The Archives
You Can Go Your Own Way: The Categorical Imperative of the Bikescape
We are utility cyclists. We are pathfinders. We see more from the seat a bike. Part of the pleasure of riding in an urban environment is that the terrain, the “bikescape,” is always shifting. For a season a road, a sidewalk, or a building will be under construction, and the traffic pattern will be altered….
5 Tips for Riding with Your Kids in Low Light
Fall is here and the days are getting shorter. Gone are the long, sun-filled evenings of summer. At the same time our kids are back in school, and it’s harder to find time to ride. If you’re like our family, you’re still trying to squeeze in some after-school, after-work evening rides. We did one of…
Sizzling Strategies – Part 2: Dress for Distress
It seems like years ago that I mentioned how much I like the products from Duluth Trading Company. Wait a minute … it was years ago: Doctor’s Orders: Ride Naked! As I said in that ancient article, Duluth makes stuff for real working people, which means they’re very familiar with clothes which will help to…
Pedal Cliques: Top Five Reasons to Go Clipless (not)
“All real cyclists ride clipless pedals.” “No real cyclists use platform (“flat”) pedals.” That’s what you’d think, anyway, from reading many biking websites and magazines. They’ll tell you, in not so many words, that you’re not “serious” about biking if you’re not walking around in clunky plastic shoes and clicking on linoleum like a castanet….
A tale of N. America’s 3 hi-end trailer brands & Why we’re closing out Croozer at 40% off
Croozer Trailers – 40% Off!!! I know it sounds to good to be true. Let me explain… This is not an ordinary sale. We’re offering this amazing line of German designed trailers at what is effectively our wholesale/dealer pricing while supplies last. I should explain how things evolved as I know the price probably sounds to good to be…
What We Learned From a Year of Traveling and Biking as a Family
Yesterday we pulled into our driveway after a year on the road. Over twelve months, we visited more than 50 biking destinations around North America. Our route took us to the flowy trails of Copper Harbor, MI, the jungles of Ocala, FL, the paved paths of Bend, OR, and the bike park in Whistler, BC….
Sizzling Strategies – Part 1: Timing is Everything
I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned it before, but just in case I haven’t: I do not commute by bike during the hot summer months in Phoenix, Arizona. The reason is simple: I don’t need to complicate life for either the Phoenix Fire Department EMTs or myself. With nightly temperatures sometimes still above 100°F at 10:00…
5 Tips for Biking with Kids in Traffic
In an ideal world, every school commute could be done on a bike path and every grocery store would be on a road with a protected bike lane. In reality, most of us who bike with our children have to share roads with cars. Despite our best efforts to choose the safest routes, eventually, we…
Phone Follies
I’m a bona fide nerd. I even have the credentials to prove it: a first edition Netware CNE (Certified Novell Engineer) certificate and a Windows NT MCSE (Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer) certificate. In case you don’t know, this means I am not only a Nerd, but am truly an Old Blood Geek. The further proof…
13 Things to Do This Summer with your Kids (On Bikes)
School is out, the weather is warming up, and it is time to start racking up some miles. While you might be training for your next century ride or singletrack epic, make sure you’re including the kids on some of your rides too. Unlike adults, most kids aren’t interested in racking up the miles for…
The Better Bike Lanes
In my last post, I groused about bike lanes that I thought were done poorly; that were actually, in some situations, dangerous to the folks who are supposed to use them. I thought it was only fair to bring attention to some bike lanes in Phoenix which I think are done well. My home town…
Building a Better Bike Share
What happens when you finally arrive? For decades I’ve been trying to get more people onto bikes in my adopted hometown of Norfolk, Virginia. I’ve tried appealing to their motivation; reminding them that they say that want to ride more. I’ve tried to create more opportunities for folks to bike by working with my local…
Biking the Golden Gate Bridge with Kids
The first time I biked across the Golden Gate Bridge, I was still in my mom’s belly. Six months pregnant, my mom made the trek from San Francisco to Tiburon by way of that iconic orange spanway. At least that’s what she told me when I balked at biking the 22-mile route with my son…
Traffic Troubles
FACT: Maricopa County, Arizona, where I call home, is the fastest growing county in the United States. That is not me talking, that is the U.S. Census Bureau. The data says we add an average of 222 people every day. FACT: Arizona has the highest rate of pedestrian deaths in the nation. Again, that ain’t…
The Wheels of Justice Go Round and Round
Like the wheels on a bike, the wheels of justice go round and round. Life, like biking, is about do-overs. It’s about learning from your mistakes. Last month a young man made the mistake of stealing my Sport Utility Bike in plain sight of a police officer, who promptly arrested him. When the arresting officer…
Options for Off-Road Biking with Young Kids
Figuring out how to bike with young kids off-road is tricky. Even if they are old enough to ride their own bike, it takes a long time before they have the endurance or skill to ride long distances or up larger hills. Most trailers and bike seats are designed for riding on paved bike paths…
Lighten Up!
I remember the first “portable computer” I had. It was called, appropriately enough, the Compaq Portable. In the vernacular of us computer geeks of the time it was referred to as a “luggable.” It was the size of a portable sewing machine. You laid the thing on its side, unsnapped the keyboard from the bottom…
Dude, Where’s My Bike?
My bike was just there. And now it’s gone. I’d been leaning “The Beast” up against the window at Jimmy John’s for a year. For the first few months that I worked there, I was really paranoid about locking it up every time I got back from a delivery. But I noticed that the other…
Rent-A-Commuter
I’ve been seeing a few Limebike and Ofo bicycles parked around my neighborhood lately. For those who are not familiar with these brightly colored rides, Limebike and Ofo are the two most prevalent dockless bicycle-sharing systems. The two systems work similarly: you download an app to your smartphone, insert the information for a credit or…
We Ride at Night: Bicycle Therapy
We ride at night. We ride with our lights and helmets on. We ride tight together. One wheel paces the next. We call the bumps, the potholes, the traffic lights. We ride together, trusting each other half an arm’s length away. We move as a single, sinuous snake, gliding around turns and over bridges. We…
9 Family-Friendly Cycling Vacation Destinations
If your idea of a good family vacation includes more mountaintops than Disney rides, you might want to consider a cycling vacation. Just because you have kids doesn’t mean you have to plan vacations around playgrounds (although those are nice to have also). In fact, picking a great place to bike can make for a…
Click Cycling Shopping
In my previous post, I explained why I think the best place to get a ride is a local bike shop (LBS) where you have a one-on-one relationship with a knowledgeable, accommodating vendor. I also said I didn’t think an LBS was the only place to get everything bike related, and we’ll talk about that…
A Bike for All Seasons. The Birth of a Sport Utility Bike
I want a bike that will do it all. I want a Sport Utility Bike. I want a bike that’s comfortable enough to ride all day, sturdy enough to haul an overnight sack, big enough to fit a guy over six foot tall, and reliable enough to go months between tune-ups. I’ve ridden full-suspension mountain…
The Importance of Family Cycling
The most striking difference between any U.S. city and those in nations with a thriving bike culture are the number of families on bikes. Visit Seattle or Salt Lake or St. Louis and you’re likely to see a bike share program, a dude track-standing in the intersection, a rack full of fixies. What you’re less…