A Flashy Racer Becomes A Classy Commuter

When you see a bike like this, you realize why people like me like steel road bikes so much.

I spotted this Pinarello, which appears to be from the '80's or early '90's, parked near the site of the former World Trade Center.

It's not so unusual to see old racing bikes re-purposed as commuters.  It's most commonly done by replacing the dropped bars with flat ones, as the owner of this bike did.  However, I'm seeing more old road bikes with "mustache" bars or the Velo Orange Porteur (which I love).

But it's still fairly unusual to see full fenders on road bikes from the '80's or later, with their  short wheelbases and tight clearances.  Older racing bikes, like the Peugeot PX-10 and Raleigh International, were made to accommodate protection from the elements.     

That's why I was fascinated to see the Velo Orange hammered fenders on this Pinarello.  They're narrower than the ones I have on Helene and Vera, but of the same style.  It's funny how it can make what had been a flashy racing machine into a classy, classic commuter.

The Season: Warmth Or Light?

This year, as in others, the middle of March is an odd time:  It's neither winter nor spring, really.  

From Kevin's Travel Journal

Although today is pretty wintry (temperature barely above freezing, strong gusts), it doesn't seem like a day in, say, late January or early February.  It may have something to do with the fact that Daylight Savings Time began on Sunday, so the sun is not setting until 7pm.  

From Easy As Riding A Bike

At the same time, most of the trees are still bare and much of the ground is wizened (in spite of the rains we've had) and covered with brown grass, weeds and brush.  It's a bit like looking at an old person in an old winter coat, and knowing that both have to survive only a few more days to make it through the season, but also knowing that one or both might not make it.

We could still have another snowstorm or two, or some other kind of storm.  But the days grow longer and soon the trees will begin to bud.  I took did my first metric century (and first Point Lookout ride) of the year on Sunday, a few weeks earlier than I've done them in other years.  Still, I might be relegated to sneaking rides of two hours or so between bouts of bad weather and various obligations.

Of course, about five months ago, we had the inverse of what we're seeing now:  weather and water that were still pretty warm, trees still covered with leaves that were just beginning to change color, but days that were growing shorter.   I was riding into a season's, and a year's, demise, but it was harder to notice or easier to ignore, depending on how I think of it.  In contrast, my ride on Sunday, and the next few I will take, will be like emerging from a cocoon, however slowly, into light and space that could be almost overwhelming until I adjust to them, as I have done every year.

If you had to choose between cold and light or warmth (relative, anyway) and darkness, which would you choose, and why?

My Only 'Cross: Voodoo Wazoo

In much of Europe, cyclo-cross season is in progress, or getting underway.  Until fairly recently, this form of bicycle racing was all but unknown in the US.  Part of the reason for that may have been that around the same time that Greg LeMond was winning the Tour de France, bicycle racing was enjoying its first spurt of popularity in the US since the days of the six-day races, but mountain biking was also becoming popular.  Americans who were just starting to pay attention to cycling subscribed to the “road racing/mountain biking” polarity.  Some seemed to think that mountain biking and cyclo cross were the same thing. 

Here is the difference between the two:  In mountain (or, more accurately, off-road) biking, you ride—and sometimes jump or hop—over whatever comes your way, but in cyclo-cross, you might actually hop off your bike and sling it over your shoulder to ford a stream, wade through mud, climb rocks (or a fence!) or goose-step your way through un-strategically placed 2x4s, rocks or debris.  Having done both, I think that mountain or off-road riding is about riding over whatever terrain you encounter, while cyclo-cross is more about getting you and your bike over any and all kinds of obstacles.  To use a ski analogy, cross-country and downhill mountain biking can be compared to their skiing counterparts, while cyclo-cross is like the biathlon with bikes and without the rifles.

In the past, racers often fitted old frames with cantilever bosses and wheels with wider tires and treads suited to mud and other conditions for cyclo-cross.  Bikes built specifically for that kind of racing are a fairly recent development.  I’ve owned one in my life: a Voodoo Wazoo.

