Today's retrogrouch ride
 

I met Craven Moarhead today for the first time, at his place. He showed me most of his various bikes, and I tried them. Then we took a real kick-ass bike ride through rural roads near him. We went pretty fast, and it was the first time I had gone that fast for that long in a while. We went about 27 miles in all.

First, I tried his balloon tire Varsity. What a scream that thing is. It rides like a tank, eagerly soaking up any surface irregularities. Handling is slow but friendly and predictable. Shifting is really weird, as the shifters are mounted on the top tube backwards. Pull the right shifter back to shift the front derailleur down, and so on. Braking is excellent on this bike, equipped with two drum brake hubs. With brakes this good, who would want disk brakes? And of course, acceleration and hill climbing on this bike are not good at all. But that's not what it's built for. It's an awesome hauling and errand bike.

I tried his Austro Daimler racing bike. Not ready for prime time. It has bent up wheels with loose spokes. and it rides with a shimmy. I look forward to the improvements.

The Super Course is very nice. The repaint job is amazing. Brakes work better than on my Weinmann centerpull equipped Super Course. I'm not sure why, but I think it's the levers. His fork is an aftermarket one, and it seems to make the bike a bit more stable and nimble than mine.

So there we were, in our street clothes, riding on the road with the other weekend bike riders in their lycra getups. Craven wore cut off jean shorts. I had rolled up painter pants and sandals on. (SPD sandals, though). I had a t-shirt on, too. I own all the garb, but it seemed fitting not to wear it while riding our old bikes.

We had the same model bike! I call mine a 1971 Raleigh Super Course, though it might be a 1972. Craven thinks his is a 1972.

Mine is a 21", and his is a 23". We both think mine feels that it climbs more eagerly. It may be because the frame is smaller thus stiffer.

I also looked at the Miyata frame he scored at the Trexlertown bike swap. It's amazing. It's a hard-core steel racing frame, and inspired by the Italian designs of the day. I expect it to be extremely responsive and nimble.

Max speed today was 35.7 mph. Average was 14.3 mph.

Oh, and it hit 70ºF today, and it was sunny. Very unusual for this time of year. Very enjoyable, too, needless to say.

Sounds like a great ride. I love those 15mph average days.

that shot down Kinnelon Rd where we hit 35 was a hoot! :)

It was great to meet Tom and to have a blast through the hills and Alpaca farms of Morris County, and that little Super Course of his climbs like a beast. Next time i'll remember the camera.

the question we were both left with was: Why would anyone want Disc Brakes when Drum's work so well?

OH don't rub it in about how great your ride was. some of us actually had to work for a change

but it was sunday! did you have to work on sunday?

OH *blushing* I didn't see the date. nonglider must have posted this after I signed off lastnight. I did have a nice ride yesterday myself, out by the South Regional and Flying W airports.

I was gonna say! with such a nice day it was, it would be a crime to have been forced to work. :)

I had some nice rides today, too. I rode to see three clients today, all of whom were very close. Then I rode to a new bike shop (for me) which is ten miles away. The owner doesn't shun folks with old bikes, which is nice. He even has some nice old bikes for sale. He is also helping a woman custom make a heavy duty tricycle. She's welding the frame herself and works as a blacksmith in a museum.

I ordered some Park dropout tools from the bike shop. The $80 are hard to come by, but I really need them.

In total, I rode about 25 miles today. The weather was terrific.

ah, decided to go for the dropout tools. :thumb:

Sounds like a great ride. I spent the weekend 'sicker than a dog' and still had to get the leaf blower going (leaves were between ankle and knee deep in the back yard....)

And of course I made time to score a Cannondale. Duty first!

Great report!

Nice ride! My car was in the shop all weekend, so yesterday I rode ~23 miles to the climbing gym in morrisville, climbed for 2 hours, then rode back. On the way back I thought of a great name for a new route there, which I will set later this month..."gym morrisonville"...anyway, today I bike commuted to work (car still in shop)
10 miles, then rode 12-14 miles after work to pick up my car. Part of the way (several miles) were being prepped for repaving and extremely rough, it was the "paris-roubaix" section of my ride!

