Rapha Rides for Tohoku

Posted on March 23, 2011 by Self Righteous Cyclist

Sunday, I participated in a race ride for charity.  Clearly, nothing is more charitable than a bunch of people gathering on a Sunday morning in the name of charity to do, uh, the same thing they would be doing anyway – riding their bikes.  To be fair, our donations were matched by both Rapha and Ride Studio Cafe in Lexington, where the ride originated, and proceeds go to the Japanese Red Cross.

I originally intended to provide you a jealousy-inspiring and media-rich ride report complete with photos, video, and a GPS map of where we rode.  Alas, my phone was not a cooperative tool in this endeavor, and I leave you with a medianemic account of a ride to who-knows-where.

The big unknown before the ride was how many people would attend such an event.  There were other scheduled Sunday rides, the hope of a Wells Ave. race (canceled on Friday), and an 8a.m. temperature of 31º to dissuade people for riding for Tohoku.  I assumed the $10 minimum donation wouldn’t be much of a deterrent, and judging by the multitude of $5k+ bikes line up outside Ride Studio Cafe before the ride, I was right.

Sadly, my only picture of the day.

In all, about 100 lycra-clad, Japan-supporting cyclists headed out on a route more convoluted than Michele Bachmann’s State of the Union rebuttal.  There were more than 100 turns on the provided cue-sheet – an average of one turn every 0.65 miles.  In fact, this was my one complaint of the ride: it was a nightmare route to follow if you weren’t with a group in which someone had an all-knowing GPS.

The roads, however, were pleasantly unfamiliar to me and it was great to glide along sparsely traveled roads instead of the mangled mess that are Boston streets.

For sure, this was an older group than I’m used to riding with, but with age comes money and with age comes – in this case – Cervélos, carbon wheels, and Garmin units as far as the eye can see.  One of the highlights of the ride was getting owned on a short climb by a woman who looked like she could have been my mom.  Ego deflated.

I could have been racing this weekend, but it was a nice change of pace to ride with the mature crew – and for a good cause, too!

Edit: Ride Studio Cafe posted their own ride report. The ride raised over $9,000 for the Japanese Red Cross which is awesome.  Their praise for the cue sheet makes me look like an a-hole for ripping on it, but I said what I said.

Posted in Around Town | 1 Comment

An Ode to Collegiate Cycling

Posted on March 11, 2011 by Self Righteous Cyclist

Recently, I’ve been feeling pretty optimistic about cycling in general.  Seeing how many winter warriors braved the apocalyptic weather over the past few months has convinced me that Boston can be a “world-class cycling city,” regardless of Mother Nature’s best efforts to break our spirits.  Furthermore, rising gas prices and the well-documented shortcomings of the MBTA will likely (hopefully) result in more people taking to the streets by bike this year.

While I’m certainly pumped about the promise of cycling in Boston this year, nothing gets me excited to ride a bike like collegiate cycling.  Lucky for me, this past weekend featured the first racing of the season.  Sure, Sunday featured monsoon rains, but it was okay because I was racing my bike for the first time since July.

Sunday's rain continued unabated almost all day. Pictured here, the Men's C1 absorbs some H20 before the beginning of their race.

So, I could either give you a second-by-second breakdown of my races this season OR I could describe to you why I like collegiate cycling so damn much.  I’ve gone ahead and chosen the latter, for your benefit.  You’re welcome.

If you know anything about me, you know that I like getting people to ride bikes.  The Eastern Collegiate Cycling Conference (ECCC) is the largest of the collegiate cycling conferences and the conference leadership has made it a main goal to lower the barriers to bike racing.  For instance, they’ve banned aero gear, such as time trial bikes and deep carbon wheels, for all racers – a move I wholeheartedly support.  These rules put the focus on training instead of buying a few seconds with a $2500 pair of wheels.

Another thing that the heads of the ECCC and I can agree on is that females in spandex = win.  Seriously, though, the ECCC has done more to expand women’s cycling in the past few years than any other organization I can think of.  Last year, the conference added another category, making cycling accessible to women of all fitness levels.

Despite all the talk about accessibility, you’d be remiss to think of collegiate cyclists as a bunch of novices.  Racing at the elite level of the ECCC features some of the best riders in the region, who don the kits of teams such as Trek-Livestrong and Colavita when they aren’t representing their colleges and universities.  Ted King, who now rides for Liquigas-Cannondale, got his start in the ECCC while representing Middlebury College.

