Moscaline

Major media ski sensation and other activities

2012-01-23T07:46:00.000-07:00

I made it on the front page of the ABQ journal a few weeks ago with my allegedly excellent ski form:

In an article promoting the Chama Chile Classic:

Which I completely did not go to this year as I was so tired. Instead I rested after a very fun yet exhausting trip to knoxville for work. I crammed in two rides among working and other shenanigans. I need to go back without working as I did not see quite everyone I wanted to and working really interupted my having fun time.

Riding in the slop with Gary:

Excellent evidence of a good ride:

I have been skiing a fair bit since I have been back, perhaps races will happen again. The snow is in reasonably good shape and the trails have been well groomed. I did a great little back country ski trip from the ski hill parking lot over and down to the Caldera with my friend zach, more pics here scoping out a guided tour that Zach is organizing. Among the highlights were hopping fences in skis:

Snow biking has been excellent too. Even where the snow is aflame:

Finally the infink is now action little girl. It is good.

'sup? Update!

2012-01-15T12:40:00.003-07:00

Update 1/16/12, improved by pal Charlie

Can you get nightmares from a picture of yourself?

Fire powered tiny house barrel

2011-12-08T19:12:00.004-07:00

Or maybe a sauna. I was a bit sad to find out that this was not exactly a portahobbit home. Prestocked with hobbits. The next big thing, kind of like terrestrial hairy giant sea monkeys.

Seen in crested butte over thanksgiving.

Also, I tried to shove the old Kelly into the mountainbike hall of fame, but they would not let me. Bastards.

Pugsley, Alive!

2011-12-06T00:43:00.005-07:00

It took a snow day to get the thing done. It had been sitting as a well cleaned, prepped, framesavered frame and fork with headset and cranks installed for about 3 weeks (possibly longer). I busted out the wheels last night, and with the assist of a couple few hours and a fair number of Anchor Steam Christmas Ales, I got it out the door and for a late night really really cold test ride.

Riding conditions ranged from snow packed roads to 4-8 inches of fresh snow in the park to rutty bits to a couple ill advised trail shortcuts that did not end badly. It was about 5F out and my face hurt. I mostly resisted the urge to ride through all my local cyclist pals snow covered yards leaving fatbike tracks. This is going to be a really fun bike.

Note the squishy blue ritchey grips which have been sitting in the box for over a decade waiting for the right bike. They are made out of smurfs. As cool as the flat bars look, I need some much wider riser bars on it. Maybe just swept back a bit.

These were some fun wheels to build.

They were a good challenge. I really like building wheels. I am also pretty darn slow, but the second wheel was a breeze compared to the first. The tricky bits was getting them dished right, the first one laced up way off in dish and truousity. the second one laced up almost dead on. Not sure why, other than I was better after building one. If you are building your own fat bike wheels I highly recommend reading the surly pugsley instructions a bunch and then figure out your spoke lengths with this handy visual calculator at freespoke double check the rim and hub dimensions, vic has a nice post that discovered some error in the large marge calcs. I found the ERD on the rolling Darryl rim is a bit different than surly's spec, but it is easy to play with the numbers and change them. I also HIGHLY recommend not using an ERD that is 15mm to big when you order your spokes. Good thing I have the Tarik's Everful Box o' Spokes at my disposal. No matter how many times you double check your calcs, if you transpose some numbers consistently you will still be wrong.

I had to press out the bushing out of a old canti brake and pair that with a beheaded M8 bolt to get the surly wheel build tool to work with the Paul hub. If I had my unimat set up, I should have just turned down the head of an M8 bolt. But one stupid project at a time. Don't worry if this does not make sense to you. It is not a common problem to have.

I can think of lots of things I would do differently. The most likely one is that I would probably have set up the disc brakes before I put the tires on. You can not get a line of sight on the caliper and pads with the tire on. Your head keeps hitting the tire. I set em up by smell. It feels good to be a gangsta.

Thanks to the Mellow Velo Fellers for helping me put together the highly personalized build kit eons before I could actually get the fat bike built. I shall now commence the riding the hell out of it.

Be vewwy vewwy quiet

2011-11-28T21:48:00.001-07:00

Ubikequitous 9, the Airport MacAskill

2011-10-27T06:30:00.005-06:00

There I am waiting for my mignight luggage to come out at baggage claim when I hear a very familiar song, that Jezabels song from the Danny MacAskill video. I look around, and sure enough there is Danny flipping around on the flatscreen above the baggage carousel. Somewhat hilariously they have recut the "way back home" video so it shows only tricks and all out of order, presumably to catch the gnattish attention of the jaded traveler. Thing was, it was working. As I scanned the crowd, half the people were watching the video, and people were talking excitedly about it. I was overwhelmed with bikey pride, then I collected my luggage (including my folding bike) and spend 40 bucks on a taxi to get to my hotel.

Here is the original, watch it again and again and again...

2011 NM Cross Series #4 Pojaque

2011-10-24T06:07:00.001-06:00

race 10/15/11

Late the night before the race, I was sitting in front of the TV, drinking beers, watching the baseball playoffs and blogging my last race report. I noticed an email on the NM bike racers list reminding that the next day's cross race would be in Pojaque, a mere 20 minutes or so from where I sit (a mere half mile from where I was living when this blog started many moons ago). I have mostly given up racing cross in NM as the races are most often in Albuquerque and honestly I am way to lazy to drive 2 hours each way for a one hour or shorter race. However, this race was close enough to get me interested.

I thought about it a bit, finished watching the Rangers run up the score on the Tigers and then decided to race. First thought, where the hell is my cross bike? I decided it probably was in the back of the bike closet. I unearthed it from its hook and headed to the bike dungeon to give it a once over. The tires were well goatheaded from its last adventure a number of years ago. The sealant still held in the back wheel, but was not holding in the front. The tires were a bit hard as well, so I changed out the front tire and tube, picked all the goatheads out of the rear pumped it up and gave it a spin and called it good. I was running a 36-17 on the bike which seemed good as I have not been racing much lately. I spun a 16 freewheel on my pit wheels and aired them up too. I slapped some lube on the chain and checked the brakes. It was good. I love singlespeeds.

I grabbed a helmet with a light on it and went out for a late night shakedown ride. I spotted an aluminum schwinn hardtail on a junkpile destined for large item pickup, decided I did not want it. Rode around for a couple few miles getting used to the handling, and decided to go back and check out the bike again. I looked at it more carefully and noted it had shimano quick releases, a bell, an old headlight and some bmx pedals, all worthy conquests! It also had some IRC mythos slicks on it, which are not a bad tire to put on a commuter, they looked pretty new, and were aired up a tiny bit, so I pulled the bike off the pile and ghost rode it a couple blocks home. I got in just after midnight, put the bikes up and went to bed.

The Race morning I woke up late, got my gear loaded and hit the road. Got to the race site about 15 minutes later than I planned and registered quickly and noted my race was not the next one. Somehow the schedule I read online was an hour earlier than the race day schedule. The NM cross series has 2 oddly laid out websites with a third for race registration. Information is sparse and confusing at times. But the races are usually worth the hassle of figuring out where and when to show up.

The race was at the Pojaque Reservation Wellness center. I am pretty familiar with the area, having lived very near by for most of 2003-2004, but I was not sure where they would run the race. Turns out they had laid out a really fun course over the slow wet grass of the football field/track to a nice long gravel road climb and descent and then a dirt section. Lots and lots of chicanes and 180 hairpins and a couple three sketchy high speed turns thrown in. One set of double barriers on the grass and a stairway run up on uneven large stones.

I warmed up slowly as I watched the womens/masters men race unfold. I did not really get a chance to hit the course at all, but snuck on for a brief recon after the race before ended. It turns out I was not used to my cross bike at all after not riding it for so long and I had tons of trouble with the hairpins, especially the dirt ones. But no matter, I headed to the line and lined up with the 10 or so racers in the singlespeed collegiate race. 8 or so of us were on one speeds and there was one geared male collegieate racer and one geared female racer. It was really sunny and warm as our race started, we were scheduled for 40 minutes, but we were warned that they might cut it short a bit, which was fine with me.

NM has a funny cross scene. I looked over on the line next to me and noted a hot tubes lugged cross bike with bart bowens name stickered on the top tube. I look at the rider, nope, not bart. But he is a NM native and usually shows up once or twice a year to stamp his authority on the local race scene. Also I noted there was a dude warming up in the parking lot on a slick looking carbon Trek single speed cross bike with Travis Brown's name on it. Rider looked to be Travis Brown himself. Durango is a 4 hour drive, so occasionally we get special guest visitors from the Durango scene. Fortunately for me, he was planning on riding his single speed in the Cat1-2-3 race, instead of dicing it up with our anemic singlespeed field.

Anyhow, I lined up in the second row, unsure of the condition, we got a laconic, "ok go" from the official and off we went. One dude went out really hard and I looked around at the rest of the field and realized no one else would be going after him, so I rode around a couple of people in front of me and sprinted to try to get to the guy in front. I hit the grass just behind the leader and the barriers went OK considering I had not done any barriers in almost three years.

The slow wet grassy chicanes did not go so well and the leader had gapped me and a few guys behind were tight on my wheel. We then hit a stretch on the track to a short dirt section with a tricky hairpin to the stairclimb. That part went OK, then we remounted did another tricky turn and did the big gravel climb out descend back. I tried to catch the leader here and by the top of the climb I had closed in a bit. I noted the riders close behind me (all on single speed mountain bikes) dropped off a bit on the climb.

After the fast descent we hit a hard tricky right on gravel, followed by a short climb and a fast descent to a 90 turn on pavement that was pretty tight, followed by a section of chicanes and hairpins on dirt. I pretty much screwed up all these parts. The leader gapped me good and two riders were right on my tail. We transitioned back to the grass part and I further screwed up the grass chicanes, but did well on the barriers and the stair climb.

I drilled it on the gravel section and got a pretty good gap on the lone chaser and settled in. It was pretty clear at this point that I was probably not going to catch the leader, and it was clear that I was only going to be caught by the guys behind me if I kept screwing up the hairpins. I transitioned to the downhill and over to the dirt section, screwed up a bit less than before, but the guy behind me had pretty much closed the gap. When we hit the grass again, I did much better, finally trusting my bike a bit and opened up the gap a slight bit through the stairs to the start of the climb. I drilled it again on the long climb and had a ton of room behind me by the time the tricky bits started. The third time through I did pretty well all through the gravel and the grass, I hit the track and got three to go from the official and probably had a good stair run and went out to climb again.

At this point I was hot and tired and thirsty and vaguely aware that my rear tire was getting soft. There were goatheads everywhere on the course, I could only hope my sealant would hold long enough for me to finish. I was pretty sure I could hold off everyone behind me and was dead sure I would never see the leader again. So I resolved to drilling it yet again on the climb and looked back at the top, delighted to see no one even close. The rest of that lap went very well as I finally got the corners dialed through the dirt and grass. The rest of the race was only dramatic in that my rear tire was getting progressively softer.

To make my long story shorter I will say the race ended just like that. I think I actually closed in on the leader a bit once I figured out the corners, the guy behind me had pretty much thrown in the towel and I finished second in the race, second of the single speeds. Just before I got the bell, I think I pinch flatted the rear in a manner that the sealant could not deal with and lost quite a bit of pressure in the last lap. I finished with the tire damn near flat, but I barely had to slow at all.

I changed drank some water, grabbed a cowbell and cheered on the A's for a bit. When I left Travis Brown was yo yoing off the back of the lead pack in the A race, but it appears that he won in the end. The course was really nice and was quite fun. The views of the snow capped Sangre de Cristo mountains were supurbe. I am not a huge fan of separated single speed races in cross, I think they should have thrown us in with the A group so there would have been more racers in between to make it more interesting. As it was the A (cat 1-2-3) only had about 12 racers in it. But otherwise I remember why I like cross so much. I think I started cross racing 15 years ago (1996 DFL cross races and Surf City Races) and I have skipped 3 years since then, so happy dozenth season to me. I may try to hit one or two more races before season end, but I would bet on fewer rather than more...

This is totally Travis Brown. Not some cheap imitation. Real deal.

Race well run by, results posted at, and photos borrowed from Dash for life

2011 Pajarito Trail Fest 10k Race Report

2011-10-17T06:17:00.001-06:00

So last friday night (10/7) my plane touched down in the pouring rain in Albuquerque at 9:40pm. I grabbed my luggage, got to my car and drove 2 hours home in more pouring rain. I pulled into my driveway around midnight just as the rain was turning to snow. I went in the house, had some leftover pizza and crashed hard.

My alarm awoke me at 7am, I got my oatmeal and coffee on. Found some runny gear and some warms, looked out at the bright cold sunny day and saw the snow line was at 7700 feet or so, my house is at 7200, the race would start at 9200 feet and go up and over pajarito mountain at 10,400. Before my brain woke up Coach K and hubby were in the driveway to pick me up.

Some freshies at the lodge pre-race

We drove up the ski hill and found the road snowy and very icy in spots. Got the lodge to find 3-4" of fresh snow. The 9am start was postponed till 9:15 to accommodate the people who had to park on the side of the road and hitch up. Mood in the lodge was apprehensive, but the turnout was excellent, especially given the weather. The race organizer, Petra, made an announcement saying she had run the whole course and the trails were completely snow packed and slippery and snow was chin deep in places. Panic ensued until we collectively realized chin and shin sound pretty similar in charming accented english.

The course is pretty similar to most of the races I suffer in on the ski hill. Up singletrack to the top (east side this time), over the very top of the mountian, and then down singletrack on the other side of the mountain. I did this race in 2009, the course was pretty similar, but the bottom half of the downhill was changed due to fire damage and possibly the snow.

I decided to not warm up at all. I wore shorts, a wool tank top, a bike jersey, arm warmers, wool socks and a visor. It was a bit cold sitting there at the start line, but it was sunny and I had 1200 feet of climbing ahead of me to get me warm. After some joking and greeting at the start line, I lined up in the second row and the gun went off. I cleverly did not go out t oo hard, nor it seemed did anyone else. I settled in to the back of the lead group as we initially descended slightly on the Aspenola trail. Course was slick indeed and the wind was kicking up making it kind of unpleasant. The lead pack stretched and spread out immediately and I settled in to around 10th place or so (probably about half were 10k runners, half were in the 2 lap-12 mile race).