As you can see, the frame was made of oversized TIG-welded Reynolds tubing and stays, which made it stiff for a bike with its geometry.  One result is that, even though it was somewhat heavier than my road bikes, it climbed well.  It also remained stable even with a rack and full panniers.  As you might expect, I rode the Wazoo on three loaded tours: from France into Spain through the Pyrenees, along the vineyards and chateaux of the Loire, and through the Alps from Lyon into Italy and Switzerland and back.

The only real complaint I had about the bike was that it had an odd chainstay configuration, which made it difficult to install a triple crankset and get a good chainline.  I had one smaller quibble:  When I bought the bike (complete), it came with V-brakes and Shimano “brifters”.  V-brakes aren’t made to work with road levers, at least not the ones available at that time. Voodoo included a “travel agent”, which was supposed to compensate for the fact that road levers have less range of motion (or “pull”) than V-brakes are designed for.  Alas, the setup never worked to my satisfaction; before I embarked upon my tours, I switched to cantilever brakes. 

I bought the bike, as it turned out, during a transition from one model year to the next (1997-98).  I expected to get the 1997 model, which had the same frame in a shade of green rather like chartreuse.  As you can see, I ended up with the 1998 model, which was only available in a screaming bright orange.  The color wasn’t my cup of tea;   however, the components were actually, I thought, slightly better than the ones on the 1997 model.  And I paid the same price for the new model that I would have paid for the older one.

The Wazoo is the sort of bike you’d want to have if you lived in the country and could have only one bike, but you wanted that bike to give you a lively ride while holding up to varied conditions. I might, one day, have Mercian build something like it for me—with lugs and in finish #57, of course.  

A Journey

Just recently, I came across this e-mail I sent a few friends.  I couldn't believe I still had it in an old e-mail account that I now use for school.

18 november 2006

 Hi Everybody:

 No urgent messages here. This'll be more like a blog, I guess, or a journal entry. Read on at your own peril! ;-)

 Today I went for a bike ride with Barbara and Sue, who have become sometime riding buddies during the past couple of years. It was chilly, overcast and fairly breezy, but actually not a bad day to ride.  We may not see any better for a while, so we went.

 We started on the Queens side of the 59th Street Bridge, with no particular destination in mind. I don't know which, if any, of us was leading the way, but we found ourselves headed toward water: Jamaica Bay and the ocean. It was as if currents of the sky, gray and rippled by white crests of clouds, pulled us there.

 Our bikes zigged and jagged along boards that clunked and chattered underneath us on the Rockaway Boardwalk. Sky and ocean grew grayer, bluer and steelier all at once as foamy white ripples thickened.

 We crossed the bridge into Atlantic Beach, Nassau County, where both the fresh-faced and the weathered people wore down parkas with swim trunks and flip-flops. Sand swirled on the road toward Point Lookout--on the other side of the bay from Jones Beach--where we had a picnic lunch.

 Since we all did errands this morning, we didn't meet for our ride until well after noon. Of course, we didn't take into account how the days are growing shorter, so by the time we got to Point Lookout, we saw rays of a sun that was about to set peeking through furtive openings in the clouds.

 And everything grew darker as we rode back along the southern Atlantic shores of Nassau County, the Rockaways section of Queens, Sheepshead Bay and ultimately to Coney Island. The point at which the sea and sky disappear into each other grew closer and the tides amplified their echoes as their foam crests grew whiter like advancing glaciers.

 There was a time in my life--actually, most of my life--when a scene like this was my only solace. The day returned to the sea; the night spread across it, punctuated by the pulse of waves that reflected flashes from the moon and stars. I often went to the sea, alone, in the darkness. Sometimes I hoped not to come back; other times I had some vague, if entirely implausible, hope that fluidity and darkness would wash away what I was trying to leave and change.

 Somehow, though, it didn't seem so odd to be at the darkening sea with a couple of friends. In a sense, I was never actually alone, even in the days when I was traveling solo. When I first started my gender transition, I used to believe that for all those years, the boy and young man I had been was carrying the person I'm becoming within him, all the while hoping nobody would notice. I suppose that is what would sometimes cause me to sometimes grieve about Nick when I first began to live as Justine. I used to think that he'd been carrying me all this time, and somehow it wasn't fair that I was able to experience the joy that he never could.