As an interesting aside, I find that collegiate cycling has made my rides safer.  How, you ask? Well, you may find this hard to believe – hell, I hardly believe it – but, drivers are less belligerent towards me when I’m wearing my collegiate team kit.  How drivers that usually ignore my existence take the time to notice the university name on my back has me befuddled.  Yet, I am rarely honked at, threatened, or run off the road (you know, the normal fare) when representing my school.  The lesson to be learned here?  Sponsor a collegiate cycling team – people actually read the jerseys!

Posted in Collegiate Cycling/Amateur Racing | Comments Off on An Ode to Collegiate Cycling

Recommended Reading

Posted on February 22, 2011 by Self Righteous Cyclist

Hi Everyone, I apologize for being AWOL in this here intertube, but the glorious life of graduate studentude has had me in the library studying things much less enjoyable than bicycles.

During a study break, I noticed on the Tweet-O-Sphere (why aren’t you following me, by the way?) that my good friend Ted King (he has no idea who I am) recommended an article from Outside Magazine promising to explain to me how “cyclists that can turn sane, law-abiding drivers into shrieking maniacs.”

Click here to go to the article (opens in a new window).

Given the current climate surrounding cyclists and people who hate cyclists (read: everyone else), I expected the usual drivel about how people get their non-lycra underclothing all twisted every time someone on a bike runs a red light or swerves in front of them to avoid a pothole.  Remember, we as a group are UNPREDICTABLE AND LAWLESS!

So, I reluctantly clicked on the link, ready to have my self worth thrashed by some snide syndicated bike blogger who thinks they know everything about “bike culture.”

Much to my delight, this was instead an impressive summation of the bike vs. car culture war.  I think you’ll enjoy reading the whole thing, but for those of you short of time or attention span, I provide the following highlights:

Of course, if calling cyclists “vulnerable” makes it seem like they’re never to blame, that’s not true, either. It’s not just those hipsters on fixies sealed off from the world by earbuds who give bikers an image problem. Plenty of well-meaning bike commuters aren’t aware of the laws, or fail to use bright flashing lights at night, or turn without giving hand signals. Statistically, some studies show cyclists running more red lights than drivers—for a number of complicated reasons, whether to conserve momentum, to get ahead of traffic and be more visible, or, more profoundly, perhaps because their out-group status leads them to act that way.

But the red lights may be a red herring. The way cyclists get hurt seems to have less to do with their own culpability and more to do with getting hit by cars—either from behind or when a car turns right, the way Simonetti was struck. Echoing research in the UK, a recent three-year study by Australia’s Monash University found that in 54 recorded crashes among a sampling of cyclists, drivers were at fault nearly nine out of ten times.

AND

In one study in which drivers were asked how they feel about cyclists, one of the recurring labels was “unpredictable.” When asked to elaborate, drivers often blamed the “attitudes and limited competence” of the cyclists themselves, rather than the “difficulty of the situations that cyclists are often forced to face on the road.” When asked to describe their own actions or those of other drivers, however, they blamed only the situation. Psychologists call this the “fundamental attribution error.”

AND (the most interesting part, for me)

In one sense, the so-called bikelash has little to do with transportation modes. In the late 1960s, a pair of British psychologists set out to understand the ways in which we humans tend to split ourselves into opposing factions. They divided a group of teenage schoolboys, who all knew each other, into two groups and asked them to perform a number of “trivial tasks.” The boys were then asked to give money to fellow subjects, who were anonymous save for their group affiliation. As it turned out, the schoolboys consistently gave more money to members of their own group, even though these groups had just formed and were essentially meaningless.

“The mere division into groups,” wrote the psychologists, Henri Tajfel and Michael Billig, of the University of Bristol, “might have been sufficient to have produced discriminatory behavior.” Though not exactly Lord of the Flies, the experiment was a demonstration of the power of what’s called “social categorization”—and the penalties inflicted on the “out-group.”

Posted in Activism | 2 Comments

No More Epic Posts

Posted on February 15, 2011 by Self Righteous Cyclist

Last week, I deviated from my previous posts by cranking out a 1500-word epic about Lance Armstrong.  My original goal was to stimulate an invigorating discussion about the effects that a LA conviction could have on the entire bike industry, on bike commuters like you and me.  I laid out some facts.  I asked for comments.  But alas, no one obliged.