As we started climbing the exposed switchbacks I felt really good, taking it easy, watching my footing but I drifted off the back of the lead group and lost sight of them pretty quickly. A group of three was closing in behind me, but I paid them no mind as there was lots of climbing left to do. I settled into a rhythm of running as fast as was comfortable and slip free on the steep stuff and opening it up when it flattened out. We went in and out of the woods and across ski slopes over aspen leaf dappled snow covered trails. The next time I looked back I saw no one close behind me and perhaps one runner off in the distance.

Further up the hill the snow was approaching a foot deep, slightly deeper in drifts and I was reduced to some sort of weird toe kick in climb on the steeper slope. It was hard going but I felt amazingly good. The runner behind me had closed in, but was clearly breathing much harder than me. I snuck a look back and was surprised to see that it was a young kid (12 it turned out). I was able to drop him as we hit some steeper bits toward the top. As we came out of the woods on the back side of the hill I could smell roasting chiles. Some of the ski hill workers were having a little barbecue overlooking the valle.

Me at the top of the mountain

The views were spectacular on the back side of the hill overlooking the caldera and the snow covered Jemez mountains. I took a few cell phone photos here and kind of lost my impetus a bit. We descended briefly and the kid caught up to me and then blasted by me as we started seeing some of the front runners come down the trail from the top. We ran up a steep singletrack scramble to the very top of the hill, looped around and descended into the field behind us. I still felt pretty good and tried to open it up on the slick trails to catch the runner ahead.

As we turned off the top loop to the descent we hit some off camber trails that traversed the ski hill. It was really hard to see where the trail really was. So I slipped badly a few times and took a pretty big fall in the first parts of the descent. Further down the hill I could see I was not the only one, all sorts of scrape marks leading down off the trail where people had biffed. Most of the descent alternated between offcamber singletrack to really steep little drops through the woods. It was insanely sketchy and really really fun.

Alas I am a pretty crappy downhill runner in good conditions, I was really crappy this day. The runner ahead of me was not seen again and two runners ran by me like I was standing still. I had many near spills a few real ones and lots of unstable foot plants. It was a blast. The further we got down the trail the more mud there was in the sunny spots where the snow had melted away. I had to stop to tie my shoe and saw two more runners closing in fast and I said basta and took off. Fortunately the trail leveled out a bit with some long straight trails. I was able to decisively drop them and close a bit of ground to the runners ahead of me.

The end of the race got a bit squirrely coming straight down the grassy snow covered ski slope toward Mother lift. I fell three times in quick succession, flat on my ass, but bounced right up and kept on rolling to the finish. I ended up finishing in 6th in the 10k race, one minute back of the kid and one of the guys who passed me on the downhill, but well back of the top three. My time was 1hour 13 minutes 15 seconds. 5 minutes slower than when I did the race two years back, but given the conditions and how good I felt during the race and afterwards, I think I was much faster. I was sore for 4 days or so, mostly in the hips and inner leg from trying to stabilze myself on the snow, but otherwise no big deal. There were nice raffle prizes at the finish, a good cookie and muffin spread for snacking on. Alas, the kitchen was not open so I was denied the traditional post race burrito. Overall 65 people finished the 10k and 25 did the two lap 12 mile race. The turnout was excellent given the crappy weather. results here.

Aida (pink hat) runs towards the cookies and beads

Aida and Elena came up to watch the finish and to have Aida run in her first race the 100 yard kids race. The kids race was great, featuring approximately 10 kids, much pushing on the start line and much excitement about post race cookies and rewards. Aida actually started running when the starter mentioned the cookies and juice post race. Fortunately there were no DQ's for the first false start and she was allowed to line up again. The race went off and she ran the whole way to the end. I am pretty sure she was torn between picking up interesting looking rocks and running the whole way, but her racing instinct held out. She ate some cookies and got a shiny orange bead necklace for her prize. She was mildly irked that her older friends ran the 1k bigger kids race too, but that was soothed by more cookies. Hurray cookies. We returned home and I took an epic nap.

Decisions

2011-10-14T23:49:00.002-06:00

To race? If so, which of the 10-15 year old cross tire technology should I embrace...

Update answer was yes, and went with the NOS michelin Sprints, the perfect NM Cross tire, report soonish

Bucket o' squids

2011-09-29T23:17:00.002-06:00

Because I noticed that Squidblog is back as a tumbler.

Seen, found, got

2011-09-22T20:45:00.003-06:00

Seen in the yard:

Odd crustyness found on the trail

Pugsley bits about to be got:

From the Mellow Velo, photo from
joel

Daughter Road Runner Pugsley Unicycle

2011-09-08T06:44:00.000-06:00

Been hiking a bit with the fierce young lady.

She has been looking for bugs and chipmunks and squirrels. And monkeys! To take home with her. Alas, we only got bugs. She was unreceptive to the idea that there may be no monkeys to be had in the forests here. But we did see a rare Los Alamos Road runner. They usually stick to lower altitudes, but this is the third I have seen in town since I moved here. This one in the western area (our neighborhood).

Took some stuff up a couple hundred feet to a bbq at the park this past weekend.

Got some wheeled goodness to bring home.

Anyone got some spare fatbike rims (32 hole) tires and tubes they don't need? The unicycle is a vintage schwinn to borrow until I learn how to ride it. The pugsley is mine all mine.

Future plans may include daddy and daughter at the park on the grass while she masters two wheels and I master one.

Los Alamos Blogs

2011-09-06T21:05:00.003-06:00

I very very belatedly added a Los Alamos blog section on the right there down a bit. Any other suggestions? In the comments please.

Somewhere on the edge of the Santa Fe National Forest in Los Alamos

More Wood hauling

2011-09-02T16:46:00.003-06:00

My neighbor at the end of the block took down a pretty good sized piñon tree that was blocking the view around the corner. He also took out a juniper tree. I saw my chance, gave him a call got the blessings to go wood scavenging. I got two really heavy loads of piñon and juniper and I am pooped. Piñon is the heaviest and sappiest wood I have ever worked with, it burns hot and long and completely cruds up your chimney, but it is a NM staple. This tree was half dead and probably predated the manhattan project, but at least it will keep me warm this winter.

I did grab a few piñon nuts from a cone to see if I can get them to grow. The birds and squirrels are amazingly good at eating all the good ones. I opened a few, but they were all shriveled. I have a seedling growing in my yard that I planted a few years back. It is doing pretty well. Most of the piñon below 7000 feet in the area have died off in the last 15 years due to prolonged drought, but the few that are in town here seem fine.

The ride was less than a quarter mile to get the wood. the first load was a bit tough, the second one was half piñon and half juniper and it was a cakewalk. I probably will just walk up there with a wheelbarrow and trim the remaining branches with an axe to get some good sappy kindling.

I was able to score a small haul of cottonwood earlier this summer. Cottonwood and aspen are the anti-piñon, they burn hot and fast and clean. I think wood hauling is my favorite use for the big dummy thus far.

Including a big batch of elm that the tree owner would not let me haul off on the bike (he insisted on delivering it to my house via pickup), I probably have scored a cord or so of free wood from the neighborhood over the past few years. Good stuff.

previous wood hauling on the big dummy

Bulldozing a trail

2011-08-07T22:41:00.005-06:00

As many know there was a really big fire around Los Alamos last month, called the Las Conchas fire. Someday I will write about it, but not today. A fair bit of our trails were heavily fire damaged, including the nordic ski area, but today I will write about what it looks like when they bulldoze a trail to make a fireline. I ran up the Quemazon trail about 3/4 of the way up to the Pipeline Trail intersection. The fire crews ran a bulldozer more or less right up this trail to create a potential fire break for the western area and the rest of town. I probably have run or ridden this trail 2-3 times a month in the warm months since I moved to Los Alamos in 2003. It is a rocky technical climb that is fairly continuous with lots of tricky bits and some really fun slick rock esque tuff rock sections. There are still wagon wheel ruts in the tuff rock (enhanced by peds and bikes) from when this trail connected the grazing grounds of the caldera and the los alamos mesa.

Anyhow, technical soft rock trail does not really hold up to being bulldozed.

You can see some burnt trees from the 2000 cerro grande fire up in the top of the picture. The trail was a narrow doubletrack with technical bits here. Now it is pretty smooth. You can see the bulldozer track scars on the tuff rock.

Same deal as before. You can see what was individual rocks now sort of smooshed together where the tracks went. Most of the trail looks like this now. I am pretty impressed they could get a bulldozer up the steeper parts and through some of the technical section. Fortunately they went around the first technical section right near the bottom with the step in it:

But that is pretty much it for the tricky bits.

I got a pretty good look at the upper southern part of Los Alamos canyon. It either burnt heavily or was backburned. The slope is steep and completely denuded of vegetation. LA canyon goes right alongside of town. The major fire fighting effort to save town and my neighborhood was to keep the fire from spreading down the canyon. It worked. This trail bulldozing was a part of that.

The dead trees in the foreground are from the 2000 cerro grande fire which heavily damaged this trail. The south side of the canyon and the east side of the ski hill is visible and fireblackened.

Here are some pics and videos from pre-Las Conchas:

All the rocky lumpy bits are smoothish and the single track is now bulldozed width. The wagon ruts are dimished, but are still there, with overlaid bulldozer track scars. I think the few large remaining ponderosa pines next to the trail have been knocked down. There are some large bulldozed firebreak/clearings where the trail gets near LA canyon. There may have been one major reroute, but I can't really recognize much of the trail now. I will try to ride the trail this week to the top to see what it really looks like.

The good news:
1. The town and my neighborhood did not burn thanks to efforts of the fire crews, this bulldozing is part of that effort. Looks like some pretty intense burning was well within 3 miles as the crow flies of my house.
2. Most of the trail did not burn (the very top reportedly did, but I was too tired to run up there today)
3. Shoots from aspens, locust and scrub oaks are already coming back in the some of the bulldozed sections, so the trail will narrow up pretty quickly.
4. Trail work crews have already constructed waterbars on the steeper dirt parts of the trail to hopefully prevent major damage.
5. The huge aspen grove was widened a bit, but was not damaged too much. There may be shade yet on this trail. The aspens were a couple feet high when I first moved here. Now they are 10+ feet high.

Anyhow, kind of a bummer, but all told, it is still a good trail and I still have a house. So it is in the plus column in the big picture.

Rootsnake damn near got me.

2011-08-04T22:46:00.003-06:00

The Greater Los Alamos Rootsnake almost kilt me on a high speed descent on the way to work today. I saw it poised to strike. I focused on it and then swerved at the last minute in a panicked manner and almost slid out. I had seen and been startled by this very rootsnake before, but it was sleeping previously. What compelled it to raise its rooty snake head in anger I do not know.

Later this same day:
I almost punctured on a vertebrae.
I got caught in a downpour.
With bonus hail.
I got me a burrito while trailing puddles of water in the burritory.
I got caught in another downpour.
I almost got caught in a third downpour on the way home, but skirted the danger.

Seen on my dad's bookshelf

2011-07-28T20:59:00.003-06:00

context
or perhaps more distinguished context

Watching the tiny bike men with Aida

2011-07-14T23:55:00.002-06:00

A conversation with the daughter while watching the Tour De France today.
TV shows tiny bike men flying down the back side of the Tourmelet.
I am attempting to get Aida to watch the tour instead of shouting and singing louder than the TV.

Me: Aida, look at the tiny bike men racing down the hill
Aida: They are not racing!
Me: Yes, this is a bike race!
Aida: NO!
Me: What are the men doing then,
Aida: They are riding to the grocery store.
Me: Why are they riding to the grocery store?
Aida: To, um, to get tomatoes!
Me: All those riders are going to the grocery store?
Aida: Yes they need to get tomatoes!
Aida: Mad cackling

Then she ran away.

Either teaching by example really works, or Aida wants some tomatoes.

Praugles in Cobbe

2011-06-16T16:49:00.002-06:00

Its moscaline cobbles fortnight, just not on the internet.

European Mornings

2011-06-08T06:00:00.000-06:00

Turns out if you wake up early in Europe you can watch the end of the west coast baseball games with your espresso and chocolate pastries. The hard part is getting the espresso and pastries before 6am.

California Poppies, Finally

2011-06-06T06:00:00.000-06:00

After a, no joke, 7 year ongoing effort to get a california poppy to flower in Los Alamos, NM. I win. The key for this one is that it was a seed that did NOT flower from a planting last year. I have tried planting in the late fall before unsuccessfully. But maybe this was close enough to the house to winter without getting too cold? Not sure. A woman down the block has them growing like weeds in her yard, she actually has to weed them out of other beds, why is she so blessed? Probably as she is right with the god. I am so not right with god, in my defense though, it said nothing about that on the back of the seed packet. I will further investigate as seasons progress. She also graciously will allow me to collect seeds from her known producers. We tried transplanting her unloved poppies to my yard, but california poppies resist transplanting and seem to even resist starting them indoors in compostable pots and then just plain old planting the whole pot in the ground.

So the new plan is to monitor the poppies planted this year to see if any succeed, and then to sow seeds in october or november this year.

Roulers

2011-05-28T21:44:00.003-06:00

We ride hard many miles for you.

Thank you Tyler.

