GeekCyclist

Only Cowards Hit And Run

2009-04-01T21:38:00.000-07:00

In the past two weeks there have been two seperate incidents where cyclists have been critically injured in hit-and-run collisions in the Salt Lake City area....

The rest of this post is on my new blog - GeekCyclist.com

Moving Day

2009-03-31T22:16:00.000-07:00

I am moving!

I recently set up a couple of domain names that I have owned for a while. I felt like one of the things that was keeping me from blogging as much as I wanted to (besides the laziness) was that I was losing focus on this blog. I never knew whether a particular topic was too 'cyclist' for the geek side, or too 'geek' for the cyclist side.

So...

I have split my blog into

agilecoder.net - primarily tech topics
geekcyclist.com - cycling and the rest of my varied interests

I am sure there will be some crossover, but it is my intention to keep an appropriate focus for each blog.

Jump on over to which ever (or both) suits your interest and update your RSS feed.

Log4Net ConversionPattern Strings

2008-12-11T22:21:00.000-08:00

Several months ago we began to transition from an in-house logging framework to Log4Net in our primary web applications. For the last couple of days I have been trying to troubleshoot some production problems in the two of these applications and I noticed that my Log4Net logs were using a 12hr clock for the timestamp, and didn't include an AM/PM indicator. It also used old style parameter names rather than the newer verbose parameters.

Seeing as how I tend to cut and paste code for things like that, and I know other programmers do as well, I figured I would blog about what I am switching to, as well as a couple of other options. In case you are not really familiar with log4net, this setting is changed by editing the value string for the ConversionPattern param in the - log4net --appender - section of the web or app config file:

<param name="ConversionPattern" value="your string here"/>

The old:
value="%-5p %d{yyyy-MM-dd hh:mm:ss} - %m%n"
Results in:
ERROR 2008-12-03 01:28:38 - login.aspx submitted for 7234

Besides the timestamp problem, the format string is difficult to understand. It is not at all obvious what 'p', 'd', 'm' and 'n' stand for. Well, maybe the fact that 'd' is followed by a date format string you could guess that it stood for Date.

The following link lists both the shortcut and the verbose fomat values from the Apache log4net documentation.

The one I am switching to:
value="%-5level %date{yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss} - %message%newline">

Note the more obvious setting names. This value string results in:
INFO 2008-12-11 14:06:59 - login.aspx submitted for 7234

Other choices:
value="%-5level %date{G} - %message%newline">
Results in
INFO 12/11/2008 2:15:07 PM - login.aspx submitted for 7234

value="%-5level %date{yyyy-MM-dd hh:mm:ss t} - %message%newline">
Results in
INFO 2008-12-11 02:06:59 P - login.aspx submitted for 7234

value="%-5level %date{G} - %message%newline">
Results in
INFO 12/11/2008 2:15:07 PM - login.aspx submitted for 7234

value="%-5level %date{u} - %message%newline"
Results in (not this is UTC time)
INFO 2008-12-11 14:06:59Z - login.aspx submitted for 7234

Those of you familiar with date string formats in the .Net framework will recognize some of these strings. The Log4Net framework allows you to use any date format that is valid in a ToString() call in the .Net framework. For additional format strings see the MSDN Format String Documentation.

Adding A New Label

2008-12-01T22:32:00.000-08:00

I am long past due for an update to this blog. Part of my lack of motivation is knowing that most of the people who subscribe via various readers came here for the cycling posts. Unfortunately, other than my sporadic attempts to attend my local spinning class, I have reverted to near non-cyclist status.

This is not my preferred lifestyle, but represents a trade-off based on life long passions and priorities. Perhaps a little history is in order...

Many, many years ago in the very late years of the fabulous decade commonly referred to as the '80s', I met a fabulous woman. This woman became my wife, and led me to exclaim jokingly that in my life, she ranked right up there with Basketball and Subway Sandwiches. While she is clearly (at least I hope it's clear to people other than me, and to her most of all) at the top of my list, basketball remains a deep love, one that after years of devotion has come to return my favor.

My New Gig
About two months ago I was approached by the head coach of my son's high school basketball team about the possibility of joining his staff. It took several weeks of negotiations with family, bosses and my own insecurities, but approximately 3 weeks ago I became an assistant basketball coach and the head (read 'only') sophomore basketball coach for the high school. I run practice for 2-2.5 hours after my regular job each day, and will be on the bench for 20 soph, 21 JV and 21 varsity games.

This is truly a labor of love, because so far all I have been paid is 4 t-shirts and a pair of shorts. I am sure that the income will never come close to the costs. It probably won't even cover my gas money for the season. But already, having lost our first game by 20, and watching as the varsity lost by 50 to one of the premier programs in the state, I can't help but smile and say to myself, "Tomorrow is going to be a great day...I get to coach basketball again."

See and Be Seen

2008-09-08T21:15:00.000-07:00

At work we recently switched from a standard 5x8 schedule to a 4x10 schedule. Among the other complications of this change is one of particular concern for cyclists. While in the past there was a major portion of the year where I could ride without lights, it seems I will need to use my lighting system year-round now.

A couple of co-workers have asked what kind of lighting system I use so I thought I would share my experiences here.

See or Seen

There are really two issues with bicycle lighting. Can you see, and can you be seen by others. In an 'urban' setting you may only be worried about being seen since street and building lights may provide plenty of light for you to see. Your speed can also be a big factor in this as well, as the faster you ride the more important your ability to read road conditions becomes.

For 'being seen' almost any reasonably bright white light will do and one that flashes may be better than on that only has a steady-state mode. On the bikes my family owns I have used several different manufactures and models, but have been very satisfied with several models of Cateye brand lights.

For my commute, I typically ride through a couple of industrial areas that are not well lit. I also ride at an average speed of around 16-18 mph through those areas, so the AA battery driven lights don't typically cast enough light an an appropriate pattern for my commute.

A wide range of lights are available that are more suitable for this use.

Eddy's bike shop in Ohio put up a great light comparison page. You can click on various systems and see the illumination, beam pattern and light color.

My Recommendation

The difference in cost between a AA or AAA battery driven system and the brighter rechargeable systems is significant. Unless you know that your speed and the road conditions require the brighter, more expensive systems, I would recommend you start with a low-cost light with a flashing mode. Then, if you decide it's not bright enough for your needs you can still use it in flashing mode, or as a helmet light when you upgrade.

Sarah get your gun

2008-09-01T21:46:00.000-07:00

I try not to get too political in my posts unless they fall into one of three categories:

I am absolutely outraged by something and just can't keep it to myself;
There is a political point to be made about transportation or cycling policy;
I see/hear something funny that has to be shared.

Today's post is a category 3 post.

I was just surfing the net, not really paying attention to the TV, which was tuned to the Larry King Show (clearly Mrs. GeekCyclist was in charge of the remote). There was a panel of 4 talking heads going on and on about the selection of Sarah Palin and the emerging complications related to her daughters pregnency. It was then I overheard this gem by one of the blatherers:

It's a good thing she's still a member of the NRA because it looks like it's going to be a shotgun wedding.

Excellent!

What Kind Of Bike Should I Buy?

2008-08-30T17:01:00.000-07:00

If you were paying attention I bought a bike about three months ago. My bike budget is zero, so the question here really isn't about me. In one week I was asked that by two neighbors and two co-workers. It seems like a get this question at least once every couple of weeks. I figure it must be gas prices. Even better, that question gives me a reason to write a new post.

It's not what, but where that counts the most...
The first thing I tell anyone asking about buying a new bike is that the best choice they can make is to go to their Local Bike Shop (LBS). There are a number of advantages to buying from your LBS rather than a department or discount store:

Qualified sales staff - if you ask them your question they should ask about the way you plan to ride and can match you to the right bike.
The bikes are higher quality, even at the bottom end of the catalog.
The bikes have been properly assembled by qualified mechanics.
Service is available after the sale, usually for free for a year or at a steep discount.
Usually any accessories you buy with the bike will be discounted.

What are you going to use it for?
Before you head to the LBS you should have a good idea of how and where you are going to ride your fancy new bike. Most people who are buying a first bike are looking to:

Ride around the neighborhood for fitness and fun
Ride parkways and paths (remember a car carrier to get the bike to the parkway if you live more than a couple miles away)
Ride in a charity ride like an MS-150 or a Tour de Cure
Replace local/short car trips and errands with bike trips
Commute to work

You should figure out what you think will be your primary use and then your top secondary uses. With the broad range of bicycles available you should be able to find something suitable within your price range. Sometimes the only thing that would need to change for one use to another would be accessories. For example if you want to ride paths and do charity rides but think you may also want to commute or run errands you may want to consider a rack and fenders.

The Test Ride
For most of the uses listed above, a bike in the 'cross' (not cyclocross), 'comfort' or 'hybrid' categories would be perfectly suitable. The key is to take as long a test ride as the store will let you. Bring your helmet, and wear the clothing you will normally wear when riding for your primary use. You want to make sure you are comfortable on the bike. Go back to the shop and have it adjusted and try again if something doesn't feel right.

Other Categories
The uses above are what most people list when they say they want to buy a first bike. There are other uses, and a lot of other categories. You may want to do technical or long distance mountain bike rides where a full-suspension bike would be appropriate. You may want to commute only, and might have a fairly flat route to work, in which case a trendy single-speed may be just the ticket.

The key is to tell the worker at your LBS what you want to do, listen to their suggestions, and try several models before you buy.

On Top Of Utah - The Videos

2008-08-17T08:00:00.000-07:00

My little Sanyo camera also takes videos. The actual quality is much higher than what you get when you post to YouTube, the these will give you an idea of beautiful area we backpacked in.

The view from our campsite. It was kind of early, so when I get the camera pointed east there is a pretty serious exposure problem...

The view from the top of Kings Peak. I think I was suffering from oxygen debt when I narrated the view from the peak. What I called Yellowstone Basin is actually Painter Basin, and the basin I didn't know the name of is the Yellowstone River Drainage.

On Top Of Utah - Kings Peak

2008-08-16T22:15:00.001-07:00

Brennan and I capped off our summer with a fantastic 3-day backpacking trip to Kings Peak; the highest point in Utah.

We started at the Henry's Fork Trailhead at about 11:00 AM on Monday. We proceeded to put in an 8 hour day of backpacking, hiking about 12 miles and over Gunsight Pass into Painter Lakes Basin.

This was the view outside our tent the next morning.

On Tuesday we hiked up to Anderson Pass, and then started the 0.8 mile boulder scramble to the top of the peak. I had figured we could make that portion of the hike in about an hour, but in the end I think it took us closer to two hours.

There were a number of people up on top when we got there, so we asked a volunteer to snap this picture for us.

We only stayed on top for a few minutes. Recognizing that the east face was really not that much steeper than the north ridge, we made a bee line down the east face and back to the meadow below the peak. I think that saved us about an hour of hiking time.

We got back to our campsite at about 4:00 PM, so we decided to pack everything up and head back into Henry's Fork Basin. We went back over Gunsight Pass and headed north for Dollar Lake. We camped about 1/2 a mile to the south east of the lake.

Neither of us slept well that night, so we were up by 6:00; packed and on the trail by 7:00. By 11:30 we were back at the trailhead and looking forward to lunch at the Pizza Hut in Mountain View, WY.

More Pictures

You can visit my Flickr Page for more pictures from this trip, including a critter, some wildflowers, and an unusually happy teenager.

Lessons Learned
We really hiked in an aggressive manner, putting in long days. If you have 4 or 5 days I would recommend spending the first night in Henry's Fork Basin, then crossing the pass on the second day and camping in Painter Lakes Basin. In fact, there are a number of pretty and secluded lakes in Henry's Fork Basin so you could spend several days there prior to crossing over. A key advantage of taking extra days would be that you would be better acclimatized when you actually attempt the peak.

There are a couple of short-cut routes to the base of the peak. In fact our campsite sat near a spring on one of the longer short-cuts. Most of the shortcuts involve significant boulder hopping or scree slope navigation. I am not sure that the savings in distance equal any savings in time unless you have experience navigating that kind of terrain.

Bike Lanes

2008-07-15T22:11:00.001-07:00

I made a mistake today. I read the newspaper opinion section which included a letter about bicycling. Then I compounded that mistake by going online and reading the comments.

Every time there is a plea in the paper for bicyclist safety you see the same arguments in the comments. From cycling opponents you see:

Cyclists don't pay for the roads. (False, cyclists actually subsidize auto traffic)
Cyclists should get out of the way, not impede traffic, or get on the sidewalk. (False, we are traffic, not impeding traffic; riding on the sidewalk is significantly more dangerous than riding on the road.)
Cyclists are scofflaws who run every light. (I am sure no motorist treats Stop's as Yields, nor do they speed, make turns without checking blind spots...)
Etc.

Each of those is a post or more. But one thing that frustrates me is when the cycling advocates plead for more bike lanes.

There are drawbacks to bike lanes The most dangerous place for cycling accidents are intersections. Bike lanes frequently complicate intersections and increase the conflicts between motorists and cyclists. A prime example is a bike lane that is a thru-lane, where there is a car turning right. The complications are even worse when a multi-use path crosses a road. Another drawback is that when a lane exists motorists sometimes believe that the cyclist must remain in that lane, so they don't allow or accept it if a cyclist has a legitimate reason to move to the left.

Don't get me wrong. I love some bike lanes. One of my commutes travels about 5 miles on a Class 2 (the kind that are striped like an additional traffic lane) bike lane. Bike lanes can be nice because they do separate traffic moving at different speeds, they may increase the passing distance when a car overtakes a bicycle, and I think they make novice "vehicular cyclists" feel safer.

At the same time, I am not sure people are really aware of what they are asking. I want to use my bike to ride to the library, Burger King, Subway, the grocery store, work. In short, I want to be able to ride everywhere I would normally drive. I recognize that I am not allowed on the major highways, but what these 'advocates' are really asking for is a bike lane on every road.

Clearly, that is not a realistic solution.

There are better alternatives. One is to advocate for and take advantage of vehicular cycling training. In Utah the Salt Lake Bicycle Collective teaches free courses that focus on riding in (becoming part of) traffic. You can visit the League of American Bicyclists education page to find similar programs or instructors in your area.

The other alternative is to advocate for Complete Streets. Complete Streets are designed and built with multiple user groups in mind; not just fast moving automobile traffic. From a cyclists point of view a complete street is a street with wider lanes and shoulders, rather than a marked bike lane, and includes traffic calming like median strip planters.

The movement for Complete Streets integrates well with the Safe Routes to School program. It also complements advocacy programs that highlight sustainable development and walkable communities.

Harmon's Best Dam MS-150 Report Continued

2008-07-05T20:45:00.000-07:00

Saturday Night
After the first day of ridding there is a big dinner at the fairgrounds, entertainment, and a raffle. They announced that it looked like the ride would net over 1.7 million this year. While everyone was sitting around talking the couple sitting across from me had to leave. Standing up, they asked the woman sitting next to me if she wanted their raffle tickets. Wouldn't you know it, the grand prize ticket was in that set of tickets; she won a Specialized Epic Marathon worth over $4,000. I couldn't believe it.

Brennan didn't get enough to eat, so we went to an A&W for burgers and treats. Brennan slept in the spare bed in Ken's room at the college. I spent a second night in my tent at the fairgounds, and actually slept much better that night.

Worshiping at the alter of Eddy Merckx
Usually Brennan and I don't ride on Sunday, but we make an exception for this ride. The Sunday 75 mile route is beautiful, traveling up Blacksmiths Fork Canyon for 17 miles to Hardware Ranch Recreation area.

Ken was able to ride with us, but was pretty tired from running around as a volunteer the day before. Brennan and I felt better that I thought we would, but neither of us wanted to do the whole 75 route. The 40 mile route skips the canyon. In the end we decided to ride the canyon and back down, and then just ride the few miles back to the fairgrounds. It was a fantastic decision.

We really enjoyed riding together. Ken is a mountain biker who is just getting into road biking as he prepares for a sprint triathlon coming in a month or so. Brennan and I introduced him to the concept of a 'town line sprint' as our custom route went through three or four little towns on the way back into Logan.

Ride Stats
The following links will take you to my MotionBased account ride stats. I had my Garmin Edge 305 with me, but I forgot my HR strap, so heart rate is missing.

Saturday's Ride
Sunday's Ride

Thanks again to all who donated. Hopefully you believe that this is a worthwhile cause, and an activity you can support in the future.

Harmon's Best Dam MS-150 Report

2008-07-02T21:29:00.001-07:00

First, that's not a typo - the Utah MS-150 ride took its name from the 3 or 4 dams that the ride passed when it was originally held in Park City. Even though it is held in Logan / Cache Valley now, it still passes a couple of dams and reservoirs.

The Fund Raising
I didn't make my goal but did raise a substantial amount. Brennan and I raised over $800 this year. We rode for the Harmon's team which looks to raise over $100,000 and the entire ride will probably raise over $1.7 million this year.

Thanks to everyone who donated to Brennan and I this year. There were a number of people who dug deep into their wallets and made donations in the last week, including a few that I know donated money that was budgeted for other expenses. I appreciate every penny.

The Trip
The drive up was great Ken from work rode up with Brennan and I. We left work early and made it on the rode by 1:00. Ken had to be at the Logan Fairgrounds around 4:00, so we had plenty of time. He volunteered (and worked very hard) on Friday and Saturday and rode with us on Sunday, which worked out perfectly. He also had a room at USU, so we had a place to shower even though I was camped at the fairgrounds.

We got to the fairgrounds early enough that I got a great camping space. Friday night was Team Dinner Night, and the Harmon's chefs put together a fantastic buffet of salmon, chicken, pasta salad and fruit. For a while I was sitting across from Dean, who I found out was the president of Harmons. Turns out that years ago he started as a stocker and worked is way up to the top. Inspiring.

