...the weekend madness (installment 10)

Last week I decided that this weekend past I would go out and do something interesting or exciting for a change, so I decided to wake up at 5:30 am Saturday and join the Escape New York ride presented by NYCC.


The ride set out from Sakura Park on 122nd St and Riverside Dr. at seven in the morning, so I had to ride up there from Brooklyn starting at 6:00am. I stress the extreme earliness if the ride because I'm not what one would call a "morning person" and not having registered for the ride beforehand, I was pleased with myself for not making an excuse not to go and rolling over back into sweet cozy slumber.

I arrived at the staging area exactly when I had planned and after forking over $50 to take part, I downed a few cups of coffee and some pastry before loading my pockets with Boudreaux's Butt Paste, super foods, half a banana, and chocolates.


After a getting a cue sheet (map and list of turns in sequential order) and stretching a bit, we were off!


Once in NJ, the pace quickened by a considerable amount and the cyclists began grouping into pacelines... I joined this one as It overtook me in part because they seemed to be riding efficiently, but also because of this orangey jersey that said "Formaggio" on the front and back. Being a big fan of cheeses, I decided this was the paceline for me and grabbed this guy wheel as they passed.

The route took us winding through upscale new jersey suburbs where the road quality rapidly changed from 'newly paved' to 'riddled with pot-holes' and back, lending an epic quality to the ride, fit for grey-scaling in the Rapha-way. Before getting to the first rest stop, my average speed was a whopping 26 mph... gotta love the drafting.


I didn't spend much time at this stop, only enough to relieve my bladder, fill water bottles, and take in a pb&j or three. Then we began to really get into hilly sections and the larger groups broke into smaller grupettos, selecting against weaker climbers. This group of three formed when the guy in second position and I caught up to the guy in blue and the guy in rear.


We traded turns pulling at the front but eventually the riders we caught up to wore out on a particularly steep section of residential road and from there on it was me and this guy:



After stopping for a terrestrial goose paceline (pictured above), I eventually got dropped by him and gathering what was left of my shattered ego, I huffed on alone for most of the rest of the way (sound familiar?). Heres a close up of the geese "threading the needle", as they say in cycling parlance:


I encountered some pretty dramatic climbs (one of which is a fabled climb of 8% average with the last section at some 19% grade) and also some killer descents, my max speed here was 39.9mph (note: photo below is a dramatization of that experience, I'm not dumb enough to try and go that fast one-handed)


Eventually I reached the halfway point (judging by the cateye) and turned south along the Hudson, just short of Bear Mountain.


I liked this ride specifically because though it took us through a veritable cycling mecca, we rode routes entirely foreign to me, leading me to feel lost much of the time, which strangely, I enjoyed. What I didn't enjoy however, was the unseasonably chilly weather; I assumed I'd tough it out until we got riding and my internal temperature would elevate to a comfortable level, but I didn't think it would be quite as cold as it was.


by the time I reached the last rest stop in Piermont, I was none too pleased with my lack of weather appropriate attire, quite unlike this 'double century couple' I saw (behind the normal people, standing at the counter); both wearing the kind of skinsuits that help perpetuate the negative stereotype of horribly dressed cyclists.

Conversely there were a surprising number of guys completely decked out in Rapha gear, which of course in turn made me green with envy at their 'epic style' and 'timeless cycling traditions.'

Any way, I got the requisite shot of manhattan coming back over the GWB,


And hurriedly made my way back to the start so i could get the hell home and warm up. Once i got into the city, however, I was surprised to find it a good five to ten degrees warmer than out in the boonies. I was also surprised to find mega-size heros and napkins;


Though realized that the only variety of heros available were meat, cheese, or vegan. I covertly aprehended one of each (not the vegan though, blech!) and proceeded to mix their ingredients by hand. Satisfied with my sandwich renovation, I turned around and witnessed incontrovertible evidence that the universe was likewise in favor of further meat-cheese collaborations:


I agree universe, I like cheese too.

At this point I knew it was safe to head home after watching a few gripping rounds of flat fixing contest.


Which, I have to point, out seemed obscenely wasteful of tubes, not to ruin the outro here...

