I broke a spoke.

Howdy!

Yup, 85F for the ride home. Niiiice....

Couple of happenings on my commute recently: last week I was at Group Health for tests & left my Expedition Touring bike locked out front in their rack. Rode home and hung it in my garage. A few days later, I noticed that some tidy thief had removed the blinkie light from my rack. Took the light & bracket but replaced the nut & bolt that was holding it! Yesterday as I rode down the access road near St Peter's Hospital, a young raccoon crossed the road about 100 yds in front of me then turned to watch me as I approached. When I was about 10 feet away, he paniced, whirled around & dove into the underbrush. There is about a 50 foot incline there that leads down to a wetland area & as I rode on I could here lots of thrashing & crashing. Not sure if he was still running or rolling end for end! At least he learned the road is a place to avoid. Don

Rain on the way to work and mud on the way home . It was still a good commute today . Have a good nite .

Bizarre day today (like most days on the bike I guess). Really, these are the best.

I passed someone this morning and suddenly did this gesture I'd never done before. I waved. I don't know why, but I just did. Sort of like to say:"Don't mind that I passed you, it wasn't to piss you off, just because I'm late for a meeting" or "If this is your first time getting passed by someone going at a decent speed, you did a good job, no swearving, no nothing, really keep up the good work." (That person didn't look like a very experienced cyclist. I could be wrong, though...)

Then something very strange happened. I came to an intersection, down a steep hill at 45 km/hr and didn't really look at the light. When I realized I had to stop, I put the brakes full on and stopped just inches away from pedestrians about to cross the street. I apologized and, surprisingly, they smiled and thanked me for realizing my mistake. Usually I just get yelled at... even when I come in very slowly, that's it's 100% clear I've seen them and that I stop a whole foot in front. I don't know how far they want me to stop, but really...

Then I saw my first lefty fork and it just made me wonder, deeply and genuinely, "Why would you design a fork like that?"

And if someone can answer that question, I'd appreciate. I'm a mechanical engineer and the only reason I could come up with right now is "Because it looks cool." I say this with some reserve. I haven't really worked out the problem, but I don't see how you'd save weight (must be built stronger to resist the new torque and the doubled load) or improve stability by that much...

I got some good news today. I found out there is a security guard overnight at my campus, which means I can leave my car there and do a "one-way commute." The campus is somewhat isolated and I was worried my car wouldn't be safe there but he said others have left their cars overnight for various reasons and in the two years he's been there, there has never been a problem. He's a cyclist, too, and I think he'll make a point of keeping an eye on my car.

So when the fall semester begins (August 29) I'll be doing the whole 17 miles -- one leg at a time!

I am having so much FUN riding now! And I can tell that a little less strain on my cardiovascular system is allowing me to increase the use of my muscles -- for the first time since I started cycling in March, I actually have some sore muscles!

I asked the same question the first time I saw a Leftie (yes, I'm an engineer to ) the answer I got was "it's lighter this way". Anyways, the new friction you talk about is probably very similar to the friction any fork gets when you are breaking and the suspension works, so all forks experience similar friction. But the main question in my mind is why they don't make rigid forks like this (or do they?)

Great ride home last night. I was really suprised by the tempature when I left work. It was really really cool. It rained some in the afternoon. I got some light showers on the way home too, it felt good. It almost felt like October out there.

Ride in this morning was good. Traffic was a little heavy, but saw a pretty nice sunrise.

This morning I had possibly the best commute to my new (as of May) job so far. Temp was in the high 60's at 6:30ish AM, slight tailwind and the best of all, NO IDIOTS. I honestly did not feel the need to curse out anybody today (not that I do, but you know the feeling). The only really annoying thing was a cop car parked in the bike lane near home, pointed the wrong direction to boot. I would have stopped to take a pic with the cameraphone but the cops were right there and you know, don't want to be called the "T" word.

Today was the first day that I managed to drag myself out of bed early enough to take a longer route. It still onlyl came out to five miles, but that's still nearly double my normal hop and skip.

Due to the heat, I'll be taking the path of least resistance on the way home.

Temps in the high 50Fs. Low humidity. Sunny. Perfect conditions! I followed a murder of crows that were flying about 15 feet above the trail for maybe half a mile. Sort of like being one with nature or something.

Very nice temperatures today for riding. It felt almost like a fall morning ride! Very little sweat flowing at the end of my ride, but plenty warmed up.

Temperature was 75 at 0630 this morning. Ride was uneventful, except for a head wind and I noted that it took me six more minutes to complete the commute today. Don't have a clue as to why I was so slow.

You're right that the friction forces are roughly the same. The new torque I was refering to was from the fact the now the support structure is not symmetrical. Even doing a trackstand, the fork would have an extra torque that's not in "normal" forks. But then... oh well... as some said in other threads, the lefty is a Cannondale proprietary thing (at least so far) with a non-standard headset size and so on and so on... let's wait and see if other companies pick up. Meanwhile, I'm leaving for my morning commute. Great weather, a bit warm, but I don't have that far to go anyway. Only 9km.

