What We Learn About Our Bikes, And Ourselves

This post will be short.  It will also be a bit of a prologue or teaser for another post, which may appear tomorrow.  If not, you'll see it very soon.

No, I'm not going to make any dramatic announcements about life-altering events.  And I'm not going to confess any deceptions or misperceptions I might have perpetrated.

Instead, I'm going to ask a question that will be a basis of that post:  Have you ever, in the course of a ride, discovered something you didn't expect about the bike you were riding, or some part or accessory on it?  

From Bike Yogi

That surprise could be a positive or negative one, or simply a fact.  That is something that happened on a ride I took today. Don't worry:  The bike, and I are fine.  Actually, we're doing quite well.

Also, you might want to think about something unexpected you learned about yourself on a ride.  That, in a way, will also be included in the post that's coming.

I hope you've done some great, or simply pleasurable riding, this weekend.  And, if you haven't, I hope something that you've simply had a fine time.

I Tried To Be Graceful. Spoiler: He Was Gracious.

The last time I rode to Connecticut, I made a wisecrack about how the Swiss boarding schools might still be teaching good manners after all.  Well, I saw evidence of that today when—you guessed it—I rode to Connecticut.

I was riding—coasting, actually—down the same street that prompted my quip.   Although there wasn’t a street fair, a lot of people were there, shopping in the boutiques—and walking around with the frappucinos they got in Starbuck’s. (I guess the coffee purveyor is the street’s concession to mass market!)  Even though I was controlling myself, I was going at a pretty good clip, as the street slopes downward.

Sign on a shared path in Perth, Australia.  Photo by Jo Beeson.  From ABC News Australia.

A man stepped into the street, his back turned to me.  He was talking to a woman who I assume is his wife.  Both were dressed in a similar sort of high-dollar casual way.  As they talked, they stepped into the street.  The woman, a step or two behind him, tried to pull him back.  I rang my bell and shouted non-obscenities. (I guess I was trying to show that you don’t have to go to a Swiss boarding school to learn good manners!)  I couldn’t steer out of his path, as not more than the thickness of my glove separated me from a line of cars descending to my left. 

I hit my brakes—and him.  Well, not quite hit:  It was more than a graze, but I careened off his rear left side.  He staggered a couple of steps but didn’t fall.  I stopped.

Before I could ask whether he was OK, he intoned, “I’m sorry.  I’m so sorry.”

“I’m sorry.”  I meant it.  It’s the sort of street lots of people cross without looking, and the drivers seem to anticipate it. If I could have steered out of his way, I would have.  It’s useless, really, to scream at pedestrians in such a place.

“I’m really, really sorry.”

“Are you OK?” I finally asked.

I took off my sunglasses.  He looked into my eyes. I waited for him to cross.  He flicked his right hand.  “After you,” he said with a deferential smile.

“Have a good day,” I said.

“Likewise.”

They really do teach good manners in Swiss boarding schools—or Deerfield or Andover or Groton or wherever he went to school. Or maybe he’s just a gentle, polite man.  Whatever the case, I really couldn’t be angry.  And, to tell you the truth, I didn’t want to be: It was a beautiful day and I was having a great ride.

Riding And Working

Whenever I ride along the Brooklyn waterfront--especially in Red Hook or near Bush Terminal--I can shed a tear or two as I'm opening my wings.   At least, that's how it feels sometimes.  It's the joy of victory twinged with a little bit of sadness and guilt.

The views along those stretches of New York Harbor are always awe-inspiring, and not only because of the Statue of Liberty or the lower Manhattan skyline.  No matter how many towers are built along the shorelines, they are exactly that:  shorelines, which means that they can never fit into a grid pattern; they can only disrupt or stop it.  And whoever or whatever comes or goes, lives go on.  

For that is what those waterfronts have always represented to me:  lives.  Sure, the promenades and picnic fields built over the old piers are pleasant places to walk one's dog or hang out with friends and loved ones--or to bicycle.  But nearly anyone who goes to the waterfront now has never worked on the docks, on the piers.  Those who work in the concession stands or clean the paths or fields don't work on the waterfront; they work for companies in faraway places that contract with the city's Parks Department.  

