sharrows are like fuzzy pussycats & fun with gravity.

so kansas city kansas decided to do a real bike lane commuting corridor for bikes on the merriam lane / south west blvb route from joco th downtown kansas city mo. they are doing real bike lanes correct design & all. so i’m riding home a few nights ago & what do i see running for 2 blocks .</p
this piece of stupidity. the parking width is not enough for cars doors to open with a bike passing by.also it runs for 2 blocks. then sends you into a pinch point under a bridge with sharrows to hopefully make cars not run you over.

oh i forgot to tell you this piece of beauty is in kansas city mo. well known for being bike friendly and using our tax dollars in well thought out way.
sharrows! really sharrows. they are like fuzzy pussycats . cute, but useless when being run over by a lincoln town car. i have been hit by one! i love the bike lanes i’ve ridden in other towns but wow. 2 blocks & then good luck sucker. that’s a bad way to get the beginner to commute.

this weekend fast eddie is putting on the no gas nationals! love it.
so a welding i went & this little beauty appeared out of the haze.

a late model magna with the much sought after trispoke wheels. all metal & bikes were found by the roadside or given to me. the foot rests were bed frame no money was spent to make this.! love it.

come out saturday & have fun with us!

big grin…joel

alberto contidor, a victim of the system & hubris.

alberto contidor great bicycle racer , probably the best stage racer since lance armstrong. so he is finally found guilty. the Spanish sports authority found him innocent 1 year ago so he could race last year. so he has 2 grand tour victorys taken from him & 2 years lost. the big question seems is he really guilty or innocent & the unfairness of this late court decision.
mabey the question should be why do we pin our hopes our egos on sports people . we have huge interest in distractions from sports & celebrity personality’s. so why???? i don’t get it. a good friend of mine said “the downfall of humanity is sports”. i don’t think it’s that bad but it is disturbing.yes i follow cycling & a few other sports in a minor way as escapism. but i have friends & acquaintances i find way more interesting than any sport celebrity.
the people i know & my adventures are what i take real interest in. these things i take seriously.think of the people that you know & their trials , your adventures. then remember alberto is just a man making bad decisions . he is no more interesting than the guy i just met who sold his car & only rides a bike everywhere.finding out alberto is guilty shouldn’t worry you any more than the info that the great eddy merckx was found guilty of taking drugs in the early 60’s. or that i might have had a few too many beers a few weeks ago.

big grin….joel

poseur

poseur

well the word says it all.so do you actually believe & do the things you profess to do? wow!
so when i looked at the rapha site tonight it hit me….poseurs!!! this guy fit the profile . now don’t get me wrong i don’t care how you get to cycling. just that you do it & have fun!
poseur holy crud a itialian middle aged hipster, damn skippy! i guess being a old school punk rocker it was an imperative to walk your talk! to do anything else was basically lying to yourself & others.
so what do you do??? what do you really do? well don’t worry how you look. just have fun & do it lots.

possibly a poseur, but really good lookin.

big grin….joel

rugs my second or third love.

rugs!

this is a nickle chinese oriental rug from the 1920s .
i found it in a thrift store for 20$. cleaned & fixed it’s worth 15 to 20 times that. but more importantly, it’s beautiful .

this is my stabilization stitch repair to salvage the ends from unraveling . fun for a evening fixing rugs.
most importantly michelle likes it so all the better.

big grin….joel

trailbuilding on the ot

aaron & tim in the muddy mess before picture.

this is all the rock used to make this.love this missouri red granite. sexy rock!

we got the pleasure of laying all this beautiful rock in the ground. these rocks were the sides set in about 4to 6 inches under ground . hard work the trenching.

lotsa playing with rock. this was the easy part playing where does the 4inch rock go.

the rock with the road barrier cloth around it.

joel doing the spreading of the 3/4 minus. way funner than the digging & laying of the big rocks.

