Janette Sadik-Khan is the Commissioner of Transportation in America’s largest city. She happens to be very easy on the eyes. But she’s also a pro-bicyclist  radical and her crazy agenda is probably going to incite a vicious civil war in NYC between the “elitists” (who like her) and the “little people” (who don’t).

New York Times By FRANK BRUNI

Published: September 10, 2011

Who Commutes By Bicycle

It came from a young cyclist who happened to pull up beside us, glanced over at her and suddenly beamed.

“Oh, it’s you!” he stammered, then mentioned that he owned a bicycle shop and had recently placed a newspaper ad publicly thanking her for her cycling advocacy. “You’re going to leave a legacy, you know.”

He’s right. Sadik-Khan and Mayor Bloomberg both. And it’s past time that more than just a passer-by trumpeted it.

Since the mayor appointed her in 2007 and she began to bring her agency’s work more closely in line with his vision of a greener New York, the city has roughly doubled its miles of bike lanes, to about 500. If you did any biking at all in Manhattan or Brooklyn this summer, you may well have noticed the improvements, including protected bike lanes (ones that separate cyclists entirely from street traffic) on such major arteries as Columbus and First Avenues in Manhattan.

I know I did, and when I rode through the Upper West Side and the Lower East Side, Williamsburg and Boerum Hill, I felt something I hadn’t before, a kind of full permission and robust encouragement, even if motorists continued to behave obtusely.

The city has also plotted a far-reaching and potentially game-changing public bike share program, whose details and timetable are expected to be announced this month. In a swift manner all the more impressive given government sclerosis these days, New York is truly transforming itself.

And for that it has received, from some of its citizens, an unwarranted degree of ill-considered grief. Biking, it seems, is an uphill ride, due largely to mathematics and a sort of Catch-22: with only a small percentage of Americans using bicycles as their primary method of transportation, there’s no huge public outcry for — or immediate political benefit to — remaking city streets so that they’re a little less friendly to cars and a lot more hospitable to bikes.

But without that hospitality, primarily in the form of better bike lanes and more bike racks, biking isn’t convenient and attractive enough to win all that many converts and thus a political constituency.

So if a city believes that biking is part of a better future, it must sometimes muscle through a reluctant, rocky present. That’s precisely what Bloomberg and Sadik-Khan have done, in a fine example of the way the mayor’s frequent imperiousness and imperviousness to criticism can work to the city’s long-term advantage. If anything, the two of them should move even faster and more boldly, but that’s pure fantasy, given the opposition, bordering on hysteria, they’ve met so far.

“There are not only 8.4 million New Yorkers but at times 8.4 million traffic engineers,” Sadik-Khan said in an interview a few weeks after our bike ride. “And we’re, you know, very opinionated.”

I’LL say. Her critics have brutalized her, even making inane schoolyard fun of her surname by calling her Chaka Khan, after the hefty black R&B singer. (Sadik-Khan is white and almost bony, and never belted a tune during any of our meetings.) Before Anthony Weiner’s loins sundered his ambitions, he reportedly taunted Bloomberg with the promise that he would succeed him as mayor and promptly erase all the bike lanes. Additionally, a group of Brooklyn citizens with close ties to Iris Weinshall, the former transportation commissioner and wife of Chuck Schumer, filed a lawsuit against the city — dismissed by a judge last month — for its installation of a protected bike lane along Prospect Park West. And The New York Post was even more truculent, waging a constant, nasty war against Sadik-Khan, who was excoriated in one typical editorial for “turning over vast swaths of city streets to delivery boys on bikes and the occasional cool dude pedaling along in his Day-Glo tights.”

Vast swaths? Day-Glo tights? Those of us on two wheels still get only a sliver of the roads, and my biking shorts are baggy and olive green, with an elastic waist.

By many credible accounts Sadik-Khan has brought some of this misery on herself, with a style that can be impatient, intolerant, moralizing. I’ve gotten to know her a bit, and she has a certainty that borders on righteousness and an intensity in the vicinity of mania. But that’s to her credit — and our benefit. New York needs visionaries who won’t simply let things be.

In the end the resistance that she and the city have encountered has to do mostly with parochialism and selfishness. Some New Yorkers seem offended by the notion that we should be more like such biking havens as Copenhagen, Paris, or for that matter, Portland, Ore.: life here is too urgent and blunt and brutal for such crunchy-granola niceties. Besides which, no one wants to give an inch, literally: not the Prospect Park West gripers who lost parking spaces to the bike lane, not the drivers of delivery trucks whose jobs are sometimes complicated by such lanes, not the Manhattan traditionalists who feel that sharing just a few of Central Park’s transverse paths with cyclists — as the city decided in July they must do — requires too much in the way of vigilance from people ambling among the trees. The complaints were loud and passionate.

And misleading. Several polls have shown that a majority of New Yorkers favor the creation of bike lanes, at least in the abstract. The problem is that it’s a relatively soft, quiet support, reflecting the limited use of those lanes. According to Department of Transportation figures, about 15,500 cyclists daily entered Manhattan’s central business district between Battery Park and 59th Street in 2009, the most recent year for which statistics are available. That’s in contrast to 762,000 cars.

