‘The whole thing was surreal’

I’ve never been to New Zealand, but I’ve imagined it as an idyllic sort of place at the antipodes, full of snow-capped mountains, sheep stations and civilized folks. Judging from an incident involving a pair of touring cyclists whose travels I’ve been following on their website and Facebook, I guess, like anyplace in this world, New Zealand has its share of assholes.
Russ Roca and Laura Crawford, who have been touring New Zealand on British-made Brompton folding bikes, encountered one of that country’s ilk on Tuesday as they were riding single file just south of Wellington on the North Island.
A motorist passed them dangerously close, stopped his car up the road and came back to push Roca off his bike and punch him in the face, according to a report in The Dominion Post.
“The whole thing was surreal,” Roca was quoted as saying.

Russ Roca and Laura Crawford. Photo by Kent Blechlynden/Fairfax NZ

“Roca said they had been warned before they came to New Zealand of the country’s ‘crazy drivers,’” the report said.
“Last year German cyclist Mia Susanne Pusch, 19, blogged about the perils of cycling on New Zealand roads, describing Kiwi truck drivers as ‘beasts.’ She died after colliding with a truck and trailer near Bulls.”
Patrick Morgan, a spokesman for New Zealand’s Cycling Advocates Network, said the attack on Roca was embarrassing to New Zealand.
“This assault is unacceptable but unfortunately … not rare,” Morgan said.
In a report in The New Zealand Herald, Roca was quoted as saying:
“It seems like such an isolated experience — it is not going to put us off touring or riding the trails of New Zealand.
“I don’t want to diminish it, because it was absolutely awful, but it was a fluke thing — I don’t think anyone should take it as a reason not to cycle.”
I had a chance to meet Roca and Crawford on April 28, 2010, when they gave a presentation at a Fort Worth bike shop on their bicycle travels around the United States. (See April 27, 2010, blog post, “Nomads on two wheels.”)
Here’s hoping that their continued travels in New Zealand are asshole-free.

A winter reading list

It’s cold and rainy today in North Texas, a crappy day to be out on a bicycle. For a retired guy like me, it’s a fine day to tuck into a good book.

Photo by April Streeter

So I’m pleased to report that April Streeter, who writes and blogs on bicycling and environmental issues in Portland, Ore., has put together a list of 10 relatively new books on biking for just such winter days as today.
The eclectic list, on the Treehugger website, includes an urban cyclist’s survival guide, a book of 50 essays on how “the new bike culture can change your life,” and three books on the history of early cycling, including a children’s book and one on “how women rode the bicycle to freedom.”
The only book on Streeter’s list that I currently have is one of the three on cycling history, The Lost Cyclist by David V. Herlihy, which I’ve already read and reviewed. (See March 26, 2010, blog post, “The search for the lost cyclist.”)
So I guess I’ll spend a chunk of the day re-reading John LeCarre’s Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy in advance of seeing the new movie based on the book.

‘The long ride toward a distant dawn’

A French documentary about the grueling Paris-Brest-Paris bicycle race is delightfully quirky in its production, shifting abruptly, for example, from interviews with participants to snippets from such classic bicycling films as Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure and the “Bicycle Repairman” sketch from Monty Python’s Flying Circus.
The interviews, most of them in French with subtitles in fractured English with creative spelling, provide a look at some of the more eccentric cyclists who take part in this now-quadrennial event — a bike ride from just southwest of Paris to Brest on France’s Atlantic Coast and back to Paris, a total of just over 1,200 kilometers that has to be completed in 90 hours.

Screen shot of Jeremy Shlachter being interviewed

But the best part of the documentary, made by Poisson Lune Films and called Paris Brest Paris: The long ride toward a distant dawn, is an interview about 3 minutes and 14 seconds into the film with Fort Worth cyclist, bike builder and longtime friend Jeremy Shlachter.
Just over a minute later in the film, Jeremy shows off the stainless steel bike he built especially for his participation in the Paris-Best-Paris event, which began on Aug. 21. (See Aug. 21 blog post, “An epic ride dedicated to Mom.”)
The course is equivalent to more than 745 miles, nearly the distance between Chicago and New York. Jeremy finished in 78 hours and 31 minutes, well within the 90-hour time frame, and got his name listed in Le Grande Livre (“The Great Book”), an enduring chronicle of all those who have completed the ride within the required time since the first P-B-P event in 1891.