Saturday's Ride
Brennan and I set out on Saturday not really knowing which of the three options (40,75 or 100 miles) we were going to ride. We really did very little training for the ride this year. We met Ryan and Natalie (friends from out neighborhood) at and early rest stop, but they were planning on riding the 40 route and we were feeling pretty good.

We then hooked up with Carmen from my spinning class. She was riding with Sophia who owns the salon where my wife and kids get their hair done. They had trained quite a bit more than we had and were planning on doing the 75. We rode with them to lunch and beyond, hoping to finish strong and together.

The Phone Call
Right before leaving on the ride I debated whether to bring my cell phone. I'm glad I did, even though it led to an interrupted ride. Neither Carmen nor Sophia had much experience riding in a pace line, so I was explaining to Sophia how to follow someones wheel safely when my phone rang.

Right before we left for Logan I had pushed some changes to one of my projects into production. On the phone was my boss, letting me know that the changes had a serious bug. It took about 45 minutes to walk him through the final stages of troubleshooting, backing out the bad code and publishing a clean application. Overall that went pretty well.

After 45 minutes of 'rest' hiding behind a tree so that every group that went by wouldn't ask me if I was okay, I felt pretty good. I cruised through the last rest stop in into the finish feeling pretty strong.

(To be continued...)

Big Ride Weekend

2008-06-26T21:34:00.000-07:00

The Utah MS-150 is this weekend, and I am really looking forward to it.

If you can spare a few minutes and a few dollars, please click on the "sponsor me" link to the right and help me meet my goal of $1,000 to fight this disease.

Honestly, I first registered for an MS Bike Tour because I had heard it was a fun way to do a century ride with friends on a well supported course. While that is certainly true, it's no longer the reason I ride.

I ride because I want to do something for the people who have been diagnosed with MS - Including my sister who was diagnosed the year after my first MS Bike Tour.

I ride because want to do something to prevent more people from learning what it means to live with this disease. Today, there is no cure for multiple sclerosis, and with diagnosis occurring most frequently between the ages of 20 and 50, many individuals face a lifetime filled with unpredictability.

Why You Should Sponsor Me

The National Multiple Sclerosis Society will use funds collected from the Harmons MS Bike Tour to not only support research for a cure tomorrow, but also to provide programs which address the needs of people living with MS today.

Because we can fight this disease by simply riding a bike, because we have chosen to help thousands of people through a contribution to the Harmons MS Bike Tour, we are now getting closer to the hour when no one will have to hear the words, "You have MS."

Bad Cop, No Donut

2008-06-16T21:11:00.001-07:00

I got pulled over last Friday night.

JuniorClimber got a job as a janitor at our local county recreation center. He is working from 6:00 PM to 10:00 PM most nights. Since he doesn't yet have his driver's license and doesn't want to hassle with lights for his bike Mrs. GC and I get to shuttle him around, or at least pick him up when it is dark.

So around five after ten I jumped into the car and headed down the street. I try to be a conscientious driver, driving the speed limit and signalling; I think being a cyclist helps with that. I pulled into the parking lot and through the pick-up / drop-off zone and barely had to stop since Junior was waiting on the curb and got right into the car.

We pulled back onto the street and headed to McDonalds, passing a sheriff's car sitting right outside the entrance to the parking lot. We pulled up to the intersection and the lights behind me were flashing. I was shocked! I really didn't think I had done anything wrong.

The officer came to the window and asked for my license. When I handed it to him he asked "Why did you pull in there like that?" I was completely confused because I was think "I pulled over because you pulled me over!?!?".

Turns out he had come up behind me when I pulled out onto the street in front of my house, and thought it was suspicious when I pulled into the dark rec center and then back out so fast. When he saw that we were father and son and had a 'believable' story he sent us on our way.

The Aftershock
Sitting in the drive through, I started to get a little frustrated. I had visions of "may I have your papers please". I had made legal maneuvers, signaled and pulled into and out of a public parking space. It is irritating that I was subjected to a police action for doing nothing more than picking up my son from work.

I wonder if I should have behaved differently. It seems I could have asked for what I was being stopped before providing my ID, but then again, being oppositional likely constitutes probable cause for a search.

Two-Wheeled Wonder in Errandsville

2008-06-14T15:46:00.000-07:00

Eric Sorensen had an excerpt of his book Seven Wonders for a Cool Planet published in a recent edition of Sierra Magazine under the title Two-Wheeled Wonder. I highly recommend you go read it before it disappears into the nether-net, even if you are not a cyclist. Here are a couple of excerpts:

The bicycle is a masterpiece of physics. It harnesses human muscle power directly to that old-time marvel--the wheel--and yields a vehicle more energy efficient than any other devised, ever, by anyone. A human on a bicycle is more efficient (in calories expended per pound and per mile) than a train, truck, airplane, boat, automobile, motorcycle, skateboard, canoe, or jet pack. Cycling is more efficient than walking, which takes three times as many calories per mile.

This introduction reminds me on one of the UTA Blue Bikes I see downtown every May.
You can see more blue bike pictures here.

There is a great point in the article about how we regard bicycles in the U.S. compared to the way they are seen in the rest of the world:

Bicycles outnumber automobiles almost two to one worldwide, and their production outpaces cars by three to one. Rush-hour traffic in China is dominated by these human-powered vehicles. Even in the wealthy cities of Europe and Japan, a large share of the populace gets around by bike. Only here is it treated as little more than a plaything.

It's always been frustrating to me the way mass market chains treat bicycles as toys. It seems like most chains use their bicycle section to mark the transition from Toys to Sporting Goods. In the never ending battles of alternative transportation advocacy it seems we are always trying to chip away at the perception that bikes are toys for children and eccentrics. I long for the day when parents look at buying their child a first bike the same way they would when buying a child a first car - take it seriously, buy quality, and teach them to ride right.

Finally, I am going to adopt his term 'Errandsville':

While advertising sells cars and trucks as tools for the open road, most often they help us inhabit a small daily realm--"Errandsville"--defined by home, store, job, and school. Many of these trips are easily bikable--or walkable--even on roads designed without bicycles or pedestrians in mind.

A topic for another post is Complete Streets v. Bike Lanes, but it is my experience that there are very few places I go to in my normal daily life that can't be easily reached by bicycle. I can arrive at most places without using any high speed / high traffic thoroughfares.

So, thanks Eric. Your book is on order at my local library and I have a hold on the first copy that makes it to the shelves.

What's in a Name?

2008-06-12T23:15:00.000-07:00

Since announcing the purchase of my new ride an interesting phenomenon has occurred. Several people have asked what I have named my new bike. Did I miss something? Is this a requirement for being part of the serious cycling community?

I have always known there were people out there who named their bikes, cars and other important inanimate object. I have never been one of them. That's not to say I don't remember fondly the various sets of wheels I have used to transport myself around this fair world:

A dark green Coast-to-Coast secondhand bike I got from my grandparents. My first 10-speed.
A brand new Schwinn Le Tour Lux I bought with money saved from delivering newspapers (and some matching funds from my parents). I crashed the first time I did my paper route on it when a neighbor kid ran out in the street in front of me. I rode that bike everywhere for a couple of years.
A blue and white 1976 Volkswagen Van that was my primary vehicle when I got my license, and that threw rods when I aggressively down shifted on the way to a date. Missing that date was the beginning of the end of my first 'serious' high school romance.
A 1976 Datsun Pickup. Mustard yellow, this truck was backed into in the school parking lot by one of my best friends, and one of the only friends from high school that I still hang out with after 20 years.
A red cruiser bike that I rode in San Jose Dos Campos, Brazil while on a religious mission. This bike had to have weighed at least 40 pounds, and was such a pain to ride that instead I would walk miles and miles each day.
A tan Mercury Lynx, the first car I actually bought for myself, and the one I was sitting in when I gave Mrs. GeekCyclist her engagement ring.
A woody side Plymouth Volare that belonged to Mrs. GC when we got married, that was always breaking down. My dad took pity on use when we moved from Illinois to Utah and bought it from us for $500.

There have been others, but I swear, I don't think I ever consciously considered naming any of those vehicles.

Should I Conform?

So, now I am left wondering...should I succumb to the pressure and give my new bicycle a name? And if I do, am I required to name the other steeds in the stable?

Currently I have the following bikes:

The new hotness - An '07 Specialized Roubaix Comp
The tried and true, even if a little creaky - An '02 Novara Randonee Touring Bike
The old and a little rusty beater - A '92 Mtn Tek Verticle - A rigid fork hard tail that I started commuting to work on.

If you name your bikes I like to hear about it in the comments. If you feel strongly about what I should name the new hotness I am open to suggestions. The obvious 'Ruby' has already crossed my mind but I am not sure it feels right. Maybe because bikes aren't really supposed to have names...what do I know?

A Smooth New Ride

2008-06-11T21:46:00.000-07:00

It's terrible to think that this is possible, but my wife bought my love this week.

After many years of riding an excellently functional Novara Randonee touring bike, Mrs. GeekCyclist gave me a significant budget to buy a new bicycle for fathers-day.

This is the result:19 pounds of buttery-smooth carbon fiber Specialized Roubaix Comp sweetness, full Shimano 105, Mavic Open Pro wheels...

Okay, so you have to be a bike person to appreciate this, but I am a bike person...and every time I look at it I want to giggle like a school girl.

Mrs. GeekCyclist would want me to tell you that this bike is named after the hometown of her royal French ancestors through Pierre Apollonaire de Roubaix. (I hope I spelled that right.)

That picture doesn't quite do it justice, so here is one 'lifted' from the Specialized site:

Giving it up for ChainLove.com

2008-06-08T21:58:00.000-07:00

On a local message board someone posted a message last week about ChainLove.com. ChainLove is a subsidiary of BackCountry.com, a retailer that also operates DogFunk.com, SteepAndCheep.com and other outdoor gear sites.

ChainLove, for lack of a better description, operates on a QVC model. They list one item for sale at a steep discount and sell them until they are gone. I am not entirely sure that the 'until they are gone' part is completely true; it seems like they have switched items with some inventory left, and I have seen the same items listed multiple times. SteepAndCheep, DogFunk and several of the others operate on the same model but specialize in different subsets of outdoor gear.

Here are some samples of what I have seen recently:

Pearl Izumi Men's Veer Short-Sleeve Cycling Jersey ($18.75/list $54)
Oakley Men's Compression Short ($12.50 / $84.95)
Northwave Kameleon 3 MTB Shoe ($49.00 / $139.95)
SockGuy Cycling Sock 4-Pack ($11.00 / $39.95)
Fizik Rondine MG ICS Bike Saddle ($22.86 / $83.30)

The shipping costs seem pretty reasonable as well. I purchased a couple of jerseys last week, and then I noticed that I was charged sales tax. I looked more closely and realized that not only is Backcounty.com a local Utah company, their main warehouse and showroom is right on one of my primary bike commuting routes to work. I rode out there and had them pull my order and they credited the shipping cost back to my card.

A Customer Service Story

Please note, I have no interest in turning this site into a customer service review site; but I have to share some of these experiences.

Saturday they were running a Bar Tape deal for something like $5.70, so I ordered two sets. When checking out I typed something like the following in the shipping instructions:

DO NOT SHIP
Hold for local pickup.

Around 1:00 today I got a notice in my email that my order had shipped, so I sent an email:

I appreciate the quick shipping service, even on the weekend.

I would have appreciated it more if someone had read the Shipping
Instructions that read "Hold for local pickup". Eight bucks is
expensive shipping to send my ten dollar order 40 blocks, especially
when I ride my bike right past your place every morning and afternoon
on my way to and from work.

What is the best way for me to make sure my orders get held at your warehouse?

About 30 minutes later I got a response back:

I do apologize for the inconvenience. I have given you a credit of $7.56 for your shipping. I recommend using Backcountry.com's Live Chat as the fastest and easiest way. Open up a Backcountry.com window, in the upper right of the screen there is Live Help button, click on that to chat with a representative. Then copy and paste your order number into the chat and you are good to go. You can also call Backcoutry.com at 1-800 409 4502.

I really didn't expect any kind of credit, just a hint on the best way to arrange local pickup. I still think that the shipping instructions should have been enough. But, money back and easy instructions for the future, that seems like a great way to 'fix' this minor gaffe.

Blackburn (Bell) Customer Service

2008-06-06T20:24:00.000-07:00

Over the last few years that I have been trying to pay attention, there has been a fairly significant level of consolidation in the bicycling related industries. I may not have all of these right, but I seem to remember:

North Castle Partners, owners of Bike Nashbar purchasing Performance (who had previously purchased and closed Supergo).
Pacific buying Schwinn, Mongoose, GT and others.
Bell Sports buying Blackburn (who now has electronics and trainers in addition to the racks and pumps so I imagine they bought out a couple of other companies. Bell Sports and all the subsidiaries are owned by Easton).

I am sure there are many others. It is usually assumed that when there are consolidations like this, that competition and customer service are areas that suffer. Anecdotally, it does seem like the 'deals' at Nashbar and Performance are not quite as good as they used to be; there are fewer coupons as well.

Replacing A Pump

At work we have a cage in the parking garage that provides more secure parking for bicycles. When the cage was built three years ago I asked a couple of regular riders to pitch in a few bucks and went to the LBS. I came back with a Blackburn Track Pump. The pump served us well, but the presta portion of the dual head has worn out.

Thinking I could buy a replacement head I called Bell Sports, the parent company of Blackburn. After explaining what I needed I was told that heads for that pump were no longer available. I told the customer service rep. that I would just go buy a new pump...

"Wait.", she said. "All our pumps carry a lifetime warranty, please hold on for a minute." When she came back on the phone she said "I have ordered a new Air Tower pump as a replacement for you."

She collected my mailing address, and eight days later the bike cage became the home for a new Blackburn pump.

I guarantee you, every opportunity I have, I will think twice before choosing another manufacturers product over one built by Blackburn.

Mind Your Own !@#$ Business

2008-05-30T23:07:00.000-07:00

With gas prices at or above $4.00 a gallon there have been more cyclists on the roads than I have ever seen before. Some ride like they have been commuting for years, and others clearly have no idea how to ride safely or legally. There are two things I see frequently that really annoy me:

Running Stoplights, especially in the busy downtown area; and
Riding on the left, facing traffic.

I feel like each of these are egregious enough that given the chance I will try to (politely) discuss it with the offending cyclist. For light jumpers I point out that not only is it against the law and dangerous, it makes it difficult for motorists to predict what the next cyclist is going to do. It also irritates many motorists and cyclists alike. For wrong way riders, if I have time, I point out that it is more dangerous, cars don't expect you to be there, and that in an accident the cyclist will most likely be found at fault and recover nothing. Most people will either respond politely, or make it obvious that they are going to ignore me.

So the other day I was riding home on a two lane road with bike lanes in each direction. There was another cyclist on the opposite side of the road, riding in the bike lane but against traffic. We were almost matched in speed so I slowed down a little, waved, and said, "Great day for a ride." When he responded I said, "I don't know if you know this, but riding against traffic is against the law and very dangerous."

You would have though I had insulted his wife, mother and firstborn. He reacted to me with a violence almost physical, suggesting that I have an inappropriate relationship with both myself and my mother, among other things.

Maybe I should take his advise and just mind my own business. I know that since then I have seen two offenders and not said a word. That bothers me as well. Somehow, as a body of 'transportation' cyclists, we have to find a way to politely yet effectively educate new or oblivious cyclist about riding legally and safely.

The Way Sports Should Be

2008-05-23T17:14:00.000-07:00

You may have seen this on ESPN, but it is an excellent story. In an age that sees high school athletes acting like spoiled and privileged pros, this is a refreshing display of sportsmanship (or should I say sportswomanship) at the college level.

I've been involved with AAU basketball, state competition level soccer and I can tell you that compassion and sportsmanship like this is unfortunately rare these days.

Try, Try Again

2008-05-22T22:15:00.000-07:00

As I detailed in a post a while ago, I find myself reviewing and updating a large amount of vb.net code that was written by a developer in our shop that moved on to greener pastures. Even though my background was originally in the BASIC world, I moved to C# when Visual Studio .Net 2002 was released and find that I really prefer it to vb.net. I have embraced the curly brace. So I have been converting as much as I can to utility classes in C#.

One of the great improvements of the .Net framework for VB was the Try-Catch-Finally style of error handling. However, just like GOTO, it can be misused and abused. The Pragmatic Programmer tip #34 is Use Exceptions for Exceptional Problems, and is an excellent read. But before you get there, you must have a basic understanding of how an exception is going to be handled.

With a few modifications (including translation to C#), this is a function that was in one of the projects I inherited.


public bool CheckStatus()
{
try
{
 SystemCheck();
}
catch(Exception)
{
 SystemCheck();
}
}

Trust me, it is unlikely that if SystemCheck() threw an exception the first time you called it that it will execute successfully when called again in the catch.

Here is another example:


public DataTable GetData()
{
try
{
 DataTable dt = new DataTable();
 /* Code here that:
 Built Command and Connection objects
 Adapter
 Filled Adapter
 */
}
catch(Exception)
{
 'Do Nothing
}
finally
{
 cn.Close();
 'more stuff snipped here
}
return dt;

}

The 'Do Nothing' has to be a HUGE red flag that there is something wrong.

If you know it might happen, handle it in the body of the function. Save the catch for things that are truly 'exceptional'. When they happen, log the details, recover if you can, or fail gracefully.

Hey Hey, Magic Bus (or Train)

2008-05-13T20:24:00.001-07:00

The Wasatch Front has a new transit option - the FrontRunner high speed commuter rail has been open for about three weeks now. I don't live in the area served by FrontRunner, but I have heard some good things about it.

