[Bilsko]

I’m signed up as well. 17.15 mph average to pull down the Gold medal and the only real climbs seem to be up Wilson and then the harder one to get up to the AFMemorial. First ride of this type for me (not quite a race, but still competitive) so I’m excited.

[Bilsko]

@4st7lbs 53561 wrote:

Maybe a few years ago but now they’re usually around $1,400 before tax for the base model. He doesn’t mention the color or if it has disc brakes, but that’s not a bad deal considering the extras.

Hmm. My Disc Trucker was $1400 when I bought it in August 2012 and I know that they slapped a 2 or 3 hundred dollar premium for getting the disc brakes…

Last year was the first year that the Disc brake version was available, so I’m assuming that unless heavily modified, the 2009 LHT he’s selling is standard road calipers.

[Bilsko]

A little on the pricey side – a new LHT should run you about 1000-1200 before tax. So for a low mileage model that’s 3 years old, it should be a little closer to 50-60% of the new price.

[Bilsko]

Lynn,
I’m curious about the LA rides you did – any shop rides? Golden Saddle Cyclery, Swrve, and MASH (in SF) are the kind of shops that I wish we had here around DC. There’s just something about the West Coast riding vibe that is sooooooo appealing. From your description – I get the feeling that you should keep tabs on the Bicycle Space rides (they can get very crowded, but from what I hear they are lots of fun)

As for your bike – you should be absolutely fine for road rides down around Warrenton (or anywhere around DC for that matter). There are plenty of options for fun gravel grinders (see: Dirt), but lots of good roads and trails for the road bike. I’m on a heavy Surly with road tires 80% of the time, and also on an old 70s Schwinn also with road tires and there is no lack of places to ride.

As for my last name – yep there’s definitely Italian heritage there. Although from what I recall, on that side of the family its a least 2 if not 3 generations to get back to Italy.

[Bilsko]

@dcv 53247 wrote:

I think I saw Rolo westbound on the WOD in Vienna this morning. Definitely saw Bilsko, amazed at how far away he spotted me at closing speeds.

Great to see you! Glad we just skipped the whole akward do I slow down and turn around in the middle of the trail dance and kept riding to our respective workplaces. Not that I didn’t want to stop and chat, but those little circly dances are always, well, akward.

Also, I got to see 1/8th in front of the White House, but I still haven’t met him so I figured yelling out “Tom!!!” amidst SS and tourists would have been a bad move.

[Bilsko]

@lynnaiello 53180 wrote:

Hello,

I just moved (back) here after traveling through Los Angeles and San Antonio for the past 5 years. I did a lot of social rides in both cities and really miss it. I’ve only been back home for 3 weeks but am finally getting settled back in and would love to meet some new faces who love riding as much as I do! Soooo if you know of any social rides or just want to make a new friend let me know! I live in the Northern Virginia area, closer to Gainesville/Haymarket.

Okay then!
Lynn

Welcome Lynn! Nice to have a newly re-transplanted face to the DC area. You’ve come to the right place for finding rides and good company.
There are plenty of great rides down by you – here’s a fun one that a few of us (Dirt, dcv, jabberwocky, others…) did a few months back. The weather was MISERABLE, but the ride was a lot of fun.
The DC Randonneurs (dcrand.org) also do some brevets (200km) that leave from Warrenton.

What kind of riding are you looking for? By social rides do you mean 50-100 miles ‘club rides’ or shop rides or do you envision more of a ramble through town type ride (the Tweed Rides, or just about anything that Bicycle Space here in DC puts together)

As a side note – my old last name (story for another time) is also Aiello. Nice to see another one around

[Bilsko]

I did it 2 years ago from here (not sure the link will work properly. The new Google maps doesn’t appear to have a dedicated way to share location links, but the URL is different for every view, so that link may or may not work)

anyways it was pretty crowded (although not intolerable), LOTS of bugs in the air and on the ground, and really crowded on the trail back to Key Bridge

[Bilsko]

More poster covet goodness: http://malatesta.mysupadupa.com/collections/movies/products/l-uomo-col-martello-x-le-coq-sportif (although for that kind of money, the least they could do is throw in a free bike)

[Bilsko]

Will the Taqueria serve beer?

