Critical Mass Horror in Brazil

This last Friday 25th February 2011 a Critical Mass event was held in Porta Alegre in Brazil, as I am sure many of these same CM rides were held in various parts of the world.

This one ends in a horrific manner. A car driver deliberately drives at high speed through the crowd of cyclists and keeps on going.

I was sent the link to this video by Juan Salazar, a regular reader of this blog. He gave no details of casualties.

I later found this report, and miraculously no one was killed, eight were injured, one female was seriously hurt. The driver later abandoned his car and fled the scene.

                          

Two epic bike rides

Just this week I learned of two very different bike rides; both of epic proportions.

Eleven years ago, Motocross rider Jimmy Button (Above, nearest camera.) was a 4-time winner on the Motocross circuit and beginning what he expected to be another winning season, then in one brief moment his life took a terrible turn.

In January of 2000, Jimmy crashed during a practice for the AMA Supercross at Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego. It was not a particularly bad crash, at a slow speed from a low height, but he fell at a bad angle and landed on his head.

Jimmy suffered paralyzing injuries, his spinal cord was pinched and he could not move from the neck down.

Doctors told him he might never regain movement and might never walk again.

Jimmy’s trainer and best friend, Cory Worf, stayed by Jimmy’s side 24 hours a day willing Jimmy to move again.

Three months after the crash, Jimmy moved his thumb; ten months later, he took his first step, and has never looked back since.

Five days ago Jimmy Button and Cory Worf set off together on a 42 day, 2,400 mile bike ride across the USA from Southern California to Florida.

Jimmy is doing the ride to raise money that will benefit the Reeves Irvine Research Center, a California-based research facility devoted to the study of spinal cord injuries.

Jimmy still suffers some lingering problems from that motorcycle crash a decade ago. He can’t sweat, he has difficulty balancing, and he tires easily. But his best friend Cory Worf, fully believes he’ll be able to make this journey from coast-to-coast.

You can learn more about the ride and how to contribute at: http://www.milesformiraclestoday.com/.

As Jimmy and Cory's epic journey is starting, another is ending. (Picture above.)

After nearly three years on the road, the Vogel family of Boise, Idaho, John (56), Nancy (50), and twin sons Davy and Daryl (13) left Prudhoe Bay, Alaska in June 2008 to cycle to the southern end of the Americas.

The family is now a mere 500 miles from Ushuaia, the southernmost town of the world, and expects to reach their destination in mid-March.

To date, the Vogels have pedaled 17,000 miles through fourteen countries. They’ve crossed North America, Central America, and South America in the 33 months since they left the north shore of Alaska.

The Vogel brothers, twins Davy and Daryl, will have earned a place in the Guinness Book of World Records as the youngest people to cycle the length of the Americas when they reach their goal next month. The current record holder was 18 years old when he arrived in Ushuaia.

The family travels on two bicycles, and a tandem for John and Daryl. They carry everything they need on their bikes. Tents, sleeping bags, a stove and pot, clothes for all seasons, spare parts and tools, and homeschooling materials for the boys.

Speaking of schooling, it is my opinion that the experience these two boys will have had on this trip is an education you can’t get from books or school. An event that will no doubt stay with them a lifetime.

Follow the Vogel family’s last leg of this adventure on their website http://familyonbikes.org/blog/

The Huffington Post did a story last September on the Vogel family that includes a video.

                          

What's in a name?

A friend recently sent me this picture. (Left) He said,

“I was mountain biking with my daughter through Aliso and Woods Canyon in Laguna Beach, CA, and came upon this sign.”

There is also a Moulton Parkway in that same area in Laguna Hills; it seems probable that both were named after some influential person named Moulton from that area, although I am pretty sure it is not me.

Some people have a hard time figuring out how to pronounce Moulton. One of the strange rules of the English language is if there are two vowels together in a word, one of them is silent.

