...BLRI - the chinatown edition

Riding into work today, I was happy to find that it (as it has been the past few days) was a very comfortable temperature for cycling. Feeling sprightly and refreshed from my 'rest day' yesterday, I zipped quickly over the bridge, leaving in my wake many emasculated fixters.

Well, I suppose they don't really care how fast they're going anyway, as you can see from this track bike's handlebar statement. I think what is meant by this is instead "fuck multiple gear ratios and the ability to shift."

Then again perhaps I'm wrong and this person literally objects to any toothed cogs without exception... Since there's no side view of the bike, it is impossible to tell; but I hope it belongs to one of fixed-gear-riding's lesser-known fringe groups: the un-fixed riders.

Known to be vehemently against any sort of gain ratio or mechanical advantage whatsoever, the un-fixed riders will shuffle along, finally making use of their day-glo top-tube pads, while the pedals dangle arbitrarily at the side. Undoubtedly, only the most 'hard-core' of the fixter scene would be admitted to the chain-free ranks of un-fixedness.

I really hope this trend, like the pista trend, catches on. Then they can start offering free chain-removal 'upgrades' at urban outfitters, the number one inspirational source for subcultural poseurs and aspiring beatnicks alike.

(I really encourage you to follow the above link and take note that UO has attempted to re-brand itself as a bike shop; meaning they sell bar grips and knog lights in all sorts of different 'colorways'.)

Having dropped the fixies like a bunch of Fabian Cancellaras on stage seven of the tour this morning, I decided to document one of my most travelled streets in the city. Directly after a few ironic switchbacks coming off the Manhattan bridge, most everyone who isn't heading downtown rides north on chrystie st to Delancey or Houston (or beyond, but more on that in a moment). Being a bi-directional street, it has major differences between the south-bound and north-bound sides.

Riding north in the mornings along the bike lane on Chrystie is pleasant only after you pass Grand st. which is apparently the bermuda triangle for asian minivan pilots and delivery trucks (seriously, nobody at that intersection knows which way they want to go). Beyond there it is OK as long as you avoid wayward delivery salmon and, well, the bike lane.


Due to abundant debris consisting of shattered glass, twigs, trash, and rocks, the bike-lane is actually three or so feet to the left of where it has been designated on the pavement (as highlighted by the BADA55 lines). Motorists usually give you space on this side, and lacking a sidewwalk, is relatively ped-free. With the power vested in me by myself, I hereby confer upon this stretch of Chrystie St. the Bike-Lane-Rideability-Index (BLRI) grade of:


Not too bad all things considered... As I've said before and of which you may already be aware, it is a two way street and as such, warrants multiple analyses.

The SB side is almost the antithesis of the NB side; alike in kind though opposite in every positive and negative way. Where the NB side touts added width the SB side shrinks to near useless levels; where the NB side is sidewalk and parallel parking free for much of its course, on the SB side, there is no relief from jaywalking pedestrians or the door-swing-zone. Most notable are the 'rollers' along the SB bike lane; small but gentle rises and dips in the poorly laid blacktop test your bike's construction as well as your grip (not too tight, not too loose).

Though you risk being cut off by besuited station-wagoners, the SB side is the primary lead up to the Manhattan bridge and benefits from this monopoly as most people are fairly aware that during rush hour, zillions of cyclists pass through here.


Interestingly, chrystie street morphs from a two way street into south-bound-only 2nd Ave. It is at this point I have been lucky enough to witness a 'fork in the road,' so to speak, where cyclists choose either to find a legal and safe route north, or they gloriously transform into bike-salmon, fighting upstream to reach what I imagine are the UES spawning grounds. The small UES frys have been known to learn the salmoning art from their parents in the eddies of the Central Park loop before venturing down to Brooklyn when their fathers freeze the trust-fund (to teach them 'responsibility') before awarding them full partnerships in their law firms.


That's all for today, friends... ride smooth and avoid bearly cheating death by riding the correct direction.

...keepin it real Thursdays

So today I'll regale you with three tales of gore and intrigue... Firstly, on Tuesday evening, as I was cycling home down Christye St. about to come to the base of the Manhattan bridge, I was suddenly cut off by a silver station wagon that had been driving to my left and slightly in front of me. Thanks to my cat-like reflexes, I was able to avoid riding headlong into the rear windshield; though I didn't avoid contact altogether.

Since I was riding with my hands on the brake hoods, my right-hand knuckles went onto the tail-light of the offending Volvo, though I didn't realize this until later... Thinking I had just bumped into the car, I stopped riding to admonish the driver for not yielding to bicycle traffic, but he beat me to the punch, so to speak. The guy jumps out of his car and starts cussing me out at the top of his lungs, insisting that I intentionally and maliciously punched his car, 'cause as he said, "I see you people hit cars all the time! Don't try and act like it was an accident!"

