Breaking the skewed perception of cycling

As many who cycle will know & those who don't cycle will think, they see people who are cycling just Wiggins wannabes clad in Lycra cycling around in packs! They see cycling as a hobby or a sport so need to be clad in Lycra, helmets & shouldn't be on the road but in Velodromes.

Those who know me know I sure aint no Wiggins wannabe, I aint no sporting person to compete (not with my disability) & I definitely do NOT wear Lycra, I sure hell don't have the figure for it & if I did I would look more like the Michelin Man.

But I do cycle! And strange enough I get all the hatred & misconception claptrap mentioned above I get online coz I cycle but never in person & why is this? Well this photo says it all & yes that is what I wear when cycling at any distance!

Photo thanks to Peter Monk

Definitely don't fit the misconceptions & to be honest most do not...

 

  

 

And when I mention shopping by bike I often get the look of horror as if it is some feat that can only be done by car or possibly by bus. Again I blow this out of the window too...

 

 

But the best one is when I get asked if I went out cycling on my days off during the past few months & I go yeah I went to this place or that place & cycled 30 or 40 miles on my 20+kg Cruiser.

 

And its the OMG moment I get as if I am totally mad (like I had today), as if it is some impossible task & in some cases I've had been mentioned that cycling 5 miles is quite far (REALLY??), its something I can do in 30 mins easily & not break a sweat. And as I have said, I aint fit & I sure don't do those 100 mile rides on lightweight racing bikes (roadies) & go as quick as possible. Why bother? I go at a pace I like in clothes I feel comfortable in, I stop when I want or feel I need to & eat & drink whenever I like & do these rides with friends or alone.

I often get remarks on my feat of cycling on these long rides or when shopping which I just smile & shrug, often tho I get comments on my Cruiser as one person said last week as they went past its a 'Radical bike'. :D

To me it's just a bike that's comfortable to ride, easy to ride & very reliable. I think my limit so far is 50 miles (due to disability) but hope I can increase that in the future (depending on disability) but every time I am out cycling I am showing the world a bike is a mode of transport, nothing special needed to ride one & if you get the right bike for your body you can eventually build up the miles & do what you would never think possible. And I have 4 I can use, all different & all bought for a purpose in mind.

Photo thanks to Ashley Parmenter

Hell, when I got back to cycling I found 1 mile was an effort until I got cycling regularly & it is possible to do far more miles than what I am doing now on any bike. :D

But for now I am happy with how I am doing & smashing the skewed perception of cycling.

Project: Roadrunner, the evolution of a personal bike...

I thought after some months of posting pictures & updates on the social media on this, it was time to collate it all into a blog.

So how did it all start, well having returned to cycling 3yrs before I started this project to help overcome my disability (something I am still doing). One thing I found was each bike I bought I ended up pulling them apart & changing it piece by piece to suit me & my cycling ergonomics. So in 2013 I decided it was time to get a bike built up to suit me from the frame upwards. Now I just needed to work out how to go about this & first thing I did was draw up a concept design to get an idea what I wanted.

Why call it Roadrunner, well the idea was to build a bike to be light as possible (for my budget), built to be comfortable to ride & thus be able to do long distance rides which at the time I was finding almost impossible to do on the heavier bikes I have. So it was a road runner, plus I love the cartoon character of the same name. ;-)

Now I looked around at having the bike built for me & as good as they were, custom built just was not affordable for me & not an option. So next best thing was go with buying a 2nd hand frame & build the bike up from there. And at the time I was volunteering at Re-Cycle, a charity that sends bikes to Africa. They managed to find a frame with forks as well as wheel rims for me at a price I could afford. So I bought them & managed to get it all home by bike to start the project.

 

 

Doesn't look much but was a starting point, so next was to get tyres & I decided I wanted hybrid tyres as some of the cycle 'network' was more like dirt tracks. Only ones I found that would fit & made by Schwalbe were the 23x700 Marathons & I was concerned they be too thin a profile for me but there was no room for wider & as I found out from many miles done on them, they were the right choice.

 

So next was to find parts in boxes around the flat to piece it together until I find the parts needed & replace them. Like the saddle, I tried a few & just couldn't find what I wanted so went with what I had used on previous bike for now. And then changed handlebar to a boomerang (ergonomic) one as it felt right to hold & of course the brakes...

 It was slowly starting to take shape, so next was a rear rack as I always use panniers so went for some low profile Tortec Velocity as they were on offer & felt they looked good on the bike.

 

Now whilst I was building this bike, I had won tickets for Nightrider London charity ride. So I needed this bike ready ready faster than I could get it, so got Re-Cycle's mechanic to help (for a fee) build the final pieces of the bike. So the chain, sprockets, bottom bracket & gear mechanism was added to complete the bike & this is how it looked on day I collected it & rode it for the first time.

Its starting to look like what I am aiming to build & riding it for the first time was definitely a joy. Far easier & quicker to ride than my other bikes. Tho of course with all prototypes, you find some snags. Main one which worried me was the panniers kept going into the wheels & I needed to change the rack. So I changed it for a slightly pricier Axiom Streamliner Disc Deluxe Rear Rack which resolved the issues as it supported the whole pannier & moved it further back thus giving a bit more room to pedal.

