You Can Get it If You Really Want

I saw something today that made me stop. I saw a woman on a bike, pulling a trailer with two little bikes on it. It was unusual enough that I turned and chased her down. I had groceries flopping around in my bike bags so it was no hot pursuit. I caught up with her and congratulated her on a wonderful idea. School was about to let out and she was going to pick up her kids. She said it was a lot easier to ride to the school with the bikes than to get the kids up to ride. The kids are 6 and 8 years old. This was not a perfect picture. Her bike was a Walmart Special and in dire need of generous amounts of oil, grease. or opossum fat, anything to at least startle the rust. There were also no helmets around for big or little. I would like to see helmets but I will settle for one less car and a family on bikes. If you saw the traffic jam of SUV’s in front of the school you would jump for joy to see anyone not shoving a kid in the back of a car.

There has been a bit of talk lately, some e-mails flying around, about the lack of bike paths down here in the Rio Grande Valley. There are a few bike lanes and paths but they go nowhere and tend to be tacked on to four lane roads or share a double wide sidewalk with dog walkers and roller bladers. I have a theory as to why this is. The city planners see cycling as a recreational sport and not an alternative means of transportation. It is a valid point. There are very few people down here who commute by bicycle. It is a chicken and egg situation.
If there are more bike commuters will they build more paths or if they build more paths will there be more bike commuters? There is no need to outfit the valley with a comprehensive network of bike lanes and paths overnight. There is also no need for cyclists to wait until there are bike paths. However, unless more people start using their bikes as transportation and not toys, the city planners are not going to take bike lanes seriously.

Now before anyone gets their panties in a bunch (you guys know who you are) I will admit to wrapping my butt in lycra and riding for sport four or five times a week. I enjoy it tremendously. I will even admit to having a wife with a truck and (GASP!) going to the store in the truck. Sometimes I even throw the bike (gently and metaphorically) into the back of the truck and ride home from wherever it is my wife needs help at. I do try and use my bike as often as I can. It makes for some awkward moments, think two frozen turkeys and a six pack or beer, but I manage. I can’t think of a sport that rewards an old guy with bad knees as much as cycling even if lycra does make your butt look big. (Tip: Black is slimming, every other color makes your butt look like the Hindenburg.)

So what is the point of this ramble? I just like to see everyone leave the car at home once in awhile. Maybe, just maybe, there might be enough bike lanes someday that commuting is easy and fun, until then, we have to start somewhere.

post note: Bob went back to the vet on the Surly. He is still not happy. My other cat, Comet, at 14 was not much more impressed than Bob. I at least had the foresight to take them on separate trips.

Labor of Love

It is the new year and I have a head cold. One of those nasty hack your brains out, eat pharmaceuticals and struggle along through misery colds. This has curtailed a lot of my cycling plans but has not kept me from my mission to tear down the old shed and put up a new one. Imagine having a head stuffed with cotton and secured with a hard hat. Two questions go through your mind; “Is that beam going to come down like the walls of Jericho?” or “Is the stud bunny going to pee on my head while I’m down here?” It’s a cliffhanger, ain’t it?

Much more fun is the rebuild of my beloved Co-Motion Espresso. Seven years ago I ordered my dream bike, an artisan made, fillet brazed steel racing bike. Most people at the time were getting carbon fiber bikes. They still are. In fact many of the people who were buying bikes about the same time I was have bought at least one new bike since. We are not talking WalMart bikes either. A new racing bike, top quality, starts at about $5000 and only goes up from there.

Carbon bikes are trendy, light, expensive and fun but where’s the soul? Sure you can buy the same bike Lance Armstrong won the Tour de France with, but do you think he really cares? Does anyone at Trek even know your name? When I was considering my Co-Motion I was told that if I bought a Lightspeed or a Merckx everyone would say cool bike and that would be it. If I got a Co-Motion they would say what’s that? and I would have to show them every Saturday.

Well it is true. Most of the carbon crowd has know idea what I am riding. The brand conscious riders don’t even see me as a tiny bip on their radar. What I have that they don’t have is a bike with a soul. I have met everyone who has ever worked on my bike. The person who designed it and did the fillet brazing is an old friend, Dwan Shepard. He took me around the factory and introduced me to all of the people who built my bike from tubes to shipping .

So what is the labor of love? I have completely stripped the Co-Motion down to the bare frame and I am painstakingly cleaning, polishing and upgrading. The whole bike will get a nice coat of carnuba wax and be buffed to a blinding shine. There will be a new crank, new brakes and a shifter rebuild. The bike has been very good to me for over 50,000 miles. It should be just as good for another 50K. That’s what you call soul.