But ridership is definitely growing. A decade earlier, only 4,700 cyclists entered that part of Manhattan. And over the last 20 or so years, the percentage of New Yorkers who use cycling to commute has doubled, to 0.6 percent in 2009 from 0.3 percent in 1990, according to an analysis of census figures by John Pucher, a Rutgers University professor who studies bicycle trends worldwide. That still leaves New York behind Chicago, with 1.2 percent of commuters on bikes; Washington, D.C., with 2.2 percent; San Francisco, with 3 percent; and Portland, with 5.8 percent.

WHAT’S keeping more cyclists in New York from doing so? “The indifference of the New York City Police Department is the biggest obstacle,” said Charles Komanoff, a mathematical economist and past president of Transportation Alternatives. He and other cycling advocates said that police officers too seldom ticket drivers who ignore cyclists’ rights, particularly by treating biking lanes as temporary parking spots and thus forcing bike riders to swerve into and out of traffic. As prevalent as such lane-obstruction is, I’ve noticed more news reports on cyclists blowing through red lights, and I’ve found myself envying, of all places, the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius. Its mayor recently deployed a tank to crush a Mercedes-Benz illegally parked in a bike lane.

Without going quite that far, our city’s police officers must do more. And the transportation department must expand markedly the number of bike racks citywide — the official city count is about 12,800 — so that riders can rest assured that they’ll find a safe place to stow their bicycles. Pucher is the co-author of “City Cycling,” a forthcoming book, which notes that Paris has about 1,490 bike parking spaces — slots in racks, for example — per 100,000 people, London about 1,670 and Tokyo about 6,400. And New York? About 152. “It’s lousy, lousy, lousy,” Pucher said.

TWO summers ago, a companion and I hunted so fruitlessly for a rack outside a movie theater that we locked our bikes — illegally — to a parking sign. The sign’s mooring in the concrete must have been loose, because we came out of “The Hurt Locker” to find it lying on the sidewalk across the street, where it had apparently been deposited by a thief or thieves who’d pried it from the ground so they could liberate our bikes. This happened in full view of a busy grocery store and within feet of a Mister Softee truck. New York really is brutal.

The bike share program will help enormously, because for every bike, there will be a locked place at the stations where you will be able to pick it up and drop it off. In the transportation department’s request for bids from private companies, it outlined a network of about 600 stations with at least 10,000 bikes, to be at least partly operational next year. Usage fees might be just a few dollars for short rides, making bikes a sensible alternative to, say, subways, which have suffered from service cutbacks and increased crowding.

The Chicago transportation commissioner, Gabe Klein, noted that biking pushed back against a range of modern ills. “There’s the congestion problem,” he said. “The pollution problem. The obesity problem. The gas problem.”

On top of all that, it makes an important statement about our priorities — about our willingness to amend the reckless, impatient, gluttonous ways that have created not only smog and clog in our cities but also a staggering federal debt.

“Bikes are definitely a symbol of what your city stands for,” said Klein.

The Recycle A Bicycle store on Avenue C in Manhattan.

An old, broken bicycle is a sorry, sorry thing. Tom Waits knows—he wrote the saddest song in the world about those rusty old skeletons: “Somebody must have an orphanage for/All these things that nobody wants any more.” Well, that orphanage is New York, where used bikes are the corroded darlings of the vintage scene. In just a few years, local retailers say, prices have doubled. There just aren’t enough used bikes to go around.

It’s likely due to the city’s newfound passion for cycling—our DOT says bike commuting is up 62% since 2008—and a streetwise mindset that puts a premium on dull, battered frames. A shiny new bike locked to an Avenue A street pole, after all, has a half life of roughly 60 seconds.

In most parts of the country, an old bike has all the cachet of a cathode-tube TV. On his blog Blind Taste, behavioral economics researcher Robin Goldstein wrote up the results of an informal study comparing used car and used bike prices in major U.S. cities. There’s an inverse correlation: In towns where everyone drives, such as Phoenix, used-car prices were sky high, while the median used bicycle sold for just $120. Here in New York, used car prices ran 16% lower than in Phoenix, but the median used bike cost $200. In cycling-crazed Portland, Ore., it’s even worse.

All of which suggests a fantastic business opportunity: bicycle arbitrage. Why not buy up all the used bikes in, say, Albany, and resell them in New York? Of course, like every good idea I’ve ever had, dozens have thought of it before me.

Among them is a man known as Shane DaBikeJack, a towering former pro athlete who supplies half a dozen bicycle retailers around the city, not to mention his own stand at Brooklyn Flea. “I keep the cherries for myself,” says Mr. DaBikeJack, who declines to use his real last name for reasons I can’t quite comprehend. His buying territory: the New England ‘burbs, including Connecticut and Massachusetts. On a typical day, he’ll hit five scrap yards, the tag sales, a half-dozen Goodwills and a Salvation Army. Sometimes, driving along, he’ll spot an unsuspecting cyclist tottering by on a vintage Schwinn and offer to buy it for $20 plus the shiny Chinese-built “Wal-Mart special” off the back of his truck.

A vendor known as ‘Shane DaBikeJack,’ unloads his wares at a flea market.

It’s not easy, says Mr. DaBikeJack. The days are long, he says, and 75% of the time he strikes out. On the other hand, he has no boss and can take all the breaks as he wants: “I smoke weed and girl-watch.” And the profits can be fantastic. Most used bikes need a lot of work, and Mr. DaBikeJack specializes in retrofitting vintage frames with new parts. “I Puff Daddy it out. I remix it,” he says. But occasionally, he scores a real find: a $5 bike in perfect condition that resells for $500.

At Mr. DaBikeJack’s stand, prices start at $125 for a delivery-boy special—a scrappy mountain bike from the late ‘80s. And that’s about as cheap as bikes come in New York. Even on Craigslist, the rustiest, sorriest bicycles pulled from the Gowanus start at $150. And most listings come from a handful of dealers eager to rendezvous at some vague meeting spot near the Staten Island Ferry, for example, or the Knickerbocker stop on the M line.

Among the more reputable Craigslist regulars is Peter Whitley, who sells hundreds of used bikes from his Brooklyn basement. He had a busy summer. Sales doubled after a customer advised him to rename his business Brooklyn Vintage Bicycles. To keep up with demand, he relies on a handful of vendors who shop out of town and resell used bikes by the truckload. On a typical deal, he’ll pay $50 wholesale, add $50 in new parts, and sell the ride for $200.

Mr. Whitley says he trusts his long-term vendors. But the problem with buying a used bike, of course, is figuring out where it came from. And according to Transportation Alternatives, there are dire consequences for buying a stolen ride. It not only wrecks your karma, the group warns on its website, “but also increases the chance that your own bike will be stolen.”

The advocacy group recommends Recycle-A-Bicycle, a nonprofit with shops in Dumbo and the East Village that restores donated bikes and uses the proceeds to fund job training for city teenagers (a brave new generation of bicycle mechanics). But there are no bargains there, either: Retail Director Susan Lindell says she charges market rates. The recent selection ranged from $225 for a Mongoose BMX (“so classic, so cool”) to $1,200 for a Merlin Road bike.

Many folks buying a vintage bike think they’re getting more than just a mode of transportation. It’s a signifier. “A fabulous car will get a man in bed with a girl,” says Mr. DaBikeJack. “The bike will do the same thing in New York.”

“I’m not in that scene, I really can’t comment,” says Joe Nocella. The full-time architect recently opened a Park Slope bike shop, 718 Cyclery, and is already planning a new location in Gowanus five times the size. He specializes in collaborative builds, working with clients to create custom rides based on used frames bought off eBay. The typical tab: $900 to $1,200.

To some, he surmises, a vintage bike suggests you appreciate the finer things: “It’s an easy ticket to displaying a lifestyle that’s better than the lifestyle you have.” As if on cue, a man in his 30s comes bursting through the door to check on his bike-in-progress. He is literally dancing with excitement. To refresh his memory, Mr. Nocella asks the customer to recall a few details. The response is immediate: “I just told you to make it look awesome!”

—Ms. Kadet, who writes the “Tough Customer” column for SmartMoney magazine, can be reached at anne.kadet@dowjones.com

The Dutch Way: Bicycles and Fresh Bread

Robin Utrecht/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

In the Netherlands, respect for bicycles is hard-wired into the culture.
By RUSSELL SHORTO

Published: July 30, 2011

Related Article: Across Europe, Irking Drivers Is Urban Policy (June 27, 2011)

Amsterdam

As an American who has been living here for several years, I am struck, every time I go home, by the way American cities remain manacled to the car. While Europe is dealing with congestion and greenhouse gas buildup by turning urban centers into pedestrian zones and finding innovative ways to combine driving with public transportation, many American cities are carving out more parking spaces. It’s all the more bewildering because America’s collapsing infrastructure would seem to cry out for new solutions.

Geography partly explains the difference: America is spread out, while European cities predate the car. But Boston and Philadelphia have old centers too, while the peripheral sprawl in London and Barcelona mirrors that of American cities.

More important, I think, is mind-set. Take bicycles. The advent of bike lanes in some American cities may seem like a big step, but merely marking a strip of the road for recreational cycling spectacularly misses the point. In Amsterdam, nearly everyone cycles, and cars, bikes and trams coexist in a complex flow, with dedicated bicycle lanes, traffic lights and parking garages. But this is thanks to a different way of thinking about transportation.

To give a small but telling example, pointed out to me by my friend Ruth Oldenziel, an expert on the history of technology at Eindhoven University, Dutch drivers are taught that when you are about to get out of the car, you reach for the door handle with your right hand — bringing your arm across your body to the door. This forces a driver to swivel shoulders and head, so that before opening the door you can see if there is a bike coming from behind. Likewise, every Dutch child has to pass a bicycle safety exam at school. The coexistence of different modes of travel is hard-wired into the culture.

This in turn relates to lots of other things — such as bread. How? Cyclists can’t carry six bags of groceries; bulk buying is almost nonexistent. Instead of shopping for a week, people stop at the market daily. So the need for processed loaves that will last for days is gone. A result: good bread.

There are also in the United States certain perceptions associated with both cycling and public transportation that are not the case here. In Holland, public buses aren’t considered last-resort forms of transportation. And cycling isn’t seen as eco-friendly exercise; it’s a way to get around. C.E.O.’s cycle to work, and kids cycle to school.

