It's Too Cold....For What?

This afternoon, the temperature has risen to 55F (12C).  That's about 12F (6C) higher than normal for this time of year. 

Three days ago, the temperature dropped to -1F (-18C) at dawn, giving us the coldest morning we've had in over two decades. It was Valentine's Day--a Sunday, to boot-- and when I went outside, nobody was on the streets.  (That might mean that a lot of babies will be born in November.)  None of us who might normally ride on a Sunday were pedaling down the pavement.  Even the delivery men for the 24 hour diner seemed to have taken the morning off.

Before that, we had a week or so of relatively mild weather, preceded by a blizzard, which was in turn preceded by warmer-than-usual-for-early-winter temps.


In years past, there always seemed to be a spell of a few weeks when the weather was "too cold" for most people, including dedicated cyclists, to ride.  Of course, what people in this part of the world deem as "too cold" would seem absolutely tropical in, say, northern Quebec or the eastern plains of Montana.  But I would imagine that even in such places there are conditions which even the hardiest and most seasoned cyclists, hikers and other outdoorspeople dare not venture.

This year, though, we seem to have had almost no such stretch of weather.  Aside from a couple of abnormally cold days (like Valentine's Day or the weekend of the blizzard), we have not had terribly wintry conditions.  Within two days of the blizzard, the temperature rose to 50F (10C), so the snow didn't remain for very long.  And the snow that fell in the wee hours of yesterday morning is a memory, distanced by the warmer-than-average conditions we're having today.

Still, when I showed up at  my job today, one of my colleagues expressed disbelief that I cycled in.  "It's too cold!"

"Too cold for what?" I wondered aloud.

"Well, it is still winter, you know.  You must be cold." 

I wasn't, but I took her up on her offer of a hot chocolate.  It is indeed winter, whether or not "it's too cold".

Prone To Revival--And Deservedly So, I Think

Shakespeare never had an original idea--for a story, anyway--in his life.  George Orwell took almost everything that makes 1984 worthwhile--including the notions of "thought crimes," "Big Brother" and its mathematical theme--from We, a novel from a little-known Russian writer named Yevgeny Zamyatin.  (Orwell reviewed the book three years before 1984 came out.)  D'Artagnan was not the creation of Alexandre Dumas; rather, Dumas lifted him--and Athos, Porthos and Aramis--from the first volume of Gaeten Courtilz de Sandras' book called The Memoirs of D'Artagnan.

In the book of Ecclesiastes, we find this:  "There is nothing new under the sun."  So it is in the world of literature and the arts.  So it is in science and technology.  And so it is in the world of bicycling.  In the four decades I have been cycling, almost every "new" idea had been done before, sometimes in the very early history of cycling.  As I mentioned in two recent posts, suspension is one such idea.  Another idea is that of building frames of anything besides steel:  During my formative years, carbon, titanium and aluminum frames were not only created; they were available to the general public (for a price, of course).

Then there are those ideas that never really go away but are nonetheless "rediscovered" by a new generation of marketing types (or, sometimes, actual cyclists who haven't been in the sport for very long).  One such concept is that of the recumbent bicycle.

I am not about to dismiss recumbents, as I have never ridden one myself.  I don't doubt that, as their proponents claim, their aerodynamics can make them faster than standard bicycles.  My concerns about them are twofold:  How well and comfortably can a rider use his or her muscles in such a position?  (At my age, the answer to such questions is more meaningful than it was when I was younger!)  And, how visible is a recumbent rider in traffic?

(I'll admit that the second question is the one that has done more to keep me off a recumbent!)

That there were recumbents before Dan Henry and others were touting them doesn't surprise me.  It's also not surprising to note that in the years just after World War I, some cyclists experimented with riding nearly prone.  Marcel Berthet--for whom the Lyotard No. 23 platform pedal was named--was concerned with aerodynamics, as were other racers and designers who flew or worked with aircraft during the war. 