 But now I realize that in some way, I, Justine, had been guiding and protecting him. And I was again today. Today I would show that scared, confused, angry teenaged boy and young man named Nick--whom I learned to love only by becoming Justine--that what we were seeing today was not all there is to life, that we were continuing on a journey and that it would be all right and neither of us would have to be alone.

 Of course I didn't tell any of this to Sue or Barbara, for I am just realizing it now. But I did tell them what a joy it is to ride with them, and apologized for not being in the kind of shape I was once in and for being something of a chatterbox.  Don't worry, they said. It's all fine.

 Yes, Justine, it's all fine. And it's going to be all right. For you, too, Nick.

 OK. I apologize if this is a bit of a ramble. I know you're all busy, and I appreciate you, whether or not you've read this far.

 Good night.
 

 Love and best,

Justine

A Century After The Storm

I'd forgotten about Daylight Savings Time. So that, of course, meant I'd slept an hour later than I thought.

Then I realized I'd have another hour of daylight at the end of yesterday.  Plus, something about yesterday's noon light seemed very appealing.  What I didn't realize, then, was that it reflected some light I would see later in the day.

I also thought that going for a daylong ride (or, at least one of more than a couple of hours) would help to shake me out of the emotional funk and physical lethargy that enveloped me.  I was, as they say, sick and tired of being sick and tired.  

So--you guessed it--I got on my bike.  I think Max and Marley knew I was going to be gone for a while because I left extra servings of food and water for them.  

Anyway, I took out Tosca, figuring that if I rode for only two hours or so, I'd at least get a good workout.  That's one reason I recommend having a fixed-gear bike:  If you're pressed for time, you can still get in a pretty vigorous ride.

I started in the direction of Rockaway Beach.  I hadn't been there since the first Sunday of January.  It was a little more than two months since Superstorm Sandy; the streets still looked like sections of the Ho Chi Minh trail after the bombings and people still seemed shell-shocked.  I'd heard that there was still much devastation, but I was determined to ride out that way.

Well, as the day was breezy and chilly, but still quite pleasant, after crossing the bridge into the Rockaways, I wanted to keep on riding.  And so I did--alongside the sections of the boardwalk the storm tore away, past stores that still haven't opened and houses still vacant.  But some people, at least, seemed to be taking Sunday afternoon walks and otherwise taking back what they'd owned in their lives.  That may have been the reason why I just wanted to keep on riding.  

And I kept on riding, until I got to Point Lookout.

That meant I'd already done the second-longest ride I've done so far this year, and the third-longest since Sandy.  I felt invigorated, to say the least:  I pedaled into a breeze-bordering-on-a-wind most of the way out.

You'll notice that Tosca is standing aslant.  She's not "posing"; it was the only way I could stand her up.  As I expected, the tides had tossed rocks and slates into positions in which no one had seen them before.  And there was a lot of erosion:

That mushroom-shaped thing is an Army Corps of Engineers marker.  In the two decades or so in which I've been riding to Point Lookout, it was always level with the ground and usually dusted with sand.

The bay loooked as it usually does, if a bit more forlorn:

I know they're buoys, but a part of me wondered whether they weren't markers for something lost during the storm.

I also couldn't help but to wonder whether those trees were denuded by the season or the storm.  After all, it happened in late October, right about the time leaves attain, or start to pass, the peak of their autumnal color in these parts.

Even in the middle of such musings, I didn't feel sad.  After all, everything and everybody I'd seen during my ride was a survivor.  Plus, the light wind into which I'd pedaled would blow at my back as I started my return ride.  I felt stronger,and the ride seemed quicker.

And, by the time I got to Far Rockaway, the sea and sky refracted a layer of visual frost through the late-afternoon sun.

It was, I realized, a later-day image of what I'd seen when I left my apartment just after noon.