But is it the first or the second vowel?  In this case it is the second, so drop the “U” and pronounce it Molton.

Moulton is a pretty common name both in England and the US; look in any US phone book and you will find at least half a dozen. In England and Scotland there are at least five small towns or villages named Moulton, which I am sure is where the name originated.

English surnames often derive from the occupation of a person; hence Smith, Baker, or Miller. Or some less obvious ones like Cooper (Someone who makes wooden barrels.) or Fletcher (Someone who puts the feather flights on arrows.) Not a lot of job opportunities for fletchers these days.

Names like Black, White, Brown or Green came from the color of a person’s hair or eyes. Often a person was named John, William or Robert, and his son was called Johnson, Williamson or Robertson, and in many cases it got abbreviated to Johns, Williams or Roberts.

Other English surnames are the same as the place they originally came from. Moulton is one of those names. Its original meaning was simply, “A place where mules were kept.”

So people were named after a place, the later places got named after people. This I think is the most likely scenario in names of places in America. Almost certainly the case of Moulton Pkwy. in Laguna Hills, California. I would be interested to know who that was if anyone from that area knows.

There is a town of Moulton in Alabama, which may or may not have been named after a town of Moulton in the UK.

However, another town in Texas was named Moulton by someone from Moulton, Alabama who apparently lacked imagination.

Only 3,000 or so people live in Moulton, Alabama, and under a 1,000 in Moulton, Texas.

I wonder if there is anyone named Moulton living in either place.

Addendum Feb. 24. 2011

Places in USA named after British places, with some creative spelling. 

                         
 

Hate Crimes

Hatred, prejudice, and intolerance is alive and well here in the South. For that matter it is alive and well in most of the US, and in other parts of the world, especially in the so called “Civilized” world.

Countries like Great Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, places where people are educated and well informed, and you would not expect such base behavior.

It is against the law in most of these civilized countries to show intolerance to another based on their race, religion, sexual preference, etc.

Hate crime and bias crime laws are numerous and varied enough to inspire whole law classes or online criminology courses, and new ones are still being passed.

Most people do not openly show prejudice to another on these grounds; it is no longer socially acceptable. I hear less racist jokes or comments than I did twenty or thirty years ago.

However, if it becomes socially unacceptable to be prejudice against one group, the human race can improvise and find others to attack where it is okay to openly spew out hatred and vitriol towards that group. 

Whenever there is a cycling related story on a news media’s website, just read the comments from the general public. Even when it is a report of a cycling death where family, loved ones, and friends of the deceased are reading these comments; the hatred and intolerance comes spewing out.

If it were the death of a black person that was being reported, these same people would not post racial slurs, even though they could do it anonymously. If they did the news media would be quick to delete it as most readers would find it extremely offensive.

Where is the difference? A cyclist has died, and strangers crawl out from the under-belly of our so called civilized society, reacting to some basic tribal instinct, to make a judgment on that person simply because he was riding a bicycle.

They base this judgment on the worst behavior they have ever witnessed by other people on bicycles. Maybe they haven’t actually witnessed this behavior, but they have read about it in similar comments on other cycling related articles.

These comments perpetuate the hatred, just as racial slurs and jokes used to perpetuate racial intolerance. They post put downs and remarks about the appearance of cyclists, they ridicule the clothing, and post worn out cliches like "Lance Armstrong Wannabes."

If you think about it, this has nothing what-so-ever to do with anything, in the same way that the color of a person’s skin was never a valid reason for hating a complete stranger.

The other day I was riding my bike on a street close to my home, the road was straight and traffic was flowing past me without problems. A beat up old pick-up truck pulled up behind me, the driver revved his engine a few times, got as close as he could then gunned it, passing me with barely twelve inches to spare.

I could see the driver stretching his neck to look back in his rear view mirror to see how I would react. In my younger years, when I was full of piss and vinegar, I would have least given him the finger. I might have even chased him down to try to catch him at the next traffic light.