2011-05-19T19:51:00.006-06:00

And so it comes full circle. I think all my doping posts started with the initial Tyler Hamilton doping bust in 2006. I have always been a big Tyler Hamilton fan, but have never believed his innocence. Big thanks to Tyler Hamilton for finally spilling his beans. Watch the video preview for a 60 minutes feature this coming week:

That is some fairly unambiguous stuff. I need to watch the full video, they sure cut to a grimacing Tyler often for a 1 minute clip. I don't think he is a particularly credible witness what with the 5 years of denial and ruining himself defending his "honor". But I don't think people just make things up when they come clean, especially multiple years of chronic doping. Lance-y-pants is on the highway to vast conspiracyville at this point. Floyd and Tyler had millions of dollars of incentive to lie when caught doping. Not sure what all encompassing conspiracy would give them the incentive to lie now. I am sure we will start to hear more first hand doping reports come out in the next year. Lanceipants should have retired for real the first time. I think the whole Federal case against armstrong (and Barry Bonds) by Jeff Novitzky is a huge waste of taxpayer money, but due to the grand jury subpoenas that many riders received, there is big incentive for telling the truth. Hamilton appeared before the grand jury last year, I would suspect he started spilling beans then. There is at least one other (not yet caught for doping) US cyclist out there who reportedly provided first hand accounts of Lance doping to the grand jury. (see this Aug 2010 NYT article.

I wish Tyler came clean in 2006, but I was pretty sure that there was imminent confession coming down the pipe from Tyler, see the end of my last two Floydtosterone posts (1,2). Anyhow, I am now officially tired of the doping. My doping writing has been ongoing for 5 years. Which is a long freeking time. I do I am pretty sure we are in for some more confessions from prominent American cyclists who decide to confess and retire before getting caught, or at least confess their past doping. I welcome it all. I will still watch them tiny bike people, but I probably am not going to write about the doping no more. There are a sea of other bloggers doing a much better job at covering doping in pro cycling (boulder report is my favorite), and the mass media has been coming around to reasonably non-hysterical bordering on intelligent coverage of doping. My work is done.

So thanks Tyler, thanks for telling the truth, and thanks for setting the Moscalines free.

Bad Bicycle Drawings 1

2011-05-16T06:14:00.002-06:00

A new occasional series documenting bad or notably wrong drawings of bicycles.
The first is from the children's book Little Pig is Capable.

While Aida seemed to enjoy the book, I found it a bit odd and disjointed. The bicycle barely features in the tale despite the prominent cover picture.

Stunning really. The frame angles are forgivable. The chain leading to the rear tire is not. The front training wheels are just confusing. Even from a stylized point of view there is little excuse for this. I imagine the author, Denis Roche, has not ridden let alone seen a bicycle in decades. This being the internet, I look forward to a response from Ms. Roche.

A May commute

2011-05-13T11:00:00.001-06:00

On May 10th, I got up very early and watched the sun come up as I did some data analysis for a tight deadline. I then got ready to ride to work around 9. I watched a storm front hop the mountains and roll over town as I had one last espresso. It was probably about 40 degrees and overcast as I rolled the mountainbike down the block. I took the long way in. Over the neighborhood, on the trails.

At the highpoint of the ride, I paused to watch a small coopers hawk in an aerial battle with a much larger raven. Then it started spitting snow.

I rolled on toward the Quemazon trail, watching a coyote scurry away ahead of me. Did a small loop through the woods on the edge of the canyon.

Crossed the bridge, hit the trails on the opposite side of the canyon and looped around the tiny connector trails before dropping into the canyon for the final leg to work. I was warming up, but the day remained grey and cold.

Startled one more coyote, followed fresh elk track through pine needles, paused again as I was enveloped in a flurry, and then popped up on the road and headed to the office to continue my working day.

Moscaline-Mastastico fishing adventure

2011-05-05T23:24:00.000-06:00

Finding myself in the wilds of long island last week, I met up with Mr Lentini of the fine blog, Mastastico, and had some beers and did some early morning fishing. Highlights were falling into the long island rabbit hole and learning much about the little known conspiracy scene in middle long island, aliens and mutant deer and industrial waste abound! Having grown up an hour south of Manhattan, I don't remember ever being further east than JFK airport, so I was not sure what to expect, but I learned much. I recognized the sandy terrain and the perpetual fog from my earlier life living on the east coast. I did not see the sun for three whole days while I was there, something that never occurs in New Mexico.

mastastico game face, moscaline not so much

Fishing started very early one morning, especially considering the two hour time change I was experiencing. Based on sound intuition, we headed out to the more sporting "not catch fish" area of the Carmans River.

trackside access

I was a bit surprised to find such a nice trout stream in the middle of Long Island, but it was good. In typical fashion I caught nothing, but I did see lots of little troutlings in the shallows. Despite unsporting dropcasting, I did not even get a nibble. I did lose a couple flies to overhanging trees.

Nice rail road access singletrack through the piney woods.

After Mr. Lentini left to catch his train, I still had an hour or so to fish before I needed to get back to work, so I kept wading downstream looking for fishy prey. Not 100meters from where we parted ways, I caught a flash of something running through the woods on a high bank of the river. I stopped casting and waited and watched. I heard nothing for a while, and then just as I resumed fishing, I saw another brown flash and heard hooves thundering alongside the stream. I saw what appeared to be something between a dog and a horse rush off in the distance and then I could hear the thundering hooves turn to splashing up the river toward me. The splashes stopped. I looked around for anything or anyone, but is was just me, the river and the splashy mystery beasts just around the bend.

Mastastico fishing the RR bridge

Honestly, my first thought was to just start running upstream and see if I could catch Mr. Lentini, but I considered it unwise in waders. I then flashed to the previous night's tales of alien landing in this very location, wondering if there were mutant alien warthogs with tenticled mouths patrolling these parts. I dismissed that and, as the beasts were running back up the bank and into the woods, I caught a glimpse that lead me to believe that these were the imported sitka deer that ran rampant to these parts. As they rushed back and forth in and out of the stream I wondered what would make them run like that. Then I realized that Mr. Lentini was sporting an orange hat. Shit!?! was it hunting season? Was I going to get gunned down in the middle of an unlikely trout stream in long island? I paused and watched and looked for chasing hunters, but nothing. After a few seconds/minutes/years of heart pounding silence, the deer took flight up the bank again and off into the woods, not to reappear again.

darn nice, if infested with insane deer

I continued casting less enthusiastically for another half hour or so, but enjoyed the misty early morning on the river. It was a really beautiful spot.

I hiked back to the car and remembered my previous fishing trip this year. A January hip deep snow hike along the Rio Chama after a cross country ski race. I could not find an ice free area close enough to shore to cast to, so I did not even unsheath the mighty bean fly rod. I did see bobcat track in the snow. It was also a good day fishing.

Frozen Rio Chama

Anyhow, big thanks to Mr. Lentini for providing the bar, calzone, local history and fishing information that improved what could have been a deadly boring trip. Next time we challenge the seagoing fish and further explore the depths of the local knowledge base!

Good times in Oakland

2011-04-22T22:29:00.004-06:00

Perusing Flickr today I was delighted to see this photo from one of my contacts:

click photo for source

That was my view upon walking out of my apartment in Oakland for two years starting in 1996 or so. This iconic coin laundry is located at the corner of Telegraph in 59th in what was optimistically advertised as "Lower Rockridge" when we looked at the listing. It probably is better described as "Upper Temescal" now. I spent many a quarter there at the 'lectric washouse. The manager was a mailman and he would often be there late at night sweeping the floors and collecting quarters in his US postal service duds. I think it was open all night.

I spent the first year in that house frantically riding a couple miles up Telegraph to campus to TA 8am labs. The second year I spent frantically riding down Telegraph, around Lake Merrit and down through the flats to my job at a foundry near the Oakland Coliseum. It was at that corner that I lived with the first of the epically round cats in my life, mighty Cymba.

Anyhow, it was a nice 10 minute walk to the Rockridge Bart and the glories of North Oakland's eating and coffee, so it was a pretty nice place to live, if on the transition to weirder and worse neighborhoods. Our upper flat was burgled once by an athletic burgler who shimmied up the side of the deck, through a unlocked window and cleaned us out of our meager valuables. We kept the bikes heavily locked up in a detached garage, so no worries there. I think 75% of the residents in the house had their car stolen in the 2.5 years I was there. The JW temple on the back side of the house meant that the streets were usually well swept, but the well muraled but very cheap apartments next door resulted in many disturbing overheard conversations often escalating to police involvement, the most memorable being an argument that left a very tall older man with a pair of scissors inserted in his leg. These were the post-crack-wars dotcom boom salad years in Oakland, so I thought living there was interesting but relatively safe, I can't say what it is like as a neighborhood now. I would guess now that Temescal is super hip, the neighborhood should be even better, but I don't really know.

Just on the other side of 59th from the washouse 'lectric was Williams liquor, whose liquor I never remember buying as they did not really cater to the microbrew set, more to the cheap hard liquor in tiny bottles set. They did however sell some adequate to excellent ice cream sandwiches, depending on how hot it was. It was disturbingly difficult to get fresh ice cream sandwiches in oakland, but a few places had enough turnover on the stock to make it worthwhile, william's was one of these. They also had the nice blinky heart sign, which in my memory never really was firing on all cylinders. According to adventurous friends who grew up in Oakland, they would sell liquor to underage women with low cut shirts, guaranteed. Finally, I do not have fond memories of the deli part of Williams.

click photo for source

Big thanks to Todd of Telstar Logistics for snapping these pics.

Ubikequitous 8, Bamboo

2011-04-21T06:27:00.000-06:00

In the midst of the fairly awful cat and the hat cartoon, a song about the many uses of bamboo, there appears a bamboo bike. Damn hipster pandas and their homemade bikes.

Fun with slow motion

2011-04-17T10:46:00.000-06:00

Cobbles

Freak

Both available in 720 or higher if you can process it.

I can completely relate to what I am seeing in the cobble video. In my inability to relate to Timmy's throwing motion, I realize why my fastball topped out at 70mph.

Normally I have been tossing posts like this over at the Velocanoose check it out for an aggregation of images and videos.

A year of Pajarito Mountain

2011-04-13T06:23:00.000-06:00

Last year I took about a picture a week riding into work. Sometimes riding at lunch. Photos are taken about three quarters of a mile from my house on my bike commute. I used my 3 megapixel cellphone camera.

I left it pretty much in its unedited glory, crooked shots, badly backlit, etc. But you get the idea. 1/4/10 to 1/3/11. Pictures with brief comments on my flikr set bridge photos

The Roshambo 29er lives

2011-04-04T08:41:00.003-06:00

Man, that was the slowest build in the history of mankind. I watched the ronde ned flanderseses and then went out and hit all the trails within a 2 mile radius of the house. Maybe 7 miles total? Build details:
Kelly 29er singlespeed frames, lots of Pauls bits.

It rolls and rolls good. Initial impressions:
1. Holy crap! are our trails dry for this time of year, the fires season is going to be a doozy.
2. Man! is it fun to ride.
3. Boy! am I out of shape.

Big thanks to the Team Tarik sponsors that helped make this bike happen and work:
Mellow Velo bike shop in Santa Fe, Paul Components, and Kelly Bike.
No thanks to me for completely freezing up when it came time to build the wheels and extending the build for at least 4 months. This is the first time in 3 years that I have a race ready mountain bike earlier than the night before tierra torture. I may actually race socorro this year! Although that is apparently in two weeks, so lets not be hasty here...

Pajarito Pinhead challenge 2011 Race report.

2011-03-23T21:30:00.005-06:00

I won. Boom! End of report.

Ok, so there was not enough snow for the uphill downhill ski race so they ran it as an up hill only snowshoe race. And really, other than me and Mary Jane, no one showed up. Sure we had 4 people on the start line, but one was pressed into service by Jean,one of the race organizers and the other was Jean herself. Also, I was the only one on the start line without poles. My rule is that if you are in a snowshoe race and are wearing poles you are not running, even if you think you are. Anyhow, the other three people were hiking anyway. So I pretty much had to win.

I run to victory

The race started at the bottom of spruce lift and then went straight up spruce to the intersection with bruce's boulevard and then went up bruce's and ended up at the intersection with aspen. It was short and really hard. I ran for the first bit, power hiked up most of spruce and then ran most of bruces. I stopped to take pics a couple times. It took me 20 minutes and 45 seconds. Mary Jane came in second 7 minuted later. And jean and chip finished another 10 minutes later. I am pretty sure I could have run it in 18 minutes with someone pushing me, I am pretty sure ~15 minutes is possible but probably not by me.

Mary Jane and me post race

Then we socialized and hiked back down the treacherous slopes then hung out at Skiesta for a few hours drinking beers and waiting for the awards ceremony while listening to a really good zydechoid band. I won a hoody sweat type shirt with the pajarito mtn logo badly silkscreened on it. There were at least 6 breweries there and I saw about 50 billion people about half of which were endurance athletes. None of whom (excepting 4 of us) did the free race. I am not sure what the hell is wrong with all of you, but beer tastes much better after racing. And even better after winning. So there.

Chip dives past Jean for third

There are a handful of local races that I can reasonably hope to win someday, this was one of them, I am calling it done despite hardly anyone showing up. Anyhow, this is, again, a great free race. More people should do it. Big thanks to the organizers Jean and Karen. See you next year for skiesta, may there be enough snow to ski on.

2010 Pinhead race report
2009 Pinhead race report
2008 Pinhead race report

Join The Tarik Saleh Bike Club

2011-03-07T20:27:00.004-07:00

As you may have read before, I have a bike club. Due to somewhat overwhelming requests, I came up with some rules and printed up a whole mess of buttons. I want this to be as inclusive as possible so here are the rules:
1. Ride Bikes
2. Try not to be an ass

That's it. So if you can do that, you can join, if you want the pin you can do it as follows.

If you want one white pin or 10 white pins, order through Kent Peterson's Cafe Press store. I heartily endorse this method of getting pins as Kent is a great guy and he does some great bicycle style adventuring. The cafe press pins are of high quality and are about equal in price to mine, but you support Kent's adventures, which I firmly endorse.

If you want a silver pin, they are $3 plus $2 shipping from me, in the USA. Pay pal me at tsaleh @ rocketmail dot com. I will send one out with a handwritten club welcome card like this:

If you want a white one from me they are $2 dollar plus $2 dollar shipping. My white pins are the same as kent's but have my website on the back of the rim. If you want more than one, shipping remains at $2 dollars each up to 8. I will sell you combinations of silver and white at $3 for each silver and $2 for each white plus $2 shipping. If you live outside the US, email me, we will figure it out. If you want more than 8 white ones, either order from Kent or email me and we will work something out.