My wife and I work in the same agency but on different schedules usually. Usually her commute involves a combined drive/light rail trip. But yesterday her schedule synched with mine and I was able to convince her to ride in with me.

The weather was perfect and I took her on the calmest route I could think of. She tends to ride too far into the door zone, but I just mentioned it once. I didn't want to nag her. (Nor did I say anything about her cadence, gear selection, etc... )

It was a great day.

Arrgh. Stupid me. Collided with a pedestrian on a pathway through campus this afternoon.
I always go a safe speed, knowing this could happen, and I always announce my presence
loudly and well in advance, but today was not my lucky day. The student was very
apologetic, and seemed genuinely concerned about me. She was also rather cute, so it
wasn't that bad... However, the wreck did tear a small chunk out of my Motobecane's
22 year-old one-piece faux leather bar wrap, so now I'm going to sob... the bike was pristine.

Well this morning was comfortable but uneventful; this afternoon it spit rain on me all the way home but most importantly the number of bicycle commuters in my building doubled today. Now we have 2. So Mr. unknown Kona riding commuter I salute you.

my cummute was excellent i had a great time today .

From brooklyn bayridge to ridgewood NJ (ROUTE: via the mannhattan bridge up the west side path up broadway at 125 th until 174th and the george washington bridge to 505 north to left W palisade ave then teaneck rode north left onto w madison ave to oradell ave to ridgewood . a little windy but managable. effort level 7.5 from 1-10 . time 2:20 minutes .

Any ride from brooklyn to NYC or NJ often ?

Good ride to work and home . My commuting bike is still in the shop . I will have to pick it up this weekend .
The bike shop owner said it mite need some more work .
I will have to test ride it to see . Have a good nite .

Great rides all week and today was no exception. Good company, good weather, good speed. Tomorrow will close two weeks of "no excuses" 5-day biking.

I had an amazing run on the way in this morning, almost 9 miles without hitting a red light! Never had that happen before, it was just some freaky combination of traffic density keeping the gates open plus a boosted rate of travel 'cause a fellow biker was hoovered onto my rear wheel.

I made two technical errors though that kept today from being a perfect 10. On the way in said cyclist went on through a yellow that I should have taken too. Instead I left a stripe, nearly locked 'em up to stop and it suprised me as much as it did her. Just the wrong split-second choice.

Then on the way home I had my first near-topple since I started riding clipless last week. Was going uphill through a slow-you-down gate on the multi-use-path, with two riders behind me and one coming towards. I got sloppy and too slow and had to YANK both feet out of the cleats to avoid falling. None too suave!

But damn, who else looks forward to going to work as much as the bike commuter?? Not many.

No commute today! Heavy rain, windy and cold 50 deg F. (N.East Scotland) Hoping for an improvement tomorrow. Have'nt done a five day set this summer!!

High 50Fs and sunny this morning. I saw a bunny rabbit.

I need to tighten my brake cables this weekend. That is all.

No commute today as it's my day off.

In my approximately two months of commuting, I've only had two rude encounters. The first time, I had only been commuting for a couple of weeks and had read some posts on here about being sure to enjoy the ride. So I took a deep breath, looked around, a little, listened to the birds, etc., and then a huge diesel utility truck came up behind me, rode my wheel going around a curve, and finally blasted it's horn at me.

The second time, yesterday, I was riding along, thinking about how I had only had one rude encounter in my two months of commuting, when a guy in a car passing me going the OTHER direction, yelled A**HOLE at me for absolutely no other reason than the fact that I was there.

Both times, I had to laugh at the timing of these events!

Commute today was cool -- the wife wanted to do a bunch of miles on the Greenway on her own (she's on vacation now, lucky!) so she got up early to go with me most of the way to work on continue on her own. Sure, it added nearly 15 minutes to my commute (she can't keep up... yet!) but it was well worth it.

Excellent commute today. Wonderful weather after last night's thunderstorm; a cool breeze, rain dripping
off tree branches, overcast sky... great. No more 100+ degree days... (I hope!)

The last friday of every month, we have a 'Bicyclist Breakfast' for commuters at a neigborhood restaurant.
This morning, we were talking about organizing a criterium in our downtown, which is currently
undergoing major roadwork to make the streets more bike/ped friendly. That would be excellent... our
two neighboring towns, Raleigh and Chapel Hill have road races, but Durham has never had anything.

A group of us were also talking about organizing a bike co-op downtown after the road construction mess
is over... that would be an interesting development, also. There are 3 or 4 of us with garages/sheds full
of bike parts and tools, and we're talking about combining our talents and resources (and our shops) to
help fill a niche.

I'm glad we started doing these breakfasts (only been a few months, now) - it's a great opportunity to
meet other cyclists, and to network and brainstorm about shared goals.