Fendies on my Fixie

The top photo is a close-up of the component parts of the "Spring Thing" I bought from Velo Orange to help convert my old Fuji fixed gear from 700c to 650B. As you can see in the second photo (from the Velo Orange website), this contraption allows for the proper installation of the rear fender on horizontal dropouts by allowing for adjusting the distance from the front of the rear fender to the chainstay bridge. Also, one can install a wheel where otherwise there is little clearance by pushing the fender forward a little. Clever.

Clearly, you could build up your own "Spring Thing" yourself, but I hadn't even thought of it until I saw the Velo Orange "Spring Thing".

Here, you can see the "Spring Thing" in service.

Here is the rear wheel now properly fendered.

Front Wheel.



Now, I just need to figure out a new rack/brake interface. Not quite happy there.

Keep it springy,

CurioRando

Water, Water Everywhere...But Is It Safe to Drink?

This Katadyn "My Bottle" purifying water bottle was given to me by a thoughtful coworker. She had meant to give it to me before I left for India, but I boogied before she could.

But my mind quickly went back to a cyclo-touring trip DartreDame and I did a year and a half ago in Eastern Oregon. The guidebooks and map indicated that we could get water at the campgrounds, but not so fast succotash. No such water!

It led to landing a story from a bunch of Elk hunters about their encounter with a nearby Wolf pack. We got this story when I asked them for water for our bottles.

But this bottle solves that issue because there were countless streams we crossed and soaked our bandannas in for cooling purposes. And what about on certain brevets?

Interesting possibilities. Probably weighs more than the SteriPen, but doesn't depend on batteries. Dependable. I like that. I see experimentation in my future.

Keep it pure,

CurioRando

Don't Forget Pune!

This photo is from another Indian randonneuring blog appropriately titled: Randonneuring in India. It is about the adventures of the Pune-based randonneurs. As has been pointed out to me, it was the Pune riders who pulled off India's first brevet and not the Bangalore folks. For more on the city of Pune, see this Wiki site.

I will not be drawn into this rivalry, but as you'll see from their website, the Pune randonneurs are a hardy bunch and riding in true rando style. Lots of big smiles with a sprinkling of dazed faraway looks. Very familiar!

OK, I will be drawn in to this extent: the Bangalore folks claim they have the most active cycling scene in India. I'll let them all take it from here. In any event, they are all building the cycling community in a nation of over a billion folks!


Keep it rivalrous,

CurioRando

A Curious New Banner, Part 2!

I forgot the most important part of yesterday's post about my new blog banner: Aaliyah's website, so you can see the variety of her work. Above is a piece from her Heart collection.

Please do check out her website here. To see my post that has more of her work, a little bit about Aaliyah, and about my new Curious Randonneur blog banner, go here.


Keep it pumping,

CurioRando

A Curious New Banner!

The Curious Randonneur is at last fully dressed! You probably noticed the new banner atop this page. This is has been in the works for some time. I remember when I first started the blog, I Googled "Top Ten Tips for Bloggers" or some such and Tip #1 was to absolutely have a banner. Any bannerless blog was considered undressed and unworthy.

So I set off in search of a banner, but I wanted something unique. So I turned to our good family friend and artist: Aaliyah Gupta. Thanks, Aaliyah!! I know it turned into more of a project than first imagined, but I love it and am so grateful.

The photo at the top of this post is from Aaliyah's "Lichen" series. Here is how Aaliyah describes this recent series of hers:

This group of works, acrylic on duralar, builds on earlier themes. The “Cluster” series was inspired by the lichens I saw while traveling in Iceland. These lichens, while fragile and lightweight, survive in the most inhospitable of environments. Newer pieces that I am currently working on, and are not featured here yet, are about the intricate networks and environments of these amazingly complex organisms.

The pixelation of the photos does not do justice to the high level of detail and depth (due to the layerization).

Aaliyah is a celebrated fine artist who has exhibited in Portland, Seattle, New York, and Copenhagen. She has been commissioned to produce works for Kimball Elementary, Seattle; Callison & Sons, Seattle; Seattle Asian Art Museum, Seattle; Wing Luke Asian Museum, Seattle; University Hospital, SUNY at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, New York.

To visit Aaliyah's personal website featuring more of her art, please check out this link!

In the case of my banner, this kind of graphic work is a recent departure for Aaliyah, and is inspired in part I believe by her take of my descriptions of randonneuring over the past few years. All I know is it was a labor of love by a true artist, and I am blessed to have my blog graced with her sensibilities. She was assisted with the technical aspects of integration into my blog by her husband, Vésteinn Þórsson. This blog html can be pretty funky and glitchy at times. I know they both had to fight their way through this.