The Challand Recumbent

But it's truly interesting, if not shocking, to see that some two decades earlier, in 1896 a horizontal bicyclette normale was exhibited in Geneva.  The Challand recumbent, named for its inventor, was said to allow easier mounting, improved stability and greater thrust on the pedals. It had just one problem, though:  It weighed about three times as much as its rider!

Berthet and others who revived recumbents after the War used them in record attempts. Charles Mochet designed his own recumbent--dubbed the "Velocar"--and used it to set records for the kilometer, mile and hour.  In the case of the latter, he broke a 20-year-old record by half a kilometer.

His exploits ignited a debate as to whether the "Velocar" was actually a bicycle.  The Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) answered that question in the negative, and banned recumbents, as well as aerodynamic devices, from racing in 1934.  The UCI then declared all of Mochet's records invalid.

Given all of the controversy about pharmaceutical and mechanical doping, the controversy over recumbents seems almost quaint now.  Recumbents are, I believe, here to stay, just as--unfortunately--doping is.

 

When This Day Was Bicycle Day

Here in the US, most holidays have long since lost whatever meaning they had and have become, instead, occasions for orgies of consumerism.

Perhaps the most prominent example is Thanksgiving.  For decades, the day after, dubbed "Black Friday", has been an occasion for sales that mark the beginning of the Christmas shopping season.  In recent years, however, large department stores have been opening--and holding their sales--on Thanksgiving Day itself.  

This day--Presidents' Day--is no different.  While other holidays feature other kinds of bargain bonanzas (e.g., spring clothing and bedding on Memorial Day), this holiday is seen as the beginning of the automobile-buying season, and dealerships offer deals to entice consumers into buying new cars outright or trading in the ones they already have.

How did presidents come to be associated with cars? (Well, Ford Motor Company does have a line called Lincoln!)  To answer that question, we have to look at the origins of this holiday.  During my childhood, schools were closed on the 12th and 22nd of February, in honor of Abraham Lincoln's and George Washington's birthdays, respectively.  In 1971, Congress passed the Uniform Holidays Act, which moved the dates of certain festivities to Mondays.  At that time, Lincoln's and Washington's days were combined into one holiday, which falls on the third Monday of February.

Before the merger, if you will, auto sales were held on Washington's Birthday, which was seen as the beginning of the auto-buying season.  That tradition dates to the early twentieth century, when automobiles first began to shape the landscape and culture of this nation.  It has, however, roots in yet another kind of sale held on the same date.

If you've been reading this blog, you know that the bicycle is, in essence, the predecessor of the automobile.  Some of the early auto manufacturers and designers had been in the bike business, much as the Wright Brothers were at the time they made their flight.  So, it should come as no surprise that bicycle-buying (and, in some locales, -riding and -racing) season began on the 22nd of February.  Bicycle dealers usually debuted or featured new models on that date and offered special deals.  Many also had parties and even held or sponsored races, even in such locales as Boston which were as likely as not to have snow on their streets at that time of year.

From Green Fleet Messengers

As an article on the Atlantic Monthly website relates, some people were not happy that "crass commercialism" sullied the occasion of the birth of our first President.  Some of them pointed out, rightly, that there really was no reason to associate two-wheelers with "The Father of Our Country" because it's unlikely that he rode anything resembling a bicycle.  My guess is that the date was chosen because it's near the end of February and Spring is so close that people can practically taste it, if you'll indulge me in a cliche.  And, to be fair, there are parts of the US where the weather is already spring-like by that time.  

By the turn of the century, bicycles were becoming less popular as the motorcycle and, later, automobiles, seized e public's consciousness.  As bicycles are again becoming more popular, wouldn't it be interesting if the old tradition of bicycle sales was revived for Presidents' Day?

How Does He Love Thee? As Much As He Loves His Bike?

Pity Elizabeth Barrett Browning. While her husband wrote poems that tackled the Big Questions (including those of the very nature of poetry) and are in every anthology in the English language, she's seen as a "chick lit" poet.  Even if she'd written The Inferno or The Waste Land, she'd've never lived this line down:

            How do I love thee?  Let me count the ways.