By "you people" I can only assume he meant bike messengers, since they're usually the only cyclists in this city that are skilled and confident enough to tap a moving vehicle while evading the threat and not falling over. Actually I was somewhat flattered to be mistaken for the one of the "bad boys of cycling", though I'm not entirely certain of what led him to think I'm a messenger, I suppose it has something to do with my being on a bike, while wearing a backpack, since as we all know, backpacks are worn solely by messengers and no one else.

Once he felt his tirade was complete, he got back into his car and sped away, leaving me incredulous, staring after him. Then, trying to get pen and paper from my backpack to report him, I noticed that my middle finger looked a lot like this though on the other hand and more bloodied (sorry, I didn't have a camera with me that day):


I wish I had been able to remember the name of the lawyer in Carlito's Way, but alas, I'm terrible at coming up good insults on the fly. Anyway, he looked just like that character, so needless to say, it was pretty disheartening to get told off by a curly little punk like that. To make a long story short, it took me a while to both re-locate my finger and forget the guy's diatribe.

To help get my mind away from my worldly troubles, I escaped to the cozy confines of the Tour de France, reveling in the cyclists' determination. However, there certainly are traffic fiascos in the pro peloton too. Watching stage six end on wet catalan streets this morning, I just knew we could expect some spectacular crashes. Behold! Within three kilometers to the finish of a 181.5km stage, famed coke-head and German national road-racing champion, Tom Boonen (pronounced bonin' [as in fornication, yes...]) slips on a road marking, taking out 5-6 other riders in the process.



Unfortunately for Boonen and those other guys, when you're in a crash that close to the finish, they count the time gap instead of giving you the same time as everyone else (as was discussed yesterday) as when the peloton finishes.

Lastly, Mark Cavendish is yet again wearing the green jersey despite the best efforts of Thor Hushovd the stage's winner. During the ritual re-donning of the jersey, he sure didn't look too happy about having to actively defend it tomorrow.


Since tomorrow's stage is a highly anticipated mountain course where Armstrong, Contador, and Cancellara are expected to battle it out for the maillot jaune, the likelihood that the 'dish (strictly a sprinter) will be able to keep the points jersey is pretty slim. It's OK though Mark, I know someone who feels your pain. perhaps he can offer some consolation in song form:



Without a doubt, one of the more touching odes to self worth.

...video Wednesdays

I'm posting a little late today because I spent the morning watching the tour online at versus. Though it was uneventful for the most part, I did enjoy watching a breakaway group try and stay ahead of the peloton for the last 60km of the stage. If you're not familiar with road racing, a breakaway is when a (usually small) group of riders takes off from the front of the main group and attempts to stay away as long as possible. Usually breaks that occur before the last quarter of the stage get re-enveloped by the peloton unless the break away riders are extraordinarily strong or the course is mountainous enough to render pacelining useless.

The break earlier today saw six riders, four of whom were rookies at the tour, work together marvelously to stay away for the entire rest of the stage. Eventually the peloton did reel in most of them, but Frenchman Thomas Voeckler managed to stay ahead just long enough to beat the field by a few seconds.


Unfortunately, all of the general classification contenders (Cancellara, Armstrong, Contador, Leipheimer, etc...) all finished with the pack and as such received the same finishing time and no changes were made to the top ten standings.


Upon closer inspection of the General Classification Standings (above) I noticed that Lance is listed as being second with a gap of 00:00:00 to Fabian Cancellara (as is highlighted by hexidecimal BADA55, of course). Needless to say I was sort of confused about how they could be tied, for one, and how they determine who they call the GC leader in the event of said tie...

Researching the rules and regulations of the UCI while the middle of the race sped along in another tab, I heard the announcers explain where the discrepancy arose. Apparently Lance is back from Cancellara, though by a mere 0.22 seconds (that's less than a wheel length at race speeds).

This means that unless something goes horribly wrong for Lance tomorrow, he'll probably have the race locked. He's arguably the worlds foremost climber and time trial specialist, giving him quite the edge in the coming middle portion of the race, where the riders will race over the Pyrenees Mountains after tomorrows flat stage finishing Barcelona. Following that are a smattering of different courses, with the Alpe d'Huez somewhere toward the end of the race.

This in mind, I thought this might be an opportunity to refresh ourselves on some of Lance's accomplishments in the seven times he's won the tour.