aaron & tim enjoying 3 days of labor. we layed 20 some tonnes of rock in a 150 foot section in 3 days. this was a muddy bog in a valley on the ozark trail now with diversions of the runnoff & this work this trail will be great year
around.

the rest of the work was filling root ball holes with rocks & dirt. with needed deberming on the karkaghne section of the ozark trail. it was hit 2 years ago with a straight line wind storm that knocked over all the large trees on the hill tops.man it was dry down there we got 80 degree days in late october.

this is for my wife .she loves bracket fungus.

this was my favorite fungus of the trip. like a little ice cream cone.sweet!
we got to work outdoors in a beautiful part of missouri.good times with good people.

dream beautiful dreams.

big grin….joel

trans iowa!

well this has been a sucker that i’ve bitten into before but come away with a unfinished taste. year one was hard a 20plus mile per hour cold headwind never over the low 40s. i had to bail at mile 180ish.
year 2 was worse it was the last of the route across iowa. i miss that!too hard to put on a race like that! we started in a light mist & mid 40s after 2 day of rain softening the gravel.in the first 30 miles we had at least 4 miles of hiking!

this is nate king rocking a rugsnake on his surley. little known fact he was still riding at 6 pm when we picked him up he had gone 120ish miles . was off course but still trying to go across the state.

i’m the tall guy in the red jacket. i gotta say i don’t remember this. i was so cold & the weather sucked so hard.i really don’t remember the 5 or 6 hours of riding i did.
i stole these photos from jeff kerkove’s flickr page, thanks. these are the only pics of nate & i on trans iowa 2. the second photo was about 20ish miles in after a long hike.i was getting hypothermic somehow i got to a caseys off course at about 60 miles. i couldn’t stop shivering for 2 hours. had to be picked up from across the state then got nate .
i signed up for trans iowa 6. watched the rain come in then pulled the plug for my attempt that year. so now i’m hungry. let’s see what the weather gods have in store for us. i’m going rain or shine, to do my best.

dream beautiful dreams

big grin….joel

vacation!

chicago+ michelle + joel = fun for us!

the obligatory chicago skyline photo. well… we have things the davis dyke household likes to do. like ride bikes (duh) , visit museums , experience cultural interests. explore & see the wonderful wide world we live in.

the field museum. we saved this for the one rainy day we had in chicago . wow there are alot of dead animals in there!!!!

michelle taking a shade break outside the field. the middle of october & high 70s in chicago, sweet.

LUCY, FREAKIN LUCY!!!! do you get what i mean? LUCY!
you grow up hearing of our oldest ancestor . then your wife is standing next to her. , cool!

we were having a quiet moment of marital bliss then AAARRRRGGG! T-REX!!! ok we weren’t too scared.

this was in the art institute museum a cool talented bamboo basket maker from japan. wow.

van gogh ,wow a whole wall of his paintings.

wow!
more art than you can shake a stick at. you turn a corner & another piece of art you remember from the art history books. very nice!

the art institute & some building across the street. we exited the museum at the end of the day to a riot squad & the chicago police getting ready to get rid of the occupy wall street people . so we beat tracks the other way!

we got to see the world premier of the best ballet company in north america the joffrey ballet in louis sullivans theater. one of americas most important architectural buildings. we got to sit in the front 2nd side balcony for 35$ holy sh!t. super cool.

for 6 days we saw the city by bicycle . enjoyed the wonderful museums, the joffrey ballet. world class architecture ,, good food. good times .

dream beautiful dreams

big grin….joel

sunday

the little lady & like to go mtn bike riding as often as possible. this summer we’ve been riding at smithville trails. good stuff a few weeks ago this caught my eye.

ya gotta love sunflower season!
this week we went to smithville again.

on the back side of my mushroom was a good lookin slug.

so yeah for sundays. good ridin.