Upon reading my Google Analytics stats, I realized no one actually finished my homeric blog post.  Whoops!  So, lesson learned – I’ll be cutting down the length of my posts, but-BUT! The question still remains.  What will be the effect, if any, on you and me if Jeff Novitzky and his fellow federal investigators determine that Lance Armstrong is a lying, cheating fraud?  Collapse of the Trek?  Demise of LiveStrong?  Absolutely no effect?  Holler at me in the comments.

On a side note, I jokingly claimed that I wanted to improve my search engine ranking for the “Lance Armstrong is a self righteous dick” query.  I’m proud to say that I am number one for that.

Posted in Doping, General Belligerence, Pro Cycling | Tagged , | 6 Comments

The Lance Armstrong Effect

Posted on February 9, 2011 by Self Righteous Cyclist

Gratuitous photo of Lance just because I'm writing about him

Another blogger writing about Lance Armstrong? Really?  Yes, Really.  But fear not the boilerplate “did he dope?” conjecturing and testiculating.  I am writing this post today for two very important reasons:

1. I want to increase my search engine results for the “Lance Armstrong is a self righteous dick” query.  This also might mean that I need to blog about male genitalia.  Stayed tuned for what I come up with on that front.

2. I have an embarrassing confession to make – the reason I ride a bike around on a daily basis is Lance Armstrong.  It pains me to write it, but it’s true.

You’ve heard “The Story:”

Lance was an anonymous American triathlete, and later cyclist, who won big one-day races in Europe far before most Americans knew what the Tour de France was.  In 1996, he was diagnosed with metastatic testicular cancer and given a vanishingly small chance of survival.  After kicking the cancer (and part of his genitalia) to the curb, he returned to the sport.  During a dramatic comeback, Lance won the Tour de France a record seven consecutive times while simultaneously giving hope to cancer patients and decorating the wrists of anyone with at least one hand.  During a time when French-American relations were strained, our collective heart swelled with pride every July as dear old Lance ensured that the Star Spangled Banner played on the Champs-Elysees.

My first road bike, a LA-inspired acquisition. No, it's not a Trek.

And while I never idolized Lance Armstrong, his story at least got me interested in the sport of cycling.  I watched every minute of his last two Tours and acquired my first road bike in 2005, an aluminum Specialized Allez with Shimano 105 components.  My passion and excitement has grown ever since, to the point where I’m writing a bike blog targeted at the nerdiest of cycling nerds (that’s you, by the way).  Okay, back to the story:

Lance is one of the most polarizing figures in sports.  People believe that he’s either an inspirational hero whose only motivation is to enrich the lives of cancer patients and survivors or a lying, cheating, egotistical fraud who should be stripped of every award he won.  Lance Livestrong vs. Lance Pharmstrong.

But I don’t believe either.  It’s way more complicated than that.

The Lance Armstrong Effect

First of all, The Lance Armstrong Effect – Lance’s ability to bring awareness to himself and organizations he supports – is immense.  For instance, look at Google searches for “trek bikes”  in the United States between 2004 and the present:

Lance, sponsored by Trek, won both the 2004 and 2005 Tours de France.  He drove Google searches for Trek during July of each of those years.  Yet, when he was “retired” between 2006-2008, search spikes during the Tour evaporated.  Even though Alberto Contador won the 2007 Tour on a Trek, there was no search spike in America.  It was a world-class athlete, but it wasn’t Lance.  However, when Lance returned to the Tour in 2009 and 2010, so did interest in Trek Bicycles.  That, folks, is the Lance Armstrong Effect.

Contador won the 2007 Tour on a Trek, but most Americans didn't notice.

Similarly, the number of spectators at the Tour de Lance France diminished after Lance’s retirement and exploded upon his return.  I couldn’t find exact figures for this, but I did find a recent article about Lance’s affect on the Tour Down Under. The size of the crowd at the TDU jumped 39% when Lance return to international competition in 2009 over the previous year.  That’s enormous, and that’s the Lance Armstrong Effect.

The Doping Effect

Okay, so the Lance Armstrong Effect is very powerful, but I couldn’t write a blog post without mentioning Lance’s doping allegations, right?  Well I’ll get there, but first, let’s look at the Doping Effect – the destructive series events that necessarily follows a rider’s doping violation – on the sport of cycling in general.