 And of course as an all weather cyclist, I needed mudguards. So I went for SKS Raceblades as they had to fit around the brakes. 

So now it's May 2104, a month before Nightrider London & just done a 50 mile cycle ride for Pedal 4 the J's on lil Trekr & it was a struggle. Roadrunner was almost ready & after a few more tweaks on setting up I had Roadrunner set up as best as I can get her & she looked good!!

So now Roadrunner was ready, her first long ride was Nightrider London as no chance to do any before then. So in a way this was her maiden voyage & a true test on the design. 

So how did it go, 100km overnight around London on a bike I built & was it's maiden voyage? It was Fantastic!!! Bike was a dream to ride, it did better than I did on the ride but we both completed the 100km with no hitch or issues. Not only was the build a success, this bike was so well balanced it saved me from a nasty tumble as I was going downhill fast & hit a pothole. The bike refused to go down so to me, Roadrunner is a keeper!

So now to try finish what I started, it was time to add what I want on this bike & get a paint job sorted. Since June I went & bought another Boomerang handlebar but in black, a Brooks Cambium saddle for starters...

Then after I was happy & ready do get it done, I stripped her down for a paint job & then rebuilt her again with her new looks & oh boy she looks sexy...

So here's the almost complete Roadrunner, why almost? Well there's a few more bits I like to do, gearing mostly as I like to tweak the gear ratios a bit to get more out of pedaling with less effort.

But for now I am enjoying the rides on her, we've already conquered Box Hill, cycled across the Surrey/Hampshire borders, gone from Chelmsford to Colchester & many more rides. And all this whilst my legs arent doing too good too, so Roadrunner as a design concept becoming a reality has really become a success in my books. She hangs on my wall as my pride & joy & hope eventually she manages to help me finally do a 100 mile ride. :)

Lost the battle but not the war...

As many who follow me know, I've been using cycling to help get me stick free & over 18 months ago I managed it. But last year my knee decided to play up for no apparent reason despite finally stick free for some months, done 2 Charity rides, cycled to Chelmsford & back to see Tour de France & those rides were all over 50 miles each.

 

Then after thinking I had knee sorted out, started a new job which involved a lot of walking & standing, leg had improved greatly. In February, the knee went again & worse than ever & back I went to see specialist. Who had done tests before & with physiotherapist notes to back up results, he diagnosed I had Osteoarthritis. This meant changes are needed to improve the condition but it will never go away, mostly lifestyle changes which reduces strain on the knee like sit with knee straight as much as possible.

But the timing of the knee flaring up was at the worst possible time, it was 2 months before Pedal 4 the J's & 3 months before Nightrider London. And having spent over 6 weeks unable to cycle on the road, both my knee & my level of fitness has been severely reduced. I had done 30 days of biking in April, but it was more of a 5 min run daily on a gentle setting of the turbo trainer & a few short rides at the end of the month.

And now that I'm beginning to cycle again I'm finding it difficult to do, partly coz I dont want to aggravate the knee again & I just don't have the leg strength anymore. The bike is feeling heavy & hard work so looks like I will be looking for an alternative 'lighter' replacement in the near future.

I had to drop out of Pedal for the J's last w/e as I just wasn't ready to cycle that course, but I needed to get things moving so I could do Nightrider London. So this week I decided I needed to start cycling further, so with a friend we went for a long ride around town to clock up the miles & it didn't go as well as I hoped. I really struggled to do 10 - 20 miles easily. This didn't bode well for me to be able to do Nightrider London let alone complete it, so after a few days of deep thought on the mater & a heavy heart I have decided I am unable to do it this year. The risk of doing more harm than good to the knee just wasn't worth it.

So I had emailed the organisers of Nightrider London to see if I can have the booking postponed to next years event so to give me time to get back to the level of fitness required & unfortunately they will not allow that. So on that premise I had to make further decisions as I now lost a good chunk of hard earned cash on an event I pre-booked to ensure I get a spot. It's not something easy to decide or I really want to do but I'm afraid I am no longer going to be doing the Nightrider London ride in the foreseeable future & I will not be pre-booking any similar charity event too as I can't guarantee I am able to do them on the day.

As for now I have to focus on my knee improving & able to manage it to avoid any further stick use if possible. The specialist has made it blatantly clear that I will never be stick free, but with the right management I can minimise the need of sticks. And until I know I can get the knee to be OK for more than 6 months, preferably over a year I think I will need to just work on my cycling distances on my own goals of getting the distances than try raise cash for charity on sponsored rides. Events like Pedal 4 the J's is still open for me to do as I can just turn up on the day & pay before I do it. Those sort of rides I will look out for to do in the foreseeable future.

So for now I may have lost the battle of going stick free, but the war to achieve it as much as possible as I have done for a decade isnt over. I'm just going to need new tactics & equipment as well as support to keep pushing forwards even if it is doing it slightly out of breath...