It’s true that public policy reinforces the egalitarianism. With mandatory lessons and other fees, getting a driver’s license costs more than $1,000. And taxi fares are kept deliberately high: a trip from the airport may cost $80, while a 20-minute bus ride sets you back about $3.50. But the egalitarianism — or maybe better said a preference for simplicity — is also rooted in the culture. A 17th-century French naval commander was shocked to see a Dutch captain sweeping out his own quarters. Likewise, I used to run into the mayor of Amsterdam at the supermarket, and he wasn’t engaged in a populist stunt (mayors aren’t elected here but are government appointees); he was shopping.

For American cities to think outside the car would seem to require a mental sea change. Then again, Americans, too, are practical, no-nonsense people. And Zef Hemel, the chief planner for the city of Amsterdam, reminded me that sea changes do happen. “Back in the 1960s, we were doing the same thing as America, making cities car-friendly,” he said. Funnily enough, it was an American, Jane Jacobs, who changed the minds of European urban designers. Her book “The Death and Life of Great American Cities” got European planners to shift their focus from car-friendliness to overall livability.

When I noted that Manhattan’s bike lanes seem to be used more for recreation than transport — cyclists in Amsterdam are dressed in everything from jeans to cocktail dresses, while those in Manhattan often look like spandex cyborgs — Mr. Hemel told me to give it time. “Those are the pioneers,” he said. “You have to start somewhere.”

What he meant was, “You start with bike lanes” — that is, with the conviction that urban planning can bring about beneficial cultural changes. But that points up another mental difference: the willingness of Europeans to follow top-down social planning. America’s famed individualism breeds an often healthy distrust of the elite. I’m as quick as any other red-blooded American to bristle at European technocrats telling me how to live. (Try buying a light bulb or a magazine after 6 p.m. in Amsterdam, where the political elite have decreed that workers’ well-being requires that shops be open only during standard office hours, precisely when most people can’t shop.)

But while many Americans see their cars as an extension of their individual freedom, to some of us owning a car is a burden, and in a city a double burden. I find the recrafting of the city in order to lessen — or eliminate — the need for cars to be not just grudgingly acceptable, but, yes, an expansion of my individual freedom. So I say (in this case, at least): Go, social-planning technocrats! If only America’s cities could be so free.
A version of this op-ed appeared in print on July 31, 2011, on page SR5 of the New York edition with the headline: The Dutch Way: Bicycles and Fresh Bread.

Last updated: 23rd July 2011

Australia’s Cadel Evans

Cadel Evans (BIO) captured the Tour de France 2011 title as he overpowered Andy Schleck in the individual time trial penultimate stage. Evans expected to have the advantage in this time trial and he proved to the world that is the strongest man in the Tour de France 2011.

Evans was 57 seconds behind Andy and 4 seconds behind Frank Schleck before the start of Stage 20. He pedaled his bike and he gained already 36 seconds in the first time check in the 18km marked against Schleck. In the second time check, Evans has 1:50 seconds advantage over Schleck. Andy Schleck failed to win the Tour de France again as he lost the last two to Alberto Contador, now to the Australian Evans.

Cadel Evans came through a magnificent performance in beating Andy Schleck in this all important Stage 20 of Tour de France. Whoever wears the yellow jersey today absolutely wins the tour for tomorrow will just be a celebration going to Paris.

Evans never gave up on the ascent to Galibier in the 18th stage in which Schleck almost have the advantage of four minutes. Evans rode with persistency cutting the lead tima of Schleck to a reachable position. Evans was so quiet in the past stages as he is the most consistent of the Contenders. When Contador attacked in the 16th round, Evans was on the wheels of Contador.

Furthermore, Evans had been also in this situation before when he lost to Contador in the penultimate round in the individual time trial. Evans deserved to be the champion for he was the strongest with consistency.

Meanwhile, it would be a failure for Andy Schleck for the third time getting the runner up. Schleck never had been great in the individual time trial.

Lessons Learned From a Master Sprinter

By ERIC PFANNER

Published: July 12, 2011

Click on the photo to enlarge this Image.

Andre Greipel of Germany celebrated his victory as he cycled across the finish line to win the 10th stage of the Tour de France.

Andre Greipel of Germany celebrated his victory as he cycled across the finish line to win the 10th stage of the Tour de France.

Greipel, who rides with the Omega–Lotto team, edged Mark Cavendish, a wiry, combative Briton who had won two previous stages on this Tour, in a sprint to the finish. It was the first stage victory for Greipel, a former teammate of Cavendish, who rides for HTC-Highroad.

On the HTC team, Greipel had been an understudy to Cavendish, one of the greatest sprinters of recent years, and he clearly relished the chance to nip past his former teammate.

“It was a big success for me just to be able to take part in the race,” Greipel told reporters. “I’m really happy to have found a team that I could ride for in the Tour de France. Of course, I had my own ambitions here and I tried to win a stage and now I’ve managed that. I wanted to show myself and prove that I can be competitive in this race.”

The stage, from Aurillac in the Massif Central to Carmaux in the Tarn region, was short, at 158 kilometers, or 98 miles, and smooth, with only small climbs and on overall downhill profile. That appeared to suit the riders fine, after an opening week that was marked by tough stages on narrow roads in sometimes fierce weather, and marred by a number of serious falls.