If you live in los alamos and want to join, email me and we will figure something out.

If you see me at races normally, talk to me, I should have some with me.

If you hate paypal, email me, we will figure something out.

I endorse the barter system, your clubs pin or patch is a nice trade, but email me and we will figure something out.

If you can't abide the rules, you can apply for exceptions (like I should really get a bike, in place of rule one, and try not to be SUCH an ass, for rule two). Like I said, this is an inclusive club that wants to encourage you to ride bikes and to try not to be an ass. It is not too hard.

I am really happy this all seems to have worked out. Big thanks to Mr. Jalopy for somehow starting this. It is all his fault.

Floyds beans full on spilt

2011-02-03T06:37:00.003-07:00

Great interview between Paul Kimmage and Floyd Landis. Read it all at NYVelocity:
http://nyvelocity.com/content/interviews/2011/landiskimmage. It is also at Velonews but they have a nasty habit of changing their links every few years, so I usually don't link to them anymore, but it is here anyway as NYvelocity gets blocked from work and may have been crashed due to traffic for a while after posting the full interview. I am not a huge Paul Kimmage fan as I think his journalism is completely lost in his quest to out doping, but he is exactly in his element in this one.

The most notable thing to me is that Floyd admits testosterone patch use (floydtosterone lives!) and blood packing, but STILL denies that he should have been caught at the tour for testosterone. Read the interview. This is a bit weird, but maybe he is still trying to avoid getting some sort of perjury charge. Who knows. This is his excuse for spending tons of time and his money and others money trying to clear his name. The positive made no sense to him and the lab work was sloppy thus he should be cleared. I sort of am with him. Sort of. My big problem with the UCI and the testing system has often been how nontransparent and apparently sloppy it is. It really bugs me that they do not have this shit AIRTIGHT and unassailable, not only then, but still. It also bothers me that they (UCI and testing labs) leak tons of information to the press. Finally it bugs me that the UCI has never offered amnesty to riders in exchange for useful doping info, I think we would have heard a whole lot of this kind of story by now if they had been less idiotic. I guess they cut Dilucca's sentence down to 1 year based on turning people in, but I don't think we have heard any details yet. Much of this is also covered in the interview. Did you read the whole thing yet? Good stuff, no?

Floyd has no credibility as he spent a huge amount of time lying about being caught. But I believe he is mostly truthful now. Read the whole interview and if you think he is still lying, fine, but it is hard for me to believe he is just making stuff up at this point. I think his current story will be mostly vindicated over the coming years, much like Jesus Manzano (my doping hero) has been. (and Jose Cansenco too).

Anyhow, I am waiting for someone else with not much to loose to come out with a similar tell all. Tyler, I am looking at you buddy.

Read more about me writing about floyd and doping and the like at the
doping tag

Remember Floytosterone is a registered trademark of the moscaline corporation.

Sign of the Spectral Cyclist

2011-02-01T21:40:00.003-07:00

10 degrees and snowing lightly on the way into work. 6 degrees and blowing riding from meeting to meeting to lunch at noon. 3 degrees and snowing and blowing hard on the way home. I damn near evaporated, evidence:

update 2/2/11
Ok, it was -4F with shining sun this AM on the way in and -7 and dropping on the way home tonight. I think the -7F is the new Tarik record for cold bike riding. I am pretty sure I have done a couple of really sucky commutes as an undergrad in boston, but I don't think I ever rode that far below 0F. I am pretty sure I have gone for runs much colder than that. Regardless, last nights 3 degrees and snowing and blowing hurt much more than tonight's -7F. I think we are on the way to lower than -10. We will see. Good night for ashly pond riding. If I were not so damn lazy. Maybe tomorrow am.

Laptop manifesto

2011-01-30T23:43:00.004-07:00

Power inlets should always be behind the laptop. If they are on the side you will wrap the power cord around your leg and as you get up fling the laptop across the room repeatedly, until the hard drive crashes in a very final way. Blogging shall resume after a fashion. While rectified in the current model, I want an apology from whoever put the inlet on the left side of the 2009 Dell Mini 10.

Jobst was right

2011-01-20T06:02:00.001-07:00

If you are not into the Tarik Saleh Bike Club, then maybe:

Done by the pfister 10 years ago in response to some sort of snit on the long dead hardcore bicycle science email list. I think I egged him on. Creative Commons licensed and ready for printing and plastering at your convenience.

See originals singly and four up

It just is!

2011-01-18T05:47:00.004-07:00

Thanks Coco's variety!

Update!
Now available thanks to Kent Peterson:
www.cafepress.com/bikethere.
All profits are cheerfully ceded to the kent bicycle adventure fund...

Skateboarding and Ukuleles

2011-01-13T06:56:00.001-07:00

I used to skate for transportation and to work a fair bit when I lived in Oakland and Berkeley. It was easy to do multi-modal commuting with a skateboard and the riding down hill after work was fun. I have no skills to speak of other than I rarely fall off the board unaided by cars. After that last incident I have not skated, but maybe I should skate to work this year. My commute is not too bad for that. I can take some shortcuts on foot through the woods to cut out the crappy bits. It would be a bit easier on a longboard, but I think I can hack it pretty well on my regular board with the fat wheels. I did more than a few 5 mile plus long hauls on it in the past.

Anyhow, check out these guys longboarding through peru and bolivia. All sorts of silly. I would do it on a bike, but I really enjoyed this. I also am pleased that they brought a uke along.

Via the cleanest line

Speaking of Ukes. Here is some holiday ukulele singing with Aida and my Nephew. We are singing some rube waddell.

Finally, check out this:

Wooo! Thems are skills. Great shooting and editing to go along with this. I sent Brett Novak a few bucks to keep good stuff like this coming. Check out the rest of the his excellent stuff on vimeo and on his website

Via super relax

Excellent Customer Service, Schwalbe North America

2011-01-09T11:55:00.000-07:00

I had a problem with a pair of 20" Schwalbe Marathon Winter Studded tires that I have had on my Raleigh twenty for a couple of years.

ALL the center studs on the rear tire had pushed through to the inside of the tire and were causing flats. A couple on the front were starting to do the same.

You can see all the center studs now flush with the tire.

I had about 500 miles on them after three winters, at $70 plus bucks a tire, I thought this was a little short for them to wear out, especially in such a weird way. I emailed Schwalbe with the photos, they thought that I should submit a warranty claim, so I did a quick online form. They promptly emailed me that they considered the rear tire a warranty item and would be sending a replacement immediately.

Two days later I got a package with not one, but two new tires:

And a bonus christmas guardian angel ornament.

Pretty cool. That was some excellent prompt customer service. Thanks Schwalbe.

Now I have to overhaul the murderously grungy raleigh twenty and get it rolling again with fresh studded rubber.

You realize normal people

2011-01-07T11:39:00.003-07:00

don't dress like that, said my dad.

I say, thats just the system talking, trying to keep me down, maaaaaaaaan.

A dissenting opinion

2011-01-05T07:17:00.001-07:00

A couple of years ago, I found a carbon fiber arrow in the middle of a road near my house. I wrote about it here. Someone recently found that post and decided to post a well reasoned dissenting opinion, which I published, but I decided to post in its entirety here. Read on:

Yes, hunters are morons for losing an arrow (possibly dropped from a quiver) while in the woods to provide food for their family utilizing an ancient and honorable BOW. MEANWHILE... you're not an idiot for bringing your stinking humanity into the woods, eroding roads with your knobby tires, scaring animals with your presence? I'm certain YOU have never lost ANYTHING in the woods. YOU ARE AN ECO DESTROYER - bringing your STINK into the woods. Oh, and, BTW, bicycles are for children - get a job, you stinking, dirty hippy! Peace out, fag.

Alas, the author was anonymous. A shame, I would like to send them a thank you note for justifying my blogging career.

2010 Year End Motion Update!

2011-01-03T07:06:00.003-07:00

Welp, that was ought ten, time for the annual year end motion update.

Totals of 2010: 2671 miles biking and 51 miles running.

In short, it was my lowest mileage totals in recorded history. I am betting you would have to go back to 1994 to get lower bike numbers (but I probably ran more that year than I biked this year) and 1997 or so to get worse run numbers when I pulled my hip and did not run all year, but the bike that year was probably well over this year.

I drove to work about 7 times this year, mostly so I could drive up the ski hill and do some xc skiing at lunch. I think I drove two other times due to being in a hurry. Based on rough estimates I have driven to work 17 times since May 2006, which I am pretty proud of.

On a per bike basis the tally is:
624 on the Kelly Single Speed Mountain bike
570 on the Kogswell PR
412 on the Surly Big Dummy
330 on the Schwinn Breeze
281 on the Fixie Bike Friday
154 on the Kelly Road bike
145 on the Kelly Fixie
94 on the Raleigh Twenty
29 on the Picnica
29 on the Schwinn Traveler
3 on the Schwinn Typhoon

1082 miles were on single speeds or fixies, 40% of total milage, this percentage pretty steady for the last three years, but is much less than the 66% I did in 2007, the arrival of the PR and the big dummy are likely to blame. Notably I have had some repeated mechanical issues that completely took a bunch of bikes out of service for the year and prevented others from even making an appearance. The single speed cross bike and hunter 24" bmxer need some serious work and I am determined to get them rolling. The returned from the dead typhoon needs some serious work too. I also have my new 29'er single speed that I have not finished building. Wrenching time has been minimal. I did major overhauls of the single speed mountain bike and the road bike the night before races, and finally got off my ass and got the big dummy rolling after it was waylaid for most of the spring and summer with grotty chainitus and myriad braking problems. The Raleigh twenty tried to kill me mid year and I still am on the fence on building it back up or selling it. I did get a new set of 20" studded tires for it. So maybe I will get it rolling again this winter.

On the per month mileage:
102 Jan
94 Feb
169 Mar
313 Apr
376 May
338 Jun
105 Jul
188 Aug
276 Sep
223 Oct
200 Nov
287 Dec

Last winter was a really tough one for commuting. I did bare minimum subsistence commuting through march. July was wiped out by travel, I have no idea why august was so bad. I was in NZ for late October and early November, but recovered somewhat in November as winter did not arrive. December also benefited from warm weather until the last week and a trip to California over christmas where I put in a mess of miles attempting the Rapha 500 thingy.

Commuting and errand mileage were consistently high this year. I have a couple of spread out places where I work and I get lots of between mileage during the week, but I don;t think I did a ride of more than 40 miles this year. Which is the big difference between the last couple years and my high mileage years. I used to put in lots of commuting and then ride long on the weekends fairly often. I really don't do that anymore.

I cross country skied 21 times in 2010, I managed to wax my (and elena's) skis 27 times though, accounting for bringing multiple pairs of skiis to races and putting them all in storage and other wax changes for weather. Silly sport it is.

I swam four times, all in the ocean, three times in italy and once in Rhode Island.

I like racing and raced a bunch this year again:
XC ski:
Chama Chile Challenge 10k classic
Leadville Loppet 22k skate
Alley Loop Crested Butte 44k skate
Alpina Stampede half of the planned 44k skate
Pajarito Pinhead 10k skate

Snowshoe:
Santa Fe Snowshoe Classic 5k
Chama Chile Challenge 5k

Mountain bike:
Tierra Torture Short Track
Tierra Torture XC
pajarito Punishment XC
Top of the World mountain bike race, XC
Road Apple Rally XC
Single Speed World Championship New Zealand

Running:
Ruby K Yum Run 10k trail race

I also did a xc ski training race and a time trial training race. So that is 16 total races which is about the same as last year. I was pretty fast mid xc ski season and toward the end of the mountain bike season, but I need to train more to actually be really fast. I like racing anyway though, so I probably will race similarly next year, I was thinking about doing Leadville 100 in 2011, but realistically I don't think I will enjoy that race with current riding habits, I will stick to short races I can race well (or fake) on my current training habits. I did no cross races again, I can't really get motivated to drive to albuquerque (~2hours each way) for a one hour race. They did have some closer races this year, but they conflicted with some trail races here in town, in any case I had the flu that weekend and did not do anything. I hope to return to cross racing this year. I did pick up a trio of race sponsors this year, they helped make racing possible and fun and have allowed me to get an impressive array of parts for my in progress Kelly 29er. Soon my pretties, soon it will be unveiled. So big thanks to those who made Team Tarik racing possible: Mellow Velo bike shop in Santa Fe, Paul Components, and Kelly Bike.

I traveled a bunch. I made it to New Zealand for Single Speed worlds and to Italy and Russia without riding. I rode my travel bike in Santa Barbara twice, San Francisco, Boston and NJ. I also made it to Rhode Island, Chicago and Salt Lake without the bike. I did a fair bit of riding in Colorado, with meetings in Keystone and Vail I did some really fun mountain biking and then I hit some spectacular singletrack in leadville on the way there. I again skied extensively in Colorado mostly for racing.

Lets see, what else do I talk about? the weight was doing pretty well right up until the day after single speed worlds in New Zealand. I think I left the US at 195 and returned at over 205 pounds. What happened? I drove around in a campervan for a week and a half, did not ride my bike, at well, had fun, and drank beer as there was not much to do in the campgrounds after Aida went to sleep. So I ended the year at 203 lbs, which is high for me, but not too bad. I really want to get back down to 187.5 again. So that is the goal. I think with some riding plus one run a week and maybe slightly less travel, I can do it. I say that every year though. But lower weight will tie into happier running and better strength. Speaking of which:

I will also try to really attack the core strength. I was doing pretty well recently until this year. I did virtually no strength stuff this year, and with Aida being a squirmy thirty pound big girl, I have repeatedly tweaked my back picking her up. I need to get back on some sort of core program. Core! Maybe kettlebells?

So again the goals are:
more gooder, less badder, more thinner, less fatter

Specifically 3650 miles ridden and still trying to get a massive 150 miles run, I think these are reasonable goals, but I have not come near to them since 2006 or so. I will get them one of these years.

