Cheering on Brentwood Cat 1 racers, SaMo police catch a bike thief, and a weekend’s worth of links

Congratulations to Velo Club La Grange on another successful Brentwood Grand Prix on Sunday.

Even my non-biking wife, whose eyes glaze over at the mere mention of bicycling, was highly entertained. As was the Corgi, who can be heard cheering the riders on in this brief clip from the from the Cat 1 and 2 crit.

At least, I think she’s cheering.

………

When Santa Monica police saw a man using a bolt cutters to remove a lock from a $1500 Trek, he told them he had lost his key. However, using their Sherlockian powers of deduction, they quickly noticed it was a combination lock.

Needless to say, he is now under arrest.

Thanks to Stanley E. Goldich for the heads-up.

………

The UCI, the agency governing international cycling, insists that USADA has no authority to pursue charges against Lance Armstrong; the question is, do they want to prosecute him themselves, or derail the charges?

Meanwhile, ex-Tour de France winner Alberto Contador says he’s grown up during his doping ban.

………

The hit-and-run epidemic has become so severe even cops are victims. Beverly Hills may or may not discuss proposed bikeways, and may actually get bike racks in the hopefully soon-to-be-former biking black hole; thanks to Mark Elliott of Better Bike for the heads-up. La Cañada Flintridge becomes the latest local city to develop a new bike plan; link courtesy of Erik Griswold. A La Puente man suffers serious injuries in a fall on the San Gabriel Canyon Road after losing control on a descent and crashing into the mountain. A Bakersfield firefighter takes on the quarterfinals of Olympic sprint cycling, while a Temecula woman wins silver in team pursuit. A Bay Area cyclist faces deportation for riding on the wrong side of the street. Sonoma cyclists confront a summer of sorrow.

Bicycling looks at seven fast, fun and affordable road bikes; affordability being a relative term, of course. UCONN basketball coach Jim Calhoun breaks his hip falling off his bike, surgery was successful. Rochester-area cyclists gather to honor a pair of cyclists, one killed and one seriously injured. Lights, reflective clothes and a helmet aren’t enough to save an Ohio rider. A New York ethicist tries to justify running stop signals on a bike. Thirty years after graduating, a former Baton Rouge resident takes her first ride to school. A fleeing Florida criminal kills two cyclists in an attempt to get away from police; that would be two counts of felony murder, right? Is a Florida bikeway a bike path to nowhere, or a key link in a future bike system?

The family of the cyclist killed by an Olympic media bus asks that his death not be used for political point-scoring by pro-bike advocates. The next generation of British bike racers suffered a tragic loss as an 18-year old member of their developmental squad dies after crashing into a wall. Is this really a safe junction? British success in Olympic cycling has lead to an explosion in the MAMIL population. Brit riders are kicking ass in the velodrome. Bald, beautiful and an Olympic gold medal winner in track cycling. Once again, the Cycling Embassy of Great Britain offers a list of links that puts my modest efforts to shame. Salzburg, Austria suffers an increase in cycling deaths. David Hembrow demonstrates how to get parked cars off the streets.

Finally, in a breathtaking attack of rationality, Caltrans proposes lowering the speed limit — yes, lowering — on the Pasadena Freeway to 45 mph. Now if they can figure out a way to drop the limit on a few other roads. And a motorist chases down a hit-and-run driver who fled after hitting a bike rider, and captures it all on video; Cyclelicious speculates that it may have been shot here.

………

Best wishes to Rick Risemberg, aka Mr. Bicycle Fixation, for a full and fast recovery; thankfully, he’s living proof that even serious cyclists like you and me need to take care of ourselves. And with luck, he’ll be around a long time to remind us all.

8 comments

  1. TQ says:

    In the video on Cyclelicious of the hit-and-run driver, that intersection totally looks like Lassen & good ol’ WILBUR AVENUE. (Could be wrong, though.)

  2. […] the original: Cheering on Brentwood Cat 1 racers, SaMo police catch a bike thief … This entry was posted in Blog Search and tagged affordable, area, basketball, bicycling, bike, […]

  3. Danapointer says:

    Hembrow has an other excellent post, on how to tackle street parking and make residential streets better for cyclist, how can we get this street design approved by California?

    • bikinginla says:

      It’s tough to get anything approved for use in CA. You have to get it past Caltrans first, which is an exceptionally conservative organization.

      • Professional engineers in general are exceptionally conservative. Long and very painful experience has taught the engineering profession that when lives depend on what you design, there’s a pretty good reason to be conservative. When somebody dies on a structure or facility using a design in the approved guidebook, you’re off the hook professionally, legally, personally and morally. If you innovate and somebody dies, it’s all on you, whether or not the design actually had anything to do with the death.

        We have new bike lanes in San Jose with parking on the traffic side of the lane, instead of the traditional curb side. So far I like them. But traffic engineers have been reluctant to try this treatment elsewhere around the country because New York City did the same thing in the 70s with disastrous consequences. Once bitten, twice shy.

        • karL says:

          Insurance makes people settle and finance the payout since nobody abstains its’ actually so pathetic that insurance companies expect -with the data to back them up- even spouses who never remarry- to continue as customers after using a car kills horribly there own family members. They brag about no copays for th efools among us who don’t self insure at a fraction of the cost over even just a decade (if interest rates go any lower it’ll be widely understood to be cheaper from day one to borrow the money tobe financially responsible and this matters for bikes)

          To claim no moral responsibility in going by the book is hilarious though. It’s not april so I’m not laughing. IS there some sort of hypertechnical hairsplitting going on? MOral but unethical?

          If your a professional you have a duty to have the appearance of impropriety when doing better requires that. Licenses are to prevent politics from intruding. You are paid the big bucks for having to risk yoru house- to just deposit it and put yoru kids in private school is evil.

          Yes wasteful industries creates a insatiable appetite for our best and brightest- keeping them from doing anything of value, but they are no longer isolated from where even there crap goes when they flush.

          It’s a waste of time to meditate on where to park cars in the city- we have plenty of work cut out for us in getting them to leave for good.

          Anyway I watched teh short video above before reading this thread just now and need to point out how people are looting IRS revenue despite being the worst people on the planet by buying electric cars instead of bikes. Accordingly I don’t expect the followignto appear anywehre but here: [Re an actually shipping bike that can let ordinary people of ordinary means without even subsidy enjoy speed like those you show above getting appreciative barks (but do so everyday and accomplish commuting as a bonus]
          “karL says
          (Your comment is awaiting moderation)

          It’s actually hundreds of dollars below the incentive in america for electric vehicles and that’s beforeo the additional beefy incentive state regulators are imposing on ‘electric companies’ to finance efficiency.

          Batteries are expensive to manufacture the facilities to manufacture andexpensive with obsolete chemistries but not too expensive for bikes. Only to expensive it seems to own theip for to not sell out for the capital to ramp up as A’s selling out to a chinese auto supplier ina confidential MOU that probabl ymakes itharder not easier to buy there latest cells if your just a bike factory owner regardless of how large a majority of the planet currently* comes to you -not [the]evil car industry for mobility.”

          Lets’ be clear though- present pedal technology especially in upright bikes is terribly energy inefficient as shifty ones wait strainsii frames cusing htem to generate heat and sap energy and also vary the downward acceleratoin so the tires etc. can’ be as high in pressure as otherwise.

          Elliptically interfaced to our bodies or recumbent frames dont’ need the grid at all- exceptfor the thousands of dollars of rebates using one instead of a Volt or other globaldestroying monstrousity consumes.

          Again it’s $7500 per commuter that we are offering to anhyone using electricity and courts will back me up on this- of course you have ot have a job to owe ov er $7500 butif you do pay taxes it’s demented to complain about the euro’s and fraudulent to not disclose the present exchange rate is MISSLEADING!!!!