That is not to say they don't work hard (for low pay).  But their work enables the leisure of others, nearly none of whom will they ever get to know.  Those who worked on the docks and in the nearby factories were working for and with other people who worked:  the people they saw all day, and sometimes at the end of the day.  They ate, drank, played ball and attended each other's (and their families') important life events.  It's hard to imagine the person making lattes in the snack bar going to the bachelorette party of someone who power-walks or takes an outdoor yoga class along the promenade.

It's still a little strange for me to be one of those people who goes to the waterfront for recreation or fitness--in my case, to ride a bicycle--after it was a place of work, and more work, for various members of my family, most of them gone now.  For that matter, the jobs or even the very work they did no longer exist:  the plant where one of my uncles made cement, the shoe factory where my mother and grandmother stitched and the old docks where two of my uncles were longshoremen--a job rendered obsolete by cranes, container ships and interstate highways.

To be sure, their work was difficult, draining and sometimes dangerous.  The pay was decent--at least for my uncles--but, really, it did not justify the risks to themselves they were expected to take.  Nobody should have to work under those conditions, or those my mother and grandmother endured.  But, at the same time, those jobs allowed people who couldn't, for whatever reasons, spend lots of time in school to make lives for themselves and, in time, to support families.  I don't think the man grilling hot dogs in the concessionaire can do that on his pay.

He, and his co-workers are probably working other jobs. And they don't have much time, or energy, for the sorts of things we do now when we visit the pier.  If he has a bike, he's probably riding it to the job and back, but not along this pier.  I'll bet he, and the woman making lattes, didn't get to see the "rainbow cloud" to the right of the Statue.

At the end of the day, they probably want to flop into a couch or bed.  I am more privileged: In the middle of a ride after work, I can enjoy the whimsy of something like this:

I imagine that the artist who created it was one of the people who, like me, cycled (or strolled or ran) along the promenade, or some path like it in his home town.  So we might say the waterfront is a place of recreation for him.  Then again, he created a public sculpture that is exhibited on the pier.  He is an artist; that is his his work.  Or is it play--recreation--for him?

I hope it's everything.  Then I will feel nothing but pleasure about it, and about having the time to ride by and see it.

Cycling Legend Attacked On NYC Street

The name looked familiar.

Someone shoved him to the ground on East 86th Street, just steps away from Gracie Mansion, the New York City Mayor's residence.

The attacker fled and hopped into a taxi.  The man suffered a broken arm and cut to his forehead.  A week later, he's in a wheelchair, still recuperating.

The man--91 years old--had gone out around 7 am last Wednesday morning to pick up a newspaper.  His attacker was, according to the police, intoxicated and "muttering gibberish" before pushing the man.

Just yesterday the man's name was released:  Fred Mengoni.  If you race, or have followed racing in the US, you have heard his name:  He has  done more than almost anyone to bring respectability, and even prestige, to American bicycle racing.

Born in the Italian Adriatic seacoast town of Alcona, Mengoni dreamed of riding in the Giro d'Italia.  He adopted what he later described as a "killer" training regimen.   Still, he came to the conclusion that he simply didn't have the talent to become a professional cyclist.

In 1957, he emigrated to the US with $50 in his pocket.  After a series of ups and downs, he invested in some run-down brownstones in then-unfashionable neighborhoods.  It paid off, leading to a prosperous real estate career.                              

 But he never forgot his love of cycling.  Nearly every day, he trained in Central Park. In 1980, he started GS Mengoni, which became one of the great teams in US bicycle racing.  Among the team's "alumni" are Steve Bauer, George Hincapie and Mike Mc Carthy.  He also became an adviser to a young rider named Greg LeMond, with whom he has had a longtime friendship.  
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Fred Mengoni with George Hincapie.  Photo from A View From The Back

He also was instrumental in developing USPRO, which he served as president for several years before the US Cycling Federation purchased it and turned it into USA PRO.  And he holds the Mengoni Grand Prix in Central Park every year.

Let's all wish Fred Mengoni a full recovery and many more years!

It's Probably A Sun Tour Gran Prix. Or A Simplex Juy Export 61.

You know that something is influential is when it is imitated--even after the original is no longer made.

Mavic 851 rear dearailleur, circa 1981.  Photo from Velobase

Several bicycle derailleurs come immediately to mind.  If you're of my generation, one is the Campagnolo Nuovo/Super Record. From the time the first Nuovo was made in 1967 until the last Super Record came out of the Vicenza plant two decades later, innumerable parts manufacturers copied its basic design.  Much of the reason for that was, of course, the preponderance of Campagnolo equipment in the elite pelotons of the world.  "If Eddy won the Tour with it, it must be the best," is what those imitators were probably thinking.