...the weekend madness (installment 9)

So this weekend past, I had planned a number of exciting activities for myself in attempt to stave off boredom more effectively than in previous weekends. Friday I did essentially nothing, I presented myself at work in a timely fashion as usual, and then went home and caught up on satirical punditry before going to bed.

On Saturday I did manage slightly more productivity, doing laundry and cycling around from bike shop to bike shop hunting for another knog frog to compliment the two I already own. I had noticed that not only were my knogs getting dimmer with age, my front light needed a compatriot so that I could mount them on the fork blades without worrying about which side I was weighting more.


At any rate, I found the "frog" surprisingly difficult to track down as it seems Knog is promoting their "beetle" light now and all the LBS's are flush with beetles and devoid of frogs. Because of that, I was forced to finally settle on a frog in the clear-ish 'colorway' as opposed to my usual choice of black (depicted above).

Still not wanting to appear unbalanced, I removed the electronics from the new clear-ish frog and swapped them out with the red light from one of the frogs I already owned. This allowed me to be able to affix the two black frogs to my fork blades and the clear-ish frog to my seat post, where the red light would be more visible from the sides through the rubbery housing.

Also, I bought new batteries for the two frogs I already had, but was shocked at the steep cost of frog ownership, for the batteries it requires (2032's I believe) are "medical batteries" and $8 a pair at Duane Reade, which is just crazy. On that note, I needed to buy batteries for my camera as well (hence the extreme lack of first-person documentation on this blog recently) but opted to wait since I was going to see the Decemberists at Terminal 5 later, and didn't want the hassle of toting around a brick of AA's at a concert.

As I had come to expect from these Oregoners, the concert turned out to be pretty awesome. They got some MC to draw songs written on plastic balls from a tumbler that the band would then play before a preppy looking tennis guy came out to lob the song ball into the audience.

I didn't manage to catch one of the balls, but I did catch a cool vibe from both the band and my fellow spectators. This was the first crowd I had pushed my way through (in following the much smaller girls toward the front) that peacefully accomodated my path by scooting aside as much as they could or pointing out gaps that I could exploit to that end.

For me, the Decemberists were merely an indie-rock group that my girlfriend liked, and that was the end of it until I actually took the time to listen to their work. I'm no musical authority, but I found that I really enjoy their music and even moreso their good-clean-fun approach to putting on a show.


After the concert, we went home to sleep though I was having trouble doing so, either because of or in spite of the fact that I was planning a ride to Bear Mt for Sunday morning. I washed my bike, filled my water bottles and tires, packed a fresh tube into my seat bag and set out all of my gear and clothing for the morning.

Then Sunday morning everything went off without a hitch, I left pretty much right on time and was well on my way out of the city enjoying the cool weather when my bicycle broke.

I'm being vague about what "broke" because to be honest I have no idea what happened or why. All I know is that while riding normally, my pedals seized up for a split second, then made a very loud snapping/cracking sound and then I could no longer shift smoothly in the rear or at all in the front.

Using my meager set of bike maintenance skills, I attempted to reset my front derailleur but could not get it to work, so I pedaled back to Soho from about 170th St in my next-to-lowest gear (aka slower than molases). Once I made it to Bicycle Habitat, the head mechanic, Hal, corroborated that my front derailleur was both out of alignment and bent badly. As usual, he happily fixed it while dropping some lesser known bike facts on me about the parts he was fixing.

(my derailleur looked like the photo on the left, above, though much more exaggeratedly bent)

For a while I had noticed that though I have only two chainrings my derailleur was indexed for a three-chainring setup. Not quite understanding why this was, I chalked it up to the fact that my bike came with mid- to low-end components that may not have been paired properly with my setup. Hal elucidated for me why this was: apparently its just easier for companies to include triple-indexed front derailleurs on all the bikes they make. This, like the tire misconception, is another instance of people's stupidity driving product development.

If you have a geared bike, one of the first things you will read about shifting gears (If, like me, your inclined to read at length about such topics), is that the #1 no no is what's called "crossing over". This just means that its bad for the life-span of your sprockets and chain if you get into the habit of riding with the chain on the leftmost (smallest) sprocket in the rear and the right most (smallest) chainring in the front, or vice versa. So Shimano, Campy, and SRAM all offer triple indexing so that you can "trim" the derailleur position if the chain is rubbing it when you're crossing gears badly.