The most interesting thing to me was a pair of letters in the Salt Lake Tribune. Cole Carothers who lives near the end point of the train wrote in before it opened:

I just worked the numbers to see if FrontRunner would save me money: I commute 1,080 miles a month. This morning I purchased gas at Costco for $3.07 a gallon. My car averages 20 miles per gallon. That comes to $165.78 a month for gas. A monthly FrontRunner pass is $145. That's a difference of $20.78. The distance from the Woods Cross stop to my work is 2.1 miles, one way. That's 84 miles of walking a month (no bus service from the stop)... I figure gas will have to be about $6 a gallon before I start riding the train. (FrontRunner Math, SLTrib, 4/14/08)

There were a number of responses, both as letters to the editor, and as online comments on his letter . Most of them pointed out how Carothers' math failed to account for either the total consumer cost of driving (oil changes, tires, service, insurance) or the social cost (increased pollution, congestion, lost productivity, and health costs). All points with which I agree.

The first couple of days that FrontRunner was operating it was free, and it appears that Carothers took the opportunity to try it out as shown by his follow-up letter in the paper this week:

The feedback that I received about the letter made me look at the problem with a more open mind. So when the fare was free, I took FrontRunner to work and arranged to be picked up at the Woods Cross station by a fellow employee who lives in the area. I tried it again the next day.

That night I went looking for a monthly pass....

My new commute takes about the same amount of time, but it only has two stop signs and the stress level is absolutely zero. Two fellow employees now join me.

Thanks to all who responded to my letter and helped me keep an open mind about public transportation. I will be riding the train well into the future. (Driving or FrontRunner?, SLTrib, 5/9/08)

Free Fare Days
I can think of no better argument for UTA to run free fare days once a month, or on poor air quality days like some other transit systems do. I don't have any statistics, but the anecdotal evidence is that all of the riders on the buses I ride when I am not commuting by bicycle are using annual or monthly passes. My guess would be that like mine, most of these passes are subsidised by employers. I figure that the cost in 'lost fares' to UTA for a monthly free fare day would be negligible because most riders don't pay at the fare box.

The benefit would be an opportunity for non-believers to try out alternative transportation. If they did it on Red Air Days it would reduce pollution as well. I think a significant percentage would be like Carothers, and would find that riding the bus is far more convenient and economical than they estimated.

A Rose By Any Other Name

2008-05-07T21:40:00.000-07:00

It has been a very strange year for me so far. It has left me wondering; am I still a cyclist if I have only ridden 3 or 4 times so far this year?

For the last several years much of my identity has been tied to cycling. I promote cycling to work, provide 'maintenance' services for all the kids in my neighborhood, and usually ride several thousand miles a year.

This year I have even had a hard time making it to spinning classes more than once or twice a week. Admittedly, there are a number of factors that play into my lack of cycling:

At work we went nearly 6 months down a developer on my team. My particular skill set meant much of the additional work fell to me.
Between Mrs. GeekCyclist's work schedule and the school/activity schedule of the boys it seems like I have to be in more places at more times than before.
About a month ago I took on coaching the local high school's freshman basketball team for the spring season.

I am going to try and rectify that over the next two weeks. First, our commuter club is doing tune-ups on Friday, and working on bikes always gets me in the mood to ride. The reason we are doing the tune-ups is that next week is Cycle Salt Lake Week as part of National Bike Month. We have a couple of bike tours and a ride to work with the mayor. I always get motivated during bike week/month.

Finally, I recently got around to signing up for the MS-150. I will post more on that later, including a link so that all my friends who have stuck by the blog while I have 'gone quiet' can support me while I ride. Signing up means organized training rides, and a need to get back in shape.

So, maybe I can still call myself a cyclist.

Loving Launchy

2008-05-06T21:02:00.000-07:00

I have a problem. I manage a bunch of websites, some of them dynamic applications, and others static 'classic' html sites. Periodically I have to check the sites for broken links, for which I use a great utility called Link Sleuth by Xenu.

But I am a nerd. This means that I am constantly installing, uninstalling and moving programs around on any of the 3 computers I use all the time. When it comes time for me to check these links I can never remember where the program folder and executable link for Link Sleuth actually resides, nor can I remember where I put utilities like this on my start menu.

Enter Launchy.

Actually a friend at work pointed me at Launchy a while ago, and at first I didn't get it. I figured it was just a quicker way to create shortcut hot keys like this. I had no idea that it would index executables on my drive.

Now all I have to do to start Link Sleuth is type ALT+Space and then type X. It selects Xenu Link Sleuth automatically. I hit enter and everything is coming up Millhouse.

Backwards Thinking

2007-12-14T21:30:00.000-08:00

My employer has a deal with the Utah Transit Authority that allows them to provide monthly bus passes to employees that forfeit their free parking four out of five days a week. It must be time for the deal to be renewed because they did a transportation survey this week. The survey had 4 questions, but the main points were these:

If you drive and we offer you a free annual pass would you switch to the bus.
If you drive and we let you keep your parking space, would you buy an annual pass for about $200.
If you already ride the bus for free on our passes, would it bother you if we let other employees buy a pass and keep their parking spaces.

I think it is great that the powers that be are looking at ways to increase the use of public transportation, but I think they have it backwards. As it stands now, everyone is offered free (employer subsidized) parking, and if they are willing to give it up then they can have free public transit.

The question that that was missing was, "How many times a week would you drive and park if bus passes were free and parking cost x dollars per day or month?"

If we are serious about encouraging the use of mass transit we should reverse our thinking. We should provide transit passes to every employee for free, and then provide parking tokens, validations or punch passes at a reduced rate for those who want to drive.

For example - the $228 cost for the ECO pass comes out to a little less than $2 a day (there are ~ 240 working days in a year if you factor in holidays and vacation) Everyone could receive an ECO Pass and then the employer can create a parking voucher system that allows employees to buy 15 vouchers for $30 or $40. If they need to park frequently they can by a lot of vouchers. If not an employee can just buy one or two packs to last all year.

Another advantage to a Transit First mode of thinking is that it will minimize the number or single occupancy vehicle trips around a congested downtown area. Since a parking voucher would not normally allow for in and out privileges, and since every employee would have a pass, there would exist a strong incentive to use the bus and Trax to get around downtown for mid-day errands.

Be a Patriot, Ride a Bike

2007-12-12T06:49:00.001-08:00

I came across this YouTube video of a Miller High Life commercial via the Commute By Bike blog. I have never embedded a video so I thought this might be a good first try:

Enjoy. And stop on over at Commute By Bike; it's a great cycling site.

What to do with $12,000 - IsoTruss Mountain Bike

2007-12-05T12:17:00.000-08:00

This has got to be the most amazing bicycle I have ever seen:
Delta7Sports - IsoTruss Mountain Bike

I quite frankly stole this image from their site, so please click through the link and give them a page hit or two.

From the description they take a single carbon fiber and wrap it around Kevlar strings to create this 'lattice' work frame.

Gorgeous Day for a Ride

2007-11-13T23:11:00.000-08:00

Just so we are clear; There is usually a delay of a day or two between when a particular event happens and when I get a chance to write about it. The day of which I speak in the title was actually last Saturday.

I had to get up early because JuniorClimber (who hasn't blogged in over a year) made the high school basketball team and had practice at 8. So I drove him to the practice and returned home and got the road bike down from the hooks in my basement. It has been weeks upon weeks since I last showered the road bike with some love.

I made a multi-leg journey in perfect 'utility' or transportational cycling style. First I rode a couple miles to the local rec center where I attended my Saturday morning spinning class. I know, I know. When ever I ride to spinning I get a few weird looks and comments, but spinning has really helped me maintain my fitness this year, and I know I ride harder in an hour of spinning than I do in any of my normal outdoor rides.

After spinning there was a parents meeting for the basketball team. The high school is pretty close to the rec center, so that ride wasn't far. While I was in the meeting my wife sent me a text asking me to pick up her prescription at the pharmacy. That meant another 8 miles round trip which was just what I needed.

The weather was perfect. High 50's to low 60's with hardly any wind.

I fear we may not see as nice a day for cycling until March or April.

JPod

2007-11-06T22:54:00.000-08:00

As a family we went to Disneyland earlier this year. On the second day we spent 3+ hours in line at Space Mountain. The ride itself was excellent. There is something intriguing about riding a roller coaster in the dark, and not just one that is outside at night. In that situation you still have a clear view of what is typically a well lit track traveled by illuminated cars.

Space Mountain is exciting specifically because for most of the ride you can't tell where you are, where you are going or what comes next. Every few seconds there is a dramatic shift in direction or speed or sound.

Reading JPod is exactly like riding a roller coaster in the dark.

JPod is set in the recent past post-Dot Com bubble period at a Canadian software company that produces video games. The title is taken from the name given to a set of cubicles in which, through a quirk of management or HR, all the employees have last names that begin with J. It chronicles the attempts of the staff to cope with dysfunctional management, strange co-workers and their friends and families, and the vagaries of the retail software industry.

However, that plot summary makes the book seem much closer to 'normal' than it really is. In fact, it is more like reading the journals of a group of gen-x developers all of whom have severe nerd attention deficit disorder.

I loved it!

Preference Rating 4.5/5
Audience Rating: Adults Only - profanity, violence (very humorous, but violence nonetheless), adult situations and sexual references

San Rafael Knob Hike

2007-10-29T21:11:00.000-07:00

Last weekend was my scout troop's annual trip to the San Rafael Swell. Usually we do a slot canyon hike with great narrows and sculpted sandstone like this:

This year we have been working on the Hiking merit badge which requires the scouts to do five 10 mile hikes in preparation for a 20-miler. Most of the slot canyon hikes are shorter than 10 miles even if you do a loop of two canyons. In order to do a 10-miler we settled on a hike in the vicinity of Devils Canyon and the San Rafael Knob.

This is more of an open country hike. It's hard to imagine how anyone ever scraped out a life in this arid high mountain desert.

Recreation in the Swell is a point of serious contention right now. The BLM recently released an updated management plan, and have closed some sensitive routes to vehicular travel. Even though I am primarily a cyclist and backpacker, I can see the allure of ATV recreation, especially in areas like the Swell. The area is crisscrossed by old ranching an mining roads. But when I see something like this, I can't help but feel that the ATV crowd deserves even more restrictions unless they can find a way to police their own.

The blatant abuse of a posted Wilderness Study Area is very offensive to me. There are literally hundreds of miles of trails and roads open in the Swell. The route closures should absolutely be honored.

Then again, some of these signs aren't the clearest route markers in the world.

The San Rafael Knob is the highest point in the swell. From where we started it would have been a 12-14 mile round trip, so this is as close as we got.

All in all, it was a nice hike. It helped that I had some of my best friends along as adult leaders.

On the way back to camp we tagged two great geocaches. If you are in the are you have to try and find Where in the Swell Am I and If you don't, Hoo Doo?. There are a lot of caches in the area, but many are much easier to find if you have an ATV to get you closer.

The Rest of the Profile

2007-10-22T21:03:00.001-07:00

When I last left off on my background our hero was locked in his bedroom after slamming the door so hard it broke when saving a program failed.

The College Hiatus
After leaving high school I worked in retail, went on a religious mission to Brazil, and lived in Illinois just long enough to meet and marry my fantastic wife and spirit her off to Utah where I entered the University of Utah. For a while I was a performing arts major. I contemplated sociology and philosophy as majors, but finally settled on economics. I planned on completing my undergraduate degree and going on to law school.

That plan got sidetracked about 3 years in when I became a research assistant for a couple of PhD students. After years of using a computer for word processing and playing Links, I found myself introduced to QuattroPro, Excel, SAS and SPSS. I began writing VBA macros in Excel to transpose data for import into the statistics packages. And I realized that I kind of liked playing with numbers on computers.

As I neared graduation, the adviser to the PhD students referred me to a Labor Market Economist at the Utah Department of Employment Security, which was later to become the Utah Department of Workforce Services. This economist needed an intern to help run occupational wage surveys. After 9 months as an intern I was hired full-time as an economist.

The Transition
Over the next couple of years I spent a lot of time dealing with Excel data files and Access database, and writing research reports on wages and economic conditions in Utah. I also found myself in the position of mediating and translating between economists and prevailing wage specialists, and programmers hired to build occupational information systems.

In 1998 I got my 'big break'. The lead programmer on one of these projects left the state and I was allowed to take over a widely distributed Access application. Over the next several months I converted the back end to SQL Server and stored procedures and the front end to a classic ASP application. That application has been upgraded a couple of times and is about to go through a major rewrite. I was a paid professional programmer.

Over the next two years I found myself more and more integrated into a programming unit that was responsible for creating economic forecasting software, and occupational information systems. It was an amazingly good fit, and allowed me to be a programmer while still using the economics and statistics I learned in school.

Embracing the Curly Brace
As the .Net framework and VS.Net became available, I made the decision to switch to C# rather than move to VB.Net. The reasons for this decision may be a good topic for another post, but for now it's enough to know that I consider myself primarily a C# web developer of database driven web applications. I do a little SQL Server DBA work, and for the last year have been working in PL/SQL on a major web application that hits an Oracle database.

How to Irritate Three Women at Once

2007-10-17T22:00:00.001-07:00

I love my spinning class. The depth of my love is largely a result of my spinning class being the only cycling I have been doing for weeks. The class is held three times a week, has a great instructor, and a group of 3-4 'regulars' who make it to most of the classes. On days when it's only me and the instructor she tends to customize the class to the things I am working on.

During yesterday's class we had completed two of the three core sections and were finishing up with a seated sprinting section. It's not so much that I like the sprinting drills, but just that I am pretty good at those drills. I can spin at a much higher cadence when seated than most of the other participants and usually have to turn the tension up a bit to keep from bouncing off the bike. After the first sprint Ali was complementing our effort and doing the typical motivational pep talk about working hard and sticking with it. I swear I heard her say, "Two more laps and then we cool it down."

We did another sprint and after returning to pace Ali said, "One minute at this pace and then we cool down." In the seconds after that comment I made the critical mistake of not staying quiet. Instead I said, "You mean we aren't doing one more?" At that moment I was subjected to the glares of Ali and the other two participants. The glares continued through the 'added' sprint...

I am going to miss class tomorrow because of another commitment. I think they may let me back in the class on Saturday, but we'll have to see.

The Early Years

2007-10-15T21:44:00.000-07:00

True to my normal behavior, I am reading about 5 books right now. It seems I always have a work or two of fiction and two or three tech books going at once. On of the books I am reading is the classic The Pragmatic Programmer.

In that book, which I highly recommend to anyone on the programming side of the IT world, the authors talk a lot about taking pride in and responsibility for your work. On of the ways they suggest you do that is by signing your work. In that spirit, I changed my profile to reveal my name, and figured I would do a couple of 'background' posts to let all three of you who don't actually work with me or aren't my mother, know a little about where I am coming from on the tech side.

The Early Years
I was a pretty typical bored teenager in the early eighties. Little did I know the foundation was being laid for my delusions of greatness. As the Atari console and the Apple II started making inroads in my neighborhood, my parents made a great decision. Rather than by a game system, they bought a TRS-80 Color Computer and I found myself introduced to the wonderful world of BASIC.

Like many of my generation, my teenage dream was to write video games. After copying line-by-line the sample programs in the hobbyist magazines I started trying to write a Zork clone. In case you are not familiar with Zork, it was a text based 'dungeon' game with an excellent natural language processor. At the time I had no idea what NLP was, but I thought the idea of writing a choose your own adventure type game would be cool. Mine was obviously less sophisticated. Rather than typing in your actions or queries it presented a narrative and then a few options from which you could choose.

My game authoring career came to a quick end one Sunday morning. After several hours of coding I went to save the program to a cassette tape. Ten minutes later, after saving and restarting, I tried to read my program from the tape and nothing. I yanked the tape out of the recorder and threw it across our family room into my bedroom. Then I walked in there and slammed the door so hard it broke and my dad had to come down and jimmy it for me to get out.

In high school I found myself interested in the electronics courses, and did a little pc board design, built an audio amplifier and some other neat little electronic gadgets. But other than Parsec on the home computer and Tempest in the entryway of the local grocery store, my interaction with computers was pretty slim until I entered college...

On Your Left

2007-10-08T20:57:00.000-07:00

The Jordan River Parkway is a fairly typical urban greenway with a paved shared-use trail. It gets a lot of use by walkers, runners, skaters and cyclists, especially on the weekends.

A while back I took a group of scouts 'hiking' on the parkway and before our hike we had a discussion about courtesy and behavior on the parkway. We talked about yielding the right of way, walking single file, keeping the noise to a respectful level, etc. For almost the entire 10 mile hike we had no conflicts between trail users.

Then near the end something interesting happened. We had been passed by several cyclists, most of whom slowed, and announced themselves either vocally or with a bell. Now I ride the parkway all the time, and I know how annoying it gets to be saying "On your left." every two or three minutes, especially when the pedestrians are wearing headphones and can't hear you anyway. But I still try to do it.

As we passed under a bridge, one of the scouts up ahead of me picked up a piece of rope or twine and began swinging it around. You can probably guess what happened... Shortly thereafter a cyclist on a fairly nice bike, kitted out, zoomed past me. Why do I say zoomed? Because not only was he traveling the fastest by far when compared to all the cyclists who had passed us; he was moving so fast that I could not yell the scout's name before the cyclist overtook him. The cyclist was promptly, but quite accidentally hit in the face with the swinging rope. He turned and expressed his displeasure in an understandable, but I though excessively vile manner and rode up the trail.

I told the scout that he shared the blame for the accident, and shouldn't be swinging the rope. I also told him that it wasn't entirely his fault, because the cyclist was traveling too fast while overtaking, and did not announce himself.

I had a chance to express that opinion to the cyclist as well; he came riding back the other direction a few minutes later. I told him as politely as I could that the scout was sorry, but that by simply announcing his presence, which is common courtesy if not legally required, would have saved the scout the embarrassment and him the pain. Unfortunately I think my comments fell on deaf ears.

