Month: May 2009

NAHBS 2010 Richmond Virigina

Don Walker, organizer of the North American Handmade Bicycle Show, announced the selection of the Richmond Convention Center in Richmond, VA for the location of NAHBS 2010. The show will take place February 26 – 28, 2010. Richmond is the state capital of Virginia.

Champe Burnley, president of the Richmond Area Bicycling Association, is a big fan of custom bikes and is thrilled that the show is coming to his area for two years. Although Richmond doesn’t get the attention received by cities like Portland, OR; Davis, CA; or Boulder, CO, Burnley says Richmond has a strong cycling culture with a reasonable climate for bicycling for most of the year. Burnley also notes the large number of cyclists with a public university and three private universities along with two community colleges in the region.

In addition to a large number of cyclists riding on tallbikes and other frankenbike creations in Richmond, the area supports an active community bike shop, RVA Bike Polo, fixed gear hipsters, and enthusiast level road cycling.

Because two major bike touring routes intersect in Richmond, Burnley says his city has a constant stream of touring cyclists coming through on their loaded bikes. US Bicycle Route 1 runs the length of the U.S. Eastern Seaboard, while U.S. Bicycle Route 76 — Adventure Cycling’s Transamerica Trail — passes nearby.

According to Burnley, weather in Richmond at the end of February is variable. It can be either gorgeous for riding bikes, or it might be perfect for staying indoors at a convention center. 🙂

Richmond — located 110 miles from Washington, DC; a nice road trip away from New York City and 400 miles from Greenville, SC — is within a day’s drive of half of the US population. Amtrak’s Northeast Regional train passes through Richmond’s Main Street train station with several trains from Boston, New York City, Philadelphia and Washington. The Carolinian / Piedmont train with service to and from Charlotte, DC and New York stops at Richmond’s Staple Mills Road Station. Amtrak Silver Service Palmetto services Richmond Staple Mills Road from Miami, Tampa, Jacksonville, Charleston, DC and New York City.

Tuesday night bike ride video

I spent the evening uploading about two and half minutes of video in small bite sized chunks to Flickr. These video vignettes of my bike ride across Menlo Park, into Palo Alto and then from Sunnyvale to Cupertino and across to San Jose was taken last Tuesday evening. Each video is 30 to 40 seconds long. Play only one video at a time to avoid audio problems.

Menlo Park Willow Road across Highway 101.

Palo Alto to the Caltrain station.

De Anza Boulevard across I-280.

Saratoga Avenue (near Stevens Creek) across I-280.

That hot red tire is the Hutchinson Fusion2 Pro. The red color makes me go faster. It also has a Kevlar belt for puncture resistance.

The video was shot with the Gopro HERO WIDE Camera mounted to my seat post. GoPro makes a huge variety of mounting options, allowing me to strap the camera to my chest, my back, or almost anyplace to my bike.

Don’t forget: The 2nd Virtual Alleycat begins this next Monday! Have a great weekend, all!

About those UCI rules

Happy Friday, all!

The UCI’s application of the 3:1 ratio rules is on the agenda for the next issue of The Spokesmen cycling podcast that I’m recording tomorrow with David Bernstein, Carlton Reid, Donna Tocci and Tim Jackson. Oh, and we have a special guest: Bob Roll. Let’s see if we actually get to it since we never really get around to everything by the time our hour is up.

Cyclists in the blogosphere are all atwitter about this rule application, most of them coming out against it. I like Bicycle Design’s take on it:

So, lets get the pros out there and see who can reach the finish line fastest while hobby horsing along on a vintage boneshaker with wooden wheels.

Bike Rumor has the coolest illustration in UCI is smackin’ this upside yo’ head!

Elsewhere: