Bicycling

Up to this point, my run mileage for the year exceeded my bicycling mileage — something that is particularly remarkable because I had been running fewer times per week than a toddler gets up to run around the living room within 10 minutes. This is to say that I had been cycling very, very infrequently this year. This was not good considering that a 9.8-mile time trial up Vail Pass I already registered for was coming up soon. As in the following week. Continue reading »

It’s kind of hard to believe but nine months after last year’s 2,700-mile Canada-Mexico MTB race, my mountain bike was still laying in pieces on the basement floor. In fact I had done basically nothing with Cranky the Cannondale since unpacking her from the joke of a bike box I hastily constructed from a dozen discarded cardboard pieces in the parking lot of a dollar store in Lordsburg, NM one day after finishing the epic journey, aside from cleaning and noting all the broken or seriously worn parts. It’s not that I was so “done” with the crisis-ridden adventure that I didn’t want to mount an MTB ever again, but with all the two- and four-wheeled machines I have and other hobbies I do, Cranky was inadvertently left forlorn and forsaken. Continue reading »

I was on the way to a Wednesday night run with my neighbor when a friend called and asked, “so when are we meeting tonight for the bike event?” Tonight? Somehow I got the date wrong and thought it was tomorrow. So to make the event, I cut my run down to a 2.6 miles so I could get to New Belgium Brewery in time, or at least not *too* late.

Good thing Tori called — otherwise I’d have missed out on a fun evening of beer, bikes, and a documentary/info-session about how bicycles are benefiting the people of Ghana. Continue reading »

It may be true that I have broken or worn out dozens of bicycle parts over the years, and 2008 was no exception particularly because of the Tour Divide. But one item I have never broken is a bicycle wheel. Well, that is not strictly true as I have broken spokes before — but I have never committed irreparable damage to the beefier elements of a wheel, such as the hub and rim. Part of the reason is that the super heavy Mavic CXP30 deep-dish rims (550 grams each!) on my Cannondale race bike are simply indestructible and I haven’t even had to true them one time in the last seven years. In fact, just last week I rode seven miles home on a completely flat tire (due to forgetting to pack my CO2 inflater) with no ill consequences except to my patience.

Leave it to my friends, then, to be breaking wheels. A few years ago it was Steve, who managed to crack the hub of his pricey Rolf rear wheel. And then last month I got an e-mail from my friend Joe with the following blurb of a mid-December incident: Continue reading »

Now that I’m housebound here in rain-soaked Northern California, I can resume posting about the Tour Divide, the 2,700-mile Canada-Mexico adventure of a lifetime I finished five months ago. I even brought the notepad I was scribbling on in my one-person tent under the glow of a one-LED finger light each night just so I could transcribe its daily notes while I’m on vacation.

In July and August, I mainly posted about “look at how ridiculous/difficult/nutso this race was,” so this time I thought I’d begin posting about how scenic the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route is. Here are scenery photos from the Tour Divide. It was the most beautiful thing I have ever done. Continue reading »

I was in Denver for the second time this month. This time, however, it wasn’t to see airplanes, but rather… bicycles! Continue reading »