Searching for more than my keys

2007-10-05T09:25:00.000-07:00

I typically find myself using the Window Search all the time. It does a great job of finding files and documents by name, filtering the criteria by date or size, and I like having results in the graphical file explorer where I can sort by several attributes. If it could find my keys at 5:30 in the morning it would be the primary function on my laptop.

My recent experience with Search has been less satisfactory. I recently inherited several thousands of lines of HTML, asp, VB 6 and JavaScript code in hundreds of files that makes up a major portion of my employers web site. At the same time our database admins rolled out a new version of one of our primary databases that serves as a back end for several desktop and web applications. Unfortunately the web site wasn't checked thoroughly for dependency on the old database, nor compatibility with the new one. (That should be a topic for a whole separate stream of posts.)

Needless to say, this week has been one composed of frantic scrambling trying to figure out what was up and what was broken, and why. In a little bit of serendipity, I found that most of the applications used one particular configuration file in which was stored the connection information tagged with a label like 'ORA_CONNECT' (Nice job, previous developers.) When an application needed to connect it would call to the root config file and get the connection information by passing the label. Pretty standard stuff.

So, my first thought was to use the Windows Search to see if I could find all files that contained the string "ORA_CONNECT". So navigated to the root directory, fired up search, entered the parameters and waited with eager expectation after clicking on search. A long list of files came up, but shockingly it did not include the three files I had looked at by hand to determine what connection was being used.

Puzzled, I set up a little test. I created a directory with two subdirectories. In the root I put a text doc, and in the subdirectories I placed an HTML, ASP and MS Word file. Each file included text that contained the string ORA_CONNECT.

I ran search on that directory, and it found everything EXCEPT the use in the ASP page. I even went back and made sure that the All Files and Include Subdirectories options were enabled. Clearly Search was not reliable.

What will I FIND

I IM'd a co-worker about what I was tying to do, and he sent me a string using the FIND command. Ah Ha! Good old find! I had forgotten that since the last time I spent hours writing MS-DOS 5 batch files years ago. Oh No! Bad FIND...

As you can see from the image, access was denied to the subdirectories. FIND does not recurse. I knew I could write a batch to recurse the directories, and save the output to a file, etc, etc; but who has that kind of time?

FINDSTR /i /s ss64.com *.*

It was then that I remembered reading somewhere that there was a 'find' in windows that supported regular expressions like grep. I quick check of my links turned up the excellent site ss64.com - a command line reference site for SQL Server and Oracle, which just happens to have an XP/NT section.

The page on the FINDSTR command had just exactly what I needed:

Check out the command reference on ss64.com for other options, like printing the line and line number that match, and outputting the results to a text file.

More Geek - Less Cyclist

2007-09-28T14:36:00.000-07:00

Wow - It's been a long time...

For the last several months I have been telling myself over and over that I have to come up with a schedule of some kind, and begin posting again. I am sure by now that I have lost all 3 regular readers. But with the primary focus of this blog being cycling and considering the small amount of riding I have done in the past several months my lack of motivation to type should be understandable.

This is not to say that I have been doing nothing...

For the past year I have been working on a team doing a rewrite of a major enterprise information system for state government. During that time I switched primary databases from SQL Server to Oracle, and moved from working on projects alone to working directly with 5-7 people on the web front end, and another team of 10 responsible for the desktop app and the database. As I type the new version is being moved into the production environment and being tested.

As my responsibilities in this project wind down, I find myself faced with taking over a group of web site projects left behind by an employee who moved on to greener pastures. While it is never fun to take over someone's code, it guarantees that I will have plenty to do for the next several months.

I was fortunate enough to go mountain biking for the second time this year last week. I went with several co-workers early last Friday morning and rode a portion of the Bonneville Shoreline Trail near the University of Utah. I thoroughly enjoyed it, even if I was clearly in last place the whole ride. While I recognize that taking 40 lbs. of the rider would do wonders; it would be great if I could find a way to pick up a new mountain bike. The one I have been using is my fully rigid Mtn Tek I bought in '92 and use for commuting in the winter (when I commute...). I don't think an aggressive full suspension bike is a requirement, but a couple inches of front shock travel would sure be nice.

So...

Here is my plan. I want to post twice a week at least. Anything else would be a bonus. It's looking like the way for me to stay motivated is to plan one mid-week post on an IT or programming related topic, and one weekend post on cycling, hiking or the other outdoor fun stuff I try to do. In between I may try to do brief posts, pass along interesting links with a little comment, or I may just keep my mouth/fingers quiet.

Round Trip

2007-05-31T21:22:00.000-07:00

Today was my first round-trip bike commute in a while, and even though I am now pretty tired I have to say that for the most part I enjoyed it.

Highlights
One of the primary highlights of bike commuting this time of year is the morning conditions. Today it was in the mid 50's with only a light wind while I pedaled in at sunrise. Sunrise is a bonus. I am lucky in that while my morning commute is mostly eastward, the location of the sun is such that there are only a few brief sections of my ride where the sun creates a visibility problem.

On the way home one of the highlights is the nearly two miles I spend on 5600 West during "rush hour". Most of that distance is single lane both directions, and the cars really get stacked up. I love my own personal rush while I blow by car after car after car.

Today I had the particular highlight of wearing my new FatCyclist.Com Jersey. Very Sharp!.

Lowlights
Over the past several weeks the official Utah State Sport has gone into full swing - Road construction is taking place in at least one location on every one of my primary commuting routes. This leads to rough roads, debris, and squeezed spaces.

Which leads to the other lowlight - motorist conflicts. This morning I found myself in a position where I had to take the lane due to construction barriers. I figure the time I was in the lane was between 5 and 7 seconds, but it still led to a long line of irritated motorists.

On top of this there was an anti-bile editorial in the SL Tribune on Sunday. After a few years of writing back, of trying to be active in the advocacy community, and trying to promote cycling at work I find myself very tired. In some ways it feels like the fight is going out of me. In the past I would always dash off a quick response to the editor, now I just want to go for a ride.

Maybe that is the best response.

Saturday Doubleheader

2007-04-29T19:40:00.000-07:00

I may have overdone it...

My scout troop had a 10-mile hike planned for Saturday afternoon. So far we have already done three of these on our way to earning the Hiking Merit Badge. Actually the requirements are that they do 5 ten-mile hikes and one 20-miler. I think they have 8 ten-mile hikes planned and two 20-milers on the schedule before the end of the year.

Unfortunately my assignment was to scout and plan the route on the Jordan River Parkway so that we knew where we were going and so that we could do a kind of scavenger hunt to help the miles pass. I had planned on riding a couple sections on Thursday or Friday, but the insanity that is my life right now found me on Saturday morning with no route planned.

So, I hopped on my bike, rode the 8 miles from my house to the parkway, and then rode north and south a couple of times until I was happy with the route. By the time I rode back home I had done about 35 miles.

I spent the early afternoon coaching my son's AAU basketball team, and made it back just in time to find 12 scouts and 3 parents ready to go in my front yard. Off we went, and within the first two mile I knew that this was going to be a shock to my system.

We had four kids from our new scout patrol who only hiked about 6 miles, and I found myself playing the sweeper. I actually finished a lot stronger than I thought I would. But today I am pretty sore. This is classic overtraining, but I hope that the 'shock' will jumpstart my training for the MS-150 and help me push through a weight-loss plateau I have been stuck on since just before going to Disneyland.

Then again, there is something remarkably invigorating about realizing that you went 45 mile under your own power.

Calories Burned

2007-04-24T07:09:00.001-07:00

As a self confirmed geek, I occasionally browse over to the OmniNerd blog to check out the ramblings on tech, science and random nerdy stuff. I came across this post that is really interesting to someone like me who is interested in losing and then maintaining a healthy weight.

Calories Burned

Basically, the author of the post wore an heart rate monitor for 24 hours and tracked the calories burned as reported by the gizmo. I have one of those and have worn it for a few hours before and after exercise. Based on how my trend (not daily) weight behaves and tracking my diet, I would say that the measure on my gizmo is accurate to within +/- 5%.

Of course, knowing how many calories I am burning has never before stopped me from hitting a sticky plateau. It hasn't this year either. But one of the points that I like from OmniNerd is that a few small activity changes can make a big difference.

...physical mobility equates to energy burn and sedentary activity does not. It was surprising, however, to realize how even small amounts of activity could have such large gains in overall calorie consumption. If I were to eliminate walking to my bus, never use the stairs and skip days at the gym, my personal calorie burn would quickly dwindle into a deficit.

I have always been intrigued by how I take shortcuts on 'fat' days - those days where you suffer the acute pain of your excess baggage dragging you down. Rather than ride to work I drive. After walking from my parking area to the lot my building is on, I walk diagonally across the lot and in the South door, rather than staying on the sidewalk and walking around to the North door. Once in the building, I take the elevator to my 6th floor cubicle, rather than the stairs. On and on it goes as I avoid getting up from my chair and making any 'excess' movement.

On the flip side, I am always amazed at how big of a difference it makes when I ride 15 minutes longer twice a week, or when I start lengthening my weekend rides. What we forget often is that when we move, we feel better, we actually have more energy, and we don't think twice about moving more.

Back to the Real World

2007-04-13T21:05:00.000-07:00

Hey! I'm back!

I can't believe how long it has been since I did a real post. Sometime in mid March we realized that the stars had aligned perfectly, and we decided to take a family vacation to Disneyland that we have been putting off since forever.

Shortly thereafter the stars when haywire for me. I had Scouting and volunteer responsibilities to tie up before we left. On top of that I neglected to check the list of deliverables on my major project at work, and had to scramble to cram about 200 hours of software development into about 95 hours of time.

Then I took over coaching an AAU 9th Grade basketball team that was short about 5 players. My son who plays on the team essentially announced an open tryout at school, and we had 12 players show up for the first practice, not counting two of the players that were already on the team. I almost have the roster settled and am very excited because this team clearly has the most talent of any team I have ever coached. Seven of the players just finished playing varsity for their Junior High teams.

Finally, it was time to jet off to 'slightly overcast' Southern California. Overall the trip was a great one, and we enjoyed three days split between Disneyland and California Adventure with one day a Universal Studios and one day just sleeping in and wandering around Downtown Disney in between. My personal favorite ride was The Mummy ride at Universal Studios. The family favorites were that one, California Screamin' and Space Mountain.

We came back to reality earlier this week, and I have literally been scrambling every day to get a handle on everything and back into some kind of routine.

My 'diet' didn't suffer quite as bad as I would have expected over that crazy 4 weeks, and I am only 2 pounds heavier than I was at the beginning of the insanity. I am looking forward to a long training ride tomorrow, and a normal routine starting next week.

Link: The Seatpost Letters

2007-03-27T08:04:00.000-07:00

The Seatpost Letters

I know I haven't posted in a while - I promise I haven't forgotten about my loyal readers (all three of you). While you are waiting jump on over to Historian On Two Wheels and read his conversation with an entertaining demon...

Visualization

2007-03-13T07:12:00.000-07:00

The last couple of posts discussed motivation, which to me means the things that help get you out there being active. Visualization to me means the ideas and thoughts you feed through your brain to keep yourself work hard or motivated while you are riding.

Merckx, Lemond, Lance, Zabriskie
Clearly, one of the most common visualizations is to imagine yourself either as one of your cycling heroes or to see yourself riding against them. I am particularly fond of visualizing Dave Zabriskie since I spend so much time riding alone and he is such a great time trialist.

In a similar vein, you can imagine yourself riding or racing in the classic locations of the pro cycling tour. For example, when encounter that bone-jarring section of potholes that always develops over the winter, you can imagine that you are riding over the cobbles of the spring classics. Charging up the local hill you can conjure the image of the great climbs of the Alps or the Pyrenees.

The Factory
This is my favorite visualization, especially when I am in weight loss mode. I imagine my legs as large pistons and my 'fat' as the little pats of butter you get at a restaurant sometimes. With each stroke I envision the pistons smashing the butter and forcing it out little valves in my feet.

I am not sure what a psychiatrist would say about this visualization, but for me it seems to work, and it ties my effort to what I hope is the source of my energy as well as my hoped for result.

Your Ideas
Spring has at least temporarily broken her in Utah, with temps today expected to be near 70. Add in the early switch to Daylight Savings Time and all of a sudden it seems we are in biking season. We all could probably use a couple more visualization ideas as we try to shake out the cobwebs, and realize that the wind is somehow slowing us down in a way that the basement fan never die. What do you visualize when you have to ramp up the effort?

Correction and Clarification

2007-03-10T22:01:00.000-08:00

Turns out I made a couple of grievous errors in my last post about motivation. On the minor side it seems I misspelled the name of the author of one of my favorite blogs. That was an easy fix and the error was probably only noticed by him.

However, I checked in with his blog and in his post about my post (getting dizzy yet?) he wondered why I referred to him as a bad example. I went back through my post and realized the section in which I discussed Neil Brennen and his amazing weight loss gave the impression that I saw him as a bad example. That was not I intended at all, and I have changed the post to clarify my position.

It wasn't that long ago that I returned to cycling. I remember the first time I tried to ride home from work. It took me almost 2.5 hours to make it the 14 miles. My 'tush' was so sore I almost couldn't walk the next day. I never thought I would think of myself as a cyclist, but even though I have yet to lose the kind of weight that I hope, being a cyclist is part of who I am not just something I do. Even so, I can't begin to relate to the kind of transformation Neil B is going through.

So, my kudos to Neil Brennen and his inspirational blog. And Neil, if you read this one, according to the USCF, it looks like you are a stronger chess player than me as well.

Motivation - Part II

2007-03-07T21:28:00.000-08:00

Catch up with Part I if you missed it...

Let's face it. Sometimes it's really hard to drag your sorry butt out onto the road, or into the gym, or away from the double cheeseburger. These are a couple more things that keep me motivated.

Other People
Other people can serve as motivation by setting both bad and good examples. First, a couple of bad examples. There are about 500 people that work in my building. A few of them are 'just like me', meaning that they are overweight, overstressed, and generally going down the wrong health road. There are a couple that are about ten years older than me and give me a perfect picture of what my health/life will be like if I don't make a change.

Another bad example: There is a guy waiting for the bus some mornings when I drop my son off for school. Calling him morbidly obese understates his condition. Every time I see him I have a "There but for the grace of God go I." moment.

Before I talk about the positive examples for me, let me say that these bad examples may be great examples in other areas of their lives, and even sometimes in this area.

I do have some great positive examples. I find a lot of motivation from Neil Brennen. He will probably always outweigh me, but has made huge improvement in his health while at the same time maintaining a balance in other areas, an ability I sometimes struggle to find. At work there are three people who have lost a combined 180 lbs. buy putting* the fork down, shutting the pie hole, and biking like crazy. I worship with another friend who lost 60 lbs and kept all but 15 off for over a year primarily by riding his bike.

Another inspiration are the hidden cyclists. These are the people riding bikes not so much as recreation, or as a transportation choice, but as a transportation necessity. As I commute to work I see a couple of cyclists coming the other way. There not all dressed up in spandex and lycra, nor are they riding the latest fancy road bikes. They are bundled up in regular clothes, riding heavy Wal-Mart clunkers. But they are always smiling and they never forget to wave. They remind me that riding in the snow and rain is always a possibility.

The Numbers
This is where I totally geek out. I love numbers. I have taught math and statistics, and I build econometric software for a living. So for me there are few things as exciting as seeing the results in a nice table or chart, especially if there is some neat statistical model involved.

A few years ago I first came across The Hackers Diet: How to lose weight and hair through stress and poor nutrition. The book itself is really just a common sense approach to dieting built on the simple yet oft ignored principle; if you expend more than you consume you will lose weight. On his web site he offers a set of spreadsheets as well as a PalmPilot based tool called the "Eat Watch". I have used the Eat Watch and really like it. I put my weight in every morning, and I can see what my 'trend' value is. The trend is much more important than my actual weight. It smooths out the large variations that can come through eating at a different time, being dehydrated, or any of the myriad other factors that lead to daily weight variations.

So, I get really motivated when I see a table like this:
Weekly Trend Analysis

Past Week	-1.62
Fortnight	-1.42
Month	-1.56

So when I say that I am losing around 1.5 lbs per week, I have empirical evidence to support my statement.

*As a person who was at one time at least conversationally fluent in two languages besides my native English I am occasionally amazed that anyone learns this language. For example, "He was putting pudding on the putting green." What kind of language is this where the only way to discern meaning and pronunciation is by a words context?

Motivation - Part 1

2007-03-04T21:30:00.001-08:00

In my last post I talked a little about NeilK being a motivator for me. I thought I would take a minute and expand on that theme and discuss what serves as motivation for me as far as my riding and health go.

I also have to be honest. There is no way I am going to get everything down in one post or in one sitting.

Clothing
I am a little bit of a clothes horse by nurture (and maybe by nature, but how would I know?). Two of my first jobs out of high school were as a salesman at high end men's clothing stores. Between just being around that environment, having to look sharp as a salesman, and the generous store discount I had amassed a fairly large wardrobe. Then over the years as I gradually put on weight I replaced a lot of the clothing with bigger sizes, but never at quite the same quality.

Finally, last year as I reached the point where my waist size was a full 12 inches bigger than the last day at my last clothing job, I realized I had progressed to buying bad department store clothing.

On the positive side, even as I gained weight I have kept a few favorite items of clothing. I have a couple of pair of slacks size 38 and 36 (I lost the hope of hitting 34 again years ago, even if it is coming back now). I have a few size large t-shirts, and a couple of bike jerseys and bib shorts that are European size XL - thats an L or smaller compared to US sizes. In fact, I had a pair of Levis with a 38 waist on last night. They were still a little tight, but in a few weeks I think I may have to replace them because they are my smallest jeans I own now.