Guillaume Horcajuelo/European Pressphoto Agency

On Tuesday, there was one sizable pileup, but it resulted in no big injuries. Thomas Voeckler, a Frenchman with the Europcar team, held on to the overall leader’s yellow jersey, which he took over on Sunday.

The Tuesday stage followed a relatively turbulent “rest day” on Monday, which brought news of the first positive drug test of this year’s Tour. Alexandr Kolobnev, a Russian with the Katusha team, tested positive for hydrochlorothiazide in his urine, according to the International Cycling Union. The substance, a diuretic, is considered a masking agent for other drugs.

Kolobnev withdrew from the race but denied that he had been doping.

“Yesterday, during the rest day, it was reported the laboratories had found a substance, hydrochlorothiazide,” Kolobnev said in a statement. “I do not know where it comes from.”

On Tuesday, Johnny Hoogerland, the more seriously injured of two victims of a collision with a French television car on Sunday, was back in the race, despite 33 stitches in his legs, sustained when he landed on a barbed-wire fence.

“Today I felt better on the bike than I felt in bed or walking,” he said. “It was a lot of adrenaline that got me through the day, I think.”

Hoogerland, of the Vacansoleil team, finished the stage nearly six minutes behind Greipel, but that was ahead of a final group of stragglers another minute back. Hoogerland even managed to defend the red-and-white polka-dot jersey, held by the leading climber on the Tour, with some help from a teammate, Marco Marcato.

With Hoogerland slowed by his injuries, Marcato raced ahead Tuesday to collect the maximum points on several modest climbs, thereby preventing other riders from picking them up and challenging Hoogerland for the jersey.

On Wednesday, a similar stage is on tap, from Blaye-Les-Mines to Lavaur, near Toulouse. At only 167.5 kilometers, it, too, is relatively short and relatively flat. That means Voeckler has a good chance of holding on to the yellow jersey for another stage — meaning that a Frenchman would be wearing it on Bastille Day, Thursday.

After that, the serious business of determining the overall winner of the Tour will get under way, with three tough stages set for the Pyrenees, on Thursday through Saturday.

Among the favorites, including the defending champion, Alberto Contador; the Schleck brothers, Andy and Frank; and Cadel Evans, the runner-up in 2007, there has been little movement since the opening day. Evans, an Australian with the BMC team, is in the best position, in third place overall, with a margin of 1 minute 43 seconds over Contador.

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No doping evidence found

A French official said Monday that the police had not found evidence of doping in a search of Alexandr Kolobnev’s hotel room, The Associated Press reported from Aurillac, France.

Jean-Pascal Violet, the public prosecutor for the town of Aurillac, said he had opened an investigation in connection with Kolobnev’s failed Tour de France doping test.

Katusha’s manager, Andrei Tchmil, said Kolobnev had been temporarily suspended until the team receives the results of his “B” sample analysis.

“We need to take into account a lot of things, then we’ll look at the rules,” Tchmil said Tuesday. “He is claiming his innocence and says he can’t give any explanation for his positive test. Of course we were surprised.”

The Tour director, Christian Prudhomme, expressed satisfaction with the fight against doping at the race by French anti-doping officials and the International Cycling Union.

This article has been revised to reflect the following correction:

Correction: July 13, 2011

An earlier version of this article misidentified Cadel Evans as the Tour de France runner-up last year. Andy Schleck finished in second place last year; Evans was second in 2007.

A Release Valve for Cyclists’ Unrelenting Pressure

By JOHN TIERNEY

Like most cyclists, Mr. Brown at first didn’t see any need to switch from the traditional saddle on the mountain bike he’d been riding full time for five years on the force. When researchers at the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health and Safety offered new noseless saddles intended to prevent erectile dysfunction, he quickly told his supervisor, “No problems here!”

But then, after trying the new saddle, he felt the difference. His weight rested on his pelvic bones instead of the crotch area, which formerly pressed against the saddle’s nose. During his sleep, when he wore a monitor, the measure known as “percent of time erect” increased to 28 percent from 18 percent.

The results made him permanently switch to a no-nose saddle, as did most of the other bike-patrol police officers in Seattle and other cities who took part in the six-month experiment. But they’ve had little luck converting their colleagues, as Mr. Brown complains in the current newsletter of the International Police Mountain Bike Association.

“The subject matter always draws juvenile chuckles,” he writes. “They don’t even listen long to understand what part of a man’s anatomy is being protected here.”

It’s the area of soft tissue called the perineum, and it’s not just a male problem — female cyclists have also reported soreness and numbness in this genital region. But neither sex seems interested in these saddles, and I’m as baffled as Mr. Brown is by their apathy.

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I’ve spent much of my journalistic career debunking health scares, but the bike-saddle menace struck me as a no-brainer when I first heard about it. Why, if you had an easy alternative, would you take any risk with that part of the anatomy? Even if you didn’t feel any symptoms, even if you didn’t believe the researchers’ warnings, even if you thought it was perfectly healthy to feel numb during a ride — why not switch just for comfort’s sake? Why go on crushing your crotch?

When I tried a no-nose model for my 16-mile daily commute, it was so much more comfortable that I promptly threw away the old saddle. But over the years I’ve had zero success persuading any other cyclists to switch, even when I quote the painfully succinct warning from Steven Schrader, the reproductive physiologist at Niosh who did the experiment with police officers.