By the time I got home, I'd pedaled my first metric century (about 105 km, or 65 miles) this year, and my first since Superstorm Sandy.  

If Keith Bontrager Went Dutch

Keith Bontrager once said that everyone who builds or designs bikes, or parts and accessories, should spend a year in the Netherlands.

I can't help but to wonder what my Race-Lite would have been like had he followed his own advice.  I liked it a lot; I sold it only because I'd stopped mountain biking and wanted  it to have a good home, if you will.

In fact, I wonder what all of his parts--especially his wheels--would have been like.  To his credit, his designs were functional:  He had no concern for fads or trends, and he cared nothing for aesthetics (though some of his stuff is very attractive).  Also, he had no interest in, as he said, making "lifestyle" products and had no intention of releasing a line of leisure wear with his name on it.

In some weird way, I think the mountain bike maven from Santa Cruz, CA would have been right at home in this milieu:

Cyclists Cause Pollution

I hate to break this to all of you "tree-huggers":  We are polluting the air, after all, when we ride our bicycles.

Oh, but it gets worse:  the more and harder we ride, the more we fill the atmosphere with a toxin--namely, carbon dioxide.

From The Ottawa Citizen

Now, I'll admit that I haven't taken a science class since, well, before some of you were born.  But the notion that we are fouling the air when we pedal and puff is at least factually and etymologically true--at least in the same sense as another statement made by no less of an environmental scientist than Ronald Reagan.  Back in 1981, he said, "Trees cause more pollution than automobiles do."

Would you expect any less from the man who appointed James G. Watt as his Secretary of the Interior?  

Apparently, Washington State Representative Ed Orcutt learned his science from Professor Ronnie.  Hey, if I had science professors like him, I'd be nominated for a Nobel Prize.  In what, I don't know.

But I digress.  The Hon. Rep. Orcutt revealed his epoch-making discovery about cyclists to a bike shop owner during a campaign for a proposal to charge a $25 fee on bicycles costing more than $500.  That fee would help to pay for transportation facilities.  

Orcutt has since apologized for his remarks.  However, the furor over his remarks remains.

For me, learning of this story has had at least one good outcome: I found it on the BicycleLaw.com webpage.  I'll be visiting it from now on.

Dear Motorist: Why We Are In "Your" Lane

Last week, I was riding down Second Avenue in Manhattan.  I'd stopped at 37th Street, where traffic exits the Queens-Midtown Tunnel.  Even the most steel-nerved messengers can't cross that steady stream of cars, taxis, SUVs and livery vans without having green signal or being waved through by a traffic cop.

One of those cops, a young African-American with a boyish face, approached me.  "Miss!"  You're supposed to ride in the bike lane."  He pointed across the avenue to it.  "You'll be much safer there."

As I was focused on getting through that bottleneck--Below 34th Street, there's usually much less traffic on Second--I didn't argue with him.  I've "educated" more than a few police officers and other people in my time; some were receptive but others became more adamant in their assertion that if there is a lane, a cyclist must use it--or, worse,that bikes simply don't belong on the street at all.  

So, I crossed over to the lane and, after I passed the last clump of traffic at NYU Medical Center, I moved back into the traffic lane.

I hadn't been riding that line before I saw the cop because the section of it just below the Queensborough (59th Street) Bridge, which I rode into Manhattan, was blocked off.  And, when it opened again somewhere around 52nd Street, it didn't appear to be in very good condition.  In the last couple of years, there has been a lot of coonstruction along Second, where a new subway line is being built.

Poor surface conditions are just one reason why some of us don't use the bike lanes, at least some of the time.  I found this list of other reasons on NYC Bike Commuter:

The bottom line, dear motorist, is that we are in "your" lane because it's often safer for both us and you to be there.  In their infinite wisdom, the designers of lanes next curbs have--probably unwittingly--made things less safe for you as well as for us.  

Mondonico Criterium: A Beginning And An End

From looking at this blog and my bikes, you have probably figured out that my favorite color is purple.

Today, I'm going to write about my first purple bike.

