spokesNspin

Here is an interesting guy  I saw on the trail the other day. 

Can I be a bicycle snob for just a little bit?  If this chap wasn’t a sight.  This proves there are more ways to give cyclists a bad name than just by cycling aggressively.

Notice he has pant protectors wrapped around both legs(I confess I own some and have done the same).  He was wearing a unfashionable backpack and a yellow polo shirt. 

Check the mirror out.  He has taken a very strange sitting posture and was wearing nerd glasses.  He also had very uncool panniers. 

I think I know this guy.  He was the one in junior high that every day was given a wedgie by some jock whose IQ was lower than the air pressure in this guys fat tires.

Any one or two of the things this guy has going would be okay.  But the entire ensemble is just unacceptable.

Everything about this pic just screams uncool.  The worst of it is this.

This guy passed me!  How did it happen?

I had to hustle to get ahead and get this pic.

I also confess here that I would like his bike. 

Wearing spandex is not a necessity for bicycling.  But this guy really should check out Copenhagen Chic.

Now don’t go sending me comments about how he is out there getting exercise and reducing his carbon footprint and blah blah blah….

I already admitted I was being a bike snob.  I wonder if we could get him on What Not to Wear.

There seems to be a need to explain how I got to five pairs of bicycling shoes.  When you read this story I am sure it will make perfect sense. 

It’s kind of like the slippery slope of other vices.  You start small with a social drink here and there.  Bum one puff off your friend’s cigarette.   Next thing you know you are crack head living on skid row.

Like most normal people, I started with one pair of bicycling shoes.  They were for clipless pedals with mountain bike type cleats.

I am a year round commuter.  I have tried everything imaginable to keep my feet warm when riding in the winter.  That is where Pair #2 comes in.  I decided to try buying a larger pair of shoes.  I could put them over some nice thick wool socks.  That of course also required buying another pair of shoe booties(no in original pic) to go over the larger shoes.

Then I decided that instead of just commuting I should start using my bike more for just running errands and such.  It is so hot here in the summer.  Sandals with bicycle pedal cleats would be so hip.  That became became Pair #3.

Now I am suffering the ill effects of so many years of riding on clipless pedals.  The ball of my right foot seems to be developing a bone spur or something.  I switch back to regular pedals with power grip straps for my commuting bicycle.  But riding with just running shoes is difficult.  They are just too wide to get in and out of the straps easily.  You guessed it,  another pair of narrow cycling shoes without cleats goes on the credit card.  How many am I up to now? Oh yes, that would be pair # 4.

In late winter of this year I bought the true road bike.  I debated about sticking with mountain bike type pedals or going to a road bike type clipless system.  I finally decided to go with the road type.  The decision was based mostly on my foot problem.  A road clipless pedal gives my foot a larger platform for support.  That was pair # 5.

There you have it boys and girls.  The confessions of a bicycle shoe junkie.  Don’t let this happen to you.  For every day riding my favorite is the regular platform pedal with the power grip straps.  They are really old school but somethings just can’t be improved.