Texas Bicycling News April 17th 2017

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Fort Bend first responders direct bicycle traffic around monster alligator

By Fernando Ramirez | www.chron.com


n Houston, first responders direct pedestrians and cars, but at Brazos Bend State Park, they direct cyclists and alligators.
A recent photo by the Fort Bend Emergency Medical Service shows responders assisting a crowd of cyclists around a 12-foot alligator. …

Basso Bikes working with Trialtir USA on US distribution

by BRAIN Staff | www.bicycleretailer.com

WALLER, Texas (BRAIN) — Italy’s Basso Bikes is now working with Trialtir USA on distribution to U.S. dealers.
The family run brand is celebrating its 40th anniversary and recently moved into a larger production and sales facility to accommodate its growth worldwide.
“We’re having a tremendous year,” said Alessandro Basso, the son of company founder Alcide Basso. “Our 100% true Italian production is something cyclists highly regard and appreciate. With Basso’s directly owned production company involved in Formula 1, Moto GP and aeronautics we offer world-class leading technology that has always been centered around the …

Florida Bound

By Charles Brun | www.crazyguyonabike.com

Day 33: Rest day in Austin Texas
Sunday April 16, 2017, 5 miles (8 km) – Total so far: 1,744 miles (2,807 km)
I had a very good day in Austin today and I only had to the ride the bike from the hotel to a friend’s house, a total of about five miles of riding.
I got up at 6 am and left the hotel at 9 am. It took to nearly 2 hours to completely put the bicycle and luggage all back together after having taken everything apart for a thorough cleaning. When I checked out I asked for a $20 refund off of my stay as the electric stove in the room did not work and desk clerk honored my request.
I met Colin, his new baby, and their two dogs at his apartment. We promptly locked up my bicycle in their outdoor storage shed so that I could leave it without having to think about it all day. Gosh, how wonderful! I have been going hard for 33 days with only one day off in Phoenix Arizona, so I was long over-due for a complete rest day. Yesterday was a hard day of riding as I encountered numerous and …

Day 34: Austin to La Grange Texas
Monday April 17, 2017, 79 miles (127 km) – Total so far: 1,823 miles (2,934 km)
Today was cloudy when I first started out at 7:45 am from Conlin and Jenna’s place. We did enjoy having breakfast together as Colin had prepared great pancakes and fruit and lots of hot coffee. Gosh how I enjoyed all that!
I navigated out of the suburbs towards the Austin Airport. I thought that I would take road 71 to make the day go faster. Little did I realize how busy it was. While bikes were allowed the local police officer that pulled along side of me with his flashing lights was clearly concerned about my safety. He came up along side of me just a few minutes later and told me about a paved trail on the north side of the runway. In addition route 70 was …

Loyd Evans, A Tribute

Pedal Pushers | roy-pedalpushers.blogspot.com


Loyd Evans
August 17, 1944-April 13, 2017
Avid cyclist, great friend

He married his lovely wife, Frances Elaine (Carter) August 20, 1966. He and Frances lived and worked in Hobbs, New Mexico until his retirement and move to San Angelo in 2011.
I met Loyd at a club meeting in 2011 right after he moved here. He started riding with the club in 2012. He wasn’t sure what to think about me at first. We were riding together and I heard “—Hobbs, New Mexico”. I said “no, I am from San Angelo.” We rode in silence for a while he was probably trying to figure out if I was hard of hearing and just dumb. Finally he said in a louder voice, “I am from Hobbs, New Mexico.” I responded “Welcome to San Angelo” which confirmed his …

May is Mountain Biking Month

Greater Houston Off-Road Biking Association | ghorba.org

May is national Bike Month but we prefer to call it Mountain Biking Month!
Join GHORBA in a month long celebration of all things Mountain Bike! Check out our calendar of fun events for all age groups and skill levels.
We will kick off the month with a Social Party and Big Ring Challenge Race Carbo load at 11 Below Brewery with dinner from Carrabba’s Italian Grill, then off to Double Lake Recreation area for the …

Back to the Future

by Matthew | bike4heck.com


It has been a while since I’ve been able to update the blog. So far 2017 has been very busy for my wife and I. As teachers it’s also crunch time of the year. We have still been riding bicycle and have gotten out on the Cargo Bikes. I’ve been holding Monthly Kidical Mass Bike Rides (with the exception of March due to Siclovia).
As we settle into summer hopefully I’ll be able to …

