Be seen at night

I was recently in downtown Charleston for a Saturday evening event, and walking back to the car park at around 10:00 pm. I was pleased to see a great many people riding bikes; at the same time I was dismayed that most of them were riding without lights.

Apart from being against the law, a person has to be crazy to ride in the dark without lights. There is a big enough danger of being hit by a car in the daylight, but in the dark? At least give a driver a fighting chance to see you before you become a hood ornament.

Lights are available at any bike store, and even stores like Target and Wal-Mart have them for as low as twenty bucks for a front and rear light.

I often ride early morning soon after 6:00 am. when it is still dark. I use front and rear lights, with a solid red light on my bike, and an extra flashing red light clipped to the rear pocket of my jersey.

One little tip I would like to pass on; I found the batteries in my front light vibrate loose and the light would go out as a result.

A piece of masking tape around the batteries takes care of the problem. (Left.)

Also I recently found some reflective ankle bands at a local Dick's Sporting Goods Store. (Pictured top.) They were in the shoe department, and were actually made for runners.

When I started wearing these I noticed immediately, car drivers gave me a lot more room when passing. Moving reflectors on pedals or ankles are very effective.

Velcro fastening, they would double nicely to hold pant legs in place for anyone commuting to work in regular clothes. The cost was around eight dollars.

Speaking of pant legs and commuting; here is a handy device called “Leg Shield.” Made to go around your right lower leg, (Picture above.) it prevents chain grease from getting all over your Khakis and you arrive at your work place looking clean and sharp.

Remember, be safe out there and be seen, especially at night.

                       

Drinking the Pharmstrong Koolade

What amazes me about Lance Armstrong is the amount of support he still has from his fan base.

In spite of all the overwhelming evidence that Armstrong doped; there are still those who point to “He never failed a drug test,” and refuse to accept the obvious conclusion.

There are others who say “Okay he doped, but then so did everyone else in that era, therefore the playing field was level and Lance is still the greatest cyclist ever."

There has been doping in professional cycling probably as long as there has been professional cycling. However, never at the level we are now finding occurred during Armstrong’s era; with EPO, human growth hormones, and testosterone. Doping went from simple stimulants like amphetamines, to body altering super drugs.

The playing field was by no means level; Armstrong’s organization was a huge money making machine. And the wealth it generated bought the best doctors and the most sophisticated modern dope that money could buy.

Dope that was undetectable, or if it was detected, plan B was organized corruption to pay off those doing the testing. This is why there was never a previous failed dope test.

I can’t help but notice many riders who left Armstrong’s team, were later caught doping on other teams who didn’t have the same system set up to pay off the testers. Floyd Landis didn't get caught until Armstrong had retired.

There is yet another group of Lance Fans who point to the Livestrong Foundation and forgive Armstrong for what he did arguing that more good has come out of the affair than bad. These are the people who are donating even more money to the Livestrong Foundation since the USADA report was released.

Don’t get me wrong, people are free to do with their money as they please, but if I were donating my hard earned money to a charity, it would not be one that was founded on a gigantic fraud and a lie.

Evidence is now out that LA is not only a liar and a cheat; he is a bully who has intimidated witnesses and even tried to destroy people who in the past have spoken out against him. Cyclists who refused to dope were thrown off teams.

This is a character flaw that I find hard to accept, and if I had been donating money to Livestrong in the past, I would now be looking for another cancer charity, that doesn’t have a mafia type boss as its leader.

What I find disturbing is that Armstrong’s following has the feel of a religious cult; with Lance like some Cancer Fighting Messiah as its leader.

These followers have drunk the Armstrong PR Koolade and are coming back for more.

Many of these followers a not cyclists, but people who have either had, or know someone who has had cancer in their family; although ill-informed their intentions are possibly well intended.

This is probably the thinking behind Nike’s decision not to drop Armstrong; they figure he still has a large enough fan base to make it worth their while.

Trek Bicycle company said it would stand behind Armstrong, but that was before the full USADA report was released; since its release Trek has been noticeably quiet. I would love to be a fly on the wall of Trek’s boardroom this last week.

It is only those interested in the sport of cycling who have taken the time to read though the mountain of evidence that the USADA has released, who can see the larger picture.

Lance Armstrong and his associates, along with the UCI have almost destroyed professional cycling as a sport. They have not done so yet, but if the UCI and more importantly the riders themselves and their team management do not get their act together soon, it will be the sport’s demise. The sport will not withstand another scandal of this magnitude.