But my biggest clothing motivator is a pair of corduroy pants my wife bought me for Christmas about 4 years ago. I had come through the fall working out pretty well, and was a solidly comfortable 38 waist. The label on the pants said 38, but they were tight and I measured them at just over 36 inches. Rather than take them back and exchange them I told her that I was committed to my weight loss and would be in them in a few weeks... oh the shame!

I am looking forward to May, when I figure I will be in them comfortably.

Food
Ah, food! I love to eat, and especially to eat out. But I know that the choices I make while eating out are usually not the best. I have found that I can use food as a great motivator and there are a couple of the ways I have done that.

For example, rather than eat fast food for lunch, I will bring chili or soup or some other lunch from home for 3-4 days. Each time I stay in at work and eat what I brought I put the $5 I would have spent at Burger King in an envelope. Then, when I get that urge to get out of the office for lunch, I take the money from the envelope and go to one of the nicer local restaurants or deli's in the downtown area. In that way I find I am saving a little money because the nicer lunch seldom costs more than $8-$12, and at the nicer places I can usually make a better choice for my meal.

I am also one of those people who rides to eat for sure. So, instead of just having a banana, I tell myself that if I go to spinning I can have a banana split after class. It's a little mind trick, because unless I made other high calorie choices earlier I would probably have the ice cream anyway. But by doing this I get the banana, and I get a little less ice cream because the banana takes up some of the space in the bowl.

Coming Soon
Two other things that motivate me are other people, both as good and bad examples, and the 'numbers'. Explanations will have to follow in Motivation - Part 2

Reports of My Demise Grossly Exaggerated

2007-03-02T11:55:00.000-08:00

I cannot believe that it has been nearly a month since my last post. I have never had a month like this one. It's been one of those periods where you struggle just to keep your head out of the water.

Here is a little of what has been going on:

Mrs. GeekCyclist started working as a nurse at a local children's hospital. Her position is in the Neuro Trauma Unit, one of the hardest areas in the hospital. So we have been trying to adjust to changing schedules, changing pressures, and associated craziness.
February is National Scout Month, and as an active BSA leader at a couple of levels I have been involved in a number of meetings and dinners. Also, our troop did it's first of 8 planned 10 mile hikes.
We have entered a major push on a large project at work. There are probably 15 programmers working on this project and there are a number of complications as we try to upgrade a legacy database and data entry system while building a desktop and web interface in parallel.
Youth basketball season was in full swing. I coach and referee for a local league, as well as having two boys that are on three teams. Thats a lot of running around.

Maintaining Sanity
Working on my health and fitness has been one of the best ways to maintain my sanity through this month. I managed to get in at least 3 spinning workouts a week throughout the month. I also started doing a little light weight training as well. My free membership at the recreation center (a perk for being a referee) ends on the 19th of March, but I will either buy a membership or a punch pass. The punch pass is a good deal because its 30 visits for $45. I don't think I would ever use the gym enough to make the monthly membership more cost effective than the punch pass.

I have been fairly consistent in controlling my diet and weight as well. Obviously the daily value is up and down, but the log smoothed trend (can you tell I deserve the 'geek' part of the geekcyclist label?) has been very stable at around 1.4 -1.6 lbs a week. I think that 1.5 lbs per week is a perfect rate of weight loss for me.

Getting Compliments
A nice thing happened on Monday. Two different friends at work mentioned that I looked good and must have lost some weight. Is really only been 20 lbs since around Thanksgiving. But 20 lbs. is making a difference in the way my clothes fit and the way I feel.

I can't wait to experience life at my goal weight in the 190's.

Giving Compliments
Props to NeilK for hitting a major milestone that I am pushing towards. After starting heavier than me last September, he left the ranks of cycling's Clydesdale division when his weight broke through to under 200 this week. My loyal readers (all three of you) will recognize NeilK from past posts as a frequent ride partner, coworker, and an inspirational friend.

It looks like he is changing his blog right now, but I hope he posts about his success soon.

Stretching

2007-02-06T21:46:00.000-08:00

Since I spent the month of January doing all my cycling either on the trainer or at spinning class, I have found myself doing a lot more stretching. I've believed in the benefits of stretching since I was running track in high school. But like so many other things in life, if it doesn't pay off immediately we have a hard time being consistent at doing the things that are good for us.

Luckily my spinning instructor ends each class with a cool-down period that includes a pretty well-rounded stretching routine. Since the first couple of classes I have found that when I ride on the trainer I have been doing the same routine.

There is a great guide to basic stretches for cyclists here.

It's described as stretches for 'before' cycling. The debate over whether it is better to stretch before or after exercise rages on. All I can say is that I find it easier to be thorough with my stretching if I do it after my workout. It seems like if I stretch before I rush through the stretches.

Your mileage may vary.

What I Learned In Spinning Class - Part II

2007-01-19T16:44:00.000-08:00

I went to spinning class again last night. I think I did a lot better than I did the first time, but I am still pegging my HR monitor at 195 long before we hit the top of the climbing sequence. Then again, I am usually pegged within the first few minutes of any real climb so I should be used to it.

I did learn a few more lessons that I want to pass on:

1. Don't forget your towel. I ran out of the house late and forgot mine. Trying to stay 'dry' using two of the paper towels provided to wipe down the bikes didn't work at all.

2. I pedal much faster than most of the people in the class. I have found my cadence inching up over the last couple of seasons to where I now feel most comfortable at around 90 rpm. I think that most of the class is pedalling at about 70 rpm.

Which leads me to...

3. If you are not pedalling with the beat of the music, some of the drills are mentally tougher. We did what the instructor called 8-count Jumps. Basically you stand for 8 counts and then sit for 8 counts. Well, I was counting each leg on the down stroke. I must have looked like a spastic prairie dog. So in the recovery I asked how I was supposed to be counting. The instructor said it was 8 counts of the song that was playing. That was kind of awkward, becuase I didn't want to slow my pedaling that much. I did find that if I increased the tension and pedalled a little slower I actually do better on the climbs.

Well, I'm off to do a nice recovery ride at an easy 145 bpm on the trainer so I am ready for my third spinning session tomorrow.

Somebody Likes Me

2007-01-19T16:38:00.000-08:00

Historian On Two Wheels: From 0 to 100 in Six Months: Spinning Versus a Trainer

I caught a few pings from the historian2wheels.blogspot.com domain over the last week or two and bounced over there. It's a very inspirational site if you are, like me, a big guy trying to become a smaller guy.

Turns out he linked my Spinning Lessons post. It's always cool when you are a fledgling blogger to find out that somebody else has linked one of your posts. Especially if the point of the link was not to make fun of something you said or the way you said it...

Years of Failure Well Documented

2007-01-18T22:19:00.000-08:00

I have worked for the State of Utah since the middle of 1994. One of the benefits is a program called HealthyUtah which includes a basic health and fitness assessment. The first time I went in 1995 I weighed 186 and my cholesterol level was 179. This seemed pretty healthy to me, even though it was about 20 pounds heavier than I was in 1992 when I ran a marathon.

Prior to taking that first position with the State, I was working at UPS unloading and sorting packages for 4-5 hours a night. I was also biking, rock climbing and playing basketball regularly. By the spring of 1996 Mrs. GC had given birth to our second son, we bought a house, and I was busy working full time and going to graduate school.

Suddenly I found that the Big Macs and Big Gulps had caught up with me. It seems like every year since I have 'resolved' to turn my weight and fitness level around. Don't get me wrong; while I am clearly overweight, I know that I am still in better shape than a lot of 38 year-old men. Unfortunately I attended another assessment this week, and found that HeathyUtah has tracked my 'progress' since 1998. It's not a pretty picture:

Test Date	Weight (lbs)	Blood Pressure (mmHg)	Total Chol. (mg/dL)	HDL Chol. (mg/dL)	Body Comp. (%)	BMI
01/16/07	234.0	120 / 74	239	29	34.1	32.63
11/03/05	228.0	128 / 80	249	37	33.0	31.80
08/19/03	242.0	128 / 82	236	27	32.0	33.75
08/28/02	224.0	122 / 80	293	29	29.0	31.24
10/25/01	224.0	120 / 92	292	26	31.0	31.24
10/24/00	228.0	130 / 88	277	24	25.0	31.80
11/09/99	221.0	122 / 74	301	22	30.0	30.82
10/29/98	210.0	112 / 68	264	15	32.0	29.29

Looking at that I wonder now why I am not dead already. But I am still here, and three weeks into the new year I am making progress on my weight loss goal. I am hopeful (a trend on 1.5 pounds per week puts me right in the zone for my resolution to weigh 193 or less on August 1. I am also realistic, recognizing that there will be 2-3 plateaus on my journey, and that as this chart suggests, I am not very good at pushing through them.

So there you have it. The whole unvarnished truth going back almost 10 years.

What I Learned My First Time At Spinning Class

2007-01-13T21:51:00.000-08:00

I recently returned to officiating basketball by taking a job as a referee for the rec league at my local county fitness center. The pay is peanuts, but it comes with an excellent benefit; a full membership to the center.

For months I have seen the signs about spinning classes taught at the center, but I have never tried it. When the forecast high for Salt Lake City was announced at 18 degrees for today, I decided that trying a spinning class might be a nice idea. I ended up really enjoying it, and learning a few things as well:

What I learned about attending a spinning class

Show up early so you can pick a bike. I actually got to the room about 15 minutes early, and already 2 bikes were taken. Several of the others had broken water bottle cages (I observed during the class that this is because people try to bend them to hold the little mega-mart half-liter water bottles). You will want to note fan and stereo position and pick a bike located according to your preference for those influences.
Show up early so you can adjust your bike. The bikes used in this class are Schwinns, with spring-loaded adjustment points for seat and handlebar height, and seat fore/aft position. It took me about 4 tries to get to a position that was relatively comfortable, but I still wasn't completely happy with it when the class started.
Spinning class should take the place of a strength workout, not an aerobic base workout. There is a lot of sprinting, and a lot of out of the saddle riding to approximate climbing. If you are looking for an hour of riding at 55-65% of your max heart rate, ride the lifecycle.

What I learned about myself by attending a spinning class:

I don't ride out of the saddle enough. The biggest hill on my commute is a freeway overpass. I hardly ever ride out the the saddle unless it's to stretch or to change my position for a second. I only made it half way through a couple of the climbing sequences. More than once while out of the saddle my heart rate spiked up above 185.
I would kill myself on a fixie. I have a couple of friends that are into the single-speed and fixed-gear sub-culture. Over the last couple of years I have thought about building up a single speed for commuting. If I did that I would have to install a freewheel. The spinning bikes have a fixed gear and flywheel with felt brake pads used to adjust the resistance. At least 4 or 5 times I found myself nearly pitched over the handlebars when I tried to stop pedaling, or I tried to adjust my position and forgot to keep my feet turning.
I like being pushed in the class environment. There were a number of exercises directed by the instructor that I have know for years I should incorporate into my training but I never do. Besides the sprints and climbing which in addition to their own merits as training devices also served as an effective interval workout the instructor directed one-legged drills and a nice stretching routine after the workout.

There are three spinning sessions a week at my fitness center, and I think at least while the weather stays frigid, I am going to try and add at least two sessions a week.

2007 Cycling Goals

2007-01-06T19:06:00.000-08:00

In my resolution post a few days ago, I laid out my goal to lose 45 pounds by August first. This goal is part of a challenge I joined over at FatCyclist. In order to keep my focus and keep the pressure on I decided to post some of my other cycling related goals for 2007. I am relatively new to this blogging thing, so unlike Big Guy On A Bike I can't go back and compare what I said I would do in 2006, to what actually happened, but I hope that next year I can look back and say that I accomplished all of the following:

In addition to loosing the weight by August, I want to end the year with my weight still under 200. From a decade of experience, I can say unequivocally that it is at least as hard to maintain weight lost as it is to drop the weight in the first place.
Buy and use a heart rate monitor. I get to thank BGOAB for this one, since I recently received a nice Amazon gift certificate from him. I have been riding fairly consistently for 5-6 years, but I ride at virtually the same level of exertion all the time. I don't have enough money for a power meter, but I hope that by using a HR monitor I can get a little more out of my commutes and training rides.
Ride 3,500 miles this year. I am not sure how many miles I put in over 2006, but I know it was less than in 2005. My commute is about 15 miles, so I should get 3,000 just by riding one way at least 4 times a week. This also requires that I be a little more diligent about tracking my rides and progress.
Spend some time mountain biking. I usually only ride on the road, but the New Years Eve ride got me excited about doing some mountain biking. I have hiked in the San Rafael Swell several times, and have seen great routes like the Temple Mountain Trail that I would like to try.

New Years Day Ride

2007-01-03T20:44:00.000-08:00

Utah has a fair number of blogging cyclists, but the most popular is probably FatCyclist. Before going any further, it should be noted that Fatty probably weighs 60 pounds less than me, but who am I to hold a grudge over his snatching my preferred name?

Anyway, on his blog he posted an invitation to come on a mountain bike ride on New Years Day. I figured that joining in would be the perfect way to begin the year. Besides getting in some miles on the first day of the year, it would be a chance to meet some new cyclist, bike a new route. It didn't hurt to have a morning ride planned to help me back off the calorie shovel on New Years Eve.

So, JuniorSprinter and I got up early, and loaded up a couple of bikes. Since we are both primarily roadies, and because my "mountain" bike is set up with slicks for foul weather commuting, neither of us was on our normal bike. JS took Mrs. GeekCyclist's Giant Sedona, I loaded up a 10 year old DiamondBack Wildwood that I inherited from a neighbor. When I say that I inherited the bike, you should read that as "He got a frame, out-of-true wheels, and all the components in ziplocs and Wal-Mart bags." I actually spent the better part of 5 or six evenings overhauling it and putting it back together. JS usually uses it, so ultimately we both ended up on bikes a little too small for us for this ride.

After driving down from Magna we actually got to the pull-off in Provo Canyon at about 9:20, so we turned around and went back into town in search of a little breakfast and some lip balm. By the time we got back up the canyon there were so many people there that we had to park across the street.

The Ride
There were still several people in the parking lot when we headed up Squaw Peak Road. The beginning part was paved, and I started to wonder why I hadn't ridden my bike with the slicks. Then after about a mile we hit a gate and the fun began. The rest of the ride was on snow packed down by snowmobiles. Now, I am not a mountain bike rider, and I commute on the flats, so trying to ride my bike up a 7% grade covered with loosely packed snow and ruts was a challenge. But it was probably the most fun challenge I've had on a bike in a while.

After ridding on the snow for a while, JS and I were promptly caught and dropped by the main group of riders. After a while a few stragglers blew past, and soon I was alone. This made my humiliation almost bearable, since the combination of my lack of skill and abundance of surplus energy stored around my waist conspired against me. I hit a rut. Since I was only going about 4 miles an hour I promptly fell over. I got back up and realized I had a problem. I couldn't get started again. I would pedal, but by the time I got my other foot on the pedal I would be swerving and falling, or I would be spinning the back wheel in the snow.

I walked for a while, let my heart rate recover a little, found a packed section and started riding again. The going was good for a few hundred yards and then I got bounced off again. The rest of the ride up could be described as the "shampoo ride" - ride, fall, walk, repeat.

The Descent
I think I was about 2/3 of a mile from the top of the climb when I caught JS and we saw the core group on their way back down. We turned the bikes around and waited for the group to catch us mostly because I figured with our lack of experience the main group would be descending much faster than we would.

Just as the main group reached our location at least 4 people crashed, including Fatty and I think Kenny right on top of each other and right in front of me. Watching that I lost a little nerve and ended up riding my brakes so hard my hands were cramped by the time I got back to the truck.

Here is Fatty's Post on the ride. Note, I was so slow that I am in neither the pictures or the video. But I assure you, I was there...

Overall, it had to have been the craziest thing I have done on a bike in decades. I cannot wait to see what this group comes up with for next year.

Resolution

2006-12-31T15:32:00.000-08:00

Well, here it is the last day of 2006, and I ended the year only 5 pounds lighter than I was at the end of 2005. I was actually doing fairly well at dropping some weight until July, and then a number of changes in my life conspired against me... I really have no excuse though. I know I am just putting more into my body than I should be.

I have had a number of friends who have experienced some fantastic weight loss through cycling over the last 18 months, and it is my publicly stated intention to join them. I have committed to a number of people that I am going to succeed at reestablishing a healthy weight.

As of yesterday I was 238 lbs. This isn't the most I have weighed, but it is getting close. I also did a 3 mile time trial on my bike yesterday. My time was 10:13. I will be using this site to publicly report my progress as I as I move toward the following goals to be reached by August 1.

Weight < 193
TimeTrial < 8:30

This represents weight loss of 1.5 pounds a week on average for the next 30 weeks. The time trial goal would mean that I will be able to maintain a speed of 20-21 mph for 3 miles.

Wish me luck.

Classic Rock

2006-12-14T08:27:00.000-08:00

I took a fun test on Classic Rock last night - it told me I was...
The Veteran
You scored 78%!

You've picked up the majority of the classic rock basics. You probably have a classic rock collection and can sing along with most of the songs on your local radio station.

This is not the highest score, but it is arguably the best: that subtle combination of impressive knowledge and not being a pretentious geek.

My test tracked 1 variable How you compared to other people your age and gender:

You scored higher than 99% on notes

Link: The BASIC classic rock Test written by allmydays on OkCupid Free Online Dating, home of the The Dating Persona Test

Jerry! Jerry!

2006-12-12T20:27:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to Jerry Sloan, head coach of the Utah Jazz on becoming only the 5th NBA coach in history to reach 1,000 wins.