Man rescued after falling off bike in Shoal Creek Greenbelt

by CBS Austin | keyetv.com

Austin Travis County EMS were called out to the Shoal Creek Greenbelt off North Lamar after a man fell from his bike.
It took 60 minutes to find and extricate the man, who had non-life threatening injuries.
The land rescue call came in …

Texas Bicycling from Twitter

New Events Added to Texbiker.net Calendar

Love Bugs With Power and Max Speed Bike Ride

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As I rolled into the Spendora Chevron at FM 2090 the first thing I noticed was the “love bugs” flying around and landed on various parts of the station. To my left was a large white Ford pickup with the driver busy cleaning the bugs from the windshield. I moved over to him and told him he was reducing the bug population for next year with all of the dead bugs. He laughed and agreed it was a big mess.

I rode the “Kingwood – Splendora – Kingwood” route for a total of 39.5 miles improving my monthly miles to 460.6, 312 miles from my goal.

The bike ride started later than I planned because I emailed Wahoo Fitness and Velocomp about a problem I started having recently with the max speed calculation for rides. Last Saturday’s ride had me at 77.4 mph which is way beyond my ability. My wife said if this was true she was going to get me on a pro team quick. At first I thought the problem was connected to using the PowerPod but after today’s ride I think the problem is with the Elemnt. At the end of today’s ride the Elemnt’s ride summary screen showed a 26.4 max speed. At first I thought that might be possible but I had stopped in New Caney at 12 miles into the ride and checked the max speed and it was 21.2 mph. There are a couple of hills after that point so I thought maybe I sped down one of those but when I looked at the ride summary on Strava 21.5 mph showed as the max speed. Not sure what the solution is but I will use the Strava data to upload to the Golden Cheetah program rather than the Elemnt data file. While I was working on this problem I connected the PowerPod to my desktop computer and opened the Isaac software to answer a question from Velocomp. While I had the PowerPod connected I used the calibration function and it updated the numbers. I probably didn’t do the initial calibration ride correctly. During the ride I noticed the power numbers were higher than before and when I exerted extra power going up inclines the power increased more than before. The ride numbers reflect this: average power 126 watts versus previous rides around 70 watts. Max power today was 463 watts versus significantly lower values. I like the calibration results.

Back to the late start (12:04 PM). That was a good thing because north of FM 1314 the service road edges were wet from a recent rain. I might have gotten wet if I left earlier. By Community Drive the wet road ended but later near New Caney it was wet again. The ride ended at 3:00 PM with me avoiding school traffic somehow.

The weather was good for bicycling: mid 80’s, mostly cloudy sky and a SE 14 mph wind.

Golden Cheetah Ride Summary

GC Ride Summary

Link to RideWithGPS.com map and data.

Strava Extended Statistics view. Click on the image to got to the Strava data.

Strava Extended Statistics

Home weather at the start, home weather at the finish and airport weather at the finish.

Texas Bicycling News Digest April 16th 2017

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Riders take to the road for Liberty Freedom Ride

By David Taylor | www.chron.com


On what couldn’t have been a more perfect morning, nearly 200 riders from all over the Gulf Coast area poured into the Liberty City complex on April 8 to begin their trek on the second annual Liberty Freedom Ride (FLR).
Riders were greeted with a cool, crisp morning that warmed up quickly as the sun peeked over the horizon and provided a most perfect backdrop for the mostly urban riders.
Bruce Wright, president of the Liberty ISD Education Foundation, estimated 185 riders had registered prior to the start of the race. Updated numbers weren’t available at press time, but it …

Prepare to share the road: TxDOT, Angelina Bicycle Club urging motorists to be aware of cyclists, bikers and pedestrians

By CASEY SIZEMORE | lufkindailynews.com


As summer approaches, motorists should be aware that more bicyclists, pedestrians and motorcyclists will be out enjoying the nicer weather.
Angelina County saw five auto/bicycle accidents in 2014, two in 2015 and 13 in 2016, according to Texas Department of Transportation statistics provided to The Lufkin News by Lufkin district public information officer Rhonda Oaks.
“While the statistics for 2016 are especially alarming with the jump in numbers, we encourage not only bikers and pedestrians to stay alert to moving vehicles, but more so motorists who must stay alert,” Oaks stated in an email. “Cyclists and pedestrians don’t have a chance of escaping …

Cant imagine what would’ve happened with those $23 chinese carbon bars after this –

by Seths Pool | www.bikemojo.com


today at RPR, hit a washed out sandy left turn going down Super D. tire started washing out and then grabbed and sent me OTB hard. landed on my left hand between my left ribs/chest and a huge rock, heard a loud crack and thought i broke my wrist.
well thank god it wasn’t my wrist, instead – 800mm SIXC carbon DH bars.
i never personally torqued down the …