Year Bike Run
2003 2880 128
2004 3667 252
2005 3000 250
2006 4000 100
2007 2883 165
2008 2817 108
2009 2964 76
2010 2671 51
(2005 and 2006 are estimates based on partial year reporting)

With that, I conclude my 2010 update, thanks for reading,
May 2011 be filled with whatever you want it to be filled with.

Happy New Year

2010-12-31T17:48:00.003-07:00

May your year be filled with really freaking cold riding on ice and sketchy attempts at no hand riding portraits. Or whatever you want it to be. Your choice.

Happy New Years.

Festive 500 final reports

2010-12-30T00:05:00.006-07:00

The final two days as such:

December 29
Returned to New Mexico in the wee hours, slept, woke up to light snow getting heavy. Split a couple of barrowloads of wood, hopped on the stud shod Big Dummy to get tacos

Headed out again a few hours later in worsening conditions to go to the bank and get groceries.
Mileage: 10.17 miles

December 30
Snowing heavily in the morning. Shoveled almost a foot or snow off the driveway. Watched the snow fall and caulked the tub. Decided to bail on the ride to the golf course and xc ski plan and just headed out for a neighborhood cruise on the big dummy. It was probably 25 and blowing. The roads were either packed snow or ice or unplowed. The studded tires did no wrong on the ice and packed snow. The trails and park were under too much snow to ride so I stuck to the road. It was a good cold little ride.

Mileage: 6.3 miles

So these two days added 16.47 miles of studded tire big dummy riding to the previous 92.03 on the fixie friday for a massive 108.5 miles, aka 174.6 km. Not even halfway there to the 500km goal, but I did some good rides, lots of errands and rode everyday. I call it a win. Surf on over to the rapha blog to see how everyone else did.

Festive 500 reports

2010-12-29T23:15:00.000-07:00

OK, here are the first few days of the Rapha Festive 500 attempt.

December 23rd
Got up early, got to the airport, chased the baby through the infinite halls of Pheonix airport,

got to Santa Barbara (see I cheat!) unpacked the fixie friday,

headed to the markets to get some beers and sundries:

Fiddled with the non-working cyclocomputer for a while and then gave up and rode back to a bike shop to get a new bike computer.
Mileage: 5 miles (low estimate for fairness sake...)

December 24th:
Rode to the butterfly grove in goleta, some muddy riding/running to find the family, tried to keep the wee ones from getting the butterflies,
headed to lunch, ate a burrito, rode back on the foot hill route, up to mountain and down.

Ran a bunch of errands. It were a good day.
Stem QR wireless computer mount hack with super pro bidon

Mileage, 35.66 miles.

December 25th,
Christmas with the family. Rode from the hotel to my brothers house. Tried to sneak in a ride while Aida napped. She did not nap, my ride was enshortened. Probably saved me from a very wet ride.
Mileage: 5.65 miles

December 26th,
Rode out with my bro toward mountain, he turned back after five miles, I headed for parts unknown. Great ride, found the bike butt mailbox, did a loop and lots of climbing.

Mileage 20.28

December 27th.
Got out for a good afternoon ride. Completed the mountain to sanysidro loop, back through montecito and downtown. Absolutely beautiful day. Lots of wet on the roads.

Mileage 24.92

December 28th
Rode from the hotel to my brothers house. Put helmet on for ride, but baby would not nap, so I put helmet away and walked to get coffee and treats with the young lady.
Got back, packed up the bike and headed to the airport to return home.
Mileage 0.52 miles, but I did ride.

So the total for the warmish part of the festive 500 was 92.03 miles, aka 148.11 km. So still a bit short of the planned 500 but probably one of my best weeks in december since I have lived in NM, tune in tomorrow evening for how the final two days went...

Winter style riding

2010-12-16T22:13:00.006-07:00

Ah, winter, she is here.

A good day starting with snow encrusted riding, ending in really snow encrusted riding.

Got in a 14 miles of wintry goodness culminating in riding home with four inches on the trails sliding around on the big dummy.

In that vein, I announce my attempt to achieve epicness this holiday season.

I am a sucker for a good logo so I am in it to try it and fall far short. Go me.
Follow along with my meagre milage with the festive 500 tag.

They killed Kenny

2010-12-11T14:16:00.002-07:00

Usually I would be blogging winter stuff right now, but it is so dry and (relatively) warm, I actually had to water some trees. We have no snow to speak of in Los Alamos thus far, so here is some sad old news...

My favorite tree planting, posthumously anointed Kenny, is an aspen I planted in the front yard. It went yellow this year and was growing slowly, yet steadily, into a tree, potentially offering shade in the hot summer afternoons. Alas the morning we left for New Zealand, I found it smashed asunder:

Neighbors saw sparring mule deer in the front the afternoon before. You bastards. You killed Kenny. I have since cut the remains down and added it to the kindling pile, hoping that some aspen suckers come up from the root.

I think I took this photo a mere handful of hours before the deer got the tree.

Moscaline Advertising and Review Policy

2010-12-11T13:28:00.003-07:00

Boring post, but I need to actually write this down as I keep getting emails from people asking these questions. I added this link and my contact info on the sidebar if you have questions.

Review Policy:
Most of the reviews on this blog are based on things I bought with my own money. Things that are provided to me for review are noted as such in the review. You can send me things and I will happily review them. In this case you pay for shipping to me and return shipping if you want said thing back. I will review many things, but not everything, so please contact me before you send me anything to see if it is a good fit. To see what I have previously reviewed see here. I will not review anything that I have not tried. I occasionally will solicit items for review, but not often. I will not post a review that you or your marketing department wrote. Not even if you pay me. I will show you my review after I post it, you can make comments/clarification/responses to the review if you wish and I may include edited versions as updates to the review.

Some frequently asked questions (really these were all asked more than once):
Q. Can I write a review for you and then you post it in your blog?
A. No.
Q. What if I pay you 10 dollars for you to post the review?
A. No.
Q. Can you write a review of this new (thing)? here is the website: blahblop.com
A. No. I will not write reviews of things I have not tried.
Q. You want to link trade?
A. Probably not if you are a business, I bet your website has nothing to do with mine. Ask me about my advertising rates, see below:

Advertising policy:
Moscaline will accept select advertising that meets our internal standards of what we like to see. Please contact me for rates and sizes. My readership is small yet fierce, my rates are higher than you think, so please be serious before you contact me.

Sponsorship policy:
I have sponsors for racing. If you feel that you want to be part of the moscaline experience or Team Tarik Racing, please contact me. Race sponsors will get advertising space on the blog in most cases. Team Tarik Racing is currently a one man team that competes in many types of endurance racing, ranging from all types of bike racing, running, cross country skiing, snowshoeing and probably some other things that I have not tried yet. I occasionally win things, but if your sponsorship value is gathered solely in podium placing, look elsewhere.

Contact info is on the blog sidebar. All policies are mutable at my whim, but should be updated here. I reserve the right to change any policy at any time.

Thanks for your interest.

Again with the bicycle jumping

2010-11-16T21:13:00.005-07:00

Just in case you have not seen this yet.

Like I said last I linked to his videos, I hope that Danny MacAskill sleeps in piles of money. My only criticism is that I think the same music should be used last video again. That is the Ass killingist music there is. Otherwise? Just watch. Over and over again. until you think you can do what he does. Next thing? This happens:

Logical extension of trying the front flip and/or nosewheely thing on the big dummy.

See MacAskill winning over the world with the right theme song.
See MacAskill sleeping in piles of money along with no hitters on LSD and suchlike.

The demonstration compost heap...

2010-11-09T21:52:00.003-07:00

A few years ago we had a sorry square of earth next to the house that nothing grew in and the cats were using it as a toilet. Elena's grandfather was a professional gardener and gave her a huge number of gathered seeds that were unlabled and old. I added some new compost to the square and all the seeds and a drip irrigation hose. Thus was born the demonstration garden. Lots grew, little was identified with the exception of the radishes, after they bolted, and the hollyhocks when they burst into wevil covered bloom the second year. Inspired by this, I reclaimed another small barren cat claimed square of land on the backside of the house with zinnias, morning glories, california poppies and peppers (from a wind damaged ristra). Success again. I attribute the success to unrestrained application of seeds, some new improved soil and water. Not all the plants did well, but enough did to deter the cats. Now onto more complex demonstrations.

We have a wood stove that generates lots of ash. We have lots of mule deer/bear/racoon/fox/coyote leavings in the yard. We also have cat and window killed critters in the yard: mice, gophers, birds and snakes ( and airplanes). None of this stuff goes in a compost heap. But it does go into the demonstration compost heap. Which is under a 50 year old lilac bush in the back corner of the property. So the thinking is that the soil has never been improved there. Lilac bushes do well with alkaline soil, but you can easily over alkilize the soil with wood ash. Hence tempering it with poops, coffee grounds, leaves, dead things. I also threw in an old chile ristra (left over from demonstration garden two) to deter critters from digging into it, along with some cut flowers and other stuff I did not want to throw in the primary compost heap. So there you have it. Either I will kill the lilac bush, or it won't notice, or it will magically bloom prodigiously next year. I don't expect much success or failure, but hopefully the combo of all of the ingredients will cause none of the single ingredients to be that bad an idea. I will rake it out in the spring and see if deadthings and poops decompose. Presence of worms is unlikely but will be considered victory.

Any thoughts?

I schweeb

2010-11-07T12:00:00.001-07:00

Schwebed?

Me, hella schweebing

Anyhow, one of my much anticipated highlights of the trip to NZ was a chance to ride the Schweeb at Argoventures in Rotorua. Schweeb lately has been the source of much press and online ridicule as it got a google investment and a wired article as the "future of transportation!".

It is basically a hanging recumbent monorail. It is fun to ride. It is really fun to ride really fast. I am not impressed with it as the future of sustainable transportation as you can't ride a monorail faster than the dude in front of you. And then they would just add a motor to it anyway and then it would become a singlepod monorail. But as a fun race around real fast type thing, it was an absolute blast. In fairness to Schweeb, check out their FAQ which more or less address most of the criticisms to a point. I am not here to conduct a critique on this as a transportation alternative, as the Schweeb in rotorua is merely a carnival game as a concept demonstration, so check out the Schweeb website and read away.

It is billed as the first cycling monorail, but there is at least a currently operating clunky themepark one in the UK
There was also both a above and below rail cycling monorail in Smithville NJ in the late 1800's:

I have also heard of them in Japan. Kolelinia is a concept for a regular bike on a monorail, sort of a single rail railbike if you will. Anyhow, onto the schweeb!

Schweeb Scorching in Flip Flops

The schweeb is a recumbent in a pod with a track overhead. It has a simple seat, narrow bars and then a normal crank with a single chainring and a 7 speed IG hub that has a second chain on the non drive side that runs up to some sort of powertransfer mechanism between the schweeb and track. I completely forgot to ask or poke around in the drive mechanism, so I will just say it magically drives the schweeb pod around the track.

New Zealand is a country of extreme sports opportunities. Everywhere you go there is BungyJumping, sky diving, jet boating, cave rafting, etc. etc. etc. Argoventures has most of these plus giant inflatable hampster balls to roll downhill in. And the Schweeb! While there was a steady stream of bungy jumpers, swoopers and jet boaters at Argoventures that day, I was the only Schweeber. As Elena overheard some onlookers say, "that looks like exercise". However, the Agroventures is connected with the Agrodome that features a spectacularly interesting sheep show, which I can't recommend enough. Aida got to see so many sheep and lambs that her head almost exploded.

Aida and I and the mighty Merino and other lesser sheeps

Prices at Agroventures were not too cheap, Schweeb cost $39 NZD for one ride, it was the cheapest ride there, other rides were $49 or more. Fortunately I had a $5 NZD ticket for the Schweeb as part of the Single Speed World Championships, so I took advantage of it. I did spend a further $35 NZD for the photo/video package so I can share the schweebishness with you, my small yet loyal handful of blog readers. The track is a 200m oval with dual tracks with two small hill/crossover features so you could race two up on a similar length track.

They had a Schweeb contest as part of the SSWC, but I was not in town early enough for that, but they ran my race the same way they did for the race party night. One lap to get up to speed and a flying start for 3 laps. They recommended get rolling for half a lap and then crank it for the start line then keep on pedaling. They also recommended keeping it in gear 4 or 5 max.

Pre race looking good

So they took an elegant portrait of me sitting on the track, I stood against a height gauge so they could set the seat for me. Note this is what I was riding in, long shirt, shorts and flip flops. It was not too hot or sweaty. I climbed in the pod, they took another photo, they locked me into the pod, then pulled the pod back and pushed me off the start line and I started pedaling. I started in first, got around the first turn and then ramped it up and started pedaling hard.
Floating in my tin can

As I got going I was surprised how much the pod banked on turns and wobbled coming out of turns. It was difficult for me to go all out the first lap as I had no idea what to expect and the banking and wobbling was a bit unsettling. By the second lap I figured out that I was not going to rip the pod off the track so I tried riding faster. It was a weird experience. It was hard to tell where I was on the track. The up and down at the crossovers were at first disconcerting and then fun. The wobblyness turned into uncontrolled slamming back and forth as I got to higher speed. Clearly some leaning was in order, but as I had no idea where the turns were or how to compensate, I did not even try.

Banking hard through the start finish

When I finally got my rhythm the race was over, I finished 600m in 57.8 seconds, as a contrast, SSWC race winner Garth Weinberg also set the schweeb record at 51 seconds. My time is an equivalent average speed of 23mph, Garths was about 26mph. My best standing start kilo time on the track was about a 30mph average, I think my best standing 500 was around a 28mph average. Now I am not in that kind of shape anymore, but I a bit surprised that it was not possible to far exceed that with a flying start on the super aerodynamic aeropod, if not by me, certainly by Garth.

Wobbling

Finally, when I climbed out of the pod I could barely walk as my quads were so pumped up. I used to ride lots of recumbents when i was on the UC Berkeley HPV team, but had not been on one in over a decade, so I forgot how different it was to ride hard on a recumbent. I would love to see how Sam Whittingham or some similarly well trained HPV'er would do on this.