          Of course teh free golf carts sold out.

          What makes walmart able to sell bikes is nobody uses them.

          Selling a bike htat actually gets miles put on it is a different industry altogether- like landlines for instance.

          Also thinking the vehicle is where cost reduction shoudl be realised is utterly ignorant.

          Putting people on bikes takes congested snail pace roads currently scheduled fordemoltion along with the billions of dollars of housing etc. alongtehm for widening and overnight makes them fun, fast, clean, safe, .. buts somehow resistable by Mr. Ford’s scheming to modernise even more expensive parking garages?

          He’s a deadender but one who’ps never failed. russian roulette is liek that though.
          August 9, 2012, 1:59 pm Reply

  4. karL says:

    The magazine you link to may even not have had to buy there url and although it concerns me that I see it’s merely a blog entry after struggling through it’s pages (assuming it was if not inprint partof the main edition which itmight be) and road bike tubeless tires seem an odd thing to only be ‘ready’ for as an affordability feature the bit about Johny has me like his mom was when she found other parents being allowed to drive there kids and herself called up to the principals office for endangering car dealers profits.

    I can’t believe these school are being built and are allowed to continue to be used. Ican understand how car dealers see kids biking to school and think “if only we could stop that!” but I had no idea they had managed to do this in much of the country. While we circulate petitions to ban smoking.. this was going on.

    Of course all the bikes you mention are affordable- a tiny fraction of what we spend on school bus’s.

    That I know of no school district that will buy a bike instead of drive a kid to school … that I no of one that paid several timesas much busing a kid as the rest of his day cost….

    http://www.bicycling.com/news/advocacy/why-johnny-cant-ride

    It’s not tort reform- tort reform would stop the families whose kids are sick from being driven, who can’t afford to goto college because instead ofoa career at least one parent just drove them, from organising to be made whole.

    I’d like to fund an online school just for kids who can’t bike there public school- one with a budget far higher then whatever the district normally has to fear luring away it’s revenue pegs. It’s not about evenutually getting around to letting kids not be driven to sickness if not death. It’s about punishing whoever designed built administered over these unfit places.

    The public meetings lacked such discussion apparently. When will we to no surprise for some of us find out that many of the dissappeared little kids where grabbed up by used car salesmen? Who took them down like some drown kittens- just a cost of doing business splendoriously? Without any ‘pleasure’ they will say to avoid lethal injection and silencing that accomplishes those not yet caught support. IT is no accident that buying a house across the street does not entitle you to not own a car if youexpect to enroll your kid. It’s time for the parents of the killed kids to point out there kids died for no reason if any of these schools can remain. The way to stop perverts from driving off with our kids better is to stop driving. Short of that … I mean if the feds can raid polygamous households- can’t we make such towns at least adults only?

    My message is very simple- I’m not the only one who didn’t know all the talk about sugar on tv was a distraction from the fact our kids are prevented from burning it more importantly. That tax dollars pay teachers to show up for work in buildings or not be hired if they don’t own a car etc. My imagination did not concieve of a lack of minimal standards in school design- when I was a kid the first day ride was often painful- as Igot older the school gotfarther and farther away but by the time I was in highschool I could bike anywhere and now it’s hard for me to figure out where we can spend the billions to be liberated from making brake dust or slaughtering the innocent because so few pay any attention. I’ve spent long calls talking to hired people who still no ground breaking plan ‘safe rides etc. to school where there schemes only expensive streamline mainly car paths and add little or nothing to kids experience as I pointed out the charter school wouldnt’ be getting any local kids anyway- at least not that had to cross that street. I didn’t know the point was to waste the money- to keep it from where it was really needed- where a ‘grader’ not being availaable allowed “principals” to command “no bikes or legs” for our students!

    This was and is a crime. It is what we finance prisons for. I want these people sentenced to terms of years. Not just no federal funds to any school ‘systems’ in areas unsafe to walk ever again.

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