Nice, let me get a vicarious ride in, after the fact!

My daughter had her last soccer game of the season. Her team had gone undefeated for a long time, but by Sunday morning they had lost two games, and were up against another team that had lost two times. These two teams had played each other twice, each winning once. The difference is that when my daughter's team won, the other team's best player --let's call her #10-- had been absent. The time #10 was there, she had scored five times.

So on Sunday our coach took a look at the field and determined the other team had four subs, and #10 was in position at midfield. We had no subs, unless you count two injured girls who really could not play (but who were wearing their uniforms to show support). So the coach assigned my daughter the job of neutralizing threat #10. And this she did; stuck to her through the whole game, got underfoot more than once, kicked the ball away anytime it approached. Both girls are thin and nimble, and from a distance look about the same, but when they got close together you could see that #10 stands a good 8" taller than my daughter. But it didn't matter. #10 was not able to get the ball long enough to control it, and had to resort to passing it as fast as possible, which she had evidently never had to do before. At one point she kicked the ball right into my daughter's face (perfectly fair thing to do, and she probably didn't mean it anyway), knocked her flat; coach took her out and put one of the injured girls in, but once they determined she hadn't broken her nose (again), she was back under #10's feet. It's a dirty job, but someone has to do it!

One of our girls scored twice; the other team did not. Each girl got a little trophy that said "league champions." I normally hate those things, but on this particular occasion the girls looked really proud to get them, knowing they had deserved it.

That's very cool, rhm. How old is your daughter? One of my (two) daughters played soccer from third through sixth grade. I never realized how exciting kids' sports could be. For me, they were as exciting as professional spectator sports, perhaps more so. Those girls learned to be tough. The job was very tough, and I remember one day they played in the pouring rain. The rain never let up. And the girls never complained.

I would have loved to be in your daughter's place this past weekend. She played a very important role. Her coach is very smart. And yes, the team really earned the trophy.

Thanks, Tom! I totally agree, scrappy little girls make for a great spectator sport. Mine is 10. This was the 9-10 league, but the girls actually ranged 8-11; the 8 year olds were bigger than any of the 11's and most of the 10's.

or look out the window at a week of rain now ..MMMm winter time in Sweden ,it lasts atleast 6 months :crash:


sounds like a real delight to have 70 degrees weather .............

Sunday was a real treat for NJ in November. This is not normal weather, although what is normal weather is changing.

After reading a piece in the NYTimes, I just had to search for video on this college women's soccer player. Sign your daughter up for some martial arts training if she plans to continue playing!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvEob...layer_embedded

This is an el nino winter. Last one was 2001. If I remember correctly we just got a dusting of snow that melted by noon the next day. Get ready for a nice winter riding season in the Mid-Atlantic ;)

I'll second this. :twitchy:

We northern bike bums live precariously though you guys sharing your stories of mild weather during November through March, while our's just stinks! :o

We just stay indoors, wrench, and pack on the pounds. :(

I always seem to have to work on Sundays. Why is that? :innocent:

Here in the NH mountains, we're preparing for the a record snow year. El Nino winters usually bring us many big ones. My prediction: Last patch of snow melts no earlier then May 10, 2010. :notamused:

Holy spit, that #15 girl is nasty! I'd take her out for the entire season for all those things she did.

I sure hope you're right about this.

Oh, my! It's almost as bad as rugby! Reminds me of a photo that was in the Yale Daily News a few decades back.
http://rachelmarsden.files.wordpress...bush_rugby.jpg

She's very contrite in the NYTimes article, but I'm not sure I buy her plea of 'temporary insanity.' However, in context, I can see how and why she might retaliate for some dirty play against her. She simply went a bit too far.

Hey, if it's good enough for El Jefe...