Florida Bound

By Charles Brun | www.crazyguyonabike.com

Day 32: Johnson City to Austin Texas
Saturday April 15, 2017, 55 miles (89 km) – Total so far: 1,739 miles (2,799 km)
Today turned out to be a tough day; I had to deal with hills, headwinds, and heat. By the time I arrived in Austin at around 4:30 pm I was exhausted. Thankfully, I had my “support team” consisting of my wife MJ and my older son (via cell phone) to help secure lodging for the evening, as well as to help me arrange for a day off on Sunday.
Last night I had a visit by a raccoon who nibbled away at a couple of bagels I had stuffed into my front pannier that I had forgotten to secure. Evidently when I got up at some time during the night the pannier fell over and the bagel bag was exposed. The other, more serious, problem I discovered in the morning was that I had setup my tent too close to a sharp bramble plant when I set up camp yesterday. The screen door to the tent had a foot-long rip in the so called “rip stop” nylon. When I …

Upcoming Rides

Fort Worth Bicycling Association | www.fwbaclub.org

Century of the Month
Sat, April 22, 2017 8:00 AM
Bikes Inc – Arlington
Cattlebarron – KOM
Sat, April 29, 2017 9:00 AM
Springtown High School
Marvelous Massey
Sun, April 30, 2017 9:00 AM
304 E Main St, Crowley, Tx 76036 Parking Lot next TO Chicken Express
Century of the Month
Sat, May 13, 2017 8:00 AM
Bikes Inc – Arlington
No Wind No Hills
Sun, May 21, 2017 8:00 AM
Sublett and 287, Arlington, Tx
Burleson Honey Tour
Sat, May 27, 2017
Burleson, Tx
Austin to Ft Worth
Sat, May 27, 2017 8:00 AM
1100 Congress Ave, Austin, TX 78701

Day 38: Wonders Will Never Cease….

by Cyclesome | www.mybikeitlist.com


Cleveland, TX to Lake Charles, TX (77 miles, 15.5 mph, 440 ft. Elevation gain, 3,325 calories burned)
….to Amaze Me! Yep! Wonders will never cease to amaze me and today was no exception.
The weather forecast was for thunderstorms arriving at noon. Anna, our guide, gave us permission to leave a few minutes earlier than planned at 8:10 am. We stowed our luggage in the trailer, pumped up our bike tires, ate a …

Texas Bicycling from Twitter

New Events Added to Texbiker.net Calendar

Texas Bicycling News Digest April 15th 2017

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Eagle Scout Donates Bikes to Refugee Children

By Meredith Yeomans | www.nbcdfw.com

Video

For refugees who make it to the United States, transportation can be a tough hurdle.
Dozens of refugee families now have a way to get around thanks to an unexpected act of kindness.
Friday, a Boy Scout troop based in Flower Mound delivered 58 bikes to refugee families in Dallas.
The idea started with 13-year-old Tyler Olsen. …

https://www.instagram.com/p/BS4GzMRAwUE/

https://www.instagram.com/p/BS6TfvcBC2c/

Ride of Silence – sponsored by Texoma Cycling Club & BikeSherman

vspotz.com

may 17, 2017 // 7:00 pm
The Ride of Silence in Sherman, Tx will leave from Austin College located at 900 N Grand Ave, Sherman, Texas. Please park in lots at corner of Grand Ave and Brockett. Ride will begin in Zauk Circle. Campus map and driving directions: http://www.austincollege.edu/about/campus-info/
This no-drop ride will be 10 miles at about 10 mph. …

Chacon Creek Hike & Bike Trail Maintenance Contract

www.texasbids.net

Day 37: Texas Reflections

by Cyclesome | www.mybikeitlist.com


Cleveland, TX to Silsbee, TX (62.8 miles, 15 mph, 604 ft. of elevation gain, 2,679 calories burned)
What a could be more appropriate to cap off the last full day of riding in Texas than celebrating a 60th birthday for one of our cyclists, JJ, a native Texan!
JJ was born and raised in Texas Hill Country. She moved in 1999 to Colorado when she accepted a job offer as a firefighter. JJ has been a tremendous resource to all of us on the Coast to Coast Tour. She has been our unofficial bike mechanic and has willingly assisted with both bike …

Texas Bicycling from Twitter

https://twitter.com/grandpajerald/status/853407382109605893