Maybe now I am a little wiser, or maybe I just don’t have the energy, but I decided the best course was to act like nothing had happened. To give him the finger would have only made it a game and encourage him to do it the next cyclist he saw on the road.

I could have taken his number and reported it to the police. It is against the law here in South Carolina to harass a cyclist, with a penalty of $250 fine.  However, I have emailed my local police department before on cycling safety issues, and have never received a reply; I doubt they would do anything.

Criminology is seldom applied such incidents to properly investigate death or injury to cyclists; this reflects the attitude of the general public. Just as years ago, attacks on black people were ignored. My basic human right to travel freely on a public highway is being threatened.

The action of the driver of this pick-up truck was based on prejudice and intolerance, and had he injured me it would be a hate crime. How else can you describe an attack on a complete stranger for no reason other than that person looks different and has chosen a different form of transport. Apart from that, I was hurting or hindering no one, and did nothing to provoke such a response.

Do we need to be constantly adjusting our criminal justice system? Bringing in more laws making it illegal to show intolerance towards this or that particular group. We need a large section of the population to realize it is morally wrong to attack someone verbally or physically. Especially when the attack is on a stranger and is based solely on appearance or someone seen as different.

To those who perpetuate this intolerance I say this: The cyclist you see on the road is someone’s son or daughter; someone’s father or mother. Yet some of you would run them down and kill them because they dare to ride a bicycle on what you perceive as your highway.

When their death is reported online others will post hate comments implying that they somehow deserved to die; thus you breed more intolerance.

Shame on you, shame on you   

                         

Contador's "Get out of ban free card."

I am no fan of Floyd Landis but.... he has a right to be ticked off right now.

Last November Landis was interviewed on German television and said that the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) is corrupt and protects certain riders.

Now the UCI on February 7th sent Landis a letter giving him 15 days to retract his statement or be sued in a Swiss court. Floyd shot back an email that pretty much said, “I’m broke, so go ahead and sue good luck.”

What is the UCI thinking with the timing of this threat of a law suit? The handling of the Contador affair screams hypocrisy. Landis was found to have doped in the 2006 Tour de France, and was immediately stripped of his Tour win and barred from competition for two years.

Contador on the other hand was found to have Clenbuterol in his system within days of the Tour de France finish in July 2010, but the UCI kept it quiet until the end of September. Then they only said something because details had been leaked to the press.

Next the UCI pussy-foots around for months and finally handed the case over to the Spanish Cycling Federation, who initially gave Contador a one year ban. Alberto got off light when you consider most other athletes get two years.

Now in an unprecedented move a week later the Spanish Federation reverses its finding, and now says Contador is innocent. This came soon after the Spanish Prime Minister no less, stated that Contador had broken no Spanish law.

Floyd Landis broke no US law, but the American President or other top ranking US politician didn’t get involved in his case. The World Anti Doping Agency (WADA) has set a zero tolerance for clenbuterol in an athlete’s body, no matter how the substance got there. Its presence warrants a sanction; otherwise why have this rule.

Other athletes have already been sanctioned because of clenbuterol use; you can’t pick and choose who gets banned and who doesn’t. This is not criminal law of “Innocent until proven guilty” no one is being executed or sent to prison. These are rules of a sport that all the players agree to abide by.

The UCI has to step in now and ban Contador for the full two years and strip him of his TDF win. If they don’t they lose all credibility, and Floyd Landis is right; there is one rule for the super stars, and another for the rest.

The UCI needs to either strictly enforce its own rules on doping or get out of dope testing altogether and abide by whatever the WADA decides. The later might be the better choice because the UCI has a conflict of interest between promoting the sport of cycling, and enforcing the rules.

Right now they are failing miserably on both counts, and they are killing the sport they claim to love and uphold. If Contador rides in this year’s Tour de France I for one will not feel inclined to watch it.

Here are more reactions to the Contador non sanction case.