GCRad1: September 2010

Thursday, September 30, 2010

Bicycle - Roadie Enthusiastico!

Bicycle - Roadie Enthusiastico!
entusiasmó mucho but not’so easy though’so...

Yes, I am a road bike enthusiast! I love the history, the color, the style, the EVERYTHING about road biking! But it was a long time , very long time coming and it did not come the easy way. Yes, my first real road bike was in high-school. My first taste for the Italian flavor also came during high school in the way of a Colnago lent for a quick test ride. But, I WAS HARDCORE BMX!

That lead to a fifteen year transition to mountain biking. It was a natural transition from BMX.
I would however ride the mountain bike on the road as I would ride tarmac to dirt trails. I would ride further are tarmac to further dirt trails and sometimes I would just ride on tarmac just to go see different sites. I would always see the road bike guys out pedaling, all so serious. Very few would talk to me as we would ride along. Sometimes I would get on a roadie wheel and try to tag along, sometimes I could keep up and sometimes even get a little pull only for the roadie to get out of the saddle and blaze off. I was always curious about road bikes, but never found an enthusiast that was enthusiastic enough to give me that spark.

It is easy to say in that fifteen years, there was or is a major separation between road bike enthusiast and mountain bike enthusiast. I did have a brief stint where I put a big chain-ring, flat bars, rigid fork and slick-fatty tires on my mountain bike. I did get my hands on the 1990 edition of Greg LeMonds Complete Book Of Bicycing. I was going to do the Rosarito to Ensenada 50-mile bike ride [not race]. I heard about the big mountain climb toward the end of the ride and the steep decent on the backside into town and how some bikers would run out the turns, skid road tires off the rims and generally run out of talent. So I wanted to be fast down the backside and I figured my mountain bike would be as stable fast if not faster than any road bike down the backside. Fatter tires I figured would yield more grip. I got passed by riders going up the hill, but I passed a lot of guys going down. A lot of guys would yell out for me to slow down, but I could see ahead and continued to push the limit. I did that event one time and converted my bike to full MTB-Spec. I’ve pedaled with 26” wheeled knobbies for 20+ years up to 2007. Started commuting with this bike to work too - knobbies slapping all the way on the nineteen mile commute - one way! My continuous commuting sparked a co-worker to start talking to me about road biking. We even started riding a loop together after work. I was clocking a total of roughly 65-miles a day! But I was push pedals hard when my buddy was coasting along side of me, tell me the whole time I should get a road bike. I was not having it! I remembered my old MTB’road conversion so I mounted up the fat-boy 1.50 slicks and was content enough for the time being because I was in the best physical shape of my life since high school!

I grew up also riding dirt bikes [motorcycles] and still ride so the mountain bike served and physical training for the motorcycles and the demanding terrain of the desert and mountains. But 2007 Turkey Day weekend while participating in the LA2B2V Desert Dual Sport Motorcycle event, the following day we where traversing the desert back home via dirt roads and trails. We wanted to do as much dirt as possible. I unfortunately had a nasty off. I actually broke my neck! And if any of you know anything about neck injuries, I broke the C1 bone and I am still walking with full use of all my limbs and zero physical side effects! Yes, walking miracle! I am now the unofficial-official spokes person for the Leatt-Brace®. Yes, I own one, yes I ride motorcycles and mountain bike still, but there was a very dark six week period where I was seriously thinking I would be doing some serious hiking going forward. Adventure is in my blood, by any means necessary.

When my rehabilitation got me back to active status, I asked if I could start back with some light mountain biking. Doctor said no, but I could do some road riding as long as it was not too rough. I was constantly monitored and was also doing lots of professional physical therapy. I was in heaven as I was putting in big miles again and getting pro-sports level physical therapy! My riding buddy finally broke me. I remember us going out Santiago Canyon Rd and going down a hill and him coasting up next to me while I was pedaling my brains out! Mind you, I had further reached for more efficiency by mounting up 1.25 tires instead of the fatty 1.50 tires. I gave in! I said OK! I WANT A ROAD BIKE!!! I finally had that enthusiast influence that I needed while seeing first hand how much more efficient the road bike was over the mountain bike. I knew it was all along, I was just resistant to joining the “roadie brigade!”

While I have kept a couple of my BMX bikes from my youth, I did not keep my road bike. It was about this time that I wish I had just because it had Campagnolo components on it. I do not even remember the name of the frame, but I do know it was Campagnolo equipped. My plan was if I was going to build my first serious road bike, I was going to be an Italian snob about it! It had to be Campagnolo equipped. There is no one particular pro that pops in my mind when I think Campagnolo. I just know the brand, bits of the history - most importantly they invented the rear derailleur, the mystique and the status within the circle of road biking. So that part was sorted.

One day I walked into a bike shop and this frame-set just spoke to me! I knew this was the bike for me!
I started a build-thread here: http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread.php?508867-Cinelli-Aliante

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Why I Bicycle

Why I Bicycle
I ride bicycles because I like to.. because its fun and because it is both simple and challenging. Riding bicycles has many challenges yet is also carefree. To pedal is to escape, to pedal is to find freedom and to discover.

Pedaling a bike can also be a rebel-cause for protest against fuel companies. In fact, I tell people it’s the only real way to protest fuel prices, “just shut up and pedal!” Complaining about gas prices is just grounds for frustration and no real way to actively “do something” and protesting on the corner or with rhetoric and banners are short lived. Start pumping the pedaling instead of pumping the dead dinosaurs into the fuel tank - this is the only way to really protest. Driving your vehicle to a protest rally - preposterous! To pedal is to re-discover simplicity and gives you new insight and perspectives.

I did not nor do not pedal to protest, it’s just the excuse I thought up while pedaling a 38-mile round trip commute to work while finding great time to THINK and to get into shape! It’s a moment of escape and adventure, however quick, short or long the trip, just mustering up the courage to step out onto the pedals as a means of transportation to work will bring a sense of accomplishment! That is 99% of the issues that prevent most people from commuting by bicycle, courage to step outside the “normal” and doing it. While I know simply some people can not, for many that actually think about commuting by bicycle, getting past “thinking” and “doing” that is the 99% issue part... That would be a great survey: How many people commute by bike / how many people think about commuting by bike / and each year, how many actually make the leap to actually commute to work by bike. Heck, survey just the people who read-subscribe to bicycle magazines! That would be an interesting survey. I’m sure that survey has been done. Research project!

Once you activate the bicycle commute to the office gives you great insight and time to think about the real issues at work. Pedaling back home at the end of the day relieves the stress of the non-real issues at work. Sometimes pedaling this distance just clears the mind as you just find this wonder-rhythm while cranking out pedal strokes. I find that some of my best thinking is done on the bike... to the point I sometimes stop to take notes. Before I was not stopping and forgetting half of the ideas to the extreme of stopping every 15-minutes and taking notes in the Blackberry. I had to slow down / stop all that! At my age, it’s time to invest into ME!

The single largest investment one can make life for themselves is to invest in personal health! I’ve worked all my life. I’ve played some too and while most think that my life is play, I have tried my best to make my work fun. But mental stress is by far the worst enemy to personal physical health. Pedaling directly helps melt stress away! Pedal enough and melt some pounds away as well. Pedal for wealth - pedal for health and these are the true personal accomplishments to be proud of. One of my goals when I turn 65+ years old is to pedal somewhere in the neighborhood of 250+ miles a week! I know plenty of people do! I never thought about what to do after you retire, and now I have a true goal for those years. But you can not wait till then and start pedaling, you could, but I do not want to. I did manage to squeak in some 250-300 miles weeks consecutively for about three months straight, but its a constant juggle to balance life, work, family and TIME! But the pursuit, dream and goal all fire the life-long passion.

I started like everyone, pedaling a 20” bicycle at a very young age. With that type of bike, no kid just pedals it around. You start jumping Tonka trucks and garbage cans and on and on usually with product failure in the process, at least in those days before the modern BMX bikes, failure was a guarantee! Growing up around the farm in Alabama, luckily my uncle was a welder and would keep me rolling. The bike was the transportation to the 12-mile commute to town, only to look for more jumps, so reliably had it’s price. One day while grocery shopping, my younger brother brought home a BMX magazine, like in 1980 and my world was CHANGED! My little world was opened to a whole new world!

Before web sites, email, blogs and forums, the monthly magazine was THE ONLY SOURCE to fuel my new-found passion. By tenth grade I would open my own BMX shop. We built custom bikes for customers that felt our passion for the best products and our desire to help our customers beyond just selling them a bike. We had a team and raced all over the state as well as the East coast. We even raced at the 1982 Worlds Fair. I had met all my BMX hero’s, but here at this race, I would see first hand a new trend within BMX, called Freestyle as an exhibition was performed in front of the Worlds Fair spectators and BMX racers. This was cool and expanded the horizon of my perceptions of what could be done with the bicycle.

While running my shop I had two experiences with road bikes. One experience was a DAILY EXPERIENCE as I road a road bike from my house to the bus stop for my commute to school. And yes it did have Campagnolo components! My other experience was my sales rep had a road bike and wanted to use my work stand to do a little tune up. It was a Colnago. I remember it very clearly! My rep asked if I would like to ride it. I first refused as I respected his bike too much but he insisted I ride it. So I did! I pedaled it so hard and so fast, the bike asked me to! It was awesome, but it just did not stick to me to ride, I was into BMX. But that experience stuck with me. It was candy red and those cool lugs with the clover-like cutouts. I remember it because it made a strong impression. it would just take 35+ years for that impression to materialize.

Saturday, September 18, 2010

Campagnolo Alphabet Paper Bag

Campagnolo Alphabet Paper Bag, originally uploaded by GCRad1.

I've been a Campagnolo fan for a long time as my first ever road bike in high school was equiped with Campagnolo. I started me a little Campagnolo FAN set in Flickr.