big grin….joel

2011 dirty kanza pre ride! & gummy spiders

the super team at the dk 200 headquarters has come up with a new route. they were kind enough to share a little with michelle & i this sunday. so the weather in the midwest has been crapful lately . yesterday it was 70s & sunny. so today it had to be 50 with a super cold north wind( suck). we had the day to ride so no mater the weather it was ride time. tim & kristi are great company so off we went. the new route midpoint is in———– ,we started there.
in a town along the way was this little cute house.

with this detail , sweet!

beautiful.

michelle coming up a steep climb. the cold killed us. we just were not ready for this in may.

kristi said there were alot of graveyards along the route. this is the second in 7 miles. this route might be even harder than the last one.

the cold & our legs shortened our ride but we were super lucky to see some of this new route.

gummy spiders from the genius of dennis grelk. thanks buddy these are good riding food.

tim & kristi ,2 of the super group known as dirty kanza productions!
this is a hill that goes for 4 ish miles after a checkpoint. some poor people are going to hurt. this stretch of b road is so beautiful.

i’m going for more soon. i hope to see you all in emporia.

big grin….joel

sweet weekend at nahbs

so bikes are a passion of mine. this last weekend was nahbs 2011 in austin tx. basically a geekfest that showcased the best handmade bikes in the world. so michelle, tylor, jessica,vince, & i headed down there. we got out of town as a snow ice storm hit. perfect timing for us.
so austin to the best of my senses doesn’t suck. we found great little italian place for dinner the first night off 6th & i don’t know downtown. great veggie lasagna! get to bed for the big show day. yahooeee!
so first thing i see marty of geek house! he rocks love his bikes & he’s great to talk to.

this is michelle’s photo. i didn’t try to match the bike. we just go together!
michelle fell in lust with this little beauty .

i don’t blame her. i might even wear a dress for that bike.the dudes from vulture were verry cool. the show was a mix of salesmen that i tried to avoid( not very successfully)
& builders. it is so nice to talk to people who are craftsmen . they have a definite passion for what they do. being able to pick their minds about tubing gauges & tubing bending, etc… rocks!

one of marty’s creations .on my top ten list.

hank of bicycle fabrications was in my ubi class. he makes sweet dirtjump downhill & all other kinds of bikes. we talked for 20 minutes until i recognized him.cool guy. i love his bikes the urban freeride & dirtjump bikes are a great addition to all the usual stuff.

demon is a builder that brought just this one frame from england. cool stuff! love it.

cherubim is out of this world. he makes beautiful bikes, really art!

these people have the most exciting thing i saw other that a frame. a spoke cutting machine! a better design than the phil machine. so simple so easy to use . & really sweet people!

cool ass paint job & bad ass bike!

i’m pretty sure michelle is going to want one of these for her dirty kanza bike.oh well off a welding i go!

ANDY FEAKIN HAMPSTEN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
ok i’m a dork, he’s only the greatest american climber of all time the only american to win the giro!love him. did i say i’m a dork.

bvm sighting in austin !

dr jackson slept in the closet of our motel room ,good folk . he met up with us in austin . he can trick the heck out of a fixed gear!

jess looking guilty.

so every day was a rolling deja vu fest. we got a guided tour to the best vegan vietnamese food in austin by asking a cyclist where to eat. just riding along we found this.

a sweet fixed gear shop where the alley cat saturday night started.

the crew about to roll.fixed gear was the way to roll in austin!

mr perry from kc showing his dentures!

a sweet bike at the start of the alley cat saturday night. he was a x courier who apprenticed under yamagucci really cool dude & sweet ass bike! mavic track trispokes no foolin there!

tylor after getting 7ht in the alley cat . rocking the fixie. the dude who won was 2 minutes ahead on a geared bike.

the party after was a good until the beer ran out & the band left. so we split & had vegan freeto pie at …….

a airstream trailer.

so we went , we saw, we plundered, we road, we did qi gong at midnight, we showed off our super white legs in feburary. we enjoyed the heck out of austin. we left before the authority’s were alerted.

dream beautiful dreams

big grin….joel