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One of the loneliest movies I ever attended was “Stop Making Sense”, which featured a concert by the Talking Heads, led by David Byrne. My future wife and I were the only people watching that particular screen at a Cineplex in Modesto, California, that evening in 1984.
Today, David Byrne is still a musician and artist in Manhattan and is known for riding his bicycle everywhere; and I'm still showing up at the least popular movie at the local cineplex.
In writing about his current project of turning a building into a musical instrument, The Village Voice reports that Byrne recently fell while cycling and broke a couple of ribs …
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2008/06/04/david-byrne-making-sense-with-bicycling/
After the first stage of the Giro d'Italia three weeks ago, I wrote an article, “Who is this Christian Vande Velde?” when he had won the pink leader's jersey in the opening team time trial.
Just last night I received an e-mail from Jim Freibert, the former race director for Chicago's West Suburban Wheelmen and track announcer for Northbrook Velodrome. He's a long-time friend of the Vande Velde family and was able to fill in the huge gaps in my story. He agreed to let me run the e-mail on the blog:
“Having ridden with the previous generations of Vande Veldes who were founders, mentors, and sponsors of Chicago's West Suburban Wheelemen – I know most of the old Midwestern bike racers from the '60's, '70's, and '80's knew Christian's grandfather, Al, and great uncles Babe Vande Velde, and Henry Van Leuven as regulars at Northbrook velodrome, and other races, especially in Illinois and Wisconsin.
This weekend, Al lost a long, hard fought battle with cancer. …
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2008/06/03/christian-vande-velde-more-a-star-than-a-water-carrier/
The Seattle to Portland bike ride always reminds me of a tub of warm beer.
STP was my first big bike ride after moving to the Pacific Northwest 8 years ago. I had done plenty of centuries, but never 200 miles in a single day.
I had trained hard, but stayed at the half-way point too long and finished the ride around dusk. When I arrived at my motel room in Portland, I discovered that my TransAmerica bike ride buddy had room service set up a six-pack of Corona on ice in the room for me.
Unfortunately, he must have thought I would arrive much earlier in the day because the six room-temperature beers were sitting in a bowl of room-temperature water that I can only assume had been ice at one time. I drank a couple anyway…
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2008/06/03/39-days-to-stp-and-may-ride-stats/
A motorist plowed into a group of bicycle riders in Matamoros, Mexico, on Sunday, killing one and injuring 10 to 14 others. They were part of an organized bike tour, escorted by police, from the border town to a local beach.
The Metro Noticias online newspaper reported 1 dead and 10 to 12 injured in Monday morning's edition; KRGV said that friends of the victims reported 5 dead this morning, although I couldn't find that death toll verified anywhere.
An image taken by someone at the scene shows the car slamming into the cyclists. (You can see a copy of the photo that appeared in the Metro Noticias on the jump, but be warned it's a graphic image of a horrific crash )…
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2008/06/02/motorist-slams-into-bike-tour-in-mexican-border-town-1-dead/
Most bike ride events have a logo and a T-shirt. Why should the World Naked Bike Ride be any different?
The World Naked Bike Rides are scheduled in cities in the US and Canada in June, July and August to protest oil dependency and the car culture by a show of nakedness on two wheels.
It may seem like bare irony that organizers are selling about 100 T-shirts to raise money to pay expenses. But they say participants may want to wear those T-shirts 40 or 50 years from now when they're sitting in a rocking chair reminiscing about the olden days …
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2008/06/02/t-shirts-cover-expenses-for-world-naked-bike-rides2008-rides-scheduled-in-us-and-canada/
Seattle bicycle riders will be taking to the streets on Monday to call attention to inadequate signs and bike lanes in door zones.
Seattle Likes Bikes is asking interested cyclists to meet at 6 p.m. Monday at Westlake Center, follow their route, and finish up at the College Inn Pub near University of Washington.
The first half of the route loops around the South Lake Union Trolley (S.L.U.T.) tracks and the signed route along 9th Avenue North that the city has suggested as an alternate. The second half of the ride heads up Eastlake along the proposed route of the streetcar expansion.
As you may remember, the original S.L.U.T. ride last fall called attention to the streetcar tracks that were laid out where bicyclists ride, causing some serious accidents when narrow tires got caught in the tracks….
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2008/05/30/biking-the-rails-s-l-u-t-bike-ride-in-seattle-on-monday/
There's a big idea afloat to put 1 million new and returning bicyclists on the road next summer.
One Million Bicycles is a bike rally scheduled for August 9, 2009, in 300 cities across all 50 states. The participants — cyclists like you and me — will call for doubling expenditures for bicycling on the national and state levels and give away 1 million new or used bicycles to new or returning riders.
Portland's Joe “Metal Cowboy” Kurmaskie is driving this effort with the support of Congressman Earl Blumenauer and bike organizations and shops across the country.
Kurmaskie mentioned the nationwide celebration at his talk at the Seattle Bike Expo in March and launched it a couple of weeks ago when OneMillionBicycles.org went online.
Where will those 1 million bicycles come from? Kurmaskie suggests we merely choose one from the collections in our garages. As he says in the YouTube video, a bicycle is not necessary for the structural integrity of a garage …
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2008/05/29/one-million-bicycles-its-woodstock-on-two-wheels/
My son has been riding multi-day group bicycle rides with me since he was 11, but here he is a junior in high school and we've never been on an independent overnight bike tour together.
We decided to fix that cycling resume omission over the Memorial Day weekend with an overnighter to a state park located about 40 miles east of Seattle at the base of the Cascades.
It was a great trip. We had a chance to talk without the distractions at home. My son stoked my ego by blurting out on a hill, “Wow dad, you're calves are cut!” When he rocketed past me seconds later, I returned the compliment.
Although there was an element of last-minute preparations involved, it wasn't one of those spur-of-the-moment S24O's (sub-24-hour overnighter) described last year in Adventure Cyclist magazine by Rivendell founder Grant Petersen …
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2008/05/28/green-river-valley-overnight-bike-tour-in-western-washington/
The ancient proverb — “He who rides a glass bicycle shouldn't take the bumpy road” — doesn't apply to the glass bicycles hand-sculptured by Leo Lyman.
From his home studio in Wildomar, California, Leo makes a wide variety of small glass bicycle gifts in the styles of road bikes, tandems, recumbents, and more. He even makes glass cake tops; I understand the glass tandem is popular for wedding cakes.
Examples of his work are displayed at his Bicycle in Glass website. I recently asked Leo how he got started making glass bicycle-style jewelry.
“I have been doing the bicycle glass since my son Scott was racing BMX, which has been about 22 years ago,” he wrote. “He then moved up to cross-country and down hill. I used to sell the bicycle glass at the races to pay for his races and accommodations. …
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2008/05/27/small-gift-bicycles-in-glass/
An overnight snowfall in the mountains around Durango left 2,500 bicyclists all dressed up with no place to go on Saturday morning for the 37th annual Iron Horse Bicycle Classic.
The Colorado State Patrol cancelled the popular bicycle road race and bike tour from Durango to Silverton after a foot of snow was measured at the finish line in Silverton and daytime temperatures were only expected to reach the high 30s.
Said race director Gaige Sippy: “We can not have 2,500 cyclists and their friends in Silverton with those weather conditions. Hypothermia in these conditions is a high risk.”
There is a no refund policy in effect and the rides cannot be rescheduled. Other weekend events were not affected as of Saturday morning …
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Permanent link to this article: https://www.bikingbis.com/2008/05/24/snow-derails-colorados-iron-horse-bicycle-classic/
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