Bike Blog

I think I'll drink my ethanol, thanks 13 years ago
Since I upgraded my cyclecomputer, I've ridden 2406 miles. If I were to have driven that distance in my wife's car, that's maybe 80 gallons of gasoline. My cyclecomputer tells me that I burned 188,155 calories (food calories, actually a kcal). That's about 349 big macs or 0.13 barrels of oil equivalent (equivalent to the energy stored in 42 US gallons of crude oil). Less than half (46%) of a barrel is able to be turned into gasoline.. but in terms of gasoline energy, we're talking 6.288 gallons worth.

Dialing in: The rear derailleur secret handshake, wheel truing, tires, and fit 14 years ago
I figured out the rear derailleur secret handshake. It goes something like this: In order to set up a rear derailleur, there are four adjustments to be made. You need to set the high and low limit stops. You need to set the indexing adjustment. And you need to set the B-tension. I kept trying to…

Starting the process of dialing the new bike in 14 years ago
I formally decided to get a BikesDirect bike and then move the parts over to a new frame with a more reasonable set of wheels in the next few months. The thing about a BikesDirect bike is that, once you ignore the pleasant fictions that the bike industry would like you to believe about how…

More 200km brevet aftermath stories 14 years ago
I like the local Sports Basement. See, Sports Basement is kind of like Trader Joes meets REI. They carry a variety of stuff for sporting-oriented folks but don't specialize on any one thing like REI. But they have Trader Joe's style selection. I used to live near one and you'd always be able to find…

On air-cycling as a sporting discipline 14 years ago
In 1979, the Gossamer Albatross flew into history by crossing the English channel showing that humans really could fly an interesting distance. Since then, computers to model aerodynamics have become many orders of magnitude faster and our ability to fabricate lightweight sturdy structures, while…

Quick note: Eating is the key to long distance biking 14 years ago
Let's say that you are basically a noob to cycling and aren't transitioning over to cycling from something like jogging or another athletic sport. Maybe you want to get more fit or maybe you just want to drop some weight. You should be eating some food while you are riding on the bike. You'll have…

More bike purchasing test rides 14 years ago
One mark of a lot of salespeople is that if they've got one product in stock but you want a different product, similar but not exactly the same, they'll push you towards what they've got with the hopes that you'll be out the door with something out of their stock. Sometimes, they will even tell you…

Disc brakes suck. There. I said it. 14 years ago
I've found it's actually quite hard to buy good mountain bike wheels that aren't set up to only work with disc brakes these days. And there's a bunch of fancy new designs for disc-brake specific road bikes out there. Disc brakes have buzz going for them. I can see why. Adding disc brakes to cars was…

Post 200km brevet bike repairs 14 years ago
I was talking to one of the bike shop guys, while still bruised up from my fall, and he told me how shocked he was about all of the cycling injuries and their beat up bikes he'd seen. I told him "Yeah, but imagine if you were working at an auto repair shop." "Yeah," he replied, "but cars have all…

200km: I finished it 14 years ago
At 6:30 AM, about two weeks ago, I found myself near the Golden Gate bridge, ready for my first randonnée. I was one of very few people who were there with flat handlebars. Most everybody had road bikes with roadie handlebars. I had my mountain bike with a suspension fork (which is, after all…