Plane, Bus, Taxi, Bike

Last week I flew to Las Vegas for my day job. I wanted to post this from my iPhone but my iPhone chops were not up to it yet.So this is a little delayed. It was interesting day that reminded me of Planes, Trains and Automobiles although I didn't have to sleep with John Candy.

After a quick flight to Atlanta, I took the long flight to Las Vegas.

From Las Vegas

From the airport I took a bus to Caesar's Palace.

From Las Vegas

After settling in, I took a taxi to Pro Cyclery to pick up my rental bike.

From Las Vegas

My normal road ride is an 1987 Canondale touring bike, so the modern Jamis was an interesting ride.

From Las Vegas

An aluminum frame with carbon fiber fork and seat stays and a Shimano 105 20 speed drive train. I really enjoyed the brake shifters, but I think the wider handle bars were a little too wide for my tastes.

I brought various accessories to use on the Jamis. First my Crank Brothers egg beater pedals and of course the shoes to go with them. Most important was safety. Besides my helmet, I brought 4 lights - 2 front and 2 rear. The font lights are a Planet Bike Blaze 1 watt and a MagicShine 900. The rear lights are a Planet Bike Superflash and a Trek Flare 7. I run the Planet Bike lights on flash and the others on steady. Having two front and 2 rear also gives me back ups.

The last accessory was a new Biologic iPhone case. That let me carry my phone for emergencies, some pictures (which I will be posting) and a GPS since I was in unfamiliar territory.

I used a path I researched with some nice bike lanes and visited my aunt and then returned to the hotel.

From Las Vegas

More to come...

St. Paddys Ride

Besides bicycle commuting, I do a series of charity rides. Today I rode the St. Paddy's Day ride that is a North Carolina Tour de Cure training ride. One of the nice things is that the registration for St. Paddy's gives you free registration for the Tour de Cure.The ride started and ended at the Trek store in North Raleigh.

As usual I quickly faded to the back and ended up riding with Carlos and Leah, both regular riders with the Slow Spokes. We had a good time and even extended our ride 10 miles into Franklin County. Well the extra miles weren't intentional. We missed a turn. I was able to use my iPhone to find our way back to the route.

Today's ride plus my commuting gave me over150 miles for the week. Not fast miles, but I am happy.

Gear mini reviews

Today was the first day to use my Dahon Biologic iPhone case. I found it very solid on the bike. It was a little hard to see. Next time I am going to try it with my prescription glasses. I will comment more on this as well as the iPhone apps I am using in the future.

I bought some Hincapie Performer bib shorts this last week and wore them on the first time on this ride. A lot people I know in person and online rave about bib shorts, so I wanted to try some. They were quite comfortable on this 5 hour ride. I didn't really think too much about them which is perfect. Also they were easy to manage when natured called.

People for Bikes Pledge

At People for Bikes they are trying to get a ton of people to sign the pledge below. The goal is to gather a million names and use this number to get the attention of lawmakers and administrators. If they know there are this many people out there that care about bicycling, it will quit getting cut from planning projects and more importantly not get cut when it comes to financing. Here is the pledge.

I am for bikes. I'm for long rides and short rides. I'm for commuting to work, weekend rides, racing, riding to school, or just a quick spin around the block. I believe that no matter how I ride, biking makes me happy and is great for my health, my community and the environment we all share. That is why I am pledging my name in support of a better future for bicycling—one that is safe and fun for everyone. By uniting my voice with a million others, I believe that we can make our world a better place to ride.


Go ahead and sign the pledge today.

NAHBS 2010

Here is a simple photo from the NAHBS.





- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Location:Richmond, VA

Introduction

I thought I would give the whole blog thing a shot. The subject is bicycle commuting. The triangle part comes from the fact that I live in the Research Triangle part of North Carolina. I suspect that I will stray into other topics. I did some charity rides last year and I am planning more this year. I am interested in trying some longer brevet rides, so I suspect that might come up sometimes.

I attended the North American Handmade Bicycle Show NAHBS 2010 in Richmond, VA. I took lots of pictures, some of them decent, and some notes. I plan to fill in with a few posts about what I saw.