The worrying part is that if Armstrong keeps this large faithful following and even grows it; in a few years when this has all died down, we could see Lance emerge as a politician. A run as Governor of Texas, followed by a run for the Whitehouse.

Don’t laugh; if he is able to replicate the money making machine, and the level of corruption he showed he is capable of in cycling, it is all very possible. A Presidential Candidate on dope… Who can stop that?

                      

Safe Routes to School

In less than a month this blog will be seven years old; apart from a six month break I took four years ago in 2008, I have written here at least once a week, often twice.

When I look back over this relatively short period, “Cycling,” that is to say the lot of the cyclist has improved greatly; this is happening globally, Even here in the US, a country seemingly entrenched in a “Car Culture,” the bicycle is slowly but surely gaining acceptance.

The type of thing I find encouraging are movements like the “Safe Routes to School” organization. I had heard of Safe Routes but knew little about it, until last week when I received an email from Carolyn Battaglia who works for the South Carolina Safe Routes to school.

I was invited to a meeting at a local school. The school with 1,200 students has a huge traffic issue every day as parents drop off and pick up their kids.

The school was encouraged when they participated in the International Walk and Bike to School Day, on October 1st. They wanted to extend this idea and have a Walk and Bike to School Day every month. The meeting was called to study the feasibility.

One of the ideas put forward was for the parents to drop the children off at a Church parking lot less than a mile away, and have the kids walk or bike the rest of the way as a group with adult escorts.

The goal is to encourage groups of children who live within a reasonable distance to meet at certain places then walk or bike to school with adult supervision and protection, and to do it on a daily basis.

The reason so many parents choose to drive their kids to school is because the school busses take a disproportionate amount of time for what is often a relatively short trip.

As well as being beneficial as a physical exercise, it would go a long way to cut down the congestion and air pollution at the school. What a great idea; a win for everyone.

What I didn’t know is that the Safe Routes to School is part of the South Carolina Department of Transport. This is wonderful news, because it means that when meetings like this are held, recommendations by Safe Routes org. for things like sidewalks and bike lanes go straight to the people who have the power to make it happen.

In fact there was a SCDOT engineer at the meeting taking notes. He made it clear that sidewalks needed around the school would only happen if money was available. But at least as money became available a work order would already be in place.

I would urge all those interested in local bike advocacy to look into Safe Routes to School in your state. Infrastructure improvements made for the benefit of schools and children, like sidewalks and bike lanes, are of benefit to all pedestrians and cyclists who live in the area.

And as I have said before; the day that it is safe for a child in the US to ride their bike to school, will be the time when our roads will be safer for everyone. Pedestrians, cyclists, and yes even car drivers.

                       

For the love of cycling

I love the bicycle and I love cycling. The reason… Almost my entire life it has given me so much, and to this day continues to do so.

As a child I fell in love with the bicycle, which later lead to some success as a racing cyclist and was instrumental in building my self esteem. This otherwise might not have happened and my life could have taken a totally different course.

My interest in cycling lead to a career in building bicycles, which eventually brought me to the United States, and again affected the course of my life. My bicycle and cycling continue to give me joy and satisfaction to this day, every time I ride.

When something is a passion in someone’s life, it is only natural they want to share it with others, so that they too might find the same joy and passion. I look on it as “Giving Back” in return for something that has given me so much.

For this reason I find the current news stories that are dominating the sport of cycling these days, extremely disturbing; namely the whole issue of doping in professional cycling.

The two main players in this story are Lance Armstrong and Pat McQuaid, who is the President of the UCI, the world governing body of the sport of cycling. (Both are pictured above.) 

If ever there were two people who owe everything they are today to cycling, it is these two.

It can be said that Lance Armstrong has in return done much for cycling, especially in the US; but it is a “Chicken/Egg” situation where the bicycle came first, and cycling made the man.

Pat McQuaid was an average pro racing cyclist who would be for the most part forgotten now if his un-illustrious career as a professional cyclist had not eventually lead to his Presidency of the UCI. Again had it not been for the bicycle and cycling the bold Pat would not be the UCI Pres.

Neither Armstrong or McQuaid would be where they are today, anymore than I would have been a bicycle framebuilder and writing here today, if it were not for cycling.

LA is an extremely wealthy man due to his earnings from cycling. McQuaid draws a substantial salary as President of the UCI. My own financial standing pales by comparison to these two, but I am still grateful for all that cycling has given me and continues to give.  