It certainly wouldn't look out of place in a Hallmark card.  But some of the greatest works of literature contain passages that, frankly, are even more banal. The problem with that line is that it's what comes first in the sonnet. The rest of becomes more serious, even darker:

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.

"I love thee with a love I seemed to lose/ With my lost saints."  Hmm...I wasn't expecting that with my box of Godiva.  "[A]nd if God choose/I shall but love the better after death."  I know that love is patient--but is it that patient?

Say what you will, but I actually like the poem. No, forget that:  I love it.  Somehow I believe Robert did, too, in his heart of hearts.  Had they been cyclists, one might have sent the other something like this:

Being poets, they probably had a sense of humor.  (Believe it or not, verse and mirth are not mutually exclusive!)  So I could also see them exchanging something like this:

Couldn't you?  Happy Valentine's Day.

His Spirit of Innovation Wasn't Suspended

The other day, I wrote about some bicycle suspension systems that were patented nearly a century before Rock Shox or Girvin Flex Stems came bouncing down the trails.

It's not as if the idea of cushioning the ride and rider died with the fin de siecle Bike Boom.  Indeed, some of you rode balloon-tired Schwinn, Columbia, J.C. Higgins or other bikes with a big spring in front of your handlebars.  That spring was attached to a bars that were, in turn, attached to the front fork.  How much that actually absorbed shock, I don't know.  I have long thought that they--like the "banana" seat struts attached to shock absorbers on bikes like the Schwinn "Krates"--were really intended to enable kids' fantasies of riding a "chopper" on the flats of Daytona.

Around the time that boys (and, on occasion, girls) were tearing up and down driveways and cul-de-sacs, one of the few American adults riding at the time was thinking about real, functional suspension for bicycles.  Having been one of the first commercial pilots (for American Airlines), he no doubt saw the value in keeping his bike stable and upright (the real purpose for suspension on cars and motorcycles) in turbulent conditions.

If you've on any kind of organized bike ride for, say, the past half-century, you have heard his name.  More precisely, you have followed his directions.



Yes, there was a real, live Dan Henry behind the "Dan Henry arrows".  While he is best remembered for his system of road symbols, his most interesting contributions to cycling may well be in the ways he made his bikes more comfortable and stable.  



I remember reading about Dan Henry's bicycle in an issue of American Cycling, the magazine that became Bicycling!  As I recall, the bike was a Rene Herse or Alex Singer--or that of some other prestigious French builder.  He made the mechanisms himself from springs and bar stock he obtained in auto-repair shops.  Again, if memory serves, he said that this system allowed him to ride the lightest tubuar tires and rims under nearly all conditions without getting flats or dinging his rims.

(Interestingly, he would later convince Clement to make tubular tires with butyl tubes, which are more durable and retain air longer than the latex tubes commonly found in high-quality tubulars.)

Another part of his "suspension system", if you will, was something he made himself--from a pair of handlebars, a tandem "stoker" stem and some canvas webbing.  

It seems that every decade or so, someone re-invents this saddle.  When I first became a dedicated cyclist (around the time I found that copy of American Bicyclist in the local library), a similar saddle called the "Bummer" was advertised in Bicycling!  I think one of the magazine's editors test-rode it, probably unaware of his perch's provenance.  

Perhaps it's not surprising to know that Dan Henry was also one of the early proponents of recumbent bicycles, and that he designed and rode such a machine.  I guess he was one of the first cyclists to see that high performance and all-day comfort needn't be mutually exclusive--and, as an engineer and pilot, was one of the first modern cyclists to have the background and skills to realize such a vision.

He died nearly four years ago, just short of 99 years old, riding almost to the end.  I wonder what he thought of some of the suspension designs--especially for downhill bikes--that have come along.

See How They Run: Choosing Your Fuel

Are you trying to convince someone (yourself?) to cycle rather than drive to work or school or wherever?