Screen shot of eccentric Brit being interviewed

Another interview in the 46-minute film, which comes shortly after the interview with Jeremy, is with an Englishman togged out in vintage bicycling garb and goggles. He shows off his steed for the ride, a 1900 Peugeot bike that he found in a barn in Brittany. Then he displays a copy of the bill of sale for the bike and says he tracked down the great-great-great granddaughter of the original owner.
“I always ride stupid bikes,” the mustachioed Brit tells the interviewer as he is about to embark on his sixth Paris-Brest-Paris ride.
I reckon it helps to be a bit crazy to participate in this event.

PARIS BREST PARIS The long ride toward a distant dawn from Poisson Lune Films on Vimeo.

Happy New Year!

‘Sisyphus on a bike’

Bicycles, used to carry such cargoes as groceries, schoolbooks and children, are a common sight in Europe and in such bicycle-friendly U.S. cities as Portland, Ore., and Boulder, Colo. But the deliverymen in Shanghai and other Chinese cities take the cargo bike to a whole new dimension.
A series of photos by French photographer Alain Delorme in Shanghai caught the eye of my oldest son, Ben, who lives in Taipei, Taiwan, and regularly sees such sights during his travels in Asia. He passed on the link to me for use on this blog.
“It’s Sisyphus on a bike,” says the introduction to Delorme’s photo gallery on The Daily Beast Web site. “It’s the weight of the capitalist struggle on the back of the worker. It’s a rolling example of human ingenuity…
“Carts, trikes, bikes — the most humble forms of transportation this side of a mule, set against the high-rise wonder of the modern metropolis: yes, the disparity practically screams off the page.”
Indeed!

‘Waiting for the night bikes’

Check out the cool commercial for the BlackBerry Bold, shown this evening during the Champs Sports Bowl between Notre Dame and Florida State:

Merry Christmas, one and all!

Happy Hanukkah, y’all!

In memoriam …

The somber, gray skies reflected the mood of more than 100 bicyclists on Sunday as they turned out in Hurst, Texas, for a tribute ride in memory of Megan Baab, a local cyclist who was killed during training near her college in North Carolina.

Tribute ride for Megan Baab. Photo by WFAA-TV/Channel 8

Megan’s father, Chris Baab, also a cyclist, led the ride, which began at the Hurst store of Bicycles Inc. and followed one of Megan’s favorite training routes when she was growing up in Texas.
“There’s people showing up here that I haven’t seen in years,” Chris Baab said. “It’s just so comforting, and to know that they loved my daughter just as much as I did.”
Megan, 19, was killed on Thursday afternoon when a truck struck her head-on while she was doing a training ride on a rural road in Altamont, N.C., near Lees-McRae College in Banner Elk, N.C., where she was a freshman. Megan competed on the national recognized Lees-McRae cycling team.

‘So sad, so young’

Some sad news for local cyclists: Megan Baab of Euless, Texas — in the Mid-Cities between Fort Worth and Dallas — was killed on Thursday during a training ride in Altamont, N.C.

Megan Baab

She was a freshman at Lees-McRae College in Banner Elk, N.C., and a member of the nationally recognized cycling team at the college, nestled in the heart of the Blue Ridge Mountains of western North Carolina.
Megan, 19, and her father, Chris, also an avid cyclist, are well know among cyclists in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. News of Megan’s death prompted a flurry of condolence messages on Facebook and cycling Web sites.
“So sad, so young,” said one comment on Facebook.
A news release posted on the college Web site said Megan had competed on the national level for Lees-McRae in the USA Cycling National Championships (track and mountain bike) and was planning to compete in January for the college at the USA Cycling Cyclocross Championships.
The college cited news reports as saying that Megan “was traveling north on U.S. 221 in Altamont, N.C., when a southbound truck crossed the center line and struck her.” She was airlifted to Johnson City Medical Center, across the state line in Tennessee, “but was pronounced dead soon after arrival at the medical center from the injuries sustained.”
A report on the Winston-Salem Journal Web site said: “It’s the second time in a year the Lees-McRae community is mourning the death of one of their cyclists while on a training ride. Senior Carla Swart, the most-decorated cyclist in collegiate history, died in her native South Africa after a collision with a truck while she was on a training ride in January. She was 23.”
Let’s all be careful out there.