Top of the Bridge

Rode the North Branch Trail yesterday on the mountain bike. On 4 inches of fresh powder, I had to let nearly all the air out of my tires for any traction and still it was quite the workout. I took this on the bridge over Caldwell and Oakton.

I Love My Bike

One reason why it is especially important to make sure your saddle is at the right height.



Anyone understand Dutch?

Dangers

I stumbled across this cool chart:


And decided to see what happens if I look for cycling. As a control (geek alert) I googled (or is that Googled?): "Died in a skydiving accident" and "Died in an elevator accident" and found that these numbers had increased by about 10% since this chart was made. The results for "Died in a blogging accident" has increased to 46,000 hits (yes, 46 thousand), due, I'm certain, not to the increased dangers of blogging, but to bloggers citing this chart.

Anyway, the results for: various cycling terms are as follows:
bicycle: 4460
cycling: 1430
biking: 395
pedaling: 0

Sadly, the first item that comes up in the search for "died in a cycling accident" is the death of Stereolab vocalist Mary Hansen in 2002.

OK, in a post that was supposed to be humorous, I seem to have taken a turn for the morbid. I'm going to stop digging now.

On Schedule?

According to the Chicago Tribune which cited the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP), Chicago's "climatologically" coldest week of winter arrived on schedule this week.

And today is the 23rd anniversary of the coldest day in Chicago history. It was my first winter in Chicago and I woke up to a temperature of -27 degrees and wind chills down to about -90.

I didn't' ride that day either.

A Place For Your Unused Bikes

I just learned that Working Bikes Cooperative will be collecting donated bikes at the January 19 Chicago Winter Bike Swap. So bring your old, tired, used, unused, disused, useless, lonely, misfit or just the bikes you no longer need.

Last Chance Appeal

Floyd Landis's appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) will be on March 19. I've not been keeping up with for months so I'll just point that date out and refer you to TBV for all (and I do mean all) the details.

I wonder what major league baseball would look like if their approach to doping were the same as cycling's?

Morning Ride

35 degrees, cloudy and a stiff west wind made this a great day for my first 50-mile ride of the new year.

Cyclocross 2008

Through my friends at Chicago Bike Racing, I see that there is a tentative schedule for the 2008 Chicago Cyclocross Cup. There are 7 races on this schedule (Moline is new for 2008) and in the comments section at the CBR post comes word that Beverly Bike-Vee Pak may also try an add a race as well. They are having a a USAC sanctioned, non-competitive cyclocross ride on February 10 to "see how it goes". Flyer here. I'll be there.

In other news, there will be a 'cross race in Viroqua, Wisconsin on January 19. That's about 4+ hours away, so I don't think I'm going. At least, not this year.

Chicago Winter Bike Swap

The Chicago Winter Bike Swap is this next Saturday (January 19) at the Old Orchard Country Club in Mount Prospect. Details here. There is a bike swap in Madison, Wisconsin this Saturday (the 12th).

Rule of Thumb

I did a quick check of the eponymously named web site Rules of Thumb for one about cycling. The closest I found was #2250: "An ideal weight for an endurance athlete, in pounds, is twice his height in inches." Being 5'11" that would make my ideal weight 142 lbs. This leads me to #3042, "The Two Keys to Dieting: Consume less and/or metabolize more. Any diet plan, supplement or gadget will only help you do one of these two things. Ultimately, you can save a lot of frustration and money by doing nothing more than consciously and continually choosing to eat less and get more exercise."

Starting tomorrow.

Driving Under Presure

BBC News reports that a French company has developed a car that runs on compressed air, will be produced by India's Tata Motors and it may be on sale in Europe and India by year end. More details here, but essentially a fill up (recharge? pressurization?) will cost about $3 for about a 125 mile range. Perfect for a city car or a second car for those of us in the suburbs. Also noteworthy is that its exhaust is non-polluting.

Warm Out Today

How's this for an apres ride picture? It was an unseasonably warm 47 out today. Tons of snow melt made the roads wet and gritty. Everyone was kicking up rooster tails of salt water, even fenders were of limited help. Even so, it's a treat to get in a 40 mile ride in January without shoe warmers, tons of layers and gloves the size of medieval gauntlets.

The World Has Changed

Check out this wonderful commercial (h/t Fritz):

New Gear

The New Year

This is one idea for the new year:

And here's another:

Perhaps there's a way to do both?