Even the most "epic" Fondo, gravel-grinder, or bikepacking expedition isn't so much a feat as it is a vacation, and the true cycling accomplishment is Getting Shit Done.
At this year's Tour, Froome has been seen wearing a nasal dilator called the Turbine. The three-time race winner has been using it for a while. Riders are allowed to wear it in competition, according to the UCI, but we've seen Froome use it only after racing during his cooldown. The company says on its website that the Turbine is "proven in a clinical trial to increase air flow through the nose by an average of 38%."
Here are some of the research notes taken during that clinical trial:
On one hand, twenty bucks isn't a lot of money in the context of Fredly performance-enhancement. On the other hand, it's a piece of fucking plastic you stick up your nose. Also, in a stroke of pure genius, you have to keep buying new ones. Just read the FAQ: HOW LONG DOES EACH TURBINE LAST? Each device is recommended for use up to 10 times. A single pack comes with three devices.
Amazing.
And why do you have to replace it? Because accumulating bacteria could make you die: WHY SHOULD I CHANGE TURBINE AFTER 10 USES? Testing has shown that to optimise the performance of the device, comfort and fit, Turbine should be replaced after 10 uses. While Turbine may appear fit for use beyond 10 uses, optimal device performance cannot be guaranteed because: 1. Of the risk of bacteria accumulation and the maintenance of hygiene standards. 2. The device may discolour or the ultra-soft polymer may begin to stiffen affecting comfort. 3. The dilation mechanism will wear and may not hold its dilation effectively.
That's why I'm getting in on the act and selling an aftermarket system to keep your Turbine running longer:
Just keep in mind if the ultra-soft polymer gets too stiff it could snap and you could inhale the Turbine during competition, resulting in death--or worse, a diminished placing in the Gran Fondo or other targeted event.
I'm just waiting for Mario Cipollini to officially enter the performance-enhancing insertable market:
("Mine is similar, but for the butt.")
Lastly, you'll no doubt be delighted to learn the fixie and/or singlespeed as branding exercise refuses to die, and the "L Train Commuter" is proof:
Brilliant was inspired to build this bicycle after hearing news that the NYC Subway's notoriously unreliable L-Train is going down for 15 months of service, leaving many Brooklynites without their main artery into the city. With this limited edition bike, they set out to create the ultimate commuter bicycle for a seamless borough-to-borough, city ride. Even the paint options have a Brooklyn story to tell; a subway grey in tribute to the train, or a rich dark blue inspired by the Hudson river crossing.
That's right: it's the first-ever dedicated subway service change bike.
Just don't try to use it in conjunction with any other subway line outage our you'll void the warranty.
Also, once L train service resumes you should discard the bike immediately, just like a Turbine schnoz ring after the 10th use.
Admittedly I haven't been following the Touring of France very closely, but I got very excited when I saw there had been a slapping incident--until I saw footage of said slapping:
Oh please. That's a slap like Michelob Ultra is a beer. In fact, between this and the outrage over Fabio Aru not waiting for Chris Froome, it's tempting to say cycling's getting too soft.
Wait! Are we critiquing Tour de France riders for being too soft?!?
(Greg LeMond demonstrating the purported size of his testicles.)
"If the race is on, it does not matter what happens to the yellow jersey, he's got a team and that's what a team is for," added the American, who won the Tour in 1986, 1989 and 1990. ... "The riders have lost their ability to race," said LeMond.
And with that, LeMond took a bong rip the size of a team bus:
Of course, if you really want context for the Tour de France, you've got to dig deep into the race's history. Here's a New York Times article on the race from 1926:
28 Days! And check out who was racing: Many internationally known cyclists will compete in this event, the twentieth of its kind—last year’s champion, Bottesvia from Itall, Belgian’s Buysse brothers, Huysse, Beniot, Frantz, the Frenchmen Bellenger, Aymot, Huot, Sellier and many others, including Swiss, Hollanders, &c.
In those days they left off the first name for weight savings.
Of course, the basic idea was the same, but the wardrobe was a slightly different:
The man with the least number of accumulated hours will wear the coveted yellow sweater which often changes hands during the circuit.
I couldn't help plugging the delightful phrase "coveted yellow sweater" into a popular search engine, and here's what I came up with:
(Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's sweater.)
But perhaps the best thing about the old-timey Tour was that amateur Freds could jump in too:
The professional cyclists operate in squads representing various bicycle manufacturing firms and lend each other a hand in case of punctures. The amateurs operate alone, and while they cannot expect to win, they have a lively competition with each other for amateur prizes. All along the route towns and villages offer prizes for spurts, &c., and the native sons always get a wild reception, whatever their standings in the race may be.
It's true, the native son always did get a wild reception, but once he arrived in the next town and was no longer the native son he was beaten mercilessly about the head and torso with a stale baguette.
In other news, I received a press release by email yesterday, and imagine my surprise when it was 50% about me:
As the NYC Bike Snob, the snarky and elusive Weiss became a guide for cyclists all over the world, with posts ranging from bike part information to bike lane etiquette -- never afraid of criticizing the big names in the competitive sport.
The above paragraph continues thusly:
"Interest in the Bike Snob eventually faded until Outside found him behind a taqueria scrounging for discarded burrito stubs. Taking mercy on him, they engaged him as a columnist ."
Anyway, being a "top influencer, " you can imagine I get lots of great marketing emails, such as this one:
Breaking the wind with Wood...Aerowood
Never one to resist a fart pun, I read on: In today's carbon rich bicycle environment, it’s difficult to stand out from the crowd and introduce something truly unique and different. The new Renovo Aerowood is a genuine head turner and a great conversation piece. Please share this with your followers and if interested, please ask about Review Bikes that are readily available.
