interesting as it is, I'm not sure I'd want to ride the rear or have anyone else ride it if I were pedaling.