Hal went on to say that if bothers you to the point where money is no object, then the top-o'-the-line Dura-Ace comes in a "double indexed" variety; but at those prices, most people are content to deal with the extra click required to shift.

Anyway, by the time He straightened everything out and bent the derailleur cage back into position, it was already well into the afternoon and thus far too late for me to get anywhere interesting and back before nightfall (though I am still itching to try out my new 'lightway'). Knowing this and bummed that my ride was scrapped before it even really got started, I rode home and cleaned house with my roomate.

Oh well; 'til next time y'all, maintain your drivetrain...

...the weekend sanity (installment 7)

I really didn't do much of anything this weekend. My boss doesn't feel it's necessary to pay me on time anymore and the moohare was up in Boston, so I was at a loss for what to do with my scarce funds and ample free-time.

I joined a (different) few friends who were biking up to go camping on Bear Mountain on Saturday morning and accompanied them as far as Nyack, not wanting to get back to Brooklyn too late. I have to say one of the weirdest feelings I've felt recently was when I rode back through Manhattan on that Saturday night after having biked over a hundred miles to Bear Mountain and back. I've never felt so out of place as I did looking haggard and dripping sweat at traffic lights in the village, as perfumed young socialites and wannabe players strutted by.

The ride through New Jersey was the same as it always is, so I opted to forgo bringing the camera since it would just be a reiteration of previous posts. However, Instead of taking the Williamsburg bridge, as I had on past trips, we used the Manhattan Bridge and cut across Soho to the WSH. We rode from Bed-Stuy along Flushing toward Dumbo, passing the impound lot and turning onto Sands st.

The last time I rode on any of these streets, they were either in complete disrepair or under construction (which is frequently worse for cyclists than simply dealing with the crappy roads). For that reason, I usually commute from Prospect Heights, where I live, through downtown Brooklyn to access the bridges. That route has become a force-of-habit and my commute is getting to be a little stale; so to shake things up a bit, I took a fairly different route this morning in order to present this double-edition BLRI!!!!

As I do most every day, I rode Vanderbilt Avenue northbound after turning off of my picturesque, brownstone-lined slice of Brooklyn. I usually opt to use this avenue at the outset of most of my trips by bicycle because it boasts both well-maintained bike lanes and conscientious pedestrians. It should be noted, however, that the amicability of the locals and light traffic seem to breed salmon (especially of the sidewalk variety).

Despite the infestation of idiots, Vanderbilt is a great street to ride, especially given the new Brooklyn Bike and Board shop between Bergen and Dean which enjoys a steady flow of business from weekend warriors, displaced hipsters, and commuters alike (and which was the subject of a recent LBSR).


Continuing across Atlantic Avenue, the bike lane sadly disappears and one must forcefully seize a lane from the clutches of vile Livery cars. The road quality is dramatically lower than before despite passing through what is in my opinion, one of Brooklyn's most beautiful neighborhoods, Fort Greene.


While I'm no fan of Neo-Gothic 'Architecture,' I've always enjoyed having silly buildings (like this private school) in and around my neighborhood, if for no better reason than to have something to joke about. It's useful in the way those kitschy Urban Outfitters trinkets are; a springboard for sematic debates about the rediculousness of consumerism and the wayward souls who are comforted by it.

Continuing past the BQE toward the Brooklyn Navy Yard, I was surprised to see a motorcycle shop x vespa dealership collabo (I'll be damned, they're growing in popularity):


It is my opinion that while scooters are a more reasonable choice of transport in congested cities than cars are; their continued use of gasoline and the haughty sense of self-righteousness they foster in their owners are just plain bad for society. (OK, I started to go off on a tangent about how much scooter-ers bug me, so I'm gonna reserve that for a later post).

After passing the police impound lot on Navy St, I turned onto Sands St. which has been wonderfully re-designed as the most bicycle conscious street NYC has presented me with! For that reason, this street will hold top-slot as the only A+ I will ever issue (unless if course this becomes the norm and then there's just no point in continuing the BLRI except to bitch).