Some links:
Special Report(.pdf)
Article from the SL Tribune

Sloan has his critics, but he's had a fantastic career. He's been coach of the Jazz for 19 seasons, longer than any coach, not only in the NBA, but the NFL, MLB and NHL as well. His winning percentage is over 60%. And as a youth coach, I appreciate having Sloan as a proponent of disciplined, team-based basketball to serve as an example to the kids I coach.

Outrageous!

2006-12-04T21:27:00.000-08:00

I cannot believe how you can hit and kill a cyclist because you were downloading ringtones while driving and the worst you are charged with is Improper Lane Usage.

Here is a quote from the article:

[Matthew Wilhelm] 25-year-old former Champaign resident, a University of Illinois mechanical engineering graduate working for Caterpillar in Peoria, died on Sept. 8 from head injuries he received Sept. 2 when Stark hit him with her car because she was downloading ring tones to her cell phone instead of paying attention to driving.

And about the (completely inadequate) punishment:

State's Attorney Julia Rietz made the call not to lodge any more serious charge than improper lane usage against Stark, saying that the legal definition of recklessness, to sustain reckless homicide or reckless driving, did not fit her actions.
But Rietz argued for the maximum sentence of six months of conditional discharge a form of probation without reporting to an officer a $1,000 fine and traffic safety school.

"This is a tragic case and one which has demonstrated to us there are many things we can't adequately resolve in this building, unfortunately. The law doesn't give us an adequate remedy to address the loss to the Wilhelms and society," she said.

I can't believe how the State's Attorney could say:

...it would be hard to prosecute 'willful and wanton' (behavior) and the driver could have 'no reasonable expectation of a bike on the side of the road,'

This is just one more example of how we as cyclists have less than second-class status on America's roadways.

Careful out there.

What I Learned in San Antonio

2006-11-30T18:15:00.000-08:00

I spent the last 4 days in San Antonio, TX participating as a trainer/presenter at a conference. Althought I used to travel as many as 14 times a year for work my travel schedule has been cut back to usually 3-5 trips for the last couple of years. I know there are a lot of frequent travellers out there with suggestions about how to beat long ticket lines, score the best rooms or speed through airport security, but I learned a couple of interesting lessons on this trip:

Lesson 1 - Where the heck am I?
Clearly, you should know what city you are visiting, what hotel you are staying in and major landmarks near your destination, but there is one more thing you might want to investigate. What county are you visiting?

"What county?" you ask, "Why would I need to know that?"

Here's why. One evening during my trip a very strong cold front moved through the area, triggering tornado warnings and watches from the National Weather Service. Now, I appreciate highly the work done by NWS and the Emergency Broadcast System. However, I have no earthly idea what county San Antonio is part of, or which counties it sits next to. So when the warning came on listing several counties, I didn't know whether to sit in the bathtub and cover my head, just keep watching the non-stop stream of Law and Order reruns on cable, or go out to the Itallian restaurant I had a hankering for.

Lesson 2 - Check The Weather At Home, Too
I checked weather.com for San Antonio before I left Salt Lake. Ahhhhhhhh! Temps in the mid 80's until late Wednesday or Thursday when I return. Excelent! I will wear a light fleece vest to the airport, pack it to San Antonio and I'll be great.

WRONG!

I got of the plane in Salt Lake today and was met with temps in the low 20's. I had a long walk in the economy parking lot to my truck, in which I had no scrapper to remove the 4 inches of snow and ice. Gotta check that hometown weather for the return date next time.

Lesson 3 - Frequent Stay Programs are Great!
When I checked into the Westin Riverwalk (and excellent hotel) I was greated by Marissa. I asked for a non-smoking room and when she said the entire hotel was non-smoking I joking said, "Well, I'll take a big room then." At that point she asked me if I was a member of Starwood Rewards, looked up my number and told me that on my last stay I became a "gold" member of the program. She then became my favorite hotel employee of the year when she said "I have a suite available for you at no additional charge".

Suite? Sweeeeet!

Ten Little Steps

2006-11-22T22:13:00.000-08:00

Prologue
This post is not about turning your life around, although in a way it might be. And it's not about creating the ultimate Thanksgiving dish, yet that plays a part as well.

I read an article on the behavioral differences between fit and obese people several years ago. I wish I could find the reference, but the main point was this: People who are not fit, or obese find a bunch of little ways that they conserve energy. They don't get up as much when they work at a desk, they don't fidget, and they don't walk if they can avoid it.

The Story
This evening I found myself at the local big box supermarket. I went there to pick up some model paint, thinner and a snack for Mrs. GeekCyclist. It was a madhouse on account of all the people picking up dinner stuff.

On the way out I was behind a guy with a cart. In the cart was a box containing a single pair of boots. That's it; that's all he bought and he was pushing this pair of shoes to his car in a cart. As it turned out he was parked next to me, and I was parked next to the cart return. He put the box in the trunk and then proceeded to leave the cart between our cars.

That's right, rather than walk the ten steps to put the cart in the return, he left it between our cars. I looked around the parking lot and was amazed at the number of carts strewn all over the lot.

The Point
We constantly hear about people wanting to lose weight and get fit. But we have a society where we think our convenience is worth more than the time it takes to walk 10 steps. We believe that it's okay to take shortcuts or make decisions that go counter to anything we are trying to accomplish.

Living in Utah

2006-11-20T20:12:00.000-08:00

I have lived most of my life in Utah, which leaves me feeling like I should answer the three most common questions I get about my home state.

1. Yes, I am a member of the predominant religious community, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, the "Mormons".

2. No, I have never skied at Snowbird, Alta, Park City, etc, etc. In fact I have never skied other than a couple of cross-country excursions on rented equipment.

2. No, I have never ridden the Slickrock Trail, or anything else in Moab. I have never really mountain biked anything.

So, why do I live here? To begin with, I feel at home among the mountains. While I don't ski or mtn bike, I was an avid rock climber for years, and I continue to log about 25 nights of camping or backpacking every year. I like to hike. I find nearly every part of the state that I have visited to be relatively hospitable to road cycling.

I have a great job with state government. I have been there for almost 15 years, and I enjoy what I do. It's nice to feel like the programs and projects I work on can really make a difference in someone's life.

Changing My Answers
The funny thing is, I am feeling more and more inclined to change my answers to numbers 2 and 3. (Sometimes dumb things done in the name of religion make me think about changing my answer to number 1 as well, but that's a topic for a different post).

I don't really have the time, money or desire to get into downhill skiing, but I'd really like to supplement my normal winter activities with some cross country skiing or snowshoeing. I actually have a pair of snowshoes I made as a boy scout in about 1985. I figure I could get a x-skiing package for under $200 and I think even Mrs. GeekCyclist might like that.

Even more enticing is the idea of mountain biking. I have a rigid frame mountain bike that I bought in the early '90s but I have converted it to a commuter with high pressure slicks, rack and fenders. But over on one of my favorite blog, Elden, the FatCyclist, (who by some strange quirk of mathematics and physics weighs about 60 lbs less than me), has posted a 4 part series on his trip to Moab. This is another area where I think I could entice Mrs. GeekCyclist to participate. She acually has a Giant hardtail that doesn't get much use, but she has ridden the Jordan River Parkway trail with me.

I am not sure I have ever seen anything that looks more fun. I have found my reason to want a new bike...

A week with no rides

2006-11-18T09:57:00.000-08:00

It's been over a week since I last rode. In fact, last Friday I started doing a major tuneup on my mountain bike primarily because I knew I wasn't going to get to ride this week. I overhauled the hubs of both my main wheels and my backup pair, and threw both cassettes in a bucket of degreaser. That's where they have been for a week now.

Besides just being generally busy I went to Milwaukee to testify in the sentencing hearing for this case. The couple got 48 months for immigration and indentured servitude violations, which seems low considering they held a domestic servant 'captive' for almost 20 years. Then again, they are Filipino citizens which means when they get out of jail they will almost certainly be deported. I was called to testify about the back wages owed to the servant (almost 3/4 of a million dollars.)

Wrong Plane
A funny thing happened on the way to Milwaukee though. I had to fly to Denver to connect through to Milwaukee. It was one of these small Canadair Regional Jets that hold 40-50 people; one where to board you usually exit the airport and walk across the tarmac to the plane.

At the Denver Airport all of the similar small jet flights use the same main gate, and then you walk down some stairs and through a long hallway with doors labeled A-N. They have people with clipboards checking tickets etc.

As the time approached for our flight to push back, I was commenting to the man seated across the aisle that we may have gotten very lucky since we were the only two people on the plane seated in rows with empty seats. Just then a frazzled woman came rushing on the plane and sat down next to me.

We chatted briefly as the plane took off, and then I returned to my book. After about 30 minutes the pilot came on the intercom and did the spiel about our altitude, the weather and the expected flight time to Milwaukee. "Jill" tapped me on the shoulder and with a shocked expression said, "Is this plane really going to Milwaukee?" Of course I said yes, to which she responded "I not going to Milwaukee. I'm going to Indianapolis." To which I responded "Not without going to Milwaukee first..."

The funny thing was that her ticket was for a seat in row 13; my row. Had she held a ticked for any other row there would not have been vacant seats and it is likely the flight attendants would have put her on the right plane.

Counting Votes

2006-11-10T19:57:00.000-08:00

A Close Race
I know people who never vote because they say their vote can't make a difference. I know others who have this vision of their vote being that one vote that puts their candidate over the top. I think that sometimes both viewpoints have some validity.

In the great state of Utah I have a hard time seeing how my vote in a presidential election can make a difference when this is the reddest of the red states. I think in '92 not only did the former President Bush beat Clinton, but Perot did too.

On the other hand, we are in the midst of a recount in my state House of Representatives district. Our incumbent representative ended the election 25 votes behind the challenger. 25 votes seems to me like the equivalent of one evening shaking hands, 2-4 well placed lawn signs, or maybe an hour of calls from a poll watcher.

It is insane how this race has gone, especially when it looks like the challenger spent about $50k on the race while the incumbent spent about $15k. I like the incumbent, but I think our representation could be better. I strongly disagree with the challenger on multiple issues that are important to me, and with the amount of money she spent I am worried about her ties to several special interest groups I despise, but I think she would at least be a passionate advocate for our area.

It may be December before we find out who won.

Voting on Two Wheels
I rode to the polls; twice actually. I tried to vote early last Friday but when I got to the location the wait was about two hours. So on Tuesday I left the house about 5 after 7 in the morning and rode to the local elementary school. I was a little discouraged because I overslept and was afraid of the lines I would encounter. As it turns out I was done and back on my bike riding to work within 30 minutes.

Voting For Two Wheels
There were three propositions on the ballot, all of which dealt with parks, transportation and open space. They all three passed, which I am happy about. What I would really like to see is more discussion of complete streets and safe routes to school.

I don't know how much of an impression my showing up at the polls in cycling clothing made, but I know I am a little 'famous' both in the neighborhood and at work for commuting by bike. I know when I first started my 13-15 mile one-way commute seems like a really long way. Now, I can't imagine not doing it long term, and if I go more than a day or two without riding I can's stand it.

So, to my 3 loyal readers, a question. What should I do to help make cycling a more viable alternative in the Salt Lake City area?

Crossings

2006-11-06T19:09:00.000-08:00

A few nights ago was Meet the Candidate night at the local high school. There are some interesting local races including those for my district's state Senator and Representative. So I packed up the kids and off we went.

I got to talk to several candidates and made up my mind about a few races. The best thing was the chance to talk to policy and lawmakers about the concerns of a commuting cyclist.

I asked several candidates, "A legislator once told me that he was sensitive to the needs of cyclists. What do you think the needs of cyclists are?" The answers tended to flow around the idea of a recreational cyclist. The focus was on parks, trails and the like.

I was really pleased when two candidates seemed to really grasp the idea of cycling as transportation. They each talked about wider streets, better enforcement of the Josie Johnson Law. It gave me a chance to talk about Complete Streets and Safe Routes to School.

I was also able to share the major frustration of the commuting cyclist in western Salt Lake County - crossing.

On my typical routes to work I have to cross two high speed divided highway (SR 201 and Bangerter Highway), two or three interstate highways (I-15 and I-215 at least, and sometimes I-80), a river, and multiple sets of grade-level train tracks. At one set of tracks that crosses the 800 South bike route it seems like once I week I am blocked by a stopped or veeerrrrryyyy slow moving train working it's way through downtown.

I moved to my current home about 10 years ago, and since then the population has at least doubled in this area. The development has made nearly unridable three of the roads I used to ride frequently. One of the roads I have switched to is fairly good, but also has the old-style, wheel-swallowing sewer grates every few hundred feet. There is a parkway next to the river that now has an underpass below SR 201 (thank you SL County), but it suffers from an infestation of southwest thorns.

I recognize that I live in the 'wide open west' and that people out here have a love affair with their cars, especially the gas-guzzling, huge-family carrying SUV's. But I want to get the message across - I am only trying to get to work on time, just like you. I'd like to be able to get there more or less in a straight shot, similar to what I could do if I drove. And I'd like a little patience from motorists when on rare occasions I am forced to take the lane. Remember, I'm not blocking traffic, I am traffic.

So - I am going to vote bicycling as much as I can. There are a lot of other things important to my vote as well, but I only get one and commuting coupled with open space preservation are touchstones to me. It may not be much, but thats how I plan to contribute on election day.

The Epic Commute

2006-10-25T22:17:00.000-07:00

I know, I know; "epic" is not a word you would typically use to describe commuting to work on a bicycle. But there is no word better suited to my commute this morning.

To understand what happened today you need to know that when I crashed in July I broke the pump bracket on my road bike. I also switched a few weeks ago from my road bike to my winter commuter, an old rigid mountain bike, so I haven't been riding the road bike much lately.

Today when I woke up there was a cold front bearing down on Salt Lake City, with a strong wind out of the west. I rarely get a tailwind on my commute, so when I saw this I was pretty excited. I figured if I used the road bike I could break 40 minutes for my commute.

So - putting 2 and 2 together I am sure you can figure out what happened. About 3 miles from home, cruising along at 25 mph with the fantastic tailwind, I picked up a shank in my tire. That's when I remembered that I didn't have my pump re-mounted. No problem, I'll just use the Ultraflate CO2 inflater I have in my seat bag...the one I left on my mountain bike.

I was a little over a mile from a bus stop, so I hoofed it up there, only to see the bus go by when I was about a block away. That meant a 20 minute wait for the next bus. Then, when I got to the TRAX light rail station the train was already there, so there was no way I could get my bike off the bus and to the train in time. That meant another 15 minute wait.

All in all it took me 2:10 to make it to work when it usually takes about 50-55 minutes by bike, and about 20 minutes by car.

Lesson learned.

Morning Meditations

2006-10-17T20:49:00.000-07:00

I rode to work this morning for the first time in a while it seems. It's amazing to me how much better I feel, and how much clearer I think while and after I ride. This morning I passed a truck with Hexel something printed on the side. That got me thinking about numbering and different numerical bases (this is the geek part of GeekCyclist). I am a computer programmer by trade, but my training was in Economics, so I never really got that base of computer science.

Anyway, I'm tooling down the road off in numerical la-la-land thinking about hexadecimal and finally realizing how hex, octal and binary are all related and why so much of what I encounter in programming deals with hex. And then it hit me...I finally got the joke.

You see, there is a shirt that says "How many people can read hex if only you and dead people can read hex?" Now, I get the one that says "There are only 10 kinds of people, those who understand binary and those who don't." But I am sorry to say I never got the hex one until this morning. I am not going to reveal the whole thing to you, but you can see a sample of a shirt and a hint here.

Right after that was when the truck almost killed me.

I was still in la-la-land a little; cruising on a through street that makes the top of a T with another street. My road/lane has no stop sign, the intersecting street does. A truck passed me and the intersection, and a truck waiting at the stop sign pulled out right in front of me.

Yes, it was 6:45 AM which is pretty dark right now in SLC. But I had both bulbs of my headlight going, for about 18 watts of power. I had two rear blinkies going (not that the truck driver could see those). I had on a white helmet, a jacket with reflective piping, and two reflective ankle straps on. I think I am pretty visible.

We both skidded to a halt, and then, miracle of miracles, he rolled down his window and instead of yelling at me, said "Sorry for pulling out in front of you and scaring the #### out of you."

Honestly, I don't think it was that he didn't see me. I think drivers are so accustomed to seeing kids and grown-ups on heavy, cheap bikes that are moving at 8-10 mph, that they are literally shocked at how fast a serious cyclist approaches an intersection. I was doing somewhere between 17 and 21 mph, and I think he just assumed he would clear the intersection before I got there.

I told him thanks, and no harm done, and clipped back in as he pulled off, at which point the next car at the stop sign pulled out into my path as well - him I yelled at...

Heading South to the Swell

2006-10-10T20:36:00.000-07:00

This weekend I am taking a group of Boy Scouts to the San Rafael Swell in central Utah. The kids are all out of school Thursday and Friday this week. Being able to leave on Thursday make it a much nicer trip than out typical Friday night to Saturday overnighter.

I really like this area. We have gone twice before and hiked Bell and Little Wild Horse canyons near Goblin Valley State Park. We are going to camp in the same area but are going to hike Crack and Chute canyons. When I say these are narrow, red-rock slot canyons I am sure most Utahns know what I am talking about, but for those of you in other parts of the world, here are some pictures from our trip in October of last year.

The Wave

Sun in the Narrows

Utah is a Desert?

The Only Guy to Stay Dry

Don't Touch That Barrel Adjuster

2006-10-05T21:57:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine came to me at work and asked if I would take a look at his bike. He said he was having trouble with his rear shifting when moving from smaller to larger cogs. To begin with, this is the opposite of what I normally see. Usually you have a dirty or kinked cable and the added friction messes up your shifting going from larger to smaller cogs.