The general process of a doping violation runs something like this:

  1. A rider gets caught doping.
  2. The rider gets fire and the rider’s team issues a statement that they are committed to clean cycling and that the doped rider cheated with no knowledge or involvement of the team.
  3. Regardless, the team’s sponsors leave the sport
  4. TV advertisers don’t want to be associated with a “dirty” sport and bail out.
  5. Casual fans get tired of trying to guess who’s doped and who isn’t and stop following the sport
  6. Future heroic performances (e.g. Cancellara’s dominant ride at Paris-Roubaix last year) are immediately attributed to doping
  7. Downward spiral

To highlight this process further, the most recent edition of VeloNews describes how Alberto Contador’s positive test for Clenbuterol took down an entire team on the other side of the world.  Late last fall, Pegasus Sports was putting the final pieces together before applying to be the first Australian ProTour team, thus guaranteeing a coveted entry into the Tour de France.

One of the hardest parts of founding a ProTour team is finding a title sponsor.  Finding someone who will pay you a lot of money to ride around with their name on your sweating spandex is not an easy feat.  Yet, Pegasus had just about secured the deal to have Red Bull as their title sponsor, but just weeks before the paperwork was due at cycling’s governing body (UCI) news spread of Tour champion Alberto Contador’s positive test for clenbuterol.

Even though the amount of clenbuterol was vanishingly small and quite probably was a result of accidental ingestion, Red Bull got cold feet, fearing being associated with a sport riddled with cheaters, and backed out.  Pegasus was unable to find another sponsor in time and the entire team has since collapsed, leaving many riders without a job.

The Lance Armstrong Effect vs. The Doping Effect

The demise of Pegasus was the result of a tiny bit of clenbuterol in one test by a rider that, while a 3-time Tour winner, does not have the name recognition of Lance Armstrong.  Now, consider the alleged federal investigation into possible systematic doping by Lance Armstrong’s Tour teams.

I’m not going to enumerate the allegations against Armstrong, but let’s just say it’s a little bit more serious than a little clenbuterol.

A delicate balancing act for those who've supported Lance

Think about all of the organizations and people who have backed Armstrong over the years – The UCI, USA Cycling, Trek Bicycles, Don Catlin, Chris Carmichael, past teammates of Armstrong all stand to have their reputations tarnished – nay, destroyed – if they protected the rampant cheating that lead to many Tour de France victories.  Due to the Lance Armstrong Effect, it was in the best interest of these parties to pump “The Story” in the faces of naysayers.  All of the above parties had a serious financial interest in milking the story of Armstrong as the golden boy of cycling.

However, if the UCI or USA Cycling are shown to be complicit in this alleged “systematic doping,” the effect could not be understated.  It would be, uh, bad.  Sponsors and advertisers would leave the sport en masse, fan support would erode, and lycra-clad vandals would loot in the streets.  Even more seriously, the important mission of the Livestrong Foundation could be undermined, leading to an evaporation of donor support which would directly impact cancer patients, survivors, and researchers.

So this leaves me conflicted.  Normally, like any reasonable person, I believe that anyone who has committed a crime needs to face the consequences.  But not now.  The stakes for cycling as a sport (and maybe even beyond the sport) are too high.  While I would love to know for sure that the athletes I cheer on every season are free from performance enhancing drugs, I am willing to – just this once – accept not knowing the truth about Armstrong.  I’m not saying that I believe he doped or didn’t dope.  I’m just saying I’d rather not know for sure.

In the comments, tell me:

Are the stakes too high for Armstrong to be tried like any other athlete?  Is he “too big to fail”?

How, if at all, would the demise of Lance Armstrong effect non-sport cyclists such as commuters like you and me?  Would people give it up?  Would manufacturers

Am I singing a doomsday song?  Would life go on unchanged after a conviction of Lance Armstrong for systematically defrauding the US Postal Service?

Posted in Doping, Pro Cycling | 2 Comments

State of the Bike 2011

Posted on January 31, 2011 by Self Righteous Cyclist

Nicole Freedman gratuitously photoshopped into a picture of the the real State of the Union.

Reminiscent of a similar speech made last week by Prez O, Boston Bike Czar Nicole Freedman took to the pulpit Thursday night to deliver an update on the state of things.  Since I could think of nothing more thrilling than enjoying the company of the only 350 people in Boston more self-righteous about cycling than yours truly, I dutifully attended.

Last week we found out that cyclists generally don’t like surprises like the proposed seven-fold increase in traffic fines.  So, in much the same anticlimactic way that news outlets released the full text of the State of the Union address before the speech was given, Nicole Freedman outlined 99% of what she addressed Thursday night in a same-day Boston Globe column.

