Went Riding with the Wife

Ten miles ( a lot for me, it was killing her!) and two hot dog specials later, we are still alive.

OK, Usually my complaint with myself is that I don't have any pictures but this time I didn't write any words and that  shame because something needs to be said about the effort that my Honey put out keeping up to me and the incredible Hot Dogs we had for dinner. 

My wife has this Raleigh MTB that she got as a gift from her parents when she graduated High School. Last year she decided that she doesn't like riding it because the frame is too small. OK. Sure. Another Raleigh bike that was in her family was her dad's Marathon which got passes on to me a few years ago. I really enjoy riding that bike around and was very thankful to him for letting me have it as it replaced my too-small Peugeot. Last year I was able to get my hands on a matching mixtie version of the Marathon and I bought it and had the LBS fix it up. She rode it once and did not touch it again until this ride.

One of our favorite trails to ride is the Marsh Trail in Salisbury. It is not very long but we never fail to see bird life and little critters that often scamper right over the trail in front of us! On those occasions where we have our toddler with us he thinks that is pretty darn cool. We set out on this trail this evening and, before we even began she informed me that she wanted to go over the bridge and ride around Newburyport. So, that's what we did. She was a Brave Little Toaster but by the time we made it up and back the Marsh Trail and over the bridge, she was wiped out and hungry. I wanted to ride a little bit on the Clipper City Trail as it has a spur that connects to Cashman's Park that I had not explored yet. It was there that we came across a hot dog cart.

The people running it live nearby and had actually just gone into business that day! They were very nice and cart was spotlessly clean. The dogs were delicious and we even got fortune cookies for desert! Excellent first effort from those folks. I hope that they do well.

After our pick-nick meal she got her second wind and I got to do a little more exploring. We rode down to the train station, which was a lot closer than I though and cut back through the city. and over the bridge. Climbing the bridge was the biggest hill for sure, but there were a few other little hills involved in the ride. It was a challenge for me and definitely for her! She had some trouble getting the hang of friction-shifting her gears. She made it the whole way. I think that ten miles is a very respectable First Ride for her.

Bolt Upright

In my quest to transform my Trek 820 from mediocre (at best) mountain bike into the Ultimate Bike Path Warrior, I made the great leap of swapping out he bars. Now, to some folks, the so called "leap" of swapping bars is akin the the "leap" rolling out of bed in the morning, but to me, it's kinda special. So I ordered a set of "Tourist" bars from Velo Orange. I did not want to ditch my trigger shifters in favor of something more "traditional" like thumb friction or bar end shifters and I am glad to report that they, as well as the 820's original grips fit right on the bars. The whole process was, for the most part, painless. I had to re-rout the cables a few times and, truth be told, making them a slight bit longer might not be the worst die that I ever had. I had to wait two day to get to take it for a ride. It was sort of a torture.

Now, if you follow my blog at all (and I know that you don't), you might remember that a couple of years ago I had in my stable, for a short time, and Olde Tyme English Threespeed. I didn't like it that much. Unlike in The City Proper, out in my neck of the woods, there are a LOT of hills. I found that the tried and true Sturmy Archer hub just wasn't what my Big Bottom needed to get around. I also remember, now, feeling as if I were perched up on high with the bikes riding position. As if I were gliding effortlessly amongst the Common Folk and that they should all look up at me with bent necks as I rode by. I remembered this because that's exactly the feeling that I got as I test rode the UBPW.

Now, I certainly expected a more upright riding position on the re-styled Trek. It only makes sense. What I did not expect was how much of a difference it would really make. It was very sit p and beg. A little too much so for my liking actually. I don't have the bars set level either. There is a fairly good angle at the grip end to make my hands fall more naturally onto the ends of the bars and around the controls.  I found myself choking-up on the bars some time and even sliding forward on my seat. I guess the weight distribution felt off, too centered on thereat of the cycle. I'm going to adjust the angle some more I think. Maybe move the seat forward a little, which seems counter intuitive to me: I brought the grips closer, the seat should move farther away, right? That's not how it feels when I'm riding it.

Another difference was that the Three Speed had a nice, sprung, leather Brooks Saddle. That would have been nice to have yesterday. Not imperative, and if the riding experience had not been so strikingly familiar, I might never have begun to pine for that seat. But pine away I did, like a dead parrot for the fjords.  Again, adjust before replace. Not afraid to do either. I have WAY more invested in this bike in terms of parts and labour that I do in the actually bike! I might be back in the V.O. catalogue before long.