I can't believe we actually have this kind of bike lane in Brooklyn! These are without a doubt the best kind (I bet Arup designed it)! As far as I know (and I bike a lot) this is the first of it's kind in NYC, as it is a noticeably brand-spankin'-new iteration of what has been done for years in places like Copenhagen.

Sands St., though a measly two blocks in length, has been transformed into what is arguably the best solution for cyclist - motorist altercations. Notice how the bike lanes are separated by a median and are located at the center of the road instead of in the door-swing range of parked cars. Also note (if you can) that the bike lanes, median, and stripey area are elevated about 6 inches above the car's lane. This is exactly what needs to be done with all streets to quell the incessant bickering between cabbies (who of course need to drop off and pick up passengers somewhere) and the cyclists they routinely cut off.

Unfortunately, most streets here are one way (despite what one would gather from the bourgoning salmon population) and despite its simplicity, this method of bike-lane separation may not work everywhere.

Continuing over the bridge and up through the city along my usual route, I decided that in the day's spirit of new routes, I'd try to ride up Park Ave instead of turning on 13th and taking 6th Ave as I normally would. I had tried this the very first day I commuted to work by bike and didn't have the grapes to try it again, though I was much less experienced with cycling in Manhattan at that point.

Now that I'm a bona-fide city cyclist, Park Avenue seemed like a walk in the park compared to 6th Ave (which you'll remember was recently awarded the BLRI rating of F), despite not having any bicycle designations or markings.

I think as long as you're comfortable riding between cars at around 20 mph Park Ave is definitely safer than using the 'bike lane' on 6th or the dumb separated paths on 8th or 10th. Speaking of which, has anyone else noticed that there are virtually no good bike-paths to take you downtown?

Until next time friends, mind the traffic.

...the weekend madness (installment 5)

Boy was it a twirly-whirl of a weekend for me... A couple friends and I went for a ride up to Bear Mountain State Park on Saturday, and as promised, I managed to remember my camera.

I had opted to make it a century ride since Sunday morning saw the Tour de France end on the Champs Elysees in Paris, and I was damned if I was going to miss that. I figured there was no point to clenching my butt-cheeks in suspense on Saturday's stage 20 over Mt. Ventoux, so I did my own little mountain adventure in upper Rockland County instead.

First I found myself waiting to rendezvous with the other two at the foot of the Williamsburg Br once again...


While I was waiting and stretching, a group of over-the-hill gay dudes on fixed gear bikes started to conglomerate around me. I thought I had snapped a photo of them, but alas, I did not. They were great though, really nice guys who were doing a bicycle tour of LIC and Greenpoint art galleries. The ride leader, Gene, was super cool and we chatted about bikes while he unfurled his rainbow bike flag and lashed it to his seatpost.

Once underway, we rode up the WSH bike path to the GWB. Here's a snapshot I took of one of my buddies from behind my back. Self-composing shots like this are the best.



Across the Hudson there you can see the Palisades Cliffs starting. River Road (where we were headed next) is nestled in there somwhere, and it is without a doubt one of my favourite "natural rides" in close proximity to the city.

Somewhere River Rd. morphs into Alpine Approach rd. (Alpine NJ), and after a moderately steep climb that lasts exactly a mile, it passes by a 'police station' which is, in actuality, little more than a watering hole for weekend warriors going to Nyack and beyond.

I've never not seen at least one TT bike in the rack up there, and Saturday was no exception...


Oddly, the owner of that S-works TT bike was somehow leading a group of cyclists on 'regular road bikes' up through Piermont, NY. However, there were other bikes boasting greater utility for these roads at prices no less rediculous than that Specialized...


Now, this machine might actually help you climb a mountain. And with a price tag of $15,000.00 (incredible, I know) utterly shames the S-works with its elitism and rarity.

Riding along route 9W toward Piermont and Nyack, we encountered a group of 'bladers lounging on the shoulder, all clad in skin suits.


Chuckling to ourselves about the rediculousness of 'bladin', we rode on, passing under the Tappan Zee Bridge, just before entering Nyack once again...