“There’s as much penis inside the body as outside,” Dr. Schrader told me. “When you sit on a regular bike saddle, you’re sitting on your penis.”

More precisely, according to Dr. Schrader’s measurements, you are putting 25 to 40 percent of your body’s weight on the nerves and blood vessels near the surface of the perineum. “That part of the body was never meant to bear pressure,” Dr. Schrader said. “Within a few minutes the blood oxygen levels go down by 80 percent.”

Dr. Schrader has documented the results with the help of a couple of pieces of equipment, the biothesiometer and the Rigiscan.

“The biothesiometer is a device in which the men set their penis into a trough, and it slowly starts to vibrate,” he explained. “They push the button when they can feel the vibration. While it sounds delightful, it’s actually not. The Rigiscan is a machine the men wear at night that grabs the penis about every 15 seconds to see if it’s erect. It’s not as pleasant as it sounds, either.”

In one early study with the Rigiscan, Dr. Schrader found that police officers patrolling on bikes with conventional saddles tended to have shorter erections than did noncyclists. Then, in a 2008 study titled “Cutting Off the Nose to Save the Penis,” he reported the results of having Mr. Brown and the other officers switch to new designs.

Before the study, nearly three-quarters of the officers complained of numbness while riding. After six months, fewer than one-fifth complained. They did better on the biothesiometer test of sensitivity and also reported improved erectile function.

Unlike Mr. Brown, the typical officer in the study showed no improvement in the nighttime Rigiscan measure. A fan of traditional saddles might interpret that as reason not to change saddles, but Dr. Schrader sees it as evidence that some effects of a conventional saddle may be slow, or impossible, to reverse.

In another study, Dr. Marsha Guess and Dr. Kathleen Connell, who are urogynecologists at Yale, found that that more than 60 percent of female cyclists using nosed saddles reported symptoms of genital pain, numbness and tingling. Lab tests recorded lower levels of genital sensation in the cyclists than in a control group of runners. These researchers also report, in a forthcoming paper, that saddles with a “partial cutout” — an indentation or a small opening — may be counterproductive because they increase pressure on a woman’s genital area.

The accumulating evidence has led Niosh to recommend that police officers and other workers on bicycles use a no-nose saddle that puts pressure on the “sit bones.” Examples include the BiSaddle (used by Mr. Brown), the I.S.M. (a favorite of police officers in Chicago), the Hobson Easyseat, the Spiderflex, Ergo’s The Seat, and other models listed at HealthyCycling.org.)

But few cyclists are paying attention. Peter Flax, the editor in chief of Bicycling magazine, told me that he knew of no serious racers who complained about erectile dysfunction, and that problems with numbness could almost always be corrected by adjusting the saddle.

“I suppose there’s a small niche of people for whom a noseless saddle might be a solution,” Mr. Flax said. “But a saddle without a nose has real problems in terms of function. A cyclist can make turns using the weight in the hips against the nose. I just don’t think a noseless saddle is safe in a race.”

Mr. Brown and other police officers insist that they’ve learned to maneuver perfectly well with no-nose saddles. But even if the racers really do get a crucial advantage from the traditional saddle, why is everyone else still using it? People in spin classes don’t have to steer their bikes anywhere, so why are they still sitting on their perineums?

It’s possible the problem isn’t as serious as the researchers believe, but I see other reasons for the indifference. We all tend to underestimate the danger from old-fashioned, familiar technologies, particularly when the effects aren’t immediately obvious. Young athletes focus on victory today, not the future damage to their bodies. And if the winner of the Tour de France doesn’t ride a no-nose saddle, then neither will riders who want to look like him.

“Serious bike riders would be totally embarrassed to show up at a race in a noseless saddle,” Mr. Flax said.

The embarrassment factor extends to bike shops, too, as Jim Bombardier discovered in trying to sell his invention, the BiSaddle. Mr. Bombardier, who lives in Portland, Ore., went to stores armed with scientific papers and diagrams, but no one was interested. One shop owner took a look at his new saddle and summarized the marketing problem:

“This saddle screams out: I’ve got a problem. Who needs that in a bike shop?”

Well, there’s a certain logic to that retail strategy, at least for the short term. But if you’re in it for the long term, if you’d like your customers to keep cycling — and creating new customers — then it pays to protect the perineum.

by Alex Davies, Paris, France on 05. 4.11

Photos Courtesy of Jesse Herbert

Living in France, I’ve developed an appreciation for good wine. That and my TreeHugger–cultivated love for biking make me a great admirer of the bicycle wine rack, which, from Montreal-based designer Jesse Herbert, is exactly what it sounds like. Made with metal picked up in scrapyards and chemical-free, non-dyed leather, this is a great accessory for summer picnics and get togethers.

Herbert worked for Environment Canda and Natural Resources Canada before turning to design, where he feels he makes more of a difference. Most of his work is in leather: cuff bracelets (with built in USB keys), yoga straps, a strap-on purse, and, in my opinion the most impressive, the bicycle wine rack. You can check out and purchase Holden’s work through his Etsy store.

The bike wine rack fits onto any 1″ bike frame with antique brass fasteners and hidden metal clamps that hold the bottle, which Herbert guarantees will never fall out. The brass used for the fasteners comes from a scrap yard; Herbert says that found objects are “what inspires me to create.” The leather is free of chemical adhesives and dyes, and is vegetable tanned.