From what I'm told, Antonio Mondonico himself built this bike back in 1992.  I got new around Christmas of that year.  At that time, many of the Italian "master" builders like Mondonico and Colnago were still building their own bikes, though some were raced with the names of teams or sponsors on them.

This was the fourth Italian bike I owned, if I recall correctly.  Although I went through a period in which I would ride nothing but Italian bikes (the Mondonico was part of it), I was never entirely convinced of the Italian mystique, though the bikes I had were quite good.

There were two ways in which this bike stood out from the other Italian bikes I've owned and ridden.  One of them is in the finish and details.  Some Italian bikes were quite pretty; others were garish (like the Gios, in my opinion) and others simply gaudy.  My Mondonico was, I thought, distinctive and surprisingly crisp for a purple Italian bike.  The lugwork was very sharp-edged, and the outlines were clear.  And, the paint was not only pretty; it seemed to hold up better than the paint on other Italian bikes I had.

The other way this bike distinguished itself--from my other Italian bikes (and, for that matter, other bikes I've owned) is in its handling.  If I'm not mistaken, it had slightly steeper angles than other road bikes I've owned.  In fact, its geometry was remarkably similar to a track bike I would acquire about a year after I got the Mondonico.  A post about that bike is coming soon.

Its geometry meant that this bike was intended for criteriums: the sorts of races in which large numbers of riders pedal through a short course of closed-off city streets.  The length of the race is usually determined by the number of laps or the time; in either event, a "crit" typically lasts an hour or less.  

The Mondonico had what one might expect of such a bike:  quick acceleration and snappy handling.  I used to have a lot of fun riding it in Prospect and Central Parks (where I raced it a few times), and on similar kinds of courses. However, it wasn't the most comfortable of bikes on longer rides, even after I changed the seatpost to one with more setback than the one I originally had and fiddled with the saddle position.

Also, the Mondonico was a smaller size (53.5 cm, if I recall correctly) than my previous racing bikes, as I wanted a shorter top tube.  However, I think using a longer seat post than I used on previous bikes exacerbated the strain the steep seat angle created on my thigh and shin ligaments.  That would also be part of the reason why I would sell this bike after about three and a half years, when I realized that criterium-type races would never be the "main event" of my cycling life.

One other way which this bike is noteworthy, at least for me, is that while it was my first purple bike, it was also the last I rode with tubular (sew-up) tires.  In addition to the sew-ups, I had a set of clinchers for this bike; they were the wheels I rode most of the time.  When I sold the Mondonico, I also sold my last pair of tubular wheels and tires.

Cycling Humor

I've been under the weather lately.  It's not the flu, even though I haven't had a flu shot in several years.  (The last time I got one, I got the flu anyway.)  Rather, it's a respiratory infection.  My lungs and airways are clearer than they were a week ago, but I've still been very tired.  What that's meant is that, beyond commuting and some errands, I   haven't been riding.

Needless to say, I'm not happy about it.  But, in researching something else entirely, I stumbled over this webpage: "Cycling Humor".


This particular post really made me laugh:

"A Concerned Cyclist"

Dear Abby,

I’ve never written to you before, but I really need your advice. I have suspected for some time now that my wife is cheating on me. I see the usual signals; the phone rings and when I answer, the caller hangs up. My wife has been going out with ‘the girls’ a lot lately, although when I ask for their names she says, “just some friends from work, you don’t know them.” I try to stay awake to see when she comes home, but I always fall asleep. I think deep down, I just didn’t want to know the truth.

Last night she went out again and I decided to really check on her.  Around midnight, I decided to hide in the garage behind my road and mountain bikes so I could get a good view of the street when she arrived home from her night out with ‘the girls’.  When she got out of the car, she was buttoning up her blouse, which was open. She took her panties out of her purse and slipped them on. It was at that very moment, crouching behind my bike, I noticed a slight crack in the downtube, two inches behind the headset. Is this something I can fix myself, or should I take it back to the bike shop?

– Concerned Cyclist


Now, if writing a letter like that isn't a sign of a bike geek, I don't know what is!