Aside from a couple ride reports, the last real update I posted was back in March, and a lot has happened in the intervening ten weeks.

Instead of going chronologically, I’ll organize this post along four major themes. I’ll start with some major repairs I faced, and the challenges presented by the woefully incompetent local bike shop. Then I’ll ( Read more... )

I destroy wheels, particularly rear wheels.

I’m not sure why, because I’m not heavy and I don’t put out that much torque. But the expected life span of a drive-side spoke on my bike is only marginally greater than 37 minutes.

When I bought my first road bike, I went through two or three (Shimano) Ultegra wheels before I switched to (Mavic) ( Read more... )

Follow this link for my full 2011 Pan-Mass Challenge ride report, including writeup, photos, and GPS logs.

Follow this link for my full 2009 Pan-Mass Challenge ride report, including writeup, photos, and GPS logs.

Two items to report…

Last Saturday morning my coworker Jay drove me down to Dartmouth (Massachusetts) to take me on the ride he used to do when he lived down there. We wound up doing 62 miles in 85 degree heat.

The route traversed several peninsulae sticking out into the ( Read more... )

So Friday I got up and made to bike in to work, and I had one of those experiences: I walked my bike three feet down the hallway of my apartment, and it suddenly stopped.

Let me explain: the reason why it stopped was because the rear wheel was ( Read more... )

After 25 days in the shop, my LBS finally called me to say my bike was ready. Shimano made me a loyal customer by agreeing to a warrantee replace for the cracked rear wheel I brought in.

When I got there, the guy in charge picked out “my wheel” and gave it to me. I asked where my bike was. He was completely surprised that the bike ( Read more... )

This year’s PMC ride is over, of course. The travelogue will be up shortly here, but it was another amazingly wonderful year. And I’m over $9,000 in fundraising now and headed for more, thanks to my perennial biggest sponsor Liam and the people from Where’s George, the community where I met Ken and Christine, whom I rode for this year.

But the ( Read more... )

Lots to report.

I started commuting again. However, because I’m at a client site ( Read more... )

So this week marks the fourth anniversary of my purchase of the Devinci Monaco that has been my faithful ride. When I first got it, I was someone who was basically sedentary but inline skated or biked to work every so often, but I aspired to maybe do a long bike tour or something. With the new bike, I commuted a lot more, even through the harshness ( Read more... )