Not only is the shape highly ergonomic, but if you're using a tubeless system it can also be used as a sealant injector.
Best of all, I understand Best Made Co. has a travel bike conversion kit available specifically for wooden frames. It consists of one of their axes:
And a set of hose clamps:
They're like S&S couplers, only more artisanal.
Still, being a top influencer comes with a lot of pressure. For example, I'm woefully behind on all the different road bike categories, and I need to get caught up. To that end, I recently browsed the VeloNews Buyers' Guide, where I was stunned to find that ther eare now "All-Around Road" bikes:
Cannondale’s Tim Johnson calls the Slate “the Swiss Army Knife of road bikes.” Do you really want to dress a deer with a folding knife? Isn’t that can-opener a nuisance? That’s not to say the Slate isn’t a fun, versatile bike. It just seems like a complicated design that tries to do too much for a very specific person. But maybe you’re that person.
Oh snap.
Anyway, I don't know much, but it seems to me that maybe one day they can come up with a bike that's just kind of a regular road bike you can use to do pretty much anything:
We designed the Bowl Dancer from the ground up to evoke the act of butter-churning each time you clean your commode. The handle and stand are constructed from locally-grown teak (don't worry about where it's grown, it's local to wherever you happen to be) to resist humidity and urine splatter, and the brush is made from Japanese boar whiskers to remove even the most stubborn fecal remnants from your porcelain.
Oh, and for best results, make sure to use with Best Made's "Bowlshine" bowl cleaner:
Has a night of small-batch artisanal bourbon consumption left you with a case of the "whiskey shits?" Our Moonshine Bowlshine is distilled from hydrogen peroxide, fresh-squeezed Dekopon juice, and hairless cat urine. Just don't confuse it with our Best Made "Moonshine," which comes in the same kiln-fired earthenware jug:
Or, do, because it's all the same shit anyway.
Anyway, moving on to the Official BSNYC Tour de France Recap, yesterday was...a rest day:
The bag was thought of and designed by Sully Sefil, artist and designer of Rock The Street brand. X-shaped bright logo symbolizes the crossroads of streets, styles and cultures. In union resides strength and in the mix we find the source of wealth and progress.
3 REASONS FOR A NEW DESIGN So there are three main reasons for creating a new design for the traditional road bike top tude. 1. Reduce wind resistance 2. Reduce the risk of injury to wrists, elbows and shoulders due to misalignment of arms when holding your elbows in close to your body in order to reduce wind resistance, and 3. Reduce the risk of accidents due to a rider not holding the handlebar in order to achieve a less wind resistant position.
Handlebars like this are generally designed for people who really should be riding bars like this:
But haven't yet come to terms with the fact that Reason 1 has absolutely no bearing on their lives whatsoever because they totally suck.
Plus--and this may sound crazy--when you want to get aero shouldn't you be riding in the drops anyway?
I mean sure, I realize 90% of road bike owners have never actually placed their hands in the drops, but one day some Fred is bound to try it and the world of cycling will be changed forever.
About Trek's famous YBikes: These USA made carbon bikes are an example of what US carbon fiber manufacturing can produce. The Optimum Compaction Low Void (OCLV) monocoque mainframe uses techniques developed by Boeing to build 747/747 tail fins and is virtually indestructible while being ultra light weight. The unique Y-bike design established the pattern followed by countless other manufacturers but it was first, and best, done here. The URT (unified rear triangle) rear suspension is superior to multi-link setups for cross country riding providing a nominal stiffening/lockout under load (while remaining active unlike other URT designs) while being stiffer, less wear and damage prone, and lighter.
I'm not on the Facebook, but subsequent to the publication of my Outside thing about the Tour de France I went to their Facebook page, which Zuckerberg and Co. graciously let non-Facebookies look at provided they are willing to peer around this annoyingly-placed rectangle:
In so doing, I was bemused to find hundreds of incensed comments beneath the link to my piece, most of which were some variation on the theme that I'm stupid because the Tour is awesome and so should return to my "safe space." If this represents the typical Outside reader I find this highly encouraging, since if they're this easily upset it should be great fun to continue taunting them for as long as the magazine will continue to have me. In fact I'm already at work on my next missive, tentatively titled "Fuck Mountaineering."
By the way, I'd be willing to bet that 90% of those Facebook commenters have not watched a Tour since 2005.
Then again, I should probably work a little harder to understand the outdoorsy demographic, since I'm assuming there's got to be something in between the types of people who buy stuff from Best Made and chop wood in photography studios:
And the potbellied cargo-shorted suburbanites who shop at REI and buy racks they'll never use for their meticulously detailed SUVs.
However, if there is I have yet to encounter it.
Alas, I'm a lot more familiar with the cycling demographic--who, when you retweet a found stolen bike:
According to police, officers responded to the intersection around 3:59 a.m. Saturday where they found a black Cadillac “in the middle of the Hubway Station with multiple damaged bicycles surrounding it.’’ The vehicle was unoccupied.
Seems pretty innocent to me. Clearly the driver decided to exchange his Cadillac for a bike so he attempted to dock his car and then rode off. Hey, I read the Hubway instructions, and nowhere do they explicitly say the docks won't accept Caddies:
If anything we should welcome this driver into the fold and gift him with a "One Less Car" sticker.
Lastly, Bret sightings continue unabated, and here's one via a reader in which he's inspiring students at a London secondary school to pursue a career in biology:
Given Bret's omnipresence and ability to bend space and time physics would seem a more appropriate course of study, but then again his soul patch no doubt harbors untold biological mysteries, so I'll allow it.
While I love cycling and embrace it in all its forms, I'm also extremely critical. So I present to you my venting for your amusement and betterment. No offense meant to the critiqued. Always keep riding!
No? Look closer:
