I always thought custom bicycles just so much froufrou. They're critical equipment for bicycle racers, but the rest of us citizens would do just fine with something off the rack at the local bike store.
An everyday guy like me owning a custom bike? That would be like buying a Range Rover to drive to the local grocery store.
An article in the LA Times today goes a long way to changing my mind. The writer makes several good justifications for buying a custom bike which all boil down to this: If a custom bicycle gets you out on your bike more often, it's worth it.
Here are some of the advantages of a custom bike mentioned in the article….
Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/01/08/custom-bicycles-vs-off-the-rack/
The results are in for the 2006 bike mileage survey, and I see there are quite a few long-distance cyclists who voted. Nearly one in five responded that they had bicycled 8,000 or more miles this year.
I'll do the calculations for you: 8,000 miles is an average 154 miles per week. Wow. Even if the bulk of the miles were tallied on long summer rides, you'd still have to put in a good weekly average to get your miles up there.
I'm also impressed that more than half of you — 57% — bicycled more than 3,000 miles last year …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/01/06/results-for-2006-bike-mileage-survey/
For more than 30 years, June Curry has been serving cookies and lemonade to TransAmerica bicycle tourists on the steps of the Blue Ridge mountains in Afton, Virginia.
Her efforts earned her the nickname “Cookie Lady” to more than 14,000 cyclists who passed through. After they ate the cookies and drank the lemonade, or spent the night in the “Cookie House”, June would snap a Polaroid picture of her visitors. They'd sign the photo and the guest register and be on their way.
Most of those Polaroids are now available online at The Cookie House Registry at the Crazy Guy on a Bike website…
Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/01/05/the-cookie-house-registry-30-years-of-bicycle-touring-in-pictures/
A picture from my visit to Cooke House in 2000 during Bike Virginia. Photo from The Cookie House Registry.
Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/01/04/2nd-visit-to-cooke-house-2000/
My first visit to the Cookie House with my riding partner. Resurrected as part of the massive Cookie House Registry project.
Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/01/04/cookie-house-1984/
Where is it that a main thoroughfare has stop signs, but private driveways have none? At car crossings for the Burke-Gilman trail in Lake Forest Park near Seattle.
For years, bicyclists on the heavily used paved trail have had to stop at numerous driveways and minor street crossings that access waterfront properties on Lake Washington. At times, police have even issued tickets to cyclists who didn't come to a full stop.
Now that Lake Forest Park has upheld this law in Ordinance 951, the Cascade Bicycle Club is appealing that decision …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/01/04/bike-group-appeals-decision-to-support-driveways-over-trail/
Today marks the second-year anniversary for the Biking Bis blog.
This thing got started when I filed a short piece about my birthday bike ride. The website was called Bikin' Bis then; I changed the name because most of my hits came from google searches for “bikini.”
I quickly figured out that people probably didn't want to read about my bike rides, so I thought about other themes for a bicycling blog. I finally hit on the idea of focusing on general bicycling news in the blog, so that readers taking a break during a recreational ride could say …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/01/04/another-year-in-the-saddle/
The glacier-gouged Lake Crescent in the Olympic National Park, Washington.
Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/01/03/lake-crescent/
More week-long bike tours are updated at my Across State Bicycle Tour page.
While checking the dates and routes, I unearthed the minor news that Bicycle Idaho has been scrubbed this year, replaced by the new Washington Bicycle Ride in 2007. The organizers, the same folks who do the Oregon Bicycle Ride, moved the operation across the border for a ride through rural eastern Washington.
Fear not, Idaho bicycle lovers. The Treasure Island YMCA is putting on Ride Idaho for the third year with a 400-some mile loop starting in Coeur d'Alene.
Here are the other updated tours, listed by state …
Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/01/03/more-week-long-bicycle-tours-this-summer/
Early morning paceline
Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2007/01/03/paceline/
Adventure Cycling Association Trail biking Rails to Trails Conservancy League of American Bicyclists
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