Campagnolo Super Record, circa 1983.  From Wikipedia Commons

Campagnolo Nuovo Record. From Sheldon Brown's Bicycle Glossary.

Some will stop reading this post (and, possibly, this blog) after reading what I'm about to write:  The Campagnolo Nuovo/Super Record, even when it was introduced, was not the best-shifting derailleur available.  What caused its domination at the top of the cycling world was its reliability and, well, the reputation Campagnolo built with their earlier derailleurs and other components.  Also, each derailleur (more so the Nuovo, in my opinion) had a "classic" look to it.

Kharkov rear derailleur.  Probably the sorriest imitation of Campy NR/SR--with the possible exception of the Gian Robert--ever made.  Photo from Velobase.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, when the GDR government decided it needed to bring bicycle technology up to the level of what existed in the West, one of the parts they produced was a Tectoron derailleur that, from ten meters away, looks like a Campagnolo Super Record without the logos. 

Huret Svelto.  From Bulgier.net

Another influential derailleur was the Huret Svelto.  In its time, it was rather nice:  The shifting was better (or, at least, no worse) than most other derailleurs that were available when it was introduced in 1963.  And it had a certain industrial-minimalist aesthetic. (Think of a "cold irons bound" version of the Jubilee.)  But the main reason why it was widely imitated--even Shimano and SunTour had versions, called the "Pecker" and "Skitter" respectively--was that it was made from pressed steel plates riveted together. In other words, it was cheap to manufacture.  Through the 1970s, various component makers--including Romet of Poland--were making derailleurs that looked (and shifted) like the Svelto.

Romet derailleur, Poland, 1970s.  Photo from Disraeligears

(In contrast to the Svelto, the Huret Allvit--which may have come as original equipment on more bicycles than any other rear derailleur in history--had, as far as I know, only one imitator:  the USA-made Excel Dynamic of 1975-77.  It's particularly odd that, as the first American derailleur, its manufacturer would almost slavishly copy the Allvit when many cyclists were replacing their Allvits with SunTour and Shimano derailleurs.)

1964 SunTour Gran Prix. Photo from Disrealigears

Today, if you asked what derailleur is the most influential, the answer you'd probably get is "Shimano".  No specific model would be mentioned, as nearly all derailleurs made by that company over the past thirty years share the same basic "slant pantograph" design with two sprung pivots.  Neither of those features is, of course, a Shimano innovation:  SunTour introduced the former in its 1964 "Gran Prix" derailleur, and Simplex first employed the latter feature on a parallelogram derailleur when it made the "Juy Export 61."

Simplex Juy Export 61. Photo from Cycles Cambio  (Japanese blog)


Since all but the lowest-cost derailleurs today use both features, perhaps we could say that the Sun Tour Gran Prix (or, perhaps the SunTour Competition, which came out a  year later and eliminated the Gran Prix's less-desirable features) and the Simplex Juy Export 61 are the most influential derailleurs in the bicycle world today, even though neither has been made in decades.

SunTour "U" derailleur.  Photo from Disraeligears

SunTour Honor. Photo from Bikeforums

The funny thing is that the influence of those two derailleurs--and others from SunTour and Simplex--still lives on even in derailleurs found on the cheapest department store bikes.  Shimano's less-expensive derailleurs, with the dropped rather than the slant parallelogram, continue to employ two sprung pivots reminiscent of Simplex.  Perhaps even more ironically, Shimano is apparently making a derailleur that apes the SunTour "Honor" and "U" derailleurs found on low-priced bikes during the 1970's:

I saw this derailleur on a bike parked near where I work.  I'd never seen it before.  The only difference between the Shimano in the photo and the lowest-priced SunTours of the 1970s seems to be the black plastic front knuckle and that the rear knuckle, parallelogram plates and the part that holds the top pivot seem to be more crudely stamped and finished--and possibly made from a lower grade of steel--than those old SunTour base models. 

Those inexpensive SunTours shifted nearly as well as, but developed play in the pivots more quickly than, the V-series SunTours.  (Sometimes the Sun Tour "U" was the only good component on the bike that came with it!)  I wonder how that Shimano derailleur I saw today shifts.