Don’t laugh.

[Bilsko]

I like the idea of adding an address field to the survey (optional of course) – the only difficulty (as it is with managing metadata) is getting consistent address entry.

If I had more GIS skillz, I’d take the tax-lot/owner GIS data set from gis.dc.gov and figure out a way to normalize the buildings/address in a manner that made for consistent data entry. Don’t know if Arglinton and MD suburbs has good GIS datasets too.

The problem, as I see it, is that the tool (as I’m proposing it) has a pretty narrow scope of use. Some thoughts:

— For some of us, CaBi does away with the bike parking issue altogether (although not necessarily the shower/locker facilities)
— As far as long-term use of a building’s bike parking goes, the turn-over tends to be pretty low. People don’t change jobs or buildings *that* often.
— For shorter term use, the tool could be helpful, but there are almost always passable options for street parking, and the added effort of finding a building with bike parking in the garage (that is open to the public) may not pay off.
–At least for the BA forum community, posting a parking question to the forums will typically generate some response – often almost as quickly as it would take to research the info solo.

All of which is to say, its probably not worth all that much effort. It just stemmed from my curiosity about bike parking in a building that was unfamiliar to me.

[Bilsko]

The IP lookup info for that address is all over the place – some lookups return an IP in the Russian Fed., registered through Amsterdam and others show it registered to some guy in Tomteboda, Sweden.

As much of a hassle as it always is, it’s probably time to change your passwords folks. Some good advice

[Bilsko]

@dasgeh 52095 wrote:

What about this? https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1_EcN4QMZDBIyN4keLlRXJCy1lw8qciJyQzXmcIzt17g/edit#

I think the maps idea is cool, but your link didn’t work for me, so I’m not really sure what you’re talking about.

Odd, not sure why the link didn’t work – I checked in different browsers and different computers and it came up alright…

The survey is great, but what I’m looking for is a way to identify (on a map or from a list) whether or not a certain -specific- building has bike facilities. Lets say you’re looking for a new job and want to know (without having to ask HR) what the bike situation is….voila! Bike Facilities Building Map to the rescue!

Or – you’ve got jury duty. What buildings around the courthouse can you use for indoor bike parking….

Basically just crowdsourcing what Google Maps already does with Car-parking lots.

[Bilsko]

I’d like to revive this thread. While at a meeting in an office in Crystal City yesterday, I wondered what it would be like to work there as far as bike facilities go. I saw tons of riders coming and going along Crystal Drive, many parking on the street and some parking in garages. But what about that building that I was in (200 12th St, to be exact)? It was clearly an older building, and without any front desk staff, I didn’t have an easy way of finding out about bike parking, showers, etc. AFAIK, its not considered a Federal Bldg – despite housing a number of DoD/NASA contractors – so I don’t think it will show up on the FedBikes site.

So I wonder if there is any online DB or map-based tool to identify which buildings around DC have good (or bad) bike facilities. If not, I’d be willing to get a Google map set up for everyone to contribute to (as anonymously as Google will let you, of course) – something like this: http://maps.google.com/maps/ms?ie=UTF&msa=0&msid=216472585696087910941.0004dcc26682027b381d7

Or it could just take the form of a searchable spreadsheet, at the cost of being user-friendly

[Bilsko]

A couple other options – also near the water treatment plant:

Staircase here, on Potomac Ave: http://goo.gl/maps/GkM2M

Also here on Potomac Ave – but NOT really advisable because of steep rocky trail: http://goo.gl/maps/IqGRQ

Finally, Resevoir Road down to Fletcher’s Boathouse – not the most fun with traffic on Resevoir and Canal Road, but certainly do-able.

Source: Resident of the 4600 block of MacArthur Blvd

[Bilsko]

My morning commute involved two different cycling shoes. At the same time.

I didn’t realize it until I got to work. Good thing I liked my Specialized Road shoes enough to buy the same model (4 years after buying the first pair)

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