It irks me to see these two who should be so much more grateful to the sport of cycling, continue to inflict harm with the charade of lies and deceit.

Lance Armstrong has done much to bring awareness to cancer; I just wish he would put the same effort into bringing awareness to doping in sport, so that future generations do not feel they have to do that. I wish he would say, “Okay, I doped, but then so did everyone else.” Then we could move forward.

Pat McQuaid simply says that the doping problem is not his fault or that of the UCI. Well if not the UCI’s problem then whose? It would be like the Federal Government saying the use of illegal drugs is not their problem.

I can only come to the conclusion that Lance Armstrong and Pat McQuaid do not love cycling; or if they do, they love their own importance and their own egos, more than cycling.

Allowed to continue they will do great harm to the sport; the IOC (The Olympic Governing Body.) could bar cycling from the Olympics if the UCI does not get its act together and replace McQuaid soon.

More reading on the subject:

Floyd Landis and the Power of Shuddup

The UCIs failure to silence LeMond

Richard Pound Interview (Former WADA President.)

Lance Armstrong: My Conscience is Clear

                      

Opinions

If there is one thing I learned building bicycle frames; it is that no two people are alike.

If you could assemble a hundred people, all the exact same height, and then further separate into groups all those with similar leg length.

You would find within those groups, the thigh, lower leg and foot measurements would all vary.

Even within the same race, people have different facial features, complexions, hair color, etc. When you consider all peoples, the variations are infinite. An idividual's finger prints are unique, and now we know that DNA is too.

Most people accept these differences and even those who don’t, would seldom question why. Therefore, it really should be no surprise that people’s opinions will vary even more infinitely than our physical differences.

What are opinions but a collection of thoughts, based on our individual beliefs and experiences? Sometimes called a “Point of View,” meaning literally, the world as one individual sees it from where he stands.

No two individuals can have the same view if they stand in different places.

In spite of this we sometimes argue and fight defending our point of view, or trying to impose our opinions on others.

My father was an opinionated man. The problem was he didn’t have the education to back up or debate his opinions.

He was his own worst enemy; he couldn’t keep a job longer than a few months and he would be fired for mouthing off to his employer, or fighting with a co-worker.

Because he didn’t have intellect to back up his convictions, if someone strongly disagreed with him, he would get physical and fists would start flying.

The problem was made worse by his heavy drinking. He never owned a car, and a bicycle was his only means of transport, outside of public transport.

He was constantly arrested for being drunk and disorderly, and banned from every pub within a ten mile radius of our home. He would have to ride his bicycle further and further afield to get his beer.

Sad really, my father (Pictured right as a young soldier in the British Army.) in later life had no friends; nobody liked him. All because he would insist on foisting his opinions on other people. Why do some have this trait?

We accept every other difference in the human species, why do we expect the thought pattern of others to be in line with ours? We are each free thinking beings, and I can’t think of anything more random that a person's thoughts.

I think it is because our opinions are the yardstick by which we view and evaluate the world. It is how we judge situations and other people. Our opinions have been formed largely by our life experiences, our parents, teachers and other pivotal people in our lives.

Our opinions change over time, and with changing circumstances; if we find a better one we change it. However, at any given time our opinion is the best it can be. We just can’t understand why anyone would have a different opinion, after all, ours is the best.

It is not the difference of opinion that is wrong, it is the failure to see that the other’s view point is from an entirely different place.

I have found that defending my point of view is just a huge waste of time and energy. It achieves little; rarely does either side move any closer to the other’s way of thinking.

It is the single most cause of conflict between individuals, co-workers, friends, and families. On a larger scale, it is the basic reason nations assemble armies and go to war with each other.

Speaking of which, my father was aged 19, in 1929 and in the British Army fighting rebels on the Northwest Frontier of India. Under British rule at the time, that same area is now the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

This happened long before my birth, and now we are fighting the descendents of the people my father once fought. Does anything change, and has anyone learned anything? In more than eighty years has anyone changed the other’s point of view?

But now I am beginning to voice my opinion, and is that even worth the web space it is written on? Because in my opinion, if we spent a little less time defending our opinions, and a little more time in trying to understand the others fellow’s opinion, we might all be better off. But that’s just my opinion.

What is your opinion on opinions? Are they more trouble than they are worth, are they worth defending, are they worth anything at all?