There is a female cyclist who's blog I follow. She began her riding adventures on three-seep commuter type bikes. She rode to get to the store, get to work and began writing to share her experiences on it. As she began to get more into riding though, she began to bend forward over her bars. She got diamond frames and drop-bars and she began to write about how she was using different muscles and how it was effecting her riding. I had no idea that it would work so stunningly in the reverse mode! The lower third of my thigh muscles took it the hardest. Not all that bad, but I only went about four miles with no real climbing to show for it. Seriously: weather it was a natural by-product of the riding position or some sort of flashback the that poor outclassed three speed, riding around on theta bike with those bars did NOT make me want to go up hills with it. Not really an absurd fate since this bike's main function is to pull a 3 year old in a trailer along bike paths and go to the grocery store every now and then. Still, at least I should try a hill or something I guess. Now, here is the weird part. I felt like I wasn't going very fast at all. However, my GPS motored and computer generated average speed was actually higher than is normal for me. Sure, there were no climbs to drop it down but neither were there descents to raise it back up. EIther way, I would have thought that I would have had a lower number for an average.

The verdict? I liked it. I'm pretty sure that I will be keeping these well made and super comfy bars on my bike. The chrome looks a little silly coming out of the black stem, but other than that these bars are a win and a half. 

A little pissed.

I follow several bike blogs. Some are pretty amusing, some are very self-important and some are.....sad and pointless. Yet, all represent a different attitude and opinion about a pastime that I love, and wish I had more time for. Some times it's nice to live vicariously through others' rides. Some times they inspire me to get out there on my own no mater how cold it is or how tired I might be. The thing that burns me though, is that they ALL have subscribers! Some of them are making MONEY at writing bike blogs! Sa-weet! Now, I am by no means a shameless self-promoter. I imagine that you have to look really hard to find this blog, unless you are googling pictures of Raleigh Marathons. That's the number one source of traffic here. Perhaps I should write more about this bike and take more pictures and, in general, "pimp" it. Sadly, it has spent most of it's life in disrepair and disarray. I have so little time available to go ride by myself that the fully functional bikes that are NOT almost thirty years old and do NOT need any TLC get called into action and the Marathon sits on the sidelines.

As sad as it is, it is in much better shape than the Peugeot UO-8 project that is sitting in my basement! That bike started out as a perfectly rideable one-owner whip with a slight dent in the back wheel that made it brake funny. So, I decided that I was going to swap out the wheel and bars for aluminum. I had genuine Peugeot parts from a later decade, so I didn't feel too badly about the up-grades. The trouble was that the new wheel was a 6 speed and the old one was a 5. I never got the derailure to line up right an the project died. Pity. I would like again some day ahve a nice old road bike, and by nice I mean 531. I had one, another Peugeot, but it was too small for me (by a lot) so I sold it to a girl in Cambridge who, I realize now, only wanted it for a winter beater! Sigh.

So, any way, back to my original point: if you read any of my posts and enjoy the way that I write or the things that I write about please subscribe to it! Thank you for your support.

Raleigh Marathon

That's my bike. That's what I have decided to ride on the road. It's old. Very old. It's heavy. Very Heavy. But it's paid for, had a lot of family history in it and is, most of all, perfectly functional! And it's beautiful. It has sport touring geometry!
[IMG]http://i236.photobucket.com/albums/ff57/noreasterDL/Bicycles/Raleigh7-10050.jpg[/IMG]

I don't know what that means. I found a .jpg of an old catalog a while ago and the Marathon is near the top of Raleigh's non-competitive "10-Speed" line from back in the day. "The Day" is the Eighties. This is NOT from the Eighties:


This is from the sixties and it was on every bicycle that my father in law has owned since then. He has never struck me as much as a cyclist, but I guess that was a mistaken preconception on my part.

I rode it a little bit last fall when it first cam into my hands and I liked it. I was riding my Peugeot on the road at the time despite the fact that it really is too small for me, no mater how much I wish that weren't true. For this year I put a little rack on the Marathon. It's designed for a MTB but fits over the top of the 27 inch wheels of the Marathon with very little clearance but it's nice and level. I don't think that a fender would fit in there but I don't have any fenders for it (yet) so that is not an issue (yet). What I DO have is a Triumph 3-Speed with a flat tire. Upon closer inspection I found that the valve stem is ripped away from the body of the tube. No sweat right? Well, it looks like the tire is also "sliced" at another location so now I ahve to source a 26 1 3/8 tire from.......wait a minuet. I bought some 26inch tires last year that did NOT fit my mountain bike..... Hey! they are the right size! They are gum-wall cyclocross looking things but they are on hand and will go on as soon as I get a new tube or two, which isn't on the front burner since I'm going to be riding the Raleigh Marathon exclusevly on the road this year. Right.