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Down Up Down
I was doing sit-ups in the high, dew soaked grass at the edge of the baseball field when they passed. At first there was just one, bobbing at the corner of my eye, a single cyclist working his way...
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Friday Group Ride #232
A friend of mine says, “A good life is the product of good decisions. Good decisions are the product of good experience, and good experience is the product of mistakes.” He says that every time I tell...
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Friday Group Ride #233
So much about cycling is personal. I try to remember that when someone asks me for advice about a piece of equipment or a great route. Too often, I express an opinion, unsolicited, that fails to...
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Friday Group Ride #234
All the time, I get calls from people who have had their bike stolen. They are invariably in some phase of the grieving process, usually either sadness or anger. I always say, “I’m so sorry,” as if...
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Friday Group Ride #235
I don’t know why I own a blue bike. I don’t like blue, but when I was talking with the builder, I asked what color he liked on his bikes, and he said, “We have this great blue,” and I was so in thrall...
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When the Wind Blows
As night falls early, the sun blotted by a solid bank of pregnant, gray cloud, the tall pines sway side-to-side in increasingly wide arcs, the shushing of their needles growing steadily in volume until...
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Friday Group Ride #236
I live in a bubble. There’s no doubt about that. Working for a custom bike builder means I see a LOT of custom bikes, not only ours but lots of others, too. It’s almost all I look at, and of course,...
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A Minor Character
Sometimes I have trouble locating the bike in the story, although it is there in plain view, bright blue with knobby tires, or party balloon red on razor thin rubber strips. The bike is there, clearly...
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Friday Group Ride #237
When I damaged my hand over the summer and had to go to the emergency room, the admitting nurse asked me, “Do you feel safe at home?” which is a coded way of asking whether I might have been a victim...
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Friday Group Ride #238
The old saw goes something like this: “The best reason to get a job in the bike industry is to get the 30% discount that comes along with the 50% pay cut.” The percentages vary but the truth is never...
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A Coyote
The ready image is of a coyote, end-of-summer fat, halfway up the roadside embankment. I came around the corner, swiveling in my pedals against the grade to find a couple in a pickup truck cooing and...
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Friday Group Ride #239
I used to think that all my bikes, forever, would have white bar tape and white saddles. It’s PRO, right? It’s what you’re supposed to do. Except that, over time, it became more and more obvious that I...
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Friday Group Ride #240
I am, despite whatever lingering swash-buckling notions of myself I still might harbor, a serial monogamist. I had two high school girlfriends. I had three in college. The last became my wife. We’ve...
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Impressionism
“I’m not faster. I can just hurt more than you can,” she said, the former pro, dropping me on the last climb, my mind warping against the task of making my muscles do what they would not. I pulled over...
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Friday Group Ride #241
I know guys who break things. What I mean is, I know guys who, by virtue of their size, strength or hell-for-leather riding style, go through parts like a college bar through cheap, American lager....
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The RKP Holiday Wish List, Part III
I endeavor to be a year-round rider. In spring and summer, we are gaining light and warmth all the time. No problem. In fall and winter, we are losing light and warmth, so my wish-list is aimed at...
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The Corrections
When writing a first draft, I use commas the way some people mumble ‘uh’ when speaking. I type a comma every time I come to the end of a thought. This may or may not signal the beginning/end of a...
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Friday Group Ride #242
Can we all just agree that motivation is priceless? I have been riding bikes my whole life, and the motivation to ride hard or far or even just continuously has sometimes been stronger than others. The...
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Friday Group Ride #243
December is a funny month in the bike industry. Everyone knows cycling is a seasonal endeavor, and as goes the riding, so go the sales. Years ago, December was a welcome winter respite for weary...
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Friday Group Ride #244
My kids are 7 and 9 and in a weird place with Santa Claus. The older one is wise to the scam, and maybe like his father, too cynical to indulge in too much fantasy about a fat guy in a red suit...
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