In conclusion, this was a blast, I wish I could ride it again to get the hang of it, I am pretty sure I could easily shave a second per lap, especially with some confidence that I wasn't going to break it and with some strategic leaning. Most of the photos above with the exception of the first video (shot by Elena) were from the photo package I bought. Now here is the video they shot with the in pod camera while I was racing. The footage of me is interspersed with stock footage of exterior view video, but it is still fun to watch. As has been pointed out, I make funny faces, so watch away!

Tarik At the Schweeb from Tarik Saleh on Vimeo.

Rotorua is pretty much Marin/Santa Cruz

2010-11-02T21:00:00.004-06:00

Redwoods galore, but much more singletrack.

And taller ferns.

Race report coming.
Photo Dump

A moment in the homeward journey

2010-10-14T21:39:00.002-06:00

Pick up tumbleweed on pedal on tricky singletrack descent, make transition to road, pedal a few times, pluck tumbleweed from foot, remove glove, pedal through the parking lot, fish phone from pocket, take photo, upload to flickr, put phone in pocket, merge into traffic, chunk tumbleweed into gutter, turn onto interstitial path, put glove on, ride to the light, track stand for a bit, cross street, hop on singletrack to bridge, head on home.

Ruby K Yum Run 10K trail race report

2010-10-04T05:46:00.000-06:00

Got in from colorado late last Friday night, got up early saturday and saddled up the breeze and rode downtown for the Ruby K yum Run 10k trail race. It was cold on the way to the race, i was barely awake enough to eat, but I got an espresso, a banana and a couple of blue flavored gummi cliff blocks down the gullet before the race.

I had not really run in a month, except for Friday when I ran up and down the sand dunes at the great sand dune national monument. Barefoot.

So when I woke up for the race my feet hurt a bunch, my quads were sore and I had less than 5 hours sleep. But I was ready to go.

I talked to a few friends at the start. They did a fun line up where there was one start line in front of the post office. The 10k trail runner lined up on one side to go down central and the 5k pavement pounders lined up on the otherside to go up central. The gun went off and maybe 15 10kers took off down central.

The course took the trails behind the aquatic center and dropped into acid canyon and came back up and did a loop by the golf course and dropped back down the canyon more or less to the bridges trail back up and into town. I understood the course in theory, but the exact nature of the trails was unclear. Nor were they particularly well marked, but most of us made it back OK without getting too lost.

Anyhow, the race starts downhill and I am sort of running and chatting with aerobic monster Hans. He is chatting gregariously while I am breathing hard. A group of three of us drop into the canyon first. The initial switchbacks are pretty steep and I am higgledy piggledy going down. I look up and Hans has gapped me something fierce and the second place guy is also a fair bit ahead of me.

As we cruise along the bottom of the canyon a little fast feller blows by me and sprints way up past #2 over up to Hans in a short bit. I settle in to a rhythm and get dropped by the frontrunners. There are about 5 people coming up behind me, but I am cruising along OK.

We hit the nasty switchback climb out of acid canyon and I drop two guys who were closing in on my. The top two women blow by me here and I watch Susan put a good gap on the second placed woman in short order. I put my head down and run on. We hit a trail I have never taken before, which should prove useful for future cross bike rides. I turn my ankle quite well on the low part of the trail and then climb up a stair steppy technical climb to the north golf course side of the perimeter trail. A bearded fellow closes in on me and I wait for him to pass, but he never does. After some smooth trail I look back and I have dropped him pretty good. We hit a feed station with delicious chlorine/soap water served from large gatorade coolers of uncertain age and head south on the upper rim of canyon south golf course side. See?

As we descend technically demanding terrain into the canyon the feller I dropped comes back right on my back and I am forced to pick it up a bit. It smooths out and I open it up and then forget to get my leg over a rock and stub my toe and hit the dirt hard. I get up somewhat surprised that I am not passed. It dawns on me that bearded fellow is great at technical running, especially downhill, but not so great at running fast on the smooth stuff. Fortunately I realize, but for a few bites, it would be all smooth and climbing all the way back to the finish. I just needed to not pack it in and push it.

Easier said than done as my utter lack of run training plus soreness in the quads from the previous days sand running adventure has left me feeling like I need to just walk on home. But with the dulcet tones of the shitty Rufus Wainright cover of halleluja echoing through my head (the one where he enunciates "do you" at the end of each verse instead of the original Cohen rhyming "do ya", it is Hallelujah, not halleluyou, moron. Alas it is Aida's favorite song so we listened to it 400 billion times on the way back from colorado the day before) I press on.

I am delighted to discover that the sewage treatment plant in the canyon is completely gone replaced by a wildflower meadow with a nice clean bit of new single track in it. Discovering two new trails within a couple miles of the house is a great bonus to racing. I see the second place woman up ahead of me while I attempt to drop the guy behind me. We loop on this trail over to bridges and I am on the home stretch. One nasty climb out of the canyon to the finish to go.

As we climb out of the canyon, instead of going straight out of the canyon on the fireroad we turn onto twisty little trails, all alike, but without any course markings. Again, I know what we are trying to do, but the exact mechanism of staying on course out of the canyon is not really clear. I am pretty sure I do it right and motor on back to the pavement to the finish. Turns out I am the fifth overall finisher, fourth among males. The dude behind me finishes a minute or so back and the second place woman magically appears a few minutes behind him after getting well and truly lost on the twisty little singletrack all alike. She still finishes second among women though, or so it would seem...

I stick around for awhile, watch the finishers, cheer for pal Siobhan on her first 10k race ever finishing strong on a tough course, watch the kids race, chat with pals, find that my evil sister "Saleh Tarik" has finished second in the women's race. I protest the results and find myself relegated to 6th place in the mens race due to age grading of the results. Alas, I am old and slow, but not old enough apparently. I am working on it.

Overall great race, needs better water, more runners and better course markings. The course is surprisingly tough but excellent. I will try to do it again next year. I am, as of 5 days post race still enormously sore. I should run more, and get older and faster as well. My back is killing me to the point of not sleeping well due to a tweaked rear back lung brace muscle pull I sustained upon falling. Racing is good. Where the hell were you the rest of you real runners? Until next year.

Yes we are

2010-10-02T22:59:00.002-06:00

Tyler Farrar asks:
"""
Are we going to have a day where we race in wool jerseys, or a day when we race with a single speed?
"""

Yes we are Tyler. Yes we are.

First night time commute of the season

2010-09-30T22:20:00.003-06:00

Its been a rough couple weeks at work, lots of weird hours and bonus lightning round laptop work at home, but I have managed to mostly keep my commuting to hours where the sun shines, or just after it dips behind the mountains, so I have not needed to use my lights yet this season, until tonight. I had to finish something tonight, so I did and rode home in the gosh darn surely pitch black of night at around 8:30 pm. It was a lovely night for it. Warm, with patches of really cold air blasting down the mountain heading for an overnight inversion layer in the valley below.
I spied a pair of reflecty eyes off in the woods on the way home, probably mule deer, most likely not mountain lion, but a nonzero chance of chupacabras. There was no traffic to speak of. I got this great picture of me riding beneath the beauty enhancing glow of street lights.

I try to grin when i ride at night so the car's headlights reflect off my teeth.

I have been riding the Schwinn breeze all week as I have been pretty much heading straight in to work 3 miles and then coming home three miles at the end of the day with no lunch trips or offsite visits or nuthing. It has basket and fenders and for some reason is the only currently belit bike. I need to figure out my winter light inventory again. Some things are brewing on the bike front, but best just try to make em happen before reporting. I am trying to replace that which is unridden, with that which is. Sound good? Ok then. Back to the sleep.

The Velocanoose

2010-09-22T12:51:00.005-06:00

I started another blog for short one liner photo posts, mostly links, probably all bikes. I will try to keep moscaline rolling with longer posts with the occasional shorter one thrown in, mostly bikes, but also cats, travel, life, house, etc... But maybe not as often or oftener. But check out the Velocanoose if you want miniposts, thats where they will be for sure

Also, I might like some co-conspirators. Email me if interested, I will not accept just anyone. Let me know who you are and why you are a master of the title-photo- sentence(link) format for bicycle knowledge.

Finally, Velocanoose is from a David Bowie song, really. Go ahead, listen to all of his catalog. It is in there somewhere. It may or may not be on Hunky Dory, the best album ever, but you should listen to it anyway just to make sure. Listen to it again. If you can't find it, maybe you should go and get the wild the innocent and the E street shuffle and see if it is there.

Zippppp

2010-09-22T00:08:00.003-06:00

Can I ride it?

2010-09-01T22:45:00.002-06:00

I had this bike until 04. I left it in knoxville. It came back. Thanks to levers, pullies, horse trading, bike zooistas and kindness of my buddy Jason.

I built it up. Elena looks at it and first words out of her mouth are

"can I ride it?"

I am a lucky feller.

No, no, maybe, yes, yes!

2010-08-26T09:44:00.002-06:00

Lots of rules in Vail.

Some Japanese Videos

2010-08-21T08:00:00.001-06:00

I don't particularly care for motorcycles, but this guy makes some really nice ones, really well done video to boot.

via the sweetpea blog

The grindies! Ridiculous all around.

Via the mastastico

LED in your fridge

2010-08-19T06:33:00.001-06:00

If you have a new fridge that is really energy efficient and has really big door seals that are prone to sticking and not closing all the way I suggest that you replace the incandescent bulbs with LED bulbs.

Our AMANA fridge came with 2 40 watt incandescent bulbs in the fridge and one in the freezer. When we left the door on the refrigerator ajar overnight last year the bulbs pretty much cooked all the food. It melted all the butter. We threw away everything. I replaced those bulbs with these little 1 watt LED spotlighters (20watt equivalent) at 9.99 apiece at the local hardware store. Now we don't have heaters in our fridge.

Like an idiot I forgot to change the one in the freezer. Last week we left it ajar and it melted everything. Including some really nice buffalo steaks and some frozen fish that cost way more than the 30 dollars in LED replacement. I think there are real LED fridge bulb replacements out there, but the little spotlighters were easily available in my local hardware store and fit in the space of the incandescent appliance bulb.

I am not saying that leaving the fridge open is now a painless exercise, but I am saying at least you won't be actively heating your food while your fridge is open. The new fridges are so well insulated that a couple of 40 watt bulbs can actually cause the fridge to melt/burn ( according to our appliance repair man).

So in conclusion. You will save a fairly minimal amount of energy as the bulb is off when the fridge is closed, but you will save yourself a whole bunch if you accidentally leave the door cracked. The bulbs do heat up really fast. By the time I opened the refrigerator, removed the cover and started to remove the bulb they were already too hot to touch.

Or you could be not-an-idiot and never leave the door open. I recommend this path the most, but I find that the seals on our fridge are sticky enough that they defy me regularly.

It is here

2010-08-16T06:26:00.001-06:00

Bikewad:

29'er forks are serious biz...

and funny

Happy owner, suspicious youngling.

Hard to get the color photo'd. Picture forest service green with glow in the dark green mixed in.

That is the new Kelly Roshambo EBB 29'er singlespeed in Toothpaste color with lots and lots of tire clearance.
Let the wheelbuilding, earnest part gathering and frantic building commence.

Only interesting bike in all of Moscow

2010-08-11T06:19:00.002-06:00

Seriously.

In a sea of disc braked mtbs and hybrids, there was this excellent reverse steer folder. I am pretty sure that it belonged to a street performer.

If you were, as I was, expecting a sea of eastern block knockoff Raleigh D bikes, you and I were both mistaken.

Update from the Pfister in the comments:
"""
I rode that bike (or maybe a clone of it) in London about 10 years ago. It belonged to a street performer who would chalk two lines about 20 feet apart and offer rides for 1 pound. If you could ride the bike from one line to the other without dabbing he would give you 20 pounds. He was able to ride the bike around to demonstrate that it was possible.

I gave it a try, and decided to cross my arms to short-circuit any learned body english. But I still only made it about 10 feet.
"""
There you go, thanks Marc!

World's Greatest Pedal Boat

2010-08-09T13:23:00.003-06:00

Dual pedal input. Bonus water slide.

Seafaring no less. Spotted in Otranto, Italy. Adriatic in the background.

VW pickup ahoy

2010-07-17T16:46:00.000-06:00

Once in my youth I had a chance to trade a sweatshirt (nice HS track team sweatshirt, champion) for a VW rabbit pickup. Alas, I lived in Oakland, the car was in Nevada city and i had no way of getting up there and an unknown mess of things if I got up there. I guess I have a soft spot for these high mpg rattle trap junkbombs since then. There are not too many around anymore, but I spied this one in the UNMLA parking lot, I suspect it was being actively lived in.

Bumper was strapped on, spare strapped to the roof, camper cap, hood strapped on, some sort of bicycle hunting prize strapped to the roof. Biodiesel stickers on the windows. How could it not be good?

Here is a cleaner example of the specie spotted in Oakland last year:

Did you know Jockey Pulleys burn?

2010-07-15T07:22:00.001-06:00

So says my pal zack:

Also, looks like derailer housing does not take to torching either.

And a message from the Zack for you los alamooosans:
Hear about Zack's similarly ill-conceived
bike trip across the country at July's LA Mountaineers meeting
July 21st 2010 details here:
http://lamountaineers.org/

Biking to the garage sales

2010-07-12T21:40:00.002-06:00

Elena consults the paper for garage sale locations:

We are getting better about trying to only walk or bike to the garage sales. This was a good day.

Partial scores:

Lots more kids books too. I think we have bought 6 king tut art books at garage sales over the last year, maybe 5 dollars spent total on all 6? Good stuff.

Never gets old

2010-07-09T06:49:00.000-06:00

A couple of chairs for the yard. this should be the standard x-tra cycle backyard king carrying attachment.

This changes EVERYTHING

2010-07-07T22:50:00.001-06:00

or changes hardly anything, parsing subtleties like this are not my forte. But look, production aluminum bmx cranks in square taper 110 bolt circle available in 5mm increments from 115mm length to 180mm.

115mm length!
Better yet? They retail for something like 50 bucks. I think I need to buy a couple pairs to stock for some sort of future Aida bike. 115mm production cranks is kind of mind blowing. They also have isis cranks that start at 135mm. Good stuff!

Thats the way, patriot

2010-07-04T11:08:00.002-06:00

Happy fourth all you bicycling patriots.

Miller High Life — Alternative Fuels from Michael Williams on Vimeo.

An oldy but a goody and ever more timely.

Also in high life news...

Pajarito Punishment Race Report 2010 and historical mini reports

2010-07-01T07:23:00.001-06:00

I think this is the 6th time I have lined up for this race. Probably have done 5 different version of the race. My best rememberance:

2003: I catted up to expert so I could do the stage race. Stage 1, friday night time trial on bridges trail, stage 2: started with the rodeo parade downtown over to perimeter, up pipeline over to the ski hill down canada bonita and then pajarito canyon to finish at the base of the ski hill, Stage 3: god awful circuit race on the ski hill trails. I did OK. I think I did OK in stage 1. Flatted in stage 2. Suffered in stage three, but I was the only single speeder period, and one of a couple dozen people that completed all three stages. I was likely DFL in my expert age category.

2004: Big loop, bridges to perimeter to up pipeline to canada bonita to ski hill to ?????? I can't remember because I had just moved back to town and was not acclimated yet and I made it to pipeline and about a half mile past that and tossed my cookies. I turned around and rode less than half a mile to the apartment I was renting and slept for a few hours. I think there was no single speed class, but may have been some other single speeders this year.

2005: two stage race. Stage one: Quemazon trail hill climb from the parking lot to the intersection with pipeline. Stage two: painful circuit race on the ski hill. A single speed class, maybe 2 single speeders on day one and 5-6 on day two. I won the hill climb and came in second on the circuit race which only three singlespeeders finished.

my best Hincapie impression in the 2005 race

2006: Big loop race. Ski lodge, over canada bonita, down guaje ridge and three bears, across perimeter, up pipeline back down canada bonita to the lodge. race report here. Crashed hard then bonked and then finished in a few ticks under 4 hours. Last of the single speeders who finished. But I did finish.

2006 post race, still wear scars from the crash on the pumice ball bearings on 3 bears

2007: Last year that the big loop happened. I was signed up but was violently ill race morning and did not race. Dammit.

2008: First of the current course, I was out of town that weekend.

2009: Current course. Start at ski hill parking lot, up canada bonita, back to lodge, mini loop on the left side of the ski hill and then either one or two loops up the single track on the right side of the ski hill all the way over the top and then back down the single track and fire roads on the left. They had the single speeders start with the pro/experts and do the full two loop course. course map here. 18 miles and 3200 feet climbing. Big single speed field. I started slow and then passed lots of single speeders who died horrible deaths on the first over the top loop and then more on the second over the top loop and ended up in third. Ha. My hands were bloody messes due to the really rough downhill from the top of the ski hill. I could barely brake my forearms were so pumped up. But I outlasted everyone else, except for those two fast guys who were way ahead of me.

The singlespeed-expert-pro profile in 2009

2010. This year they (presumably due to the attrition last year) started the single speeds with the sport and had us do only one top to bottom loop. So 12 miles and 2100 feet climbing. I was slightly bummed out because the only thing that kept me competitive last year was the sheer brutality of the second over the top lap. But I was mostly OK with it as I had not been doing my climbing rides this year. So I showed up in my new team kit and got my racing on. I was running my usual Pajarito Punishment gear of 32-20. My mom was visiting again this year so yet again I dragged her up the mountain to watch me flail about in a race. She took most of the pics here. Thanks ma.

Conditions were really dry and dusty, but the course was in good shape. there was a strong single speed field present. I started off pretty strong up canada bonita, passing people all the way up. the descent back to the lodge on the upper xc ski trails was way faster and rougher than I remember. I nearly double flatted once due to a bad high speed line.

Up the mini loop I did some great climbing and felt OK, but was a bit perturbed that I saw no other singlespeeders anywhere near me once we started climbing. I passed a bunch of sport riders here. The descent back to the ski lodge was high speed on loose fire roads. Probably my least favorite type of descending. I rode like a grandma on the descent losing a bunch of places I had gained earlier.

As we started the single track big climb, I felt pretty good. As I worked my way through the sport riders I did realize I was not as on it as I could be. Last year I just steadily passed people the whole way up, sprinting by them when I could pass and then easily dropping them as I moved on to the next rider. This year it seems it was all I could do to pass people without blowing up. I was still moving forward, but i was having lots of trouble recovering from passing people.

The climb goes on forever it seems criss crossing the ski slopes with little switchback bits between the runs. Occasionally i could look up course and see riders above me, but i could not see any single speeders anywhere. I just kept riding and churning the pedals up the course. I had some nice cyclocross action going toward the top of the course on some steep technical bits where I was able to pass people, but overall it was a meh climb instead of the power display I put on last year (with my legs of steel! boo yah! Is anyone still reading?).

After hitting the top of the climb we were treated to a gale blowing over the caldera and a welcome drink stand. I began the descent that was way steeper, more technical and rougher than I remembered. Before the race I could really focus on was how much climbing there was, but what really hurt me was the descending. Anyhow, I cleaned almost everything on the way down (except for that one stupid ramp and dropoff that is not worth me trying when I am tired) and took it safe and sane, but since the course was a bit looser this year due to the dry and I did not put the riders away like I did with my brilliant attacking as I did last year, I got passed by nearly EVERYONE I passed going up. Sheesh. I could tell I was descending terribly because my forearms still worked and I could still brake comfortably at the end of the race. I had hardly any blisters on my hands. Whuss.

I finished the race and noted still no singlespeeders near me. A whole lot of them at the finish line though. Turns out I finished 7th among 9 finishers. I think there were at least 10, perhaps 12 of us on the start line, but meh. I at least was sort of near the 4 people ahead of me. The next singlespeeder behind me was 25 minutes back. That sort of explains why I saw no one. Mellow Velo Dave was there enjoying fine adult beverages in cans.

It was a good race. I like this course, I miss the big loop, but I think lots of people hate those courses as they are too hard. I hope to be a steel legged attacking single geared assassin next year, but this year, as my buddy Denny told me, at least I won the tubby guy clydesdale single speed rigid 26er category. That I did.

Thanks to the sponsorship crew of Team Tarik, Paul Components, Mellow Velo and Kelly Bike. Your tubby singlespeeder carries the flag for you! Big thanks to the race organizers as well. I love local races and those who make em happen. This is a good painful race.

Team Tarik Racing Presented By! Paul Component Engineering!

2010-06-28T20:56:00.001-06:00

The second major sponsor of Team Tarik Racing is Paul Component Engineering. Paul has been a long time Tarik supporter via supporting grass roots racing at Kelly bike and giving starving grad students/ frame shop employees good deals on hubs at interbike. I think I got my first Paul hub in 1996 that I still ride on the single speed cross bike.
1996 word hub:

Over the intervening years I have worked my way up to 10 Paul single speed hubs over the single speed cross bike, single speed 26" mtb and the impending single speed 29er. Plus at least two bikes with paul canti brakes and the paul flat bed on the kogswell PR. The hubs are great, the brakes are wonders. Paul and his crew helped on my purchase of full on Paul singlespeed grupetto for the new bike, as seen at the top of the post.

Pauls Component Engineering will also be covering my head for the racing season ahead.

or maybe more like this:

I guess it depends on the race.

Paul is one of them good ones in the bike industry. Swell guy, one of the rare real engineers in the industry, and nice parts.
Thanks Paul.

Vote for my mustache!

2010-06-27T12:00:00.005-06:00

Hey kids, the great state of NM is having a photo contest for images representing the land of enchantment. We of the South West Nordic Ski club are trying to drum up interest in the nordic skiing here in NM, so my pal Dina put up some photos of the great skiing here including this great image:

Click here to view and vote.
The pic is from the New Mexico Cup races from 09, NM cup race report

Now I am not telling you that you have to vote for my picture, especially as the require an email address and password to vote, but I am telling you if you go to the site and decide to vote for a picture of a fucking hot air balloon, I am going to be really really disappointed. So go check out the great photography of the state and vote for something with a mustache.

Team Tarik Racing Presented By! Mellow Velo!

2010-06-25T07:11:00.000-06:00

I decided to make my incessant racing quasi official (pseudo official?) this year and get me some sponsors. I am excited to have come to some sort of agreement with two of my long time supporters and my favorite local(ish) bike shop. I will have a post or two about each over the next few weeks/months/years, but you can get a preview by looking at the logos on the side bar.

First up, I want to thank and introduce Mellow Velo bike shop in Santa Fe. There are a handful of solid shops in Santa Fe, but Mellow Velo is by far my favorite one. They are the shop that I trusted to be on it enough to order me one of the first run of the Big Dummy. Owner David Bell and his crew have put together a bike shop that pretty much looks like the one I would like to open, but much better, as it is well run and actually open. They have jedi mechanics, rental bikes, new bikes, lots of shiny bits and lots and lots of single speeds and steel goodness.

I can also categorically declare that Mellow Velo is THE place to bring that UO-8/PX-10 you found at a garage sale and turn it into a fixie.

Some photos of the shop

Somehow this skip tooth Frejus is not even the bike I covet most at the shop:

Boxlined Pinstripey Legano

David's OS Blackbuck bike with a bar end shifter on Paul mount running in friction mode:

Ha!

Jedi Mechanic Art and David and their fabulous teeth:

Aida even loves the shop:

See more of what she thought about it here

Anyhow, if you are looking for a good shop in Santa Fe that can and will happily order you stuff and work on your bike and will rent bikes to your pals visiting from far away and will dispense the local trail knowledge head over to Mellow Velo. They are down Old Santa Fe trail about a quarter mile past the intersection with Paseo, away from the Plaza. In an adobe house. Just before the boot repair place. Got it?

I will be racing in their jersey and socks this year.

I may wear bicycle pants too.

I feel lucky as a merely occasionally fast racer of a certain girth that I can find good people that stand behind Team Tarik Racing. Thanks David, Thanks Mellow Velo.

Thistles and Peas

2010-06-22T20:23:00.003-06:00

Somehow I thought I had nettles growing my raspberry bed, so I let them go thinking I could eat some nettle soup next year.

I realized belatedly that they were not even remotely that. Next I hoped they were cardoons so I could eat the labor intensive blanched stems. But as they bloomed they really did not look cardoonish.

After some research I think they are some knapweed or starthistle. The foliage seems to be unlike most of the varieties I can find online, but it is pretty close. Turns out some of this species can stunt the growth of nearby plants, which is the last thing our poor stunted raspberries need.

I was going to let them grow anyway, but I remember that three years ago I not only let the sweet pea vines go to seed, but may have strewn them about a bit. The result is that they are thriving everywhere, including places that never get water. I pulled as many as I could find last year, but I still have more this year, I thought these were annuals? Maybe I am still being punished from seeds from three years back? As a non-fragrant variety with pea like pods that are inedible and seem to be able to outcompete the roses and raspberries, I really wish I had not let them go.
effin sweet pea vines everywhere

So in conclusion, I don't know what they were, but I kilt the hell out of em. I hope. I did save the seeding heads in a plastic bag in case I want them later. Seems like they are infested with larvae of some sort, little reddish wiggling thingies all over the bag.

NM Fire info!

2010-06-19T13:01:00.003-06:00

Rio Fire as seen from the santa fe relief route on 5/31/10

It is already a doozy of a fire season. There have been a number of relatively close fires that have covered the town with smoke and disquietude. In an effort to find out more information about the Rio Fire last month (~1000 acres near fenton lake, 30 miles or so away from here) I stumbled upon the NM fire info Blog and twitter feed.

http://nmfireinfo.wordpress.com/

Sweet! Good use of the new media to get timely info out without having to filter through the relatively abominable local news websites. My only criticism is they should have maps of where the fires are as the location descriptions are a bit hard to follow as they use somewhat odd baselines. But overall very comforting.

~~Tecolote or~~ South Fork fire (need that map, read a bit more, it is south fork, 12000 acres and counting), seen from town, 6-18-10

Los Alamos has had a long history of damaging wildfires. Having almost lost the entire town and lab to fire in the early years and then again most recently with the catastrophic Cerro Grande Fire just over a decade ago. For a first person account go here. Anyhow, it is nice to be able to get some quick info as to where and how bad the fires are without relying on rumor and crappy news stories.

Remember, put out your camp fires completely. Sheesh.

Wood Hauling

2010-06-11T07:15:00.006-06:00

More short hop large load hauling. Some neighbors two blocks up the street have had a pile of cut wood in their lawn for at least 5 months. I saw them watering their garden earlier in the week and asked if they minded if I hauled that off. They did not. So I saddled up the dummy yet again and got two good loads of wood for the winters burning. I will need to do some chopping and splitting, but that is good fun. It was way more wood than it looked in a random higgledy piggledy pile in their yard.

First load:

Second load:

Maybe a third of a mile each way?

First load again:

All I know is that it is much easier to load (and overload) the big dummy with split lumber as the last time I scored some free firewood:

Play Structure Hauling

2010-06-09T21:59:00.004-06:00

My neighbor around the block, and fellow bike nut, Albert has a daughter a few years older than Aida who outgrew her awesome play structure. He offered it to us and after a visit to see how nice it was, I spent three hours overhauling the big dummy (taking off the studded tires, putting on a new chain, new disc brake pads etc) and then saddled up the big dummy and returned with three loads of play house and slides and such. Thanks Albert and family!

First Load:

Unwieldy when off the bike:

Second Load, the most aesthetically pleasing one:

Aida tries out the piece parts:

Third and final load with bonus cat:

Riding with that third load;

It is pretty big put together:

Aida likes it!:

Three trips, probably quarter mile each way for a mile and a half of work. It is good to be riding the big dummy again with a chain that shifts, brakes that work and smooth tires. It is also good to have friends like Albert. thanks again pal.