Before getting really into adjustments, I suggested:

Using a spray or foam degreasser, apply to the chain, derailleurs and the front chain rings. Let sit for 10-20 min and then using a toothbrush and a small amount of degreaser attack the chain and derailleur pivots with a vengeance.
Remove the rear wheel and clean the cassette using the degreaser.
Wipe the chain before replacing the rear wheel.
Apply a _light_ coat of your favorite lube to the chain and the pivots.

Sure - a good cleaning won't fix a serious mechanical problem, but it's amazing how often just cleaning the chain, cables and pivots will fix sloppy shifting.

Modify Your Environment

2006-10-03T20:21:00.000-07:00

If I haven't said it before, I work as a computer programmer for a government agency. We were recently reorganized, shuffled and moved, and I found myself in a much smaller cubicle in a much noisier space.

As a geek-bureaucrat I realize I will never have an office like this. Then again, I never expected to work in an area where my noise-canceling headphone don't seem to make the slightest dent in the din. On top of that they are re-routing power to the server room and one of the primary junctions is below the elevated floor right under my chair. For the last week there has been drilling and clanking all hours of the day.

The worst though was the size and configuration of the cube. It is basically 6 x 8 with a U-shaped desk and typical corner pieces. I had been in a space that was about 9 x 11. But it's not the size, it is the shape. We try to be "agile" and "XP" centered in our programming methods, which means spending some time most days doing pair programming. In the new digs, it was impossible for two people to work at the same computer. You couldn't fit two chairs into the U, and you were crammed together so close that neither person could breath.

Last week my boss and I were working on a particularly sticky task, and had been for most of the morning when I finally snapped. I stood up and asked if anyone had a screwdriver. I proceeded to remove half of the U, an action which generated no shortage of interest in our little cube farm. Once I had it torn apart and the pieces stacked outside my cubicle I sent a message to building services that I needed a straight desk section to replace the three sections I had removed. They said they would see what they could do, at which point I said, "I don't care how long it takes to install the new parts, but you need to send someone up to pick up the old parts because I already took it apart."

Just after lunch they had my desk put back together. It's not perfect, and it's still as noisy a poolhall half the time, but at least two people can work together without feeling like you need to get a marriage license.

The bike section - Removing and Installing grips
Most of my posts have something to do with bikes, so I thought I better add something. Over the last two weeks I have switched from my nicer road bike to my old, beater mountain bike as my primary commuter.

I learned a neat trick while switching the grips and bar-ends on the mountain bike. I slipped a narrow screwdriver under the grip and gave the gap one shot of Simple Green spray cleanser. Two or three twists and the grips came right off.

When you are trying to get grips back on, use a little AquaNet or other "super-hold" hair spray. While it is wet the grip will slide right back on. When the hair spray dries it will hold the grip in place.

Out of the Political Closet

2006-09-05T15:50:00.000-07:00

I had a letter to the editor of the Salt Lake Tribune printed today - I guess I am now out of the closet as the "radical left-wing democrat" that I am. Although that is only in relation to the majority here in Utah that in spite of all that has happened is still the strongest supporter of the current administration. Embarrassing. I think in most of the rest of the country I would be seen as a left leaning moderate, but who knows.

Read the letter here.

{Update 03/02/2007 - Unless you have archive access the link above no longer works so below is the text of the original letter. I don't remember if/how it was edited by the paper.}

A banner hanging downtown reads, "We feel safer because President Bush is in
charge." Let me state clearly that this banner does not reflect my
view, nor should it reflect the view of most Americans.

During the Bush Presidency we have:
- Trembled as family members marched to wars that have no clear
objective or timeline and that serve to incite and inflame our
enemies.
- Heard of the torture of prisoners in foreign lands and in American bases.
- Seen the loss of civil liberties, and privacy protections guaranteed
by the constitution yet ignored under presidential fiat.
- Witnessed decreased tolerance, the government funding of
"faith-based" initiatives, and an erosion of both the separation
of Church and State and the founder's ideals of plurality.
- Watched as the religious right and so called "Christian Nationalists"
successfully mandate the teaching of revisionist history and science
in our schools, eroding the principles of reasoned scholarship and
science.

Under the leadership of President Bush, we watched the towers fall,
and the rise of the political culture of fear. I certainly don't feel
safer because President Bush is in charge.

Back To The Site Of The Crash

2006-09-03T16:09:00.000-07:00

Friday NeilK, JuniorSprinter and I went for a ride up emigration Canyon. The plan was to park near the zoo and ride over the Little Mountain Summit and continue on to Big Mountain. As usual when the grade gets steeper or longer than the average highway overpass, NK and JS rode away from me easily and early. So I had a while to meditate on my experience the last time I rode down the canyon.

On the way up I stopped for a minute in the area where I bought it. It turns out that there must be a fairly significant number of crashes in the area because I was able to see a handful of bike parts in the grass and rocks. Mostly is was reflector parts, but there was a pump head and what looked like a derailleur pulley.

I continued to the Little Mountain Summit, down past Little Dell Reservoir and about halfway up the climb to Big Mountain when I turned around. I figured the others would have reached the summit and be turning around about then. I made it back up to Little Mountain a little before they did and had a few minutes to prepare myself mentally for the coming descent...

I was slow going down. It's going to be a while before I get my "descending chops" back.

Running Red Lights

2006-08-30T19:22:00.000-07:00

I work very near the center of Salt Lake City, Utah. So the end of my commute entails passing through several urban intersections. The other day on my ride in I was approaching a corner where I turn right, and I had a green light. As I got closer another cyclist came straight through the intersection against the red. I turned, passed him, and then stopped at the next intersection because the light was red. The other cyclist came up next to me and we said hello, then as the traffic thinned but with the light still red he blew through and went his way. My bike parking area was mid-block after the light so that was the last of our interaction. But it left a bad taste in my mouth, and I wonder what I should have done. I can never think of the right thing to say in the spur of the moment.

I wanted to say, "You know, when you run a red light like that, not only are you breaking the law, and endangering your life, you are irritating motorists which endangers my life." I'm just not sure saying anything would have made a difference.

Friends Accident

2006-08-22T20:48:00.000-07:00

My younger son is a Cub Scout, and tonight was pack meeting. It was being held at a local park and we expected it to go past dark so instead of riding there my son and I drove. We passed a friend stopped talking to a policeman just as we entered the park. As it turns out this friend had just hit a young girl on a bike.

It looks like the consensus from witnesses is that it was a typical kids "ride-out" type of accident. The girl turned off the sidewalk and rode directly into the path of oncoming traffic. She was ok, but my friend was understandably upset.

The funny thing is that yesterday I attended the board meeting of the Salt Lake City Bicycle Collective and one of the main topics was getting the LAB kids bike safety course in front of as many kids as possible.

To Parents
Parents, please teach your kids that bicycles are vehicles, not toys. I know you found that shiny aluminum full-suspension mountain bike in the toy section of Wal-Mart. They just don't know any better.

Teach them to "drive" their bikes, not ride them. Teach them to signal, to ride with traffic, to behave like a car.

Make them wear helmets, and put lights on the bikes if they ever ride in the twilight hours.

Most collisions are easily preventable.

Blogger Beta

2006-08-16T07:02:00.000-07:00

When I heard that Google had purchased Blogger I don't think it fazed me at all. But I was looking at the new beta interface and I am getting really excited to make the switch. There are details here but these are some of the highlights I am looking forward to:

New color and font options. I do c# web developement for my job, so I know changing the look and feel of a site is not that hard. But it takes time that I just don't have.
Categorized posts. Several other services have had this for a long time. I hesitate to do IT or backpacking or other posts becuase I think most of "you" come here for the cycling related stuff. I think with categories I will be more willing to open up the other topics.
Better feed options. I have had trouble with a long lag on my RSS feed. I hope this takes care of it.

All I have to do now is wait for my site to get flagged by the powers that be so I can convert it.

Infrequent Rides

2006-08-15T21:31:00.000-07:00

I have had a very hard time getting on the bike for the last month. The following is my list of excuses:

Since the crash I haven't quite gotten my road bike back into rideable condition. I replaced the derailleur, but I need to replace the cable as well.
I went to California on business, then to Idaho for boy scout camp.
My wife's uncle passed away unexpectedly, so we had family in town for about 10 days.
I've just gotten lazy.

But I rode my bad weather old mountain commuter home yesterday and felt great doing it. Unfortunately (for my biking) I am leaving on a short backpacking trip on Thursday, so that's probably it for my riding this week.

I think what I need is another big ride to serve as a fall goal like the MS-150 does in the spring. I am thinking about one of these:

The Heber Valley Century
Bikes for Kids with Dave Zabriskie
A ride to Wendover, NV for the weekend.

That last one would be cool. It's about 120 miles from my house to the StateLine Casino. I have wanted to do this for a few years. I would have my wife drive out that afternoon to meet me there and drive back after spending the night.

Some Cycling Photos

2006-07-08T08:58:00.000-07:00

NeilK has been packing a digital camera around with him on our rides. I have gotta catch up in the gadget race eventually.

GeekCyclist and JuniorSprinter at the MS-150

JS at the top of Little Mountian - Salt Lake City, UT

Both of us on the summit - I'd smile but I am trying to eat a clif bar.

Put it in the ditch.

2006-07-07T21:01:00.000-07:00

I tried to think of some snappy lyrics to the tune of "Puttin' on the Ritz", but the best I could do was the title because my head hurts too much.

NeilK, JuniorSprinter and I took off from downtown Salt Lake around 3:30 and headed up Emigration Canyon to Little Mountain. The other two left me quickly on the uphills, and I just tried to motor on at my own pace. After a few minutes at the summit, we headed back down. I love this descent. It's fast, and just twisty enough to be a true thrill.

For the first time, JS passed my during one of the straights, and as we approached a tight hairpin turn I overtook him on the inside. Then I realized I was in trouble. I hit the brakes hard, slid a little off the back, but couldn't avoid going into the "ditch" on the uphill side of the road. I know I bounced a couple of times, and the right side of the bike is a little scratched up, as is the derailleur.

But it's the helmet that gets to me. My head does hurt, but that pic only shows a little of the damage sustained by my one month old helmet. I am so glad I had it on. Most of the back half of the helmet is cracked and destroyed.

I'm basically okay. I've got a little road rash on both legs, and some scrapes and bruises on my hip and shoulders. Still, one look at the helmet (I can't quit) tells me it could have been much worse.

I think JuniorSprinter may have been shaken up worse than I was. After I got up and we started back down the canyon, I don't think he peddled at all. This is a guy who went down hard at the ms-150 two weeks ago and wanted to keep going on a tacoed wheel. I guess it's different when dad turfs it.

Saturday's MS-150 Route

2006-06-26T12:56:00.000-07:00

NeilK from the Big Mountain post, rode with JuniorSprinter and I for about 2/3 of the ride on Saturday. He had his fancy GPS and has uploaded the ride stats to the MotionBased site.

Utah MS-150 Weekend

2006-06-26T09:05:00.000-07:00

Thank you to everyone who donated to JuniorSprinter (I don't know if he is ever going to blog again) and I for our second Annual MS-150 ride. Together we raised $1,229 for MS research as support programs.

The ride is held every year in Cache Valley (Logan) Utah. JS and I rode the 100 mile century route on the first day again this year. It is a fantastic, mostly flat, route that winds its way north into Idaho for a while before returning to the fair park in Logan. When we did it last year, the extra loop you rode to complete the century had only one stop on it. This year they moved the rest stop a little, and added two water stops which were a nice touch. We both finished much stronger than we did last year.

Our plan was to ride the long route on Sunday, which would have given us a total of 175 miles over the two days. We were both riding very strong and were helping to lead a solidly moving pace line of about 12 people. As we entered Hyrum, Utah near the 50 mile mark, we made a left, a right and then saw a support vehicle with a ride volunteer pointing that we needed to make another quick left. As the group spread out and started to slow down, JS got stuck in the middle a little bit, hit some road damage funny and severely bent his front wheel.

Elementary physics indicates that when you are going 18 mph, and the front of the bike stops, the rest of the bike keeps going. JS was thrown over the front of the bike and onto the road. We then got to meet several medics and the staff at Logan Regional Medical center. The medical and ride staffs both did a gread job taking care of him. He tucked and rolled as well as you could, but he still suffered a partial separation of his left shoulder. He has sizable road-rash patches on his shoulder blade, upper and lower right arm, left hip, and a large bruise and road rash on his right knee.

He will be hurting for a while. He will also be off the bike for a week or so, which is good because it will take that long for me to fix the wheel or find him a new one, install a new handlebar (he bent the old on in the crash as well) and bar tape, and make the other fixes to get the bike ridable again.

I later heard that same section of road, less than 400 meters long, ended up being the location of two other serious crashes. But I can't fault the MS-150 staff. They did a great job the whole weekend, and even if that area could have been signed better, there is no way to know if that would have prevented the crashes, and you can't fault them for road damage. After JS crashed we had a staffer with us the whole time until we left the hospital. They were really great.

Generosity

2006-06-23T07:57:00.000-07:00

Because of the blog template thing where the link was gone, and the fact that the MS-150 is tomorrow, I sent out a bunch of last minute emails last night begging for donations.

I have been shocked and humbled by the generosity of most people I have contacted. It is amazing to me how much some family, friends and acquaintances have been willing to donate to this cause. It has made me re-evaluate the way I approach my charitable giving.

I have done this ride in the past and always enjoyed it as a fun ride and a nice way to raise money for a good cause. It has to be the best supported ride in the state, and we are part of a team that is fantastic and fun. But when I found out last fall that one of my sisters was diagnosed with MS it became a big deal to me to take the fundraising seriously.

It seems that this year people have come out of the woodwork, some just donating out of the goodness of their hearts, and some donating because they have some connection to MS.

To all of you who donated, let me say a very heartfelt and humble "thank you". JuniorSprinter and I have raised over $1,100 as of this morning, and I know there are at least a few additional donations trickling in.

We leave for Logan later today, and are planning on riding the long course both days for a total of 175 miles. Assuming I survive I will try and post an update on how the ride went Sunday night.

Test in Multiple Browsers

2006-06-23T07:42:00.000-07:00

I am a computer programmer by trade, and do most of my work on web-based applications. So you would think that I would be well versed in web testing and browser compatibility problems...

As you can hopefully see in the header now I am trying to raise funds for the Utah MS-150 Bike Tour. I have been sending out emails and letters telling people that to sponsor me they can visit the blog and click on the link.

Then yesterday I got a call from my brother wanting to know what the link was. I told him to visit the GeekCyclist and look in the header. He called back a few minutes later and told me he couldn't find it. So I jumped on and took a look using Firefox - everything looked great. Then I opened IE.

(cue scary music)
My blog looked HORRIBLE in IE!

There was no link in the header - in fact, there was no real header. All the side bar links were displayed below the posts. The background color was incorrect and the curved graphics were in the wrong places. I loaded the template into EditPlus (my favorite editor) and messed with it for about 2 hours, but I never did discover what had happened. I finally rebuilt it from backup.

Today I learned... That I have to test ALL my web projects in my browser test bed. Even my trivial blog with only 3 readers (thanks, each of you).

Big Mountain

2006-06-18T15:57:00.000-07:00

JuniorSprinter came down and met me at work on Friday. He, NeilK and I left work early to go ride. We drove up and parked just west of Hogle Zoo and headed up Emigration Canyon. I haven't ridden this canyon in about a year, and I have never been past the Little Mountain summit. From there you can ride down the back side and then either connect with I-80 in Parley's Canyon, or turn left and ride up to Big Mountain. I go slow up anything bigger than an overpass, so until Friday, I had always turned around at the first summit.

To Little Mountain
The ride starts at about 4,800 feet and in 8.5 miles it climbs to a pass at about 6,250 feet. JS and NeilK rode away from me almost as soon as we started, but I expected that. I tried to ride within my ability and just keep a constant tempo maybe just a little out of my comfort zone. The canyon kind of rises in steps so you can recover after some brief hard pushes.

The view from the summit is great. After a brief rest (for me; the guys were waiting for a while I'm sure) we headed down the back side. It was a quick 2-2.5 mile descent on which we gave back about 300 feet.

To Big Mountain
The climb to the Big Mountain Summit was beyond anything I have every done. I hung with the other two for the first mile or so, while the grade was pretty mild. The four miles to the summit are an almost constant 7-7.5% grade by the estimation of NeilK's GPS. About half-way up I was really struggling, almost unable to ride in a straight line. I was going so slow I was shocked that my cyclometer was still picking up my speed since the wheels were turning so slowly. That's when I saw...

The Rock
It wasn't a huge rock; maybe the size of my clamshell flip phone. If I was on the flats I wouldn't have worried about it. I was thinking, "gotta miss the rock" when I hit it straight on. BAM! I came to a dead stop. It was alright though; I needed the rest. I gave myself about 3 minutes for my heart rate to come back down before I started up again. I think that JS and NeilK had been at the summit at least 20 minutes before I made it up. I was totally cooked, but in the best way.

The ride back was good. There was the little climb back up to the first summit, and though my quads were toast, I kept the other two in sight at least, and I almost caught them on the descent. JS is getting a lot better at going down.

Today I Learned...

2006-06-14T22:44:00.000-07:00

I have been talking to a coworker about taking a stack of 3x5 cards and writing on them "Today I learned" and whatever new and exciting tidbit that entered my brain that day. It was mostly a joke about how overwhelming it can be to try and stay on top of things in the IT field.

But now that I have had this idea in my head for a few days, I am starting to think that it would be a neat thing to do for a while. I think that if you reach the end of a day and haven't either learned something new, or helped someone in need, you might as well have stayed in bed.

So, what did I learn today?

