The Cycliste Moderne, Thanksgiving Edition

This is the Thanksgiving Day edition of the Cycliste Moderne. There has not been a lot of really meaningful bike news over the past few weeks and I have been really busy over that time with work. As a result, the news has been slower. Think of today's edition as your Thanksgiving meal: too much at one time.

Skibby Comes Clean

Retired Danish pro, Jesper Skibby, has published a book about his career including his admission that he doped. Skibby had a long career with marginal success. He is most famous, however, for getting run over by the race commisar's vehicle while leading the Ronde Van Vlaanderen on the Koppenberg in 1987 as captured by Graham Watson. While honesty is in fact the best policy, I am concerned that when retired pros write their memoirs, i.e. Paul Kimmage, it just reaffirms the believe that everyone has been doping. Clearly, during the 1980's and 1990's the teams had to know and had to have been active participants in the doping activities of their riders. I am really concerned, however, with the approach that the ProTour teams are advocating now of refusing to let any rider under investigation for doping compete while an investigation is underway. The teams helped create this mess. It is too easy a solution for the teams to feign ignorance and claim that they have taken meaningful action merely by turinng their backs on the problem.

Cyclist gets tasered.

Last week police in Salt Lake City tasered a cyclist who refused to pull over. Here is the Salt Lake Tribune's account of the event. Now, the man was ultimately found to have drug paraphernalia, drugs, bolt cutters and a four inch knife. He had stolen the bike and had been riding down the sidewalk late at night when he attempted to evade police. So the moral of the story is while evading police probably is a good interval workout, a stolen bike does not give you the fit necessary to be able to get away and drugs and burglary tools just slow you down.

Sad Christmas Season at Chez Cycliste Moderne.
The Christmas Season got off to a sad beginning at Chez Cycliste Moderne when my original bike sculpture "Bikewinkel A" was sold this week. It is kind of like the kid who wins the 4H prize for the best steer or lamb and then cries when it is sold for far more than he ever thought it would. Anyway, here is a print you can purchase. Now I make art to sell when I am not busy slaving for the law. Mrs. Cycliste Moderne had taken to decorating Bikewinkel each Christmas as it held a special place in the middle of the living room wall above the piano. She even used it for Cyclista's Christmas cards last year with a red nose on it. Now I have to go build Bikewinkel B.

Thoughts while riding this week.

Here are my thoughts and experiences while riding this week:

Kids on cheap chopper bikes have no clue how to ride them. Two juvenile delinquents almost t-boned me in an intersection last week.

Slime is good. After replacing my tubes with Slime tubes for the winter, they paid off yesterday when I came out to find my back tire flat. I spun it quickly, pumped it up and went and got a quick ride in afterwards. Tire ended up a little soft, but the ride was a success.

Support your local independent bike retailer. My shop is World Cycle here in Boise. Tom Patek runs a great shop that really focuses on service. I try to make all my purchases there. If they don't carry something, they go to whatever lengths necessary to get it for you. It is great when you have a shop that provides excellent service, listens to what you want and need rather than telling you what you want, and knows you by name. So go to World Cycle and tell Tom, Alex and Matt that the Cycliste Moderne sent you.