Aaliyah and Vésteinn, along with their twins, are more than just close friends, they are part of our extended family. Thank you, all you VARKs, and Aaliyah especially, sister: I am deeply honored only!!!!



For a little more about Aailyah, here is an Artist's Statement I came across:

Over the years, my work has been rooted in the ideas of connection and interdependence, nurture and sustenance, microscosms and macrocosms. Most recently, natural disasters across the world have fueled my interest in the idea of dispersion, the movement of light, color and particulate matter. The dispersion of ash, smoke, clouds, wind, water have had a global impact on multiple levels, transforming entire geographies, economies and communities. On a more micro level, I have been exploring the themes of symbiosis and coexistence, looking at complex organisms like lichens that are made up of several organisms that exist in a symbiotic relationship known as mutualism. Surviving in the most inhospitable environments, these organisms are dependant on each other for their survival. I was born in Kolkata, India, and have lived, worked and exhibited in India, Denmark and the USA. I am deeply committed to social change work and actively involved in the movement to end violence against women, as well as in immigrant rights and civil liberties campaigns.

Those of us who know Aaliyah are acquainted with that firece activist side of her. Particularly we know her as the first Executive Director of Chaya, a community based nonprofit organization established in 1996 to serve South Asian women in times of crisis and need, and to raise awareness of domestic violence issues. She remains today one of the core movers of Chaya.

For more of Aaliyah's work in person, watch this Core Gallery website for an upcoming show this July in Seattle's Pioneer Square.


Keep it fiercely coexistent, with color and layers and movement,

CurioRando

Paris Brest Paris: intuiting and relaxing.

When I decided to engage randonneuring and set the 2011 Paris Brest Paris as my objective just shortly after the 2007 edition of PBP (and my first learning that such an event existed) I had a mental image of myself surviving--barely--an event for which I had very little perspective. In fact, reviewing my first post on this blog I find two photos of PBP 2007 participants. One is of a smiling finisher looking pleased but not beaten. The second is of a cyclist asleep on the floor of the gym at the conclusion of that same event. While I bravely posited the question as to which would be me in that post, the truth is my only real objective at the onset was to finish. No matter how I survived, I just wanted to finish. I'd be thrilled to be the guy in the fetal position. And given how I fared on my longest ride to date--the Surf City 600k--I have a pretty clear image of what just surviving feels like.

Today, I here declare that I want more than to finish only. I want to enjoy PBP as an experience start-to-finish, and I want to be comfortable and relaxed in my overall pace. And to do so, I am going to follow in the footfalls of the gentleman above. Well, sort of. Tom Osler is apparently well known to those in the know among the running crowd, but I won't be running my way to Paris. I will, however, adopt Tom's training philosophy because...I intuit that it will suit me and my relaxed PBP finish visualization just fine.

I won't go too far into explaining Tom's approach because the links below to excerpts from his little book, The Conditioning of Distance Runners, speak for themselves. I will expand a little, however, on this notion of relaxation.

I've never really physically competed. Once I was chosen to compete in a track & field endeavor in elementary school and I failed superbly. The only accomplishment was breaking a basement (what we called cellar) window practicing the shot put with a soft ball! Another time I got put into the final minutes of a high school hockey game, and not because I was a clutch player. Nothing to rave about there either. I think that about covers my experience in physical performances.

Nor have I performed artistically. I don't sing or play an instrument. About the only thing I can think of that relates is public speaking: as a panelist, speaker, leader of a meeting. One thing I've learned about that is that being prepared and being relaxed are key, and they are linked. Breathing plays an important role in speaking too.

Another instinct I'm drawing on is my reaction to a book I bought to read on the plane as I went to India last month: Chris Carmichael's The Time-Crunched Cyclist. I know Chris is pretty much the guru cycling coach of the day, and I know that I probably qualify as a time-crunched cyclist, but I reacted pretty stiffly to Chris's prescription. In some ways though, Chris really ratifies what Osler contends. Chris's idea is that you can cheat by putting in less time, but just don't expect the results to last over time. I guess I don't disagree so much with that conclusion, but the notion of intervals, kilojoules, and overloads in a compressed time program put me off. It doesn't feel like it will have me very relaxed, either in training or in Paris.

Too, I am paying attention to my homeopath who winces when I describe brevets or permanents which leave me feeling spent. Spent is a warning word for him, and I listen to his winces. And when I described my intention to my physical therapist (the one I call The Healer) to begin to engage in interval training to build speed for PBP (this is prior to discovering Osler) I heard her silences. And she is an ultra-runner so her silences run deep.

All of this, combined with my bodily intuition that I want to pursue relaxation at a faster cadence, have led me to Osler and perhaps to some breath work as well. So what is Osler's prescription, written in 1967 for endurance runners?

