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I’m thinking I need an 8″ travel DH rig and body armor for riding through Rosslyn these days. Gives me an excuse to buy a new bike. Just what I need.

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@CCrew 5124 wrote:

I was hoping for something like the epic pothole picture That one however would be hard to beat….

Sorry. This week has been pretty crazy. I was fortunate to have time to even stop to photograph. I’ll strive to improve my photo creativity in the future.

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I do 3-5 organized centuries per year. I do 10-20 rides of 100 miles or longer per year on my own. 200 miles in a small group that worked well together would be fun and possible. Unfortunately work has me behind schedule for long rides this year. I’ve only done 4 or 5 long rides so far. We’ll have to do this in the fall.

Tim… I was also looking at possibly doing something in the Shenandoah valley… Between Winchester and Staunton. I need to research that and do some exploring. I just haven’t had time.

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Sir, yes sir!

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I’m so jealous! I registered, even paid for the damn jersey, then my best friend decided to get married that day. No problems…. I’ll do the metric and be in the barn in plenty of time for the wedding. NOPE. She needed me to set up and also photograph the wedding.

Next year. How was it? I didn’t look at the route. I’m guessing it is something that couldn’t be easily ridden outside of the event. A

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Someone heard your warning.

Love,

Pete

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I’ve thought about doing it, but have to wait until my schedule is more clear.

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Hi Annie. Welcome!

Bike selection: As others have suggested, getting on a few bikes from your local bike shop and test riding is a great way to get the feel for things. Finding something that is comfortable and easy to use is important. Keep in mind that you can ask the bike shop people about doing a few changes to bikes to make them fit a little better… Often a shop will switch saddles to something that fits you better for a minimal cost if you do it when you’re purchasing the bike. Sometimes getting stuff all at once gets you a discount with the shop.

Some things to consider:

1. Where will your bike be stored at the office? Is it outside in a bike rack? If so, invest in a good lock and learn how to use it.
2. Kinds of drivetrain: I know this gets a little technical, sorry about that. Internally geared hubs are making a comeback on bikes these days. They let you have a bike with one gear up front, one in back and a very simple gear change mechanism. They simplify the bike greatly and might be a great choice for a commuting bike.
3. Do you have facilities to shower at the office? Some people have gym memberships that allow them to shower. There’s a bike station at Union Station that might be able to help with that too. Honestly I haven’t researched that lately. I thought it was cool that it existed though.

Washington DC has a pretty good bike route map that can help with getting from Bethesda to the office and back. Off the top of my head it can be done using the Cap Croissant trail, the bikeway along the National Mall. The last stretch to Union Station might take a little research. I ride the roads and don’t always pay attention where the bike lanes are, so I am not the best person to advise on that topic.

Again, Welcome! Look forward to hearing how things go.

Best wishes,

Pete

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@DaveK 5014 wrote:

Fenders with rear-facing horizontal dropouts… is that why you rode home 8 miles with a flat?

Actually on that bike, the wheel can pull out the back without any problems. Additionally, those are Paul hubs and removing the hub bolts lets the hub drop straight down instead of having to pull back out the dropouts. Either way I had it covered.

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Great topic for discussion, Brendan. Thank you for posting up.

It is not an easy problem to solve… as is obvious by the article. This sounds a lot like discussions and arguments I heard when I first moved to the DC area in 1989. It hasn’t changed much.

The problem honestly is not the amount of space available for cars and bicycles. There are plenty of places that I’ve ridden over the years with less space and more traffic (both vehicular and bicycle). I know that I sound like a broken record… because I always say this when topics come up. The problem is the mindset… of both riders and drivers. Having everything go OUR way and not thinking of cooperation, compromise and accommodation as the FIRST means to the end makes it so that getting a positive outcome is virtually impossible.

Safe riding habits should not have to be enforced. Humans in other areas of the country do it all the time. Feeling like we are entitled to ride the way we want and that it is drivers’ responsibility to deal with it precludes any positive outcome.

Drivers have a similar mindset. People drive as though they’ve got a Congressional mandate to be in front of cyclists at all times.

In the end, discussions boil down to a lot of finger pointing and blaming…. just like my post right here. I’m pointing my finger at pretty much everyone on this…. including myself. We could all do more than we do as riders, drivers and pedestrians. Every action we take while driving, walking or riding has consequences…. good ones or bad ones. Until we realize it and take responsibility for our own actions, there will be no resolution to things like this on MacBlvd or anywhere else.

Thanks for posting this up Brendan. It is much appreciated. Sorry for staying so long on the soap box.

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Wish I could join y’all. I stole someone’s camera to shoot a wedding for a friend. That’ll keep me busy all day.

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Sorry, sir. Might want to put down the beverage before looking at these.

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@ronwalf 5007 wrote:

Fixie with aero bars, fenders, disc brakes and three water bottles? Forget the paint job – it’s still a bike-of-many-colors.

You can’t tell from this photo, but the wheels are very realistic looking, but fake wood. It also has tires for riding dirt roads.

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Thanks y’all. I wish it wasn’t dead. The new one is great, but it is definitely not the same beast. I’ll build something fun and hammerable toward the end of the summer. This bike completely validated for me the combination of road geometry with a fixie drivetrain. The Steamroller is AWESOME for 90 minute rides, but it gets to be a handfull beyond that. You can pretty much forget using it with aero bars. It handles a spastic squirrel hopped up on caffeine and meth when you try to put serious power into the pedals while in the aero bars. I mean that in the nicest way.

This may be the answer, though I don’t think there’s enough room for fenders. In theory I could run 23mm tires and a set of Honjo fenders on it.

Soma VanNess: http://www.somafab.com/vanness.html

Put a nice set of aero tubular wheels and gear it through the roof and you might have the perfect bike for the Seagull Century.

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@Greenbelt 4728 wrote:

maybe even a little dirt.

There’s no such thing as a little dirt.

There are many bikes out there that fit this kind of description. I’m really sad about the death of my VanDessel WTF (Even though they replaced it with a bling bling cyclocross frame). Generally it was a cross geometry with plenty of room for fatter tires if you wanted. It had drivetrain flexibility. It could be run as a single speed, fixie, geared bike or with an internally geared hub. It even had a frame split for running belt drive. It could be used as a 29er mountain bike. I set it up as a drop-bar fixie commuter. I couldn’t imagine a better bike for the job.

Did I forget to mention the lovely color?

Too bad that my size had a manufacturing flaw that made it so I went through 2 of them in about 7 weeks. Next production run will be beefed up. I’ll buy another one in a heartbeat.

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