If you are, this might make your job a little easier:

They Didn't Come As A Shock Then...

Writing recently about "path racers" and the mountain bike experiences of my youth got me to thinking of just what it means to be a "mountain" or "path" rider--and what makes bikes suitable for those kinds of riding.

I also got to thinking about how and when those kinds of riding came to be seen as distinctive from other kinds of riding, and how the terms to describe them came to be.

It seems to me that those kinds of cycling and bikes--as well as cyclo-cross and bicycle motocross (BMX) evolved as specialties within cycling because of paved roads. 

Think about it:  In the early days of cycling, there were few paved roads.  And the few paved roads had gravel, cobblestone or granite sett (a.k.a. Belgian Block) surfaces. Thus, most of the time, cyclists were riding under conditions that, today, we would equate with off-road or cyclo-cross--or what the Brits would call "rough stuff".

If you are a mountain or cyclo-cross rider, try to think of what your rides would be like with solid rubber tires--or no tires at all. In other words, think  of what it would be like to ride your favorite trail on bare wood or metal rims. That is, I believe, what normal riding conditions would have been like for most cyclists before the pneumatic tire was invented in the late 1880's.

And to think cyclists rode, not only without the cushioning of air-filled tires, but on front wheels that were almost as tall as the riders themselves!

So, really, it's not surprising that there were attempts to incorporate suspension into bicycles. 

This Blackledge bicycle, patented in 1890, uses a spring in the fork assembly to soften the blows from the rough roads of the day.  It seems that ever since the "safety" bicycle (two wheels of more or less equal size) was invented, attempts to incorporate suspension into bicycles began with the front fork.  For one thing, we feel road shock first at the front.  For another, shock to the front is more likely to upset our balance or momentum--and cause crashes-- than shock at the rear.

This Tillinghast bicycle, patented the following year, has another interesting front suspension system as well as a unique kickstand built into the pedals:

Still, attempts to soften the ride--and make the bike more stable on rough surfaces--weren't limited to tinkering with the front end.  Here is a drawing submitted by Fernand Clement for the suspension bike he patented in 1892:

Here is another early rear suspension system on a J.H. Mathews bicycle, patented in 1891:

Hmm...Wouldn't it be fun to envision Messrs. Blackledge, Tillinghast, Clement and Mathews showing up at Tamalpais a century after they created these bikes...but just before Rock Shox, Marzocchi, Manitou came along?

She Would've Had Us Riding In Style--And Comfort!

When you think of female clothing designers (which, I assume, you regularly do! ;-) , names like Coco Chanel, Miuccia Prada, Vera Wang, Betsey Johnson, Carolina Herrera and Sonia Rykiel probably come to mind.  They have influenced what we--and, yes, you guys, too!--wear today. 

We American women, especially those of us who are active in any sport like cycling, owe perhaps an even greater debt to someone you probably don't know about unless you're, ahem, of a certain age. Or if you teach at FIT or Pratt.  Or if, of course, you are a fashion designer.

According to Jennifer Minniti, the chair of Pratt's Fashion Design Department (and herself a designer), the person of whom I am writing "is known as the inventor of American sportswear or ready-to-wear."  That's not an overstatement:  She was probably the first designer to understand how American women's lives were different from those of upper-class Europeans (who were, traditionally,  the main customers of most designers) and how they therefore needed clothing that was more functional and adaptable while still elegant and stylish.

Most important of all, her creations fitted and moved with the body, something that could not be said of the work of other designers, whose clients still largely eschewed physical activity. It is no surprise, then, to see that she created this "cycling costume" in 1940:

 

I don't expect to see that in the peloton. But, hey, forget that it isn't in Lycra--wouldn't you wear it? 

 

 

Claire McCardell, who designed it, was the first American fashion designer to garner name recognition.  She was so well-known in her time that in 1950, President Harry S. Truman presented her with the Women's National Press Club Award, making her the first fashion designer to be voted one of America's Women of Achievement.