If you weren’t at the meeting, I highly suggest reading the column.  Per usual with any bike-related article on Boston.com, feel free to skip the comments section.

Cyclists don't pay for the roads, blah, blah, blah...

Yawn. Myths like this don't get old, do they?

Here are the main points of the night worth noting (in my mind, anyway):

  1. Number one has to be the following statistic from the program booklet: “Ridership increase 2007 through 2009: 122%”  That’s right – a more than two-fold increase in “ridership” – however that’s defined – in just 3 years.  Rock on, Boston!
  2. With this increase in people on bikes comes an increase in the “bike-onomy.”  Ironically, the sales tax from this increase in bike-related purchases helps to fund…  the MBTA.
  3. I admittedly was one of the many who got their bib shorts in a bunch upon reading about the proposed new law that would increase maximum traffic fines for cyclists from $20 – $150. Luckily, Nicole averted a lycra-clad mutiny and set the record straight on this one, explaining that police could fine up to $150 for chronic scofflaws, but the new law wouldn’t mandate such a hefty slap for first-time offenders.
  4. The bike share program has all the money needed to start – some $4.5m – and they’re hoping to launch this year. (Sound familiar?) The only catch is that they don’t have a vendor yet.  In my opinion, the bike share program is a huge risk for the city.  I mean, what could be risky about adding 600 new bikes to the city overnight?  Look for a post on this topic in the coming weeks.
  5. The “Bike Lanes” page of the program booklet was clearly meant to show a string of people relishing the protection afforded by the painted fortress that is the BU bridge bike lane.  Surely, though, they could have taken a better picture?  The first person in the line of bike lane users is exercising his/her right not to be captured photographically.  Is riding a bike that shameful?  Maybe it’s the helmet visor.  Those are pretty shameful, although the third guy didn’t get that memo, did he?  Behind the Cyclist of Shame is…. a pedestrian.  REALLY?  I think my eyes were deceiving me at first.  Yet, in stark contrast to the parade leader, this pedestrian (at least 10 feet from the sidewalk) wears no look of shame.  After thinking long and hard about this person, thereby missing at least half of Nicole’s presentation, I determined that this person MUST have been photoshopped in.  Why?  To fill a void in the line of happy, albeit shameful, bike lane users – that’s why.  I bet he won’t get a $150 fine.
Bike Lanes

The picture on the "Bike Lanes" page of the program booklet gave a rare glimpse inside the labyrinthine cave that is the Boston Bikes office: "Quick, we need to find a picture of people in bike lanes. It doesn't matter what they're doing, just find me a damned picture!"

Posted in Activism, Around Town | 5 Comments

When Pros Crash

Posted on January 25, 2011 by Self Righteous Cyclist

Note: Instead of today’s regularly scheduled programming, I’ve written about something that has affected me recently – pro cyclists getting into accidents while training.  While I don’t think the death of a pro cyclist is sadder than that of a bike commuter like you or me, the former is certainly receives more publicity and highlights the dangers we face every time we mount our bikes.  I’m sorry my second blog post is such a somber one – I’ll make up for it with something more lighthearted in a few days.

One of the best parts of cycling, the professional sport, is that it doesn’t differ too greatly from cycling, the recreational activity and mode of conveyance.  The well-heeled among us can purchase the same bikes our favorite pros ride, and just about anyone can run alongside these same pros as they ascend the grueling cols of Le Tour.  While pro cycling isn’t a made-for-TV sport like football or baseball, a fan’s access to the pro cyclist is much greater than that of a pro ball-player.  But, just as they aren’t protected from their craziest fans on L’Alpe d’Huez, pro cyclists are afforded no more protection from motorized traffic than is your local club racer.

In what sport do fans have greater access to the atheletes? Photo credit: brian88.

Their accidents are often public and sometimes tragic.  This rang true for me just over a year ago when Andy Schleck was hit by a car while training.  “Don’t pros train on closed roads or at least have team cars following them?” I wondered. Unless you’re Lance Armstrong, the answer is usually “no.” Most top pros receive three bikes from their team: a race bike, a time trial bike, and a training bike that they keep at home for when they aren’t traveling with their team.  When they’re training by themselves, pros are very much on their own and neither sleepy truck drivers nor texting teens care if they’re the World Champion or 5-time winner of the Race Across America (RAAM).