So why not brush up on Jerry’s Green Wine Guide, strap a bottle on your bike, and head out for a perfect summer day? I’ts not the most necessary bike accessory in the world, but it’s a fun idea and the leather looks awesome. It’s also a great present idea (the rack runs for $25, plus shipping), remember, Sunday is Mother’s Day!

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Kate Spade, Paul Smith and Other Designers Respond to Urban Commuters’ Demand for Fashionable Bags, Coats and Shoes

Wall Street Journal — On Style — May 19, 2011

When apparel maker Betabrand created a pair of khaki pants whose back-pocket linings and hems could be exposed to reveal reflective fabric, it expected the pants to be a short-term novelty item.

But the $90 “Bike to Work” pants took off among two-wheeled commuters seeking clothes that marry fashion and function. “They’re one of our most popular products,” says Chris Lindland, the 38-year-old founder of the San Francisco company, which now has a women’s version of the pants.

Helio Ascari has assembled a wardrobe that works when he’s on or off his bike.

Bryan DerballaHelio Ascari has assembled a wardrobe that works when he’s on or off his bike.

Bike commuting is a trendy mode of transport in the U.S. these days, hitting that sweet spot where green, stylish and retro meet. New York City has been in a ferment of debate over new bike lanes that are taking up car lanes, while in Portland, Ore., 6% of workers were bicycling to jobs in 2009, according to the League of American Bicyclists. Today’s bike commuters tend to be early adopters and influencers, the sorts of people who snapped up first-generation iPads.

But outfitting oneself for bike commuting raises style issues. Street clothes can be uncomfortable and limiting. Yet as a sport, biking relies on Spandex bike shorts and neon windbreakers. Commuters are hungry for bike-friendly clothes and accessories that don’t require a quick change in the bathroom before a business meeting or a restaurant dinner with friends.

“It’s very hard to find stylish cycle clothing,” says Helio Ascari, a 34-year-old Italian model who lives in New York City. But because he rides his bike everywhere, including work, concerts, stores and even parties, he requires clothes that seamlessly transition to all his destinations.

Bags that look and function like briefcases or luxe handbags are a particular request of many commuting cyclists. One of Mr. Ascari’s favorite finds is his canvas Linus Bike panniers, which have a minimalist look. “I have a classic-style bike, and the bag matches my bike, besides being very useful,” he says. “I can carry all my belongings in a very stylish way.

Manufacturers are responding to demands like his with an array of bags, shoes, coats and even tailored clothing. Some of it comes from brands such as Paul Smith, Coach and Kate Spade that are selling the styles in their own stores. Others come from new specialist brands that are selling online.

In August, Coach will launch a line of bags—each a classic leather Coach look—that’s attachable to a bike’s handlebars, frame, or rear rack.

Nona Varnado, a brand manufactured in New York, makes a chic clutch bag with straps that hook onto a belt. The company also makes a variety of “hipsters”— bands that wrap around the hips and cover up any flesh exposed when a rider leans forward over the handlebars.

Kate Spade New York last month launched two cycling bags in collaboration with Adeline Adeline, a New York City bicycle shop that specializes in urban commuter biking. (The partnership included a limited-edition, $1,100 Italian Abici bicycle fully outfitted for commuters with enclosed chain guards and fenders and a silver rear rack.)

The Kate Spade bags are versions of two of the brand’s classic designs altered to be easily be attached to bicycles. The $425 cowhide Essex bag has two clips on the strap that attach to handlebars. The $375 Bay Street Quinn tote, made from crinkle patent leather, has hooks on the bottom that can be fastened to a rear rack.

Julie Hirschfeld, the owner of Adeline Adeline, says there’s a need for more urban-biking fashions designed for women. Also a graphic designer, she commutes to work each day over the Brooklyn Bridge and says, “I want something that looks as good as a handbag I would buy.”

Ms. Hirschfeld has designed her own bike bag, which she plans to bring out this summer. The bag will come in canvas and leather versions and will sell for roughly $400. Many of the panniers and other bags she currently carries come from Great Britain, Holland and other places where commuter biking is more established.

Madame de Pé, a brand developed by a marketing consulting group in Amsterdam, makes women’s coats that look more fashionable than the tent-like rain ponchos to which many bicyclists resort. The coats have a long, weighted hem that covers pedaling knees and a ruched hood that moves with the head for clear visibility when a cyclist looks right or left.

British cycling-clothing company Rapha last fall launched a clothing collection with designer Paul Smith. It includes a purple polka-dot neck scarf and a jaunty cap for men.

Rapha also makes a tailored wool jacket, in collaboration with bespoke tailor Timothy Everest, that could walk straight from the bike rack to the boardroom. Priced at £400 (just under $650), it has a protective storm collar and front hems that can be folded back to free up a bicyclist’s legs. (The company’s website said recently that it’s sold out, with new supplies due in July.)

“We’re all businessmen and get around by bike,” says Slate Olson, general manager of Rapha in the U.S. “You want to feel like you could step into a meeting.”

He rattles off a list of Rapha products that came out of company executives’ own needs: button-down shirts with discreet side panels that provide room for reaching forward, buttons that prevent a collar from flapping in the wind, and special pockets that prevent a cellphone from tumbling out.