We found ourselves at the Runcible Spoon Cafe, as usual, scarfing down only the most ironic of food stuffs. I'd mentioned earlier the beguling sandwich-making practices this cafe works with, though I opted for my usual as I do every time I find myself there.



Still Hungry after my lunch, I decided to test their desserts, finally deciding on the Cookie Monster Cupcake:


While the cupcake and cookie were both pretty good, they used far too much blue food coloring and even after washing my hands and face, I was still noticeably bluer than I should've been. Also, that cookie was a fucking tease. I was hoping to sop up some of the blue from my moustache with it, but quickly found out that there was not nearly enough cookie for such an endeavor. While some might call a half cookie a cute nod to Cookie Monster's love of cookies (as if the cupcake devoured the other half), I call it a clever cookie-saving technique.

Prepping for the second half of our ride (second quarter for me), I saw this funny bidon on the bike across from mine on the rack...


Then, leaving Nyack, we proceeded north on 9W which rolls up and down the edge of the Hudson until our destination. Being somewhat out of shape, one member of our crew kept dropping off and the other waited for him since they had more time to burn. I, on the other hand, needed to ride another eighty miles or so and decided to slog it along by myself. Two miles north of Nyack was the last time I saw those dudes, and rode (pretty much) alone for the whole rest of the way.

This is me looking back to see if I can spot them.


Nope, nothing... I soft-pedaled most of the rest of the way to Bear Mountain, thinking they would overtake me.

I stopped next to the entrance of this Quarry for a while, waiting, resting, and quelling any doubts I had as to whether or not I was "in the mountains" yet.


The rest of the ride was too beautiful to convey with pictures, suffice to say, I've never known natural splendor like the northeast in spring and summer. I know Seattle is up there but here it's really something else; every direction you look, your gaze is met with abounding verdant landscapes fit for painting.

I finally reach Bear Mountain State Park:


...and climb...


...and climbed some more until I reached the top, where I gazed at the vista through a veritable sea of asian tourists, motorcyclists, and backpackers.


Growing weary of the traffic at the summit, I gathered my things and rode back down the mountain. This was by far my favorite part of the whole trip. The two lane road was an asphalt ribbon, beautifully maintained and never so steep as to throw me into a speed wobble.


I slid easily down, past lush flora and bounding fauna, back to the park's entrance where I was hoping to find my friends.

Alas, they had gone part way up and turned off the main road and I bypassed them in my descent. After a conciliatory phone call, I headed back to the city on my own, second-guessing my decision to do over a hundred miles in one shot.

A very nice roadie pulled up next to me about a mile or so later and we paced back toward Nyack (actually, he did most of the pace-setting, I just sucked his wheel most of the way). Knowing I was slowing him down, I told him to feel free to drop me because I was really tired and in no shape to keep up rolling turns at 25mph. He gave me a few powergels, some candy bars, and a block of powdered stuff (get your mind outta the gutter) that turns water into gatorade. I had no idea where he had stashed all of this food but I was certainly grateful for it.

The rest of the ride back was pretty much the same as the first leg, though in reverse. It was uneventful save for two things: Instead of stopping in Nyack, I got a bite to eat and some fluids at a shop in Piermont, which is a quaint little river-side village just south of Nyack. Apparently I was the last cyclist passing through for the night as evidenced by the empty bike racks...


Then, after riding on for some 500 feet or so, I flipped through my new cyclocomputer to check my mileage and stuff. Finding the odometer at 333.2 miles, I knew the auspicious 333.3 mark was only a few feet ahead of me so I schluffed along until it rolled over and snapped a quick photo.


After narrowly avoiding being rained on a few times, I finally made it back into manhattan tired, sweaty and drained.

All in all, by the time I made it to my doorstep in Brooklyn, I put 125.4 miles on my bike and had a max speed of 39.4mph (not counting the 46 something mph that put me in such a bad speed wobble I nearly got tossed off).

Now my legs are fried like the chicken at mitchell's though I can't wait to 'slay' another century-and-a-quarter.

Look forward to in-depth coverage of the tour's final day on the Champs Elysees, coming soon (this evening or tomorrow). 'Til then, ride safe... it's still early in the week.