Beautiful Mountain Views

2010-06-06T21:18:00.003-06:00

Amid unfortunate city detritus, Salt Lake City, 6/1/10

A few more pictures from a short trip Salt Lake City 6.10

Native Bees!

2010-06-03T17:27:00.003-06:00

I have a big old rotty stump in the yard that I use as a wood cutting platform. I was planning on drilling holes in it so the native bees could nest in it. I was working in the yard last weekend and noticed that bees have already taken advantage of the beetle/woodpecker holes in it.

Huzzah! We had a low bee year despite my neighbor having many hives on his property. We lost our bees two winters ago, and he lost 4 or 5 hives in total (of 20 or so scattered over the county). He is pretty sure it was not sudden bee death syndrome, but maybe just a long cold winter.

The good news is that our apricots bloomed too early again (early april I think) but they got two weeks of warmth before we hit a cold snap for 3 weeks. As such we are looking to be up to our armpits in apricots for the first time in three years.

Wooo

Riding with the grumps

2010-06-01T07:50:00.000-06:00

Happy Dad

Grumpy Baby

Abbreviated Brevet Report

2010-05-22T07:49:00.001-06:00

Last saturday was the Valles Caldera Double Cross 200k Brevet. My buddy Ryan came up to Los Alamos the night before and stayed at the house. We discussed the torrential rain and hail over beers. Ryan talked to the race organizer who prerode the course with his wife on a tandem and had to bail out half way through due to snow covering the roads in the Jemez. The forecast was for clear and cold turning into clear and warm, so I made some sammiches for the ride, got my bag ready, and then went to sleep to the sounds of rain thunder and hail.

The next morning I woke at 5am, made some coffee and eggs. Then Ryan and I packed up his car by cramming bikes in and drove the 20 minutes down to the start in whiterock.

It was not quite as cold as predicted, but still was chilly for the 6:30 am start. The field was about 15 strong, mostly NM racers looking for a good long climbing intensive training day. My pal Clay showed up as did MTB pro Damien Calvert, between the two, I think that is 5 billion race victories on the road and dirt . Anyhow, it was a great turnout for a NM brevet according to Ryan.

Anyhow, we soon rolled out in a roadie looking peleton. Ryan and I had "suitcase bikes" (overheard at the start line). Everyone else was on their road machines.

About 3 miles into the ride I flatted.

I slowly changed the tube and Ryan came back and lent me a boot. Turned out it was a sidewall tear on the Pasealas. Bah. Might have been brakes rubbing. One of the organizers rolled up in the support van and lent me a floor pump. I sent ryan on his way, finished fixing the flat and rolled on. Only to flat again less than a mile later.

Turns out the tube split at the seam. I think it was defective. I changed the flat, got rolling again, looked at my watch and realized it was 8am. I think we rolled out a 6:40. So I lost an hour and twenty minutes to flats? Seems unlikely. But the clock does not lie.

Since I was hours behind at this point I just rolled around the loop and headed home for a 22 mile day. The wrist still hurt a bit, especially after the tire changes, but it was a good early day.

I took a nap when I got home, while the riders rode up and over the snow covered passes into the caldera and back. The local fast guy Mike Englehart finished in 7:52 , the other fast fellers finished around 8hours and 30 minutes of riding, Ryan was the last finisher at after 10hours and 13 minutes, but he did eat enchiladas and have beer midride, so he is the real winner. I hope to do this ride without flats next year.

The end.

Floyd Landis is...

2010-05-20T07:03:00.004-06:00

Jesus Manzano? Or just plain Crazy?
NYT article where floyd spills the beans

I guess he is probably telling the truth. As I have stated in the past, I think the majority of the peloton was doped to the gills in the late nineties and early to mid oughts. But maintaining you are innocent and writing a book about how innocent you are and then recanting like this is not the best credibility move. I wish he did this immediately upon getting caught. I can't wait for his next book. I hope he calls it Floydtosterone and then is forced to pay me royalties for using the phrase.

Remember Manzano as the guy who detailed every little bit of the doping calvacade at Kelme, was tarred as crazy by everyone in cycling up to the head of UCI, but it turned out in the end he was almost completely vindicated by subsequent scandals including Operation Puerto and the continued attempt to ban Valverde. See previous writing by me on Manzano, doping hero. Please note the list of substances he claims to have ingested for doping purposes. Awesome.

I also wonder if we are in for a bandwagon confession from Tyler Hamilton.

Note, regardless of doping, the Giro and Tour de California are pretty interesting this year. Check em out.

Our Far Flung correspondents

2010-05-19T20:41:00.003-06:00

From Moscaline's west coast correspondent and Santa Barbara outpost manager and brother, currently on location in Korea, come these photos.

He saw virtually no bikes in Seoul, but did see two Strida folding bikes.

I am mocked

2010-05-17T23:09:00.001-06:00

The original baby

2010-05-15T15:52:00.004-06:00

Have not had a Wink256 post in a while

Here is Elena and her original needy baby. Winkie does not quite get the love he wants, but Aida gives him plenty of hair/tail/ear pullings, which he generously interprets as love.

Slowly crashing in many parts

2010-05-12T21:39:00.006-06:00

Monday night on a post dinner grocery run, as I ride up the bike on Canyon in front of the pool, up the hill on the sweeping right turn, just before the movie theater:
1. a car cuts into the bike lane a bit.
2. My spidey sense tingles and I swerve toward the curb a bit more.
3. I hit a fairly big rock in the bike lane with the front and maybe the rear wheel.
4. This jostles the bike a bit and derails the slightly too loose chain on the IG hubbed raleigh twenty
5. Just as I pedal hard out of the saddle
6. Causing me to flip neatly over the bars.
7. Land on my right hand hard
8. Give me enough time to look at the front handle bars under me and wonder where the rest of the bike is.
9. And then have the saddle hit me in the upper back and the rest of the bike pile drive into me.

Result 1:

Former Cateye opticube well shattered. Also handlebar mounted white reflector broken. Also later that evening the striker broke off the incredibell when I tried to use it. I did continue my mission and retrieved precious milk for the baby.

Result 2:

Sore wrist Monday night evolves to swollen immobile wrist on tuesday morning evolves into morning in ER. Conclusion: no breaks, some sort of contusion on the outer right wrist with swelling bruising in the carpal tunnel, effectively ennumbing the pinky and ring finger as well as preventing most of the useful bending movements.

Analysis:
Shit happens. I am not too pissed at the car as it was shoddy driving, but shoddy driving happens all the time, but it took the trinity of the swerve, the rock and the power stroke on non-engaged chain to cause me to crash. I am pretty sure clueless driver did not even see me go down as it took more than a couple beats between the pass and the fall. My chain should have been tighter and the rock should have not been there. Eh.... I did ride to the hospital and work on tuesday, walked in and back today, probably will ride in tomorrow. Coaster brakes enable nearly manual dexterity free riding.

Coworker reaction amuses me. In order of popularity:
1. As much as you ride, you still fell off?
2. As much as you ride, I am surprised this does not happen more often.
3. You drove today right?

Fortunately it feels much better already and doc claims I will be just like new by next week. The bruise on my shoulder from the saddle and the tweaked pec/ribs hurt more than the wrist. I will be better soon. I will then continue my hella training blocks.

Darn Kids

2010-05-10T07:15:00.000-06:00

Scene 1: Friday play group.
I take Aida to playgroup in the park on Friday while Elena is getting her hair cut. After a while I am sort of supervising Aida and a gaggle of bigger girls who are playing a complicated bird-cat-mouse-nest run-like-mad game. Aida likes the run around part, but she appears to be slightly likely to be trampled by older girls, so I hover a bit. As I am hovering the two oldest girls (5?) look at me suspiciously and have the following conversation:
1. Is that your dad?
2. No! My dad is at work.
1. So is my dad. He has stuff to do!

So there you go.

Scene 2: Saturday riding the purple schwinn while towing asleep baby in the chariot.
I ride up to a furninture sale at the masonic lodge's parking lot. A grade school kid rides up to me on his Next, 20" wheeled dual suspension bike. Conversation ensues:
Kid: Hi
Me: Hello.
Kid: Your bike is pink.
Me: Uh, well, it is actually purple, I think...
Kid: Is it your mom's?

Anyhow. I will be here all week.

A few of my favorite things

2010-05-09T08:07:00.000-06:00

Someday I will find THE bike for these things. Until then, sitting in the parts bin awaiting their mate. I think I got them 11 years ago. TA skip tooth ring and regina block chain.

5 years ago

2010-05-06T05:12:00.001-06:00

Heh.

Team Ed

2010-05-04T22:30:00.002-06:00

I am proud to be a founding member of Team Ed. Our namesake has an excellent profile this week in the Knoxie Paper: here. Note the terms "tortoise mentality" used in the article. I think that means Ed is sort of the kent of the southeast.

Make sure you watch the video:

Well done Ed and G.

Also note that shorter fellers that ride more than you and live in super twisty rooty muddy knoxville are all about the 29'ers. Probably a lesson in there somewhere...

I was able to find a nice photo from the initial race of Team Ed at the 2002 edition of the 12 hours of Haw ridge race:

We were all on single speeds. That is Ed, Eric, Tarik and Gary from left to right. Ed is the one we are talking about, Gary is featured in the video and article as well. Eric has the sweet vanagon and was serving hot soup and cold beers to go with his laps. I think we were attempting to grow Ed like mustaches on short notice. Good times.

Team Ed still races actively. Check out their tales here

I am so proud.

Its a thing! Bikes on smartcars

2010-04-29T20:02:00.001-06:00

If you see three, its a thing.

1st sighting:
Driving north near Pojaque, I saw a smart car going the other direction with a Yakima hitch mount rack with a dual suspension MTB on the back. It was cattywumpus on the rack with the rear wheel above the roofline of the car.

2nd sighting:
not a week later

Framebuilder and tiny car aficionado Curtis Retrotech Giantman Inglis himself seems to have this set up, seen on his flickr stream click for source.

3rd sighting:
A day after number 2:

This guy in my neighborhood has a homemade rack added to the factory hitch on his Smartcar. Factory hitch! Who wouldathunkit. Note the sweet lustron home in the background.

It is now officially a thing. All the rage. I am going to get a smartcar and festoon it with biketites screwed directly into the plasticky smartcar body and mount as many bikes as I can simultaneously so I can join the fun.

Also, Smartcar v. Bakfiets

update! 4/30/10
From the comments, we received:
This excellent visualization of smartcar bike festoonage:

from reader JRA

And then this most excellent conceptually troubling folding bike on a smartcar:

Caught in california by andy R.

Thank you fellers! I knew it was a thing.

A formidable bunch

2010-04-27T23:26:00.002-06:00

Buried way deep in the letters section on velonews is this lovely photo of a group of vintage cyclists.

(click for huge image at source)

That is a group that looks like they would put you in the curb before you knew what hit you. And then stop for wine and pastrami sammiches mid ride.

Previous and relatedvintage pic on moscaline.

Smaller velodromes

2010-04-24T12:48:00.006-06:00

I have long been interested in the small velodrome phenomena. The vandedrome was the first one that hit my radar. Then, a great regret in my velolife, I never bought the ticket to go to canada and ride the Human powered roller coaster.

I noted recently there is this tiny redbull branded minidrome floating around the antipodes:

Red Bull Minidrome from Radar Films on Vimeo.

Pretty neat, but maybe needs more banking, wouldn't it have been cooler if it was cross bred with this:

(put that on youtube!)

Or maybe crossed with a pump track somehow?

Update 5/19/2010:
Welcome Coco's variety readers! Also, check your local paper for some more tiny velodrome action:

Pomona student Samuel Starr makes velodrome inside a library!
Read the rest at the la times
132 foot circumference, 5 second laps. Well done!

SF bike racks

2010-04-22T21:33:00.001-06:00

Third street:

Not bad for arty racks, you might be able to get 2 bikes on each.

Church and Market. Virtual Racks:

I locked to them my invisible bike and all was whole.

Went to SF

2010-04-20T05:30:00.001-06:00

Rode a ton, still gained weight, took many photos. Here they are:

I consult the oracle:

Done saw the bridge:

Mr Cell Phone Talking Bag head:

The Sealions among other landmarks:

Down on Cesar Chavez:

Pier 23 Fishbike:

Did some tiny wheeled fixie off road riding in Marin:

F-market Trolleys, still cost the same as a bus.

Better than cable cars:

I imported NM finest burrito for JimG to try.

He liked it!

This tiny woman fits in her own backpack:

Saw this place down on 20th in the Mission while trying not to drown in the rain:

All the photos here

29er rim opinions?

2010-04-17T12:20:00.002-06:00

Normally I don't do this kind of blog post, but I have been out of the loop for a while whats new in the 29'er world.
Someone out there reading probably has some experience with this and I need some help.

I am imminently going to receive my new 29'er rigid single speed from Kelly.
First bike in the line is mine, look at those stays

It is designed to fit huge freaking 29er tires. Hopefully it will fit 29x2.75" tires when someone makes a set.

My current plan is to have two sets of wheels. A race wheel built on 32 hole disk hubs and 28-30mm rims using wtb weirwolf 29x2.55race tires.
My thoughts are either Salsa Semi Rims, Velocity Blunt or WTB speed disc.

The second wheelset will be more all mountainy and will be built on 36 hole disc hubs, 35mm rims and fatter tires. Probably WTB kodiak tires, or maybe Conti Mountain King 29 x 2.4
My thoughts here are for the Salsa Gordo or Velocity P35 rims.

I have built alot of wheels around velocities and I really like them. Anyone have any experience with either the Salsa or the WTB rims? Are the Salsa rims worth the extra cost? Any others that I am missing? WTB rims seem to be much cheaper. Any thoughts?

Any other fat tires in the 29'er size I should be looking at? I have been running the 26" weirwolfs for years and love them, so I am looking forward to the 29'er version.

Leave any opinions in the comments. Thanks pals.

Proud bikes

2010-04-15T20:27:00.002-06:00

A set of well used rusty bikes proudly awaiting their field worker owners return.

Goleta.