Category: review

Pedaler Clothing Hoodie

Pedaler Clothing HoodieNAHBS Attendees: See Pedaler Clothing at Carytown Bicycle Company, Richmond, VA. Details below.

Once upon a time, a group of urban cycling friends in New York and Los Angeles got together talking about the dearth of cycling specific clothing that wasn’t stretchy skin-tight plastic. The East Coast / West Coast collaboration became Pedaler Clothing , designing unisex, urban apparel for functionality, fashion, riding visibility and fabric sustainability. (more…)

Delta 7 Ascend road bike review

It’s not about the bike, but…

The Delta 7 Ascend is the road version of Delta 7’s “IsoTruss” carbon fiber mesh frame. I got to play with it during the Sea Otter Classic 2009.

Delta 7 Arantix Ascend Road Bike

Gary Fisher and the infamous “Bikes Gone Wild” both gave me grief for it, but I just had to try this paen to space age technology. Jeffrey of Delta 7 set me up with the Ascend while Erik hit the trails with the Arantix mountain bike.

The Ascend is a real head turner. I’m a moderately homely middle aged guy with birth control glasses; I rode for a short while with Liz Hatch in her Vanderkitten kit and her Storck Absolutist bicycle. Every male roadie we passed by snapped their necks looking at me, not Liz. If you’ve seen Liz on a bike, you know that’s something.

Built up, the Delta 7 Ascend weighs a hair over 13 lbs without pedals. The light weight combined with a reasonably aggressive road geometry and super stiff rear triangle translates into rocket like acceleration and effortless hill ascents. I popped up to bunny hop over a pothole and nearly launched myself into orbit because the bike is so light. If you want to try for sub 20 minutes on Old La Honda Road, this wouldn’t be a bad bike to use.

During my test ride, I caught up with a cyclist on a nice looking Trek wearing Astana kit. He looked strong but tired pushing up a steep hill, so I whipped out my phonecam and took a photo of this guy as I rode no handed on the magic bicycle. Sorry for the lousy phonecam photo — we had to push through a crowd clanging cowbells and shouting “LEVI.” I didn’t realize the jeans company had such a big presence at Sea Otter.

Levi Leipheimer Sea Otter

I only put a few short miles on the Ascend so I can’t do a full evaluation, but the ride on this bike isn’t the least bit jarring in spite of the stiff frame.

Everybody asked me if this bike whistles in the wind. Here’s video of my riding the bike on a steep downhill — no whistling, but the shadow of this mesh bike looks pretty cool against the road surface. The video was shot using GoPro’s new Wide Angle HERO Cam strapped to my chest.

According to Delta 7, they performed wind tunnel tests on this frame expecting more wind resistance from all of the surfaces and they wanted to quantify just how bad the turbulence would be. There’s indeed more drag because of all the flow through the lattices, but the drag induced by vortices behind the tubes completely disappears, resulting in a net benefit: the IsoTruss design results in less drag than conventional tubes.

In summary, the Delta 7 Ascend road bike is fun, stiff, light, fast, comfortable and very expensive. My buddies at Road Bike Review took delivery of the Ascend so watch for a real, in depth review from them Real Soon Now. Also, “Bikes Gone Wild” promised to provide his own comments on this bike in the comments after I post this review 🙂

GT Aerostream city bike

I saw Valerie at the GT Bicycles booth with the Aerostream cruiser bike and asked her to describe the benefits of this bicycle. GT Bicycles Aerostream bicycle has some nice features differentiating it from other bikes in the cruiser bike category.

GT Aerostream city bike

Valerie was kind enough to demonstrate some of the features of this bike:

  • Gates carbon belt drive
  • Shimano 3 speed hub
  • Efficient and smooth rolling 700 x 47 tires
  • Women’s model (shown) has a front basket for Valerie to store her pom poms. This front basket has a collapsible frame which is cheaper to ship (lowers dealer cost)
  • Men’s model has rear racks and panniers.
  • Unique rear triangle design eliminates the usual bolt off triangle used in other belt drive designs.
  • Lightweight aluminum frame is stiffer, less clunky and lighter than your standard beach cruiser. Valerie let me ride her bicycle and I can report that it indeed provides a very nice and smooth ride.

As you can see, just sitting on the GT Aerostream automatically makes anybody at least 14% hotter. This is what Valerie looks like off of the bike:

…And here’s another photo of Valerie on the GT Aerostream:

GT Aerostream city bike

Your mileage may vary.

Valerie also tells me that REI is now selling this bike and absolutely loves it.

Knog Bullfrog front light

The days are getting shorter and my son had to cycle to his Boy Scout meeting tonight so I bought him the Knog Bullfrog front light. This is my new favorite front light!

It’s very bright, attaches easily to any roundish protrusion, and has a very fast flash pattern that I like. I use rechargeable batteries and changing them is a bit of a pain — you need to slide the whole silicone cover off to get at the batteries — and I don’t know how waterproof this is yet, but so far I’m impressed.

This is a “be seen” light — it’s good for being seen on lit city streets. If you need to light the way to see the road, the Knog Bullfrog isn’t the right light for you. Otherwise, though, this thing looks cool and it stands out from the other lighting.

Chafed and sunburned

Back in my college days when I used to compete, my running jersey and shorts would chafe so badly my sensitive areas would bleed from all of the running. Back then I never thought about any way to ameliorate the damage — I’d put up with it, bleed and ignore the pain.

Fabrics and design are better these days, but chafing and skin damage is still a problem for endurance athletes. Surfers, for example, wear rash guards under their wetsuits to keep skin irritation down, but chafing still happens near the underarms. It’s not unusual for my feet to bleed on hiking trips. Cycling shorts are better than ever at keeping the chafing down, but I still get saddle sore and even blisters on occasion. Yesterday, oddly enough, the hot weather I rode in made the back of knees itch something fierce.

Endurance events and skin care

There are products used by many endurance athletes: Bag Balm, Body Glide, Chamois Butt’r, and so forth. Anybody who spends all day outdoors also is concerned about exposure to UV radiation from the sun.

When ultramarathoner Charlie Engle became the first human to run across the Sahara Desert, he discovered nothing he tried stayed on his skin in the brutal desert sun. He slathered on creams and lotions and sunscreens, and they all washed off his skin as he sweated. He burned. He chafed. He blistered. And he wanted a product that would work for him.

Mission Product “Athlete-Engineered Skincare”

Engle’s agent got him in touch with entrepreneur Josh Shaw. “I’m good at a couple of things,” says Engle, “and creating a personal care business was not one of them.” Shaw brought financing and marketing expertise this new venture, Mission Product, which sells “Athelete-Engineered Skincare.” Engle and Shaw have signed some world class athletes not with the usual endorsement deals, but as part owners and product development experts. Swimmer Amanda Beard, NBA MVP Steve Nash, soccer player Mia Hamm, Halfpipe medalist Gretchen Bleiler and extreme endurance athlete Hunter Kemper have signed on as founders and product innovators at Mission Product.

I’ve received a sample of their products — SPF 30 sunscreen, SPF 20 lip balm, Anti-Friction Cream (oh yes baby), Foot Gel and “Revive Gel” — and my initial impression is very favorable. I’ll put these products through the ringer by biking, hiking and swimming and let you know how it all holds up.

Mission Product skincare products are available from some sporting goods stores and online. You can learn more about Mission Product through their blog.