First, the most famous 'Lance move' that you may hear cycling fans refer to is "the look". It was given by Lance to his rival in the 2001 tour, Jan Ullrich, while ascending the slopes of the (aforementioned) Alpe d'Huez a 'beyond categorization' climb (aka steep as shit and piled higher). lets watch:



That's what I call bicycle-gangster. Looks him in the eye to give him more than fair warning, and then takes off dropping the rest of the race on a road so steep they don't have a good way of classifying it.

Then in 2003, again battling Ullrich to retain the yellow jersey, he shows his true grit:




To fall like that, have a mechanical malfunction, fix it, stumble again, and then go on to destroy the lead group and win the stage is downright superhuman.

Finally, we can't exclude his famous cyclocross X Road racing collabo after getting forced off the road on a fast descent:




Personally as much as I love the 'Dish's victory salutes, I am rooting for Lance to do it again. An eighth victory at the tour would be a nearly insurmountable record that would reinforce his already cemented claim to cycling immortality. As I said before, the next stages being rather hilly; I expect my fellow Texan to pull ahead of the other GC contenders by Friday, and hold onto the yellow jersey for most if not all of the rest of the race.

Thats right, Lance is a machine... He will win again. Remember, you heard it here first, so place your bets.


Speaking of machines, and lacking much humor in the above writing, I present for your general amusement this recently discovered ad for the Murray Street machine, which according to the ad is faster than a Star Trek transporter. In the words of one Vincent Vega, "...that's a bold statement, my friend..."



Stay tuned to JSYNYC tomorrow for a gripping tale of cyclists' rights being abused and the dislocation of my most-used finger!

Pedal softly friends...

...careful, the 'dish is on fire

Since we recently decided to forgo the boob-tube (nsfw) at my place, I've been doing lots of new and interesting things with the time that would have previously been spent sitting on my ass watching reruns of "Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives" or "Property Virgins" (no; it has nothing to do with virginity in the traditional sense).

One of the things I've re-appropriated this time for is reading comic books and novels. I haven't finished the novel yet, though not to worry, a concise and informative review of it is forthcoming; I assure you.

The comic I randomly decided to follow is apparently a fairly well known series and it was my good fortune to judge it by it's cover. Knowing nothing of the plot, writers, or artists, I bought a bound version of the first five or so issues to try it out and see if I liked it. Well I did like it... a whole lot.


DMZ is set in near-future NYC and follows accidental photo-journalist Matty Roth through civil-war-torn Manhattan in a dark, gritty time when Americans are forced to side with either the provincial and racist "Free States of America" or the cornered, paranoid, police state that is the remnants of the USA, shacked up on Long Island. Manhattan Island is a demilitarized zone between the two, and is sparsely populated by those who have been forgotten by both sides... Having banded together into block-by-block gangs and security coalitions, the city's residents are isolationist and subsist at a dark ages level.

If you like dystopic visions of the future set in familiar locations, this comic is sure to entertain. As it is produced by native new yorkers, scenes are rendered with such accuracy that you can tell which direction the frame is looking, and the story flows coherently from neighborhood to neighborhood. There's no risk of navigational non-sequiturs and New Yorkers are sure to get a kick from familiar places rendered in total destruction.

I promptly went and bought volumes 2-6 the day after finishing volume 1, which attests to the palatability of this series. (comic buying tip: go to the store on 33rd and 5th, across 33rd from the Empire State building, and for some reason, they're like half off, making them about 6 bucks a volume...)

Of course, not being able to stay away from video for long, I've been catching up on the Tour via YouTube in the evenings and Versus.com in the mornings (only streams during the live coverage time).

While Armstrong's Astana team took the lead in this morning's TTT (stage 4), Mark Cavendish of Columbia Highroad has won two stages so far (2 and 3), receiving the green jersey after the first win. According to the ego-masseurs at cyclingnews.com, the 'Dish' is "...at the precocious age of 24, the fastest, strongest and smartest sprinter in the world..." and having won Milan-San Remo and it's 20,000 Euro prize, has silenced his detractors.

I find the thought funny, cause ultimately what comes to mind when I think of cycling critics, is two guys sitting in a bar somewhere and one says to the other, "Hey, I think Cavendish is really fast this season, he might win some important races..." Then his friend retorts, "no he isn't."

At any rate, I think the surest way to silence nay-sayers in the sport of cycling is to practice one's victory salute or develop wholly new ones, in order to reinforce your win in the spectator's minds. Cavendish is worth recognizing for his uncanny ability to awe crowds with his broad repertoire of salutes and their infrequent repetition.

They range from the downright gleeful, as we witnessed Sunday....


