Bicycling blog

I have to mention "bicycle blog" every once in a while; otherwise, the search engines get confused and don't realize that this is a blog about bicycling. Swobo fanboys: here's one for you.

We're expecting rain in the Bay Area today, but this morning was dry if chilly. I had a fun ride into work as a group of four cyclists (including me) raced each other to work from the train station. The winner was a guy in tights on a Trek 820 who ran a red light to pull out in front. Last place was "Bionx Boy" with his electrically powered Specialized. It turns out the motor has a governor that limits his speed to 21 mph. I haven't seen Dorky Doug in quite a while.

Ah Pook reveals all in this shocking disclosure of the contents of .... his bike commuting bag!

The San Francisco Metropolitan Transportation Commission is seeking nominations for people and organizations who extraordinary contributions to the way people get around in the Bay Area each day. See here for details.

A human powered tour of Europe -- Husband and wife team will row their boats from Scotland, through Europe and into Syria. They'll carry folding bikes and trailers on board that they'll use to tow the bikes when necessary across land. RideThisBike.com provided the Montague full sized folding bikes used on this trip. Custom trailers came from Tony's Trailers. Read more and see photos at Ride This Bike.

Oil bumped over $100 per barrel again so maybe it's time to pay attention to the idea of escaping the tightening vise of fossil fuels:

With or without climate policies, energy prices seem set to rise. The question is, Who will get the money? Auctioned cap-and-trade gives us the opportunity to take charge of price increases and share the benefits widely -- even while we safeguard the climate and stimulate local jobs. Big chances like this don't come along often!

For the Amgen Tour of California Stage 4, weather is cool and a little rainy. The San Jose Mercury News has a nice story about the race, mentioning the two guys who rode their unicycles to the summit of Mt Hamilton to watch the racers and the the tourism impact of the Tour as hundreds of people visit the state of California from elsewhere just to watch the bike race. The best part is visiting "all these places you'd never go, especially on a bike," said Theresa Binder of Denver, Colorado. "You don't think of this as California," she said, looking around the foggy mountaintop. "You always think of the ocean."

Photos by me.