BikinginLA

Call me thin skinned.

No, literally.

If I brush against something, I get a bruise. Bump anything with point or a rough edge, and I bleed like a stuck pig.

Or just give me a sharp look from across the room, and I’ll probably start bleeding.

Yesterday I accidentally bumped something in a restaurant, and seconds later, blood was running down my wrist. I carry bandaids and alcohol pads everywhere I go, just in case.

I’ve used six in the last week.

The other day, my dermatologist finally explained what the problem is. No dread disease or blood disorder, but skin baked thin from all those years riding a bike for hours on end, back in the olden times when the sun was supposed to be good for you.

The damage runs the full the front of my arms, from mid-shoulder to my finger tips. Or put another way, the entire area exposed by a bicycling jersey while holding the handlebars.

But this is a story with a moral.

There’s nothing I can do about it at this point. But you still can.

Use sunscreen.

Lots of it.

It’s too late for me. So save yourself.

Photo by Tara Winstead for Pexels.

………

More proof that bike riders face the same problems everywhere, as a Japanese bicyclist tries to navigate a Tokyo bike lane.

………

The war on cars may be a myth, but the war on bikes just keeps on going.

WTF? A 39-year old Minnesota man was hit with a lousy misdemeanor charge after he was accused of of boobytrapping his own yard with a homemade spike strip embedded with dozens of 3-inch screws, just to keep neighborhood children from riding bicycles across his property. He faces a maximum of 180 days in lockup. Because who cares if a few kids get fucked up if it keeps them out of his yard, right?

Tragic news from New York State, where a 47-year old man was likely left paralyzed after a witness said a 21-year old driver intentionally slammed his pickup into the victim’s bicycle, directly in front of the victim’s home; the driver’s father later called to threaten the newspaper for reporting the story, adding the they aren’t the family “that owns everything.”

Nothing like blaming the victims. The UK tabloid Express says Britain’s new prime minister has already been hit with a crisis on the roads, with ebike riders jumping London red lights, and bicyclists accounting for 6% of traffic deaths, as “Cyclists have always been a safety issue for drivers.” Yes, killing bike riders is a safety issue for drivers — not for, say, the people who get killed or anything.

………

Local 

A tip of the hat to LA’s KNBC-4. which shares dashcam video of a cop chasing an ebike rider in Upland, without bothering to note that he was riding an illegal e-motorbike.

 

State

Dozens of Orange County parents may face charges after being warned their kids have been riding illegal e-motorbikes, as well as riding them in an illegal manner, and allowing them to do it anyway.

 

National

Ex-Talking Heads singer David Byrne shared the bicycling playlist he listens to while riding between dates on his ongoing Who Is the Sky? tour, ranging from Mitski and Ibeyi, to Harry Styles and Paul McCartney.

More tragic news today, as rock musician Nathan James says his father was found dead after disappearing on a Colorado bike ride; no cause of death was reported.

That’s more like it. A 41-year old Texas man was sentenced to 13-1/2 years behind bars for the drunken killing of a 53-year old man riding a bicycle. Although I have to wonder if the sentence would have been as harsh if the driver was white.

A kindhearted Toledo cop worked with a local bike shop to get a man a new bicycle after a driver destroyed the bike the man relied on to get to work.

The New York Post angrily insists the mayor and state government need to “face the deadly ebike menace now,” without noting the problem is caused by people on e-motorbikes and illegally modified ebikes. Or that people in cars kill more New Yorkers in a day than ebike riders do in a year. 

You’ll now have to register your ebike in New Jersey, even if you’re just visiting from one of the other 49 states where registration isn’t required.

Vandalism charges were predictably dropped against former Olympic rower and Masters cyclist David Hearn for damaging DC’s reflecting pool, after the Justice Department was forced to concede the damage was due to rushed, poor quality installation work — although Trump continued to insist the damage was due to vandals, who had cut a virtually impossible 300 foot slit all the way across the pool.

Southern Living says the Gulf Coast’s most scenic bike ride is hiding in plain sight with a 28-mile trail system in Gulf State Park in Gulf Shores, Alabama. That wasn’t there when I spent a long weekend at the park back in the ’80s, which is how I ended up riding my bike along the coast to Pensacola, to the astonishment of the park ranger at the gate on my return.  

A three-year old South Carolina bike club for Black women gave back to the community by donating school supplies to students, including college students.

A Florida letter writer says forget the whole ebike thing, and just get your kid a regular bike, already.

 

International

Road.cc considers the best road bikes for the equivalent of two grand.

Montreal maps the city’s most dangerous intersections for bicyclists.

Under the category of life isn’t fair, a British bike rider was fined the equivalent of $1616 for filming a close pass by a driver while squeezing past a parked car, while the driver who caused the squeeze got off with a driver training class. And the cops said it would be “inappropriate” to release the video — after it has already gone viral.

Meet the bicycling sommelier of Girona, Spain, who observes “The bicycle has helped me to understand the territory. Understanding the territory is understanding wine.”

Horrible news from South Korea, where a man in his 60s was killed when his bicycle was rear-ended by the driver of an excavator on a bridge in Yeongcheon, in the southern part of the country.

 

Competitive Cycling

Dutch star Lorena Wiebes looks comfortable in yellow, taking the first two stages of the Tour de France Femmes Avec Zwift with a combined margin of 14 seconds over Kimberley Le Court Pienaar, with Demi Vollering two seconds back in third.

Slovenian pro Urška Zigart is back in action at the Tour de France Femmes, just six weeks after breaking her jaw crashing in the Tour de Suisse.

American team Human Powered Health will contend some flat stages of the Tour with one rider on a SpongeBob SquarePants themed bike.

Belgium’s Wout van Aert cruised to victory in the Tour of Denmark by winning three of the five stages, with Lukas Kubis second overall and Henrik Pedersen third.

Remco Evenepoel has claimed a record fourth victory at the Basque Country’s Donostia San Sebastian Klasikoa single day classic. And no, I never heard of it either. 

German cyclist Frederik Niessen can now tell everyone he beat Slovenian star Tadej Pogačar to the summit in the second stage of his fundraising Pogi Challenge on Sunday, even if Pogačar gave him, and everyone else, a seven-minute head start.

UCI doesn’t just sanction bigger sports like road cycling, mountain biking and gravel racing, also sanctioning lesser known things like bike polo, artistic cycling and snow biking.

Finally…

That feeling when track cyclists start to look like hockey players. How to ride the Costco half-century.

And no, posing on the beach with a stationary bicycle for publicity photos does not equate to actually riding it.

………

Be safe, and stay healthy. And get vaccinated, already.

Oh, and fuck Putin.