Driving Home from the Ride

I am not a "car guy." I drive a five-year-old Subaru wagon with paint flaking off the rear quarter panels. There is no 1970 BMW 2002 hiding under a tarpaulin in my garage. Most of the time I'm a competent driver. Maybe I'm even an above average driver. Sometimes - when I have to drive in Boston, for example - I'm an assertive driver. But the act of driving a car is just not something that I think about a lot, or put energy into.


I have noticed something about myself many times now, though, on my way home from a ride. I've noticed it so often and so consistently that I'm convinced it's a real phenomenon. What I've noticed - especially after a ride when I've ridden well, and am not totally wrecked - is that my driving skills are WAY better than they normally are. Things seem to happen much more slowly. My reaction time is much faster and I see better. I drive faster than normal, but it seems like I have more control, not less. I believe I actually am in better control. (No, I do not drink after my rides. At least, not until I've gotten home, had the ritual glass of chocolate milk, and taken a shower.) In particular, my peripheral vision seems to be about double its normal width.

I draw the conclusion that the level of concentration and reactivity demanded of me when I'm riding singletrack at speed is way beyond anything I otherwise encounter in daily life. After I've been doing it for two hours, that level becomes a habit. When I get behind the wheel afterwards, the demands of driving are trivial by comparison.

With Bar Ends Upon Thars

A few years ago, when I first started riding a mountain bike, I had a sound but unremarkable stock hardtail. I put some inexpensive Nashbar bar ends on, because that's what a friend who knew more than I did at the time advised. I liked them. They provided a variety of hand positions that relieved fatigue. And they let me get a few inches farther forward on the steep climbs, which was very helpful.

Then as I started reading the bike press - Dirtrag, MBA, MTBR, MBR, and what have you - I learned that bar ends were not cool. They were especially not cool on riser bars (which I had) and for people who were not XC racers (which I wasn't). I learned that I didn't really need bar ends. They were a holdover, an anachronism, a vestige. Wider bars with rise and generous back sweep obviated the need for them. "Just keep your wrists down and you'll be good," was the lesson.

When I got my next bike, a huge leap up in sophistication, I did not get bar ends. I wanted to be one of the cool kids. I found I could get up the climbs without them, if not quite as happily. On long rides, though, I deeply missed the option of being able to rotate my hands ninety degrees, and the change of torso angle that those couple inches of extension provided.

After a couple more years of riding I had more confidence in my own skills and preferences. I decided I wanted to try bar ends again. My new bike had a fancy carbon bar. I learned pretty quickly that the manufacturer did not support using bar ends on their carbon bars. No reinforcements to resist the crushing force of the clamps or, potentially, their scoring edges. Crap.

After another year I bit the bullet and bought a new bar that would support bar ends, and new Braids Jr. ends. Wow. What a HUGE difference. I was SO much more comfortable on the bike. I was worried that I would start catching saplings with them, but as it has turned out that only happens about once a year. More often than not, the inward angle makes them act as a kind of shield for my knuckles, actually saving me some tree-related pain, rather than causing it. Since making this move I have never for a moment looked back. I am a much happier rider with my bar ends. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

- q

see also Dr. Seuss's The Sneetches.

Brilliant on Friday, Klutz on Sunday

I was riding really well on Friday evening. Just three of us. In the first half hour I cleaned two sections on which I average well under .500. I was floating over the bike, flowing with the terrain. On the last turny and undulating section I was drifting in the loam and the pine needles like a downhiller: chin and shoulder diving into the turns, head up, knee out, bike leaned way over, unconcerned about the skipping and skidding due to my excessive speed. I just knew that the knobbies would hook up and I would be good. And I was.

This morning, only 36 hours later, I again rode with two (different) friends. What happened to my Friday skills? It was like I hadn’t ridden in a year. Instead of friendly stars flying by excitingly at warp speed, the saplings were scary and hard and out for blood. I had to scrub all kinds of speed to keep them at bay. I went down twice in the first half hour because of stupid errors. The first time I braked hard for a sharp left that I was late for. Once around the turn, a small hole faced me immediately. Routine. But instead of letting go of the levers altogether and pushing the fork down into the hole so it could roll out nicely, I managed to grab some panicky front brake, forcing an instant graceless dismount. A few minutes later I came around a tight uphill corner with several greasy roots underfoot – a corner I’ve ridden a hundred times. I was feeling confident and strong. I leaned in hard – not just the bike but my whole body. Predictable result: The bike skated and I went down fast and hard on my hip.

Why does this happen?

Dear Local Bike Shop

Dear Local Bike Shop,

I am a typical avid cross-country rider. I would like to give my business to you. You are people I know, who do good things on the local riding scene. You have the best intentions and skilled wrenches. (Well, mostly.) You sponsor races and maintain trails that I ride in and on. You are my neighbors. Why would I ever want to give my money to Jensen or Performance Bike or whomever on the net, rather than to you?