...to the "display of might salute" (extra points for the Columbia Highroad six-pack jersey)...


...to the Triple-S, aka the "sexually suggestive salute".


Of course, every Pro cyclist knows, you'd never be in the race in the first place without tons of dough. Thanks to corporate sponsorships, these guys can race the biggest and most high-profile races without having to foot the bill for equipment, lodging, etc... The 'Dish knows this and repped his sponsors yesterday even more shamelessly than I do for this blog on facebook:


We all get lazy sometimes and just aren't in the mood to act all excited or promote cell phone plans at the finish line, and it's nice to see the 'dish is no exception:


I think he's trying to sign "whoop-dee fucking doo" to the crowd, and doesn't look too happy about the win; though his arm doesn't look to be in great shape here, so perhaps he's coolly showing off his wounds as if to say "man y'all are pussies, I fell over, got bandaged up, and still beat you to the line!"

Actually, I think I've got to re-phrase that last one, lest we forget that the 'dish is an englishman. It's like he's signaling, "Garcon! lets 'ave a spot of tea and a butta scone roit 'eah yea?"

...the weekend madness (installment 4)

I flew back to Houston for the weekend not to celebrate July 4th in typical Texas style, but to attend my parent's 25th wedding anniversary celebrations at the Sweetwater Country Club complete with a five course sit-down dinner, and upper-lip-biting/fist-clenched dancing only white people can pull off.


I have to say, my folks put together quite a soiree that evening, and despite the cheesy, bourgeois decor it was definitely a night to be remembered. (This is not to say I could've done any better, If it was possible and left up to me, all social gatherings would take place at ominously emotive sites.) I think my favorite part of the party was the kransekage, or horn of plenty, filled with chocolate covered strawberries.


Of course, I didn't forget that Saturday was the start of the Tour de France, though much to my chagrin, Tennis rules the tube at my father's house during the summer. Saturday morning, we sat around watching the men's singles final at Wimbledon. After a gripping exchange of fuzzy balls, Andy Roddick, another extraordinary Austinite, narrowly lost the match to Roger Federer, the swiss tennis master. I felt really bad for Andy because he really played his heart out and just couldn't beat Federer, who in winning, claimed his 15th grand slam title; more than any other tennis player ever.

Lance was also bummed that his countryman was bested by Federer, though rode strongly on both Saturday and Sunday, and currently is within the top 10 at the Tour... Bored of the post-match commentary, I decided to take my father's Bianchi Volpe out for a spin on the wide and luxurious Braes Bayou bike path.


Braving the 100+ degree heat, I rode next to this above-ground-sewer into the medical center and then up through downtown and then back on city streets. Pouring sweat, I realized two important things:

1. Its dumb to go outside for longer than 10 minutes in Houston without mass amounts of water.

2. Cycling caps aren't strictly a fashion statement, they keep stinging, salty sweat from dripping into your eyes, blinding you.

However, despite the sweltering humidity and sun, I've always held this bike path as an ideal of sorts. It is bumpy in spots and certainly could be maintained better, though being separated from cars by 50'-100' of verdant esplanade is a frustrated city-cyclist's dream. The bike lane even forks at cross-streets so you can choose if you want to go under the bridge, closer to the bayou, or up to the intersection, breaking up the monotonous Houston flatness while being a commuter's dream.

This in mind, I've decided someone needs to work toward a rating system for bike lanes so that one can know what to expect from given stretches of roadway around the 5boros. Since I don't have the manpower of Google, and find Map My Ride and Bikely useful though not informative enough, I'm going to assign a grade to city roads I ride for the benefit of my readers as I ride them. I had meant to start this earlier but I didn't have a benchmark for the extremes of the grade scale.

Well, using Braes Bayou as a jump off point makes this somewhat easier. So to officially start the Just-Say-Yes-NYC Bike-Lane-Rideability-Index (BLRI), I present the first (rarely seen) grade of A to braes bayou:


Cartainly this isn't a noteworthy grade without something to compare it to... lets take Broadway's new separated bike lane between 26th and 33rd sts:


While I praise the efforts of Janette Sadik-Khan, Broadway falls well below par, even for this city. Rife with pedestrians, salmon of all varieties, left-turning cars, and cabs who don't understand they've been provided a "pickup lane", Broadway here is one of the least efficient routes south. I regularly avoid it altogether and take 5th Ave south and hook up with broadway where this hackeneyed organizational scheme ends. Giving it a D- also lets me reserve some impact for when I decide drop an F on some yet-to be-seen route or lack thereof.

Be on the lookout for more crumudgeonly ratings in the future, and as always, ride safe today.