Hmm...How would she have dressed the man who quipped, "I like riding a bicycle for two--by myself"?

 

A Path Racer's Companion?

Yesterday, I wrote about Mercian's new limited-edition Path Racer.  It is quite a lovely machine.  For that reason alone, it's easy to see why path racers--a category of bikes all but unknown in the US and all but forgotten in England, France and other countries where it was once popular--is enjoying a revival.  Aside from the fact that they can be very practical, especially for someone who lives in a rural area and wants to (or can) own only one bike, they can have some of the most graceful lines and curves to be found on two-wheeled vehicles.

After writing yesterday's post, I came across another bike with graceful arcs and stunning symmetry. Unlike the new path racers, which harken to past bikes, this one is futuristic (both in the lower- and upper- case "F" sense of the word) even as it retains a classical aesthetic. (All right, I'll stop writing like the art critic I'm not!) This bike--the "Humming Bird"--is inspired by R. Buckminster Fuller's Dymaxion car, according to its builder, Cherubim:

Somehow I can see it next to the Mercian Path Racer.
 

Mercian Revives An English Tradition--For Now

When I first became a dedicated cyclist--around the tail end of the '70's Bike Boom--high-quality, performance-oriented bikes were marketed in two categories:  racing and touring.  Although there were elite touring bikes available, such as Schwinn's touring Paramount and machines from custom builders, racing bikes were seen as the more advanced and higher-quality machines.

By 1987 or thereabouts, major bike manufacturers had ceased making bikes designed for loaded, or even light, touring. 

For one thing, multiday bike touring was no longer as popular as it had been in the wake of the Bikecentennial.  Many people who bought touring bikes used them for once-in-a-lifetime treks, whether cross-continental tours like the Bikecentennial or an after-college ramble through Europe--or just a crossing of the nearest county or state line.  Then, "life intervened" or they simply lost their incentive to do another tour, and their bikes hung in rafters or barns, or collected dust in basements.  Thus, by the mid-'80's, there was little demand for new touring bikes.

For another, by that time, mountain bikes had come "of age", as it were.  The "racing/touring" dichotomy of the Bike Boom era was thus replaced by a "road/mountain" binary that lasted through most of the rest of the 20th Century.  The "hybrid" bicycle was supposed to be a cross between road and mountain bikes, but, as one wag noted, it had "the speed of a mountain bike and the comfort of a road bike".

During the race/tour and road/mountain eras of cycling, new cyclists came into the fold without knowing of other genres of bicycles that enjoyed popularity--and fulfilled clear purposes--throughout the history of cycling.  For example, most of us didn't know about the randonneuses made by constructeurs like Rene Herse and Alex Singer, let alone what distinguished them from fully-loaded touring bikes.  We also didn't know about cyclo-cross bikes or riding--and, when most of us did learn, the riding was introduced to us as if it were some kind of proto- or paleo- mountain biking.

And, until a few years ago, most of us hadn't heard of "path racers".  It's a British term for bikes that can be ridden on smooth dirt pathways as well as on roads. They are said to be inspired by fin de siècle French track bikes, which would account for the fact that they're usually ridden with turned-over North Road-style and other "riser" bars to give an aerodynamic position.

Even in England, a whole generation of cyclists came of age without knowing about these bikes, as their peers and France were forgetting about classic randonneuses.  Fortunately, Alex Singer (Ernst Csuka) lived long enough to see a revival in a demand for such bikes, and Rene Berthoud as well as builders in other countries are making such bikes.  Now it seems that the path racer is enjoying a revival in England.  Pashley, the country's last large-scale bike manufacturer, has been making the Guv'nor--a stylized version of such bikes--for several years.  Now one of Britain's best-known traditional bike builders is making a limited-path racer:

As of now, Mercian plans to produce only ten Path Racers. Given the new surge in popularity of such bikes, I wonder whether the folks in Derby might be persuaded to make more.