Here is the link to Part 1 as reprinted in Runner's World in 1984.
Here is the link to Part 2 as reprinted in Runner's World in 1985.

The photo above of Tom running more recently is from his own website which is also worth pursuing. There you'll discover Osler's prolific and successful running career and rather astounding mathematics career. One glance and you'll see Tom Osler is not some goofy uninformed weekend athlete. Nope, he is that rare character that is wondrously athletic, analytical and intuitive all at once.

I thank Ian Jackson for turning me on to Tom, but Ian is a story for another day.

All this is not to say that I wouldn't be grateful just to finish PBP. I would. But my visualization is grounded in randonneuring as ambling, faster ambling. And to get there, I am going to eschew the frantic and the rigid, favoring intuition and relaxation instead. That previous sentence is not just about my cycling, it's about my visualization for my life.


Keep it visualized,

CurioRando

India Street Sounds, Bicycle Videos & Pics

Here is a montage of Indian alternate forms of transportation, mostly bicycles. The pic above shows one of the classic and ubiquitous Indian bicycles. Lots of versions, but the essentials are similar to this.

Coconut juice and meat are yummy!

 Here is a typical rural cycling scene as we passed through a village in the middle of the threshing season.

Most bicycles aren't necessarily shops on wheels. Most are basic transportation.

Newer models seem to be showing up contrasted with what I remember from my previous two visits.

Even bicycles can't handle some jobs!

The Mysore Mounted Police, an unusual regiment, was headquartered nearby to our accommodations when we visited Mysore. They often cooled down their mounts on the street leading to our hotel.

We rented bicycles at our hotel and took a spin. They didn't fit us well, and many of the adjustments were rusted, but we had a fine ride that acquainted us with the countryside and riding on the "wrong" side of the road. For a post about my first ride in India, check out this post.

 A video of DartreDame and the SingingCyclist on their first cycling in India.

Yours truly on a poorly fitting rental bicycle. I could get a move on out of the saddle though!

A look at a typical rental bike.

For a more urban scene, here is Brigade Street in Bangalore. To hear what an actual Bangalore Street sounds like, check out this audio link.

For previous posts about bicycling in India, check out this and this and this, or use the "Topics" index in the sidebar to the right.

Keep it moving one way or another,

CurioRando

Cycling in India...Himalyan Style

Himalayas from the International Space Station, courtesy of Wiki.



I have recently marveled at riding through the crowded streets of India, but there is another, higher side to Indian cycling. The Himalayan mountains. I've only been there in my mind and via a recent great read: The Snow Leopard by Peter Matthiessen.
But straight from the spirit of the French cyclo-touring pioneering comes a blogger with whom I've been communicating and his blog cataloging some wild riding: My Crazy Rides. He's got some excellent photos of the high mountain roads, accounts of multi-day cyclo-touring, funny renderings of self-dialogues and daring adventures that others find a little out there. I like it.

If you want a taste of the higher, wilder India, do check it out.


Keep it mountainous,

CurioRando

Coup de Torchon Cycling

Coup de Torchon is simply french for The Dish Towel Technique as put forward by Ian Jackson of BreathPlay. The idea is that instead of pushing down into the bottom bracket we pull the pedals away from one another as if we're trying to keep the dish towel taught and straight.

Or, as you see in the photo above or in the video, if you imagine you're holding a dish towel between your hands, your hands represent the pedals.Then, to keep the towel straight you must push each pedal away from the other with equal and opposite force.

I discovered this technique in another podcast by Terry Bicycles owner Georgina Terry.

Ian posits that even as we contrive to push down on the down stroke and pull up on the up stroke or "wipe mud from the bottom of our cleats" we are still engaging in essentially centripetal pedaling rather than centrifugal pedaling. Coup de Torchon is about pulling around the circle rather than pushing into the circle we all hope to pedal. I'm certainly no physicist, but I am intrigued by the visualization.

I've tried it--not yet for long rides (tomorrow will be first longer test)--and I like it. I can tell I am recruiting some new muscles and my stroke is smooooothing out.

Let me know what you think.


Keep it smoooooth,

CuriooooRandoooo

Paris Brest Paris on Facebook

If you haven't seen the Paris Brest Paris facebook page yet, do check it out. There is a webcam of the official PBP Startline, pictured above though admittedly not so exciting.

Better is a YouTube interview with a PBP official about the new start times. Also, what seems to be an interactive lesson on the history of PBP. Though on that I am not certain because I need to learn French!!

Maybe that game is a way to practice my French?

Oops! Just in, the second part of this YouTube interview, this time about rider quotas and rules.

Exciting to ponder being in Paris with thousands of other cyclists!


Keep it faced,

CurioRando