Well, there are some good reasons.

First, let's set expectations. I do most of my own maintenance. Yes, I'll take the bike in for major operations that are beyond my tool set or abilities or patience, such as replacing a headset or building up a wheel. But I'm going to do ninety percent of the work myself.* That is not going to change.

Since I'm going to do most of the labor, if you want my money, you have to be willing and able to supply me with the parts and supplies I want. Not the parts you happen to have in stock in your meager selection and want to sell, mind you, but the parts I want. I will listen patiently as you try to talk me into or out of something. You see and hear a lot that I don't, and have a broader perspective. I respect that, and hearing it is part of the reason I go to your shop. But if I decide to stick with my original choice, please humor me and order it without pushback. Honor my experience as a rider. Maybe you can huck eight foot drops or bunny hop a park bench. I can't, but that doesn't mean that I can't tell the difference between climbing my favorite pitches on 34 tooth big cog vs. a 32 tooth one, or that I don't have a good first-hand reason for specifying tire compound A vs. tire compound B.

When you order my part, you are going to have to do it at a speed and at a price point that is within a rough stone's throw of the speed and price I'm going to get on line. No, I don't expect you to match sale prices on the net for special-order items. I am willing to pay a reasonable premium for personal service and advice, and to support local business. But if every usual suspect on-line is selling the pedals I want for fifty dollars plus twelve bucks for 2-day shipping, don't insult my intelligence by telling me that you might be able to have them for me in ten days if I'll give you $89.95! In short, wake up and smell the Internet.

Please respect the fact that if I'm looking for a particular item, I probably know a little bit about it. At the same time, consider the possibility that you don't. I don't expect you to be an expert on the thing that I happen to care about on a given day. I DO expect you to admit it if you're not. So if I come in looking for cool-weather tights, don't give me the absurd line, as one principal at a major LBS did a couple of years ago, that "You never see tights with a chamois any more. I'm not sure anyone even still makes them." (What I hear: "We don't happen to have any, so I'm going to try to hoodwink you into buying what we do have.") Be aware that much - not all, but much - of the special secret knowledge that used to be available only to those who apprenticed for years in the bike mechanics' guild is now accessible to anyone with some determination and a broadband connection. You may not like that, but it's reality.

Finally, if I am going to favor you over on-line vendors, even though you charge a bit more, and even though I have to schlep over to your store to place the order and schlep over there again to pick it up, it's going to be because you give me better service. That means you actually have to give me better service. When I go to my local book shop, they can order me any book that's in print and have it for me in a few days. When it arrives they call me immediately to tell me it's arrived. If it's on backorder, they tell me that before I place my order. Why can't you do that? Instead, you grudgingly consent to special-order me a part at a high price, as though you were doing me a big favor. Then you tell me it's going to take over a week to arrive. Then the day comes when I'm supposed to be able to pick it up, and you don't call. On a good day, I will remember to call you, and you will tell me that you have lost my work order, or that the distributor did not have the item available, or that you ordered the wrong thing, or that the item came but that you "haven't unpacked the order yet," so I will have to wait another day. On a bad day, I will find one of these things out only after I've driven out of my way to your store. This, Dear Local Bike Shop, is not better service. This is pure motivation for me to click "Add this item to my cart."

Sincerely,
q



* By the way, I'm going to do my wrenching in a way that answers my particular needs and fussinesses in a way that you can't, simply because you don't know me and my bike like I do. When I replace the hanger, I'm going to put fresh Loctite on the changer's main pivot bolt, because I happen to know from experience with my derailleur that for some reason it always comes loose. I am quite a good amateur mechanic, and I've been doing it since nineteen seventy-seven. If you're 20 and have been wrenching for a couple of summers between terms, you are better and faster than I am at certain things, but please don't patronize me with that exasperated "you'll end up bringing it back to us to fix your mistakes" look. More likely the reverse: I will end up re-doing YOUR work to accommodate my quirks and those of my bike.

Bike vs. Garage

So... I did it. The thing I said I would never be careless enough to do: Drive my car into the garage with the bike on top.




This is a photo of just one of several ruined rack components. I'll leave it up to you to imagine the bike.

I've heard all the tricks about hiding the garage door opener in your bike glove so you'll be reminded, etc. The problem with these ideas is that you have to remember to do them. If I have the presence of mind to remember something, I'm darn well going to start by remembering that I have a bike on the roof! No, I need a tactic that doesn't require conscious initialization each time. Closest thing I've seen is those red flags that you hang on the inside of the garage door, so that when it goes up the flag drops down and flashes a quick warning, like, "Hey! You! Look up! Guess I'll have to try to make one of those.

Of course if I were living more simply I wouldn't have the door wired up to a motor. I'd have to get out of the car to open it and then I'd probably notice that bike up there, wouldn't I?

What are your tricks to forestall this particular kind of disaster?