I was stunned to open Cycling News in September to find that Jure Robic died as a result of head-on collision with a car (the driver of which was not at fault).  His 5 RAAM victories had labeled him, at least in my mind, as a semi-human cycling machine.  I mean, he rode across this vast country in less than nine days, averaging about a half an hour of sleep per day.  He holds the world record for the number of miles ridden (over 518) in a single 24-hour period.  Surely this man could not subject to the pesky laws of physics.  But he was – just like you and I.

Even more recently Carla Swart, a fellow product of collegiate cycling, was killed while riding in South Africa.  She was an unbelievable talent who dominated the collegiate cycling with Lees-McRae college and had recently joined the HTC-Highroad women’s team.  She will be missed dearly.  The publicity her death received on VeloNews.com and other popular outlets serves as a reminder of how little real protection we have on a bike.

It’s tempting to distance yourself, though, from such news stories.  You can easily tell yourself that the risk is much greater for pros because they ride 5+ hours every day, and maybe that’s true to a certain extent.  But as annoying as it is, the anti-cycling crowd have a point when they constantly reminds us that we are no match for their 2-ton hunks of steel and glass.  We have no chance.  It doesn’t take 6 hours a day to end a life, only a split second of inattention.  Ride safe.

Edit: When I was writing this post, I read about the cyclist who died downtown yesterday. This hit even closer to home than what I have written above – my daily commute takes me just two blocks from yesterday’s accident.

Posted in Accidents, Pro Cycling | 2 Comments

A Brief Introduction

Posted on January 18, 2011 by Self Righteous Cyclist

When I started this blog, I figured I should just check to make sure no one else had  beat me to what I feel is a clever name for a blog (I patted myself on the back).  So, I Googled “Self Righteous Cyclist,” and while I was happy to not find any self-proclaimed smugly moralistic cyclists, I was inundated with post about such cyclists.

One of the many, similarly-themed posts was entitled “Give Me a Fu**ing Break Crazy Cyclists.”  The author lamented that,  “too many cyclists are self righteous bastards” who torment pedestrians – a common chorus among the ambulatory public.

It’s no surprise to anyone who bikes in Boston that the year-to-year increase in the number of cyclists on our streets further ratchets up the car vs. bike and bike vs. pedestrian turf war.  The issue is that there just isn’t that much turf to go around.  Many of Boston’s streets were built before cars and bikes (and maybe even shoes) were invented.  Have you ever tried to bike through the North End when the restaurants are receiving their deliveries en masse?  Fuhgeddaboudit.  Luckily, the investment in cycling infrastructure has come quickly over the past three years.

Snarl
Boston’s bike infrastructure is improving rapidly, but it’s still a jungle out there. Photo credit:moominmolly

But has it come too quickly?  I wouldn’t blame you for thinking so.  An uproar in Charlestown over the mysteriously-disappearing bike lanes has led some to question whether the rapid outlay of bike lanes is turning the non-riding public from cautiously indifferent to actively indignant.

A commenter on a Boston Globe article about possible new bike lanes on Mass Ave. in Arlington stated he/she didn’t want her beloved Mass Ave (who loves Mass Ave, anyway?), “sliced & diced by some feel-good numbskull ‘planners’ looking to appease a relative miniscule, yet incredibly squeaky, group of [cyclists].”  Other comments showed similar disdain for our squeaky minority.

So, we haven’t yet won the hearts of those who “share” the road with us, but have we done anything to deserve it?  I know anyone reading such a highbrow bike blog as this one obeys all traffic laws and never yells obscenities at motorists.  Sure.  But, for everyone of us I see, I see four red light-running, sidewalk terrorists.  (On a side note, these same people seem to have no regard for bike maintenance.  Perhaps they are the “squeaky” ones that commenter was talking about.)

So, as a collective bicycling mass, we aren’t necessarily earning any respect from those who could easily kill us with their 4,000+ pound SUV on the way to Starbucks.  However, we can’t just sit quietly, appeased by the current pro-bike administration.  Political tides change quickly, and we need to be better organized in our attempt to be seen as legitimate users of Bostons roads.  WHO’S WITH ME!?

Okay then.

I intend this blog to be a soapbox of sorts to share some thoughts, stories, ideas about riding bikes.  You didn’t expect me to talk about trampolines, did you?

So what does this have to do with being self righteous, you ask?

Well, now you’re just getting ahead of me.  This IS my first blog post.  Give me a few days and I’ll get back to you.

Posted in Uncategorized | 9 Comments