Today I learned...
That when you are checking a tire for the object that just caused you to flat, DO NOT stop just because you found something you think caused the puncture. You have to check the whole tire.
On my long ride into work, I flatted at about the 10 mile mark, found two little "goathead" stickers that I removed and went my merry way. Then I flatted again less than a mile later. This time I checked the tire more thoroughly, and found the piece of glass that had cut the tire. I made a quick boot and finished my ride, but I realized I could have saved myself a big headache if I had checked the whole tire the first time.

Take the Long Road

2006-06-14T15:17:00.000-07:00

People frequently ask me how to fit in training for a long charity ride or a century. I have never been good at doing training rides during the week. The bulk of my training has always been commuting.

But the core change I have made this year is to "take the long road home". Actually I more frequently take the long road to work, but I couldn't pass up a Supertramp reference. My normal commute ride is between 13-15 miles. Now 30 mile round trip is nothing to scoff at, but it's just not the same as 30 miles in one chunk. So now what I have started doing is riding from my home in the west side of the Salt Lake valley, to Saltair on the Great Salt Lake, and then into work. Depending on route variations I get between 27 and 33 miles, with options to go longer.

I do have to leave fairly early in order to arrive at work at a decent time, but I find that I am more consistent if I schedule long rides to work, instead of long rides home. Riding home it's too easy to wimp out.

Another advantage to riding long in the morning is the cooler temps, and less traffic. Although, for those who are familiar with the SR 202 and the I-80 frontage road between Saltair and the airport I have one comment. There is WAY more traffic on these roads at 6-7 AM on a weekday than there is any time on a Saturday. Construction on SR 201 has all westbound traffic routed across 202 to the interchange by Saltair. The shoulder sucks for about 3/4 of a mile...

A Perfect Commute

2006-06-01T22:23:00.000-07:00

I am not sure if I have ever had this happen before. My commute home was perfect. I am not talking about the weather, or the wind, which were a little to warm and a little to strong respectively. I am talking about the cars.

Commuting back and forth to downtown Salt Lake City it seems like every day I have to deal with one or more of the following:

Getting "buzzed" or squeezed to the shoulder.
Cars double parked, or parked in the bike lane.
Getting honked at or yelled at in the areas where I have to take the lane.

Just basically the typical commuting stuff. It bothered me when I started, but I basically ignore it. But today was perfect. Even on the rural road where I have to ride in the lane for about a mile I was given a wide berth by all the motorists. It was amazing.

Maybe it was the jersey. My wife gave me a Discovery Team jersey for christmas. Sure, it's a little uncomfortable wearing it as I putz along at 15-18 mph on my loaded touring bike. I know I got some double-takes. But as I got close to home I started to wonder, "Are the cars giving me more room because they recognize Lance's jersey?"

There is no way to really test for the Lance effect on my commute, but it is an interesting thought.

Three Parking Spaces

2006-06-01T11:28:00.000-07:00

I was riding home yesterday, still in downtown SLC. All of a sudden a pickup truck stops right next to a lane of parked cars at a corner and lets a woman out. I had nowhere to go because of traffic on the left and parked cars on the right, so I just slowed to a near trackstand while I waited for him to move.

He pulled forward past three parked cars, stopped again and backed into the parking space. I couldn’t believe it. To save his passenger 60 feet of walking, he backed up traffic twice.

Some people in this country are incredibly lazy. Unbelievable…

Cross Training

2006-05-28T18:52:00.000-07:00

That's what I call it when I can't find time to actually ride, but I somehow manage to do something else active.

I volunteer as a scoutmaster, so one night a week I am involved in a scout troop meeting, and about one weekend a month we go on some kind of campout. This weekend we incorporated some light backpacking on our overnighter. We camped at the Loop Campground in South Willow Canyon, near Grantsville, UT. The convenient thing about this campground is that it is at the top of the canyon almost exactly 4 miles from where you enter the Forest Service Boundary. One of the requirements for the Camping Merit Badge is that you backpack 4 miles.

So mid-afternoon on Friday we parked a Suburban I had borrowed from a neighbor and filled with scouts, unloaded equipment and took off up the canyon. It's not flat by any means, gaining 1500+ feet in the four miles, but it's not that steep either.

Some things you learn on an overnight backpacking trip with scouts:

At least on kid will be complaining about his pack weight, fit, the distance, etc. before you are 500 feet from the vehicle.
4 out of 10 will not be adequately prepared with the proper outerwear for the weather.
Someone will always be playing in the campfire.
It's hard to let the kids learn things for themselves sometimes when it would be so much easier to do stuff yourself.
Kids expect to be entertained. It's not enough to be outdoors, some kids have to have everything dictated to them.

Clearly this doesn't have a lot to do with cycling, but I can tell you that my legs hurt today. After backpacking to the site with the kids, I later hiked back down to the Suburban to bring it up to the site. Then the next morning we hiked about 3 miles into the Deseret Peak Wilderness Area, for a 6 mile round trip. So for the weekend I did about 14-15 miles of hiking (at an altitude near 8000 feet no less). Today it feels like my calves are just slapping against the back side of my shins with every step...

I'm not going to have a chance to ride tomorrow either, so I hope the crosstraining and the rest pays off.

Cycle Salt Lake Century

2006-05-22T09:41:00.000-07:00

JuniorSprinter and I went to ride the Cycle Salt Lake Century Saturday morning. It is a fantastic ride from the State Fair Park in Salt Lake City, to Antelope Island in the Great Salt Lake and back. It is about as flat as a ride can get here in the intermountain west.

Everything looked like it was going to be a great day. We met a friend (WI) from work who was planning on riding with us. Saw another friend from work with his team all decked out, ready to hammer. Then the ride started...

JuniorSprinter Spits Out A Lung
JuniorSprinter has been sick most of the week. He was feeling better on Friday, and had started eating again, but I was already worried about being able to do the full century. As soon as the ride started he began coughing. A couple of doses from the rescue inhaler helped a little, but he wasn't doing well. So at the first rest area we made the decision that the century was out, but we would try to push to the second rest area and do the 67 mile option.

GeekCyclist Was Stupid
I don't know how many times I have told people, don't make changes before the big ride. I even talked myself out of replacing the bar tape and switching seats from my mountain bike to the road. But I couldn't resist. I had picked up a nearly new wheel set for the road, and it already had an 11-28 cassette on it. My old rear wheel has had a bunch of spokes replaces and I have a hard time keeping it trued. I had to swap it out. BIG MISTAKE!

When I got to the ride I noticed a little "thumping" as I rode to the start. I figured it was just the repairs in the parking lot. But as the ride started, the thumping stayed constant relative to my speed. We went about 6 miles before I couldn't take it anymore. We got off, checked the wheel, removed and reinstalled the tire. No luck. This wheel has a definite flat spot. I am pretty good at maintenance, but I think I may take this one to the shop.

Lesson Learned: Never, Never, Never change something the night before the big ride...

We Survived
The wind was very favorable as we rode north out of SLC. That just meant coming back, with JS coughing and me cringing every revolution, we were headed into a pretty stiff wind. Luckily we had WI from work with us. He did some monster pulls at the front, and dragged us back to the fairgrounds. In the end we did about 72 miles in about 4:30 which isn't to shabby, but certainly not what we wanted.

Our next big organized ride is going to be the MS-150 in Logan at the end of June. Hopefully we will perform better there.

Company Cycling Events

2006-05-21T22:27:00.000-07:00

I am part of a bicycle commuters club we have at work. We have about 35 members in a building with about 600 people in it. The last couple of years we have run a couple of cycling events during Bike 2 Work week. Below are a few of the different events we have put on.

Commute by Bike Clinic
One of the members of our group ran a lunchtime clinic on biking to work. He led a discussion of the typical stuff, clothes, showers, riding in traffic, etc. In addition to that, we had a representative from UTA there with handouts and info on bikes on busses and bikes on Trax.

It generated interest from a handful of people who weren't commuting by bike before. At least one of them has made the round trip by bike since the clinic.

Tune-up Clinic
For the third year in a row we have offered free tune-ups for anyone in the company. One of our members has worked as a mechanic for a shop, for a touring company, and teaches the repair and maintenance classes for the university. A couple of us that are "somewhat experienced" mechanics help out as much as we can. We did about 15 bikes in two hours this year.

Biking Buddy
We didn't do this one this year (mostly because I have been busy out of my head at work). What we have done in the past is designate a few meeting places around town, and offered to ride into work with anyone in the area. I figure in the past that this has helped us pick up about 3-4 bike commuters each year.

Quick Trip to Milwaukee

2006-05-17T19:48:00.000-07:00

It's bike to work week in Salt Lake City, and Cycle Salt Lake week to boot. Instead of being there participating in all the festivities, I am in Milwaukee. Why? Good question.

As part of my job I maintain a national database of occupational wage information. This database is the primary source of information for Foreign Labor Certification (people trying to get employment-based green cards).

There is a Human Trafficking case going on in Milwaukee, and I have been subpoenaed by the US Attorney's Office to provide a prevailing wage history in the case. When you look at the details in the case (I know, presumed innocent...etc. etc.) you have a hard time believing that people could still treat another human being in this manner.

Unbelievable.

If all goes well, I should be back in SLC by very late Thursday night. I hope so. We have a bike tune-up clinic scheduled at work, and then the Cycle Salt Lake Century on Saturday. I would hate to miss either.

Ride Safe!

First Metric Century for 2006

2006-05-15T20:20:00.000-07:00

Okay, so a metric isn't a big deal for most serious cyclists. But since my commute is usually 14-15 miles one way, and typically my long rides hit right around 30, it was kind of a big deal to me.

It all started with JuniorSprinter, LT and I went for our Blakemore Bikers training ride. The ride was scheduled for 50-60 miles, but because of construction on SR 201 and I-80 near the Great Salt Lake, we had to switch routes. We headed down south on SR 111 (AKA 8400 W or the Bachus Hwy) toward the New Bingham Hwy. This road is probably best described a "rolling". LT was on her mtn bike with slicks, JS and I on our roadies, but she did a great job of keeping up. One of the best early happenings in the ride was when JS was trying to chase down another bike and motored up this steep hill, completely missing the turn north on 5600 W. LT and I waited for him to come back down, laughing at the base of the climb.

LT bailed at about 30-35 miles, but JS and I continued north to the International Center, West to Saltair, and then back to home on SR 201. As we approached home I realized that we were going to hit 55-56 at home, so we passed on by, headed down the frontage road, detoured through a subdivision, and worked it up to 62.5 by the time we hit the driveway.

It was a great ride. This was the first time I have been on most of SR 111 since the mid 80's. There is a lot more traffic, but the road has been widened in a lot of places, so there were only a few uncomfortable spots. I was actually pleased with how good I felt going up the hills. I am still sitting at around 230, but I know there has been some fat to muscle transition because while I am still slow, I am climbing much better this year.

Well, the time spent composing this post was supposed to be spent on cleaning my office and the basement....Off to catch up.

Ride Safe!

Essential Tools - Or what's in my seat bag...

2006-05-11T21:27:00.000-07:00

Before you ever get into doing tune-ups or repairs, you need to have the essential tools to get yourself home if something happens while you are riding. Most people will buy a little multi-tool, a couple of tire levers, spare tubes and a pump and call it good. The problem is, many mini-tools are missing a few key pieces that come in handy for even some minor mishaps, like broken spokes.

Here is what is in my bag, on my bike, or in my pockets every ride:

Spare tube, sprinkled with talc, in a sandwich bag
Patch kit (I've never had good luck with pre-glued patches)
Pump or CO2 inflater
Multi-tool that in addition to the standard screwdrivers and hexes includes a:

knife

chain tool

spoke wrench

Bare bones First Aid kit - Mini ziplock bag containing:

regular bandaids

finger tip and knuckle bandaids

a couple larger sterile pads
a foil packet of antibiotic ointment

a few pre-moistened wipes

A couple dollars cash and a couple of bus/train tokens

If I am leading a group ride where I know there will be more than one or two novices, I throw a rack trunk on with:

A couple extra tubes for both road and mtn tires
A schraeder to presta rim adapter (I picked up a bunch from loosescrews.com - and all my tubes are presta)
A couple extra energy bars and/or gel packets
Sometimes an extra bottle

Know how to use what you carry

It's not enough to carry the stuff, you need to know how to use it to fix common mishaps. Take and old chain and practice with the chain tool, including figuring out how you are going to break the insertion end off of that Shimano link pin.

Practice changing and patching tubes if you haven't done that. Some tire and rim combinations make it very hard to get the tire on and off.

In short, try to be a self-sufficient as you can on your ride.

Do It Yourself

2006-05-08T20:37:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine from work bought a bicycle work stand over the weekend, and told me about some of the maintenance tasks he had already tackled. Then he asked what he should learn to do next.

I thought about that for a while and basically came up with two answers:

1. Learn what ever it is that you have the shop do for you the most.
2. Start with the basic tune-up and work your way up to a complete overhaul.

Learn whatever it is you have the shop do for you the most

When I first started bike commuting a few years back, I was on a hard tail / rigid fork mountain bike that I had purchased almost a decade earlier. It wasn't in working condition so I took it in for an overhaul, which with parts cost me about $180 (could have bought a new bike - a new bike fixes everything). I am a pretty big guy, and I was loaded with panniers full of books and clothes going each way. I also cross rail road tracks 7-9 times on my commute. Between the weight, the load, the tracks and the potholes, I started breaking spokes within a few weeks.

Now, I have a good shop, and I still rely on them for parts and emergency fixes while I am at work. But at the time I was too scared I would mess something up, and afraid that I didn't have the right tools, so I has the shop replace the spoke and true the wheel. They are good guys, so they only charged me about $12, while I have seen truing jobs go for $30 plus. Everything was great for a few weeks, then I broke another spoke. Back to the shop, another $12. When I broke the 5th spoke (this took about a year) I decided I could really save myself some cash if I learned to do it myself. I'm far from being an expert wheelbuilder, but I figure between my bikes, and the other 5 bikes that live at my house so my family can ride, I save myself easily $200 truing wheels and fixing spokes.

You may have some other problem that you have to visit the shop for - maybe you ride in the rain a lot, so you have to do a lot of drivetrain maintenance. Or maybe you travel and rely on the shop to pack and ship your bike. Maybe you wear out brake pads quickly and need to learn how to replace them so they don't squeal. Whatever it is, you can start by learning that first and save yourself a chunk of change.

Start with the basic tune-up and work your way up to a complete overhaul

Your bike deserves a basic tune-up every 3-4000 miles, or at least once a year. The typical basic tune-up costs between $40-$60 and includes services like:

Check bike for loose bolts, rattles, etc.
Clean and lube the drivetrain.
Lube and adjust brake and shifter cables if needed.
Adjust hubs, bottom bracket and headset.
True wheels laterally.
Clean and test ride.

A few of those tasks may seem hard, but if you have the skill to change a flat, you have enough mechanical ability to learn to do all the tasks in a basic tune-up.

About once a year I like to give my bikes a complete overhaul. At my LBS an overhaul usually costs between $100-$150. It typically includes all the services of a tune-up plus such things as:

Remove an clean all major parts and cables.
Replace cables and/or housings if needed.
Clean, replace bearings, repack and adjust hubs, headset, bottom bracket and pedals.
True wheels, including dish, tension and round.
Some shops remove, clean, grease and replace all bolts, even the minor stuff like bottle cage bolts.

When I do an overhaul on my own bikes I usually add new cables, housing and chain. I also like to replace the bar tape. It make them look and feel like new bikes.

For both a tune-up and an overhaul, the job is faster and easier if you have the right tools, but tool lists will have to wait for another post.

Group Riding Skills

2006-04-28T20:44:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite sites, Bike Forums, has a great post on rules and etiquette for group riding.

Click here to read the full discussion.

The full list is pretty long, but I want to highlight a couple of the "rules":

Do NOT cross/overlap wheels with the guy in front of you.
Carry enough gear so that you don't have to ask for help when you have problems. (A future post will cover what I carry on a normal commute, and on a long training ride.)
Wear a helmet - this one isn't in the Bike Forums list, but I lead rides for youth groups, scouts, and a lot of novices. In some cases the rules of the sponsoring group requires that all participants wear a helmet. It's easier on the ride leader if everyone wears one.
If you get a flat in the middle of a pack, call out "Flat!". Raise your hand, if it is safe to do so, so other riders can spot you and not run over you.
Always assume that there is a rider behind you, and on your left, and on your right, until you can prove otherwise.
Have fun and encourage the new riders.

That last rule is the most important. I remember my first real group ride. I was (still am) pretty out of shape. The ride leader told me I was doing great, even though I was obviously struggling to hang on, and drifted back to check on me several times. All the riders in the group were great.

Those were just a few of the "rules" - so if you get a chance, jump on over and read the full thread.

Close Call

2006-04-27T22:13:00.000-07:00

Luckily I wasn't directly involved...

Yesterday on my commute home I was stopped at a rural stoplight facing west waiting to turn to the left. Two teenagers on BMX bikes were riding to the south when the light changed. While the southbound cars stopped, these kids both ran the light, passing right in front of an accelerating FORD F-250. I entirely expected one of them to get hit, but by some good fortune the driver of the truck had seen them coming and slowed down.

As I caught them, I told them how lucky they really were, and gave them the "Same Roads, Same Rules, Same Rights" lecture. I'm sure it went in one ear and out the other.

Ride like a car folks - Ride safe.

4/15 Group Ride - International Center

2006-04-18T13:53:00.000-07:00

Well - my son and I were the only two who went on this ride, but I can't say that I blame anyone for not showing. The weather report was sketchy at best, but other than the roads being a little wet the ride was fine.

We hope that some of the other Blakemore team riders come out to join us. The routes are relatively flat (unless the group wants to ride the few big hills I know about). The roads generally have wide sholders and are low traffic, with a few exceptions.

If you are new to the MS-150 or to road biking, I highly recommend that you participate in some of the group rides. Riding in a group takes a little getting used too, and the group in Logan will be huge...