Rapha’s latest invention will be out in six months: a cycling brogue shoe. It’s made of leather that has been dimpled like a wingtip but also has a recessed cleat that will attach to pedals—without clicking on the floor when walking.

Mr. Everest, the tailor, has also worked with Brooks, a British manufacturer known for its leather bike seats, to create a cycling coat that Brooks expects to launch this year. Called the “Criterion” jacket and priced at $1,400, it is made of the water-shedding Ventile cotton used by the British military and is lined in English tweed. It has channels for iPod wires and a pocket on the lower back—an easy-access location for bicyclists.

Brooks is also bringing out more bags, especially for those early-adopter influencers. “We need things for the laptop,” says Cristina Würding, Brooks’s business director, “things for the iPad.”

—Email Christina.Binkley@wsj.com or twitter.com/BinkleyOnStyle.

“The Hub” May 30, 2011

By Matt Allyn

The League of American Bicyclists announced their annual ranking of bicycle-friendly states in conjunction with May’s Bike Month. The list is based on a combination of factors that include legislation, education, bike infrastructure, and public funding.

You can also see how your town stacks up with our own Top 50 Cycling Cities list.

1. Washington
2. Maine
3. Wisconsin
4. Minnesota
5. New Jersey
6. Iowa
7. Florida
8. Oregon
9. Massachusetts
10. Maryland
11. Illinois
12. Colorado
13. Virginia
14. New Hampshire
15. Vermont
16. Arizona
17. Wyoming
18. Delaware
19. Indiana
20. California
21. Connecticut
22. Michigan
23. Kansas
24. Louisiana
25. Pennsylvania
26. Missouri
27. Tennessee
28. Rhode Island
29. Alaska
30. Idaho
31. Utah
32. Texas
33. Kentucky
34. New York
35. Mississippi
36. Hawaii
37. Ohio
38. North Carolina
39. South Carolina
40. Georgia
41. South Dakota
42. Nevada
43. Oklahoma
44. New Mexico
45. Nebraska
46. Montana
47. Alabama
48. Arkansas
49. North Dakota
50. West Virginia

The League of American Bicyclists promotes bicycling for fun, fitness and transportation, and works through advocacy and education for a bicycle-friendly America. The League represents the interests of America’s 57 million bicyclists, including its 300,000 members and affiliates. For more information or to support the League, visit www.bikeleague.org.

From Forbes Magazine — SportsMoney — May 23, 2011

Patrick Rishe — Forbes

On Sunday night, ’60 Minutes’ aired an interview with former professional cyclist and Lance Armstrong teammate, Tyler Hamilton, who sang a tune we’ve heard before: That Lance cheated.
We’ve heard this from Floyd Landis, the 2006 Tour de France champion who later had his title stripped when he was found guilty of doping

And before that we heard this from Frankie Andreu, another of Armstrong’s former teammates

Concurrent with the recent Tyler Hamilton revelations, we’re now hearing that another teammate with perhaps a bit more credibility because of his relatively clean racing record and supposed close friendship with Armstrong (George Hincapie) has reportedly made statements to the grand jury implicating Armstrong’s usage of performance enhancers.

Image via Wikipedia

As Bonnie Ford of ESPN notes, [VIDEO] a confirmation of the Hincapie comments could be the beginning of the end for Armstrong’s veracity. This would trigger a significant reduction in the perception and quality of his Livestrong ‘brand’, thereby hitting his wallet in terms of lost endorsements revenue.
As an American cancer survivor who continually dominated world-class competitors in his sport’s marquee event, his story was already compelling here in the U.S. Given that ‘The Tour’ is arguably one of the most grueling tests of endurance, stamina, and determination in sports, his racing excellence and ability to exude all of these characteristics while facing cancer cemented a life-time reputation as endorsement gold.

Provided that his accomplishments were on the up-and-up.

If Armstrong is truly innocent of ever using any type of performance enhancers, then apologies are due.

If, however, he’s been less than truthful, his reputation will suffer. Though we can certainly understand from his perspective the financial pressure to be less than forthcoming about past training habits and products ingested.

What financial pressures?

- In this 2003 CNN piece written just prior to his 5th consecutive Tour de France victory (he won a record 7 in a row), Chris Isdore estimated that Armstrong earned roughly $16.5 million a year on endorsements with Coca-Cola, Nike, Subaru, and others. Clearly, corporate America was buying into the inspirational Livestrong brand;

- In this 2010 CNBC piece by Darren Rovell, it was noted that Armstrong was still in the top 50 out of more than 2,500 celebrities in the Davie-Brown Index…a poll that measures popularity of various celebrities;

- In this 2010 piece written for Digital Journal, Armstrong tied with Serena Williams as the 13th richest athlete at $20 M a year;

- And this January 2011 piece cites court documents in a fraud probe (involving doping allegations in Lance Armstrong’s U.S. Postal Service cycling team) which show that USPS paid nearly $32 M for a 4-year sponsorship from 2001–2004. As far as endorsement cachet goes, this is ‘Tiger Woods good’ as Tiger received $40 M over 5-years from GM to promote Buick in a deal which ended back in 2009.

Of course, Tiger Woods is proof positive that no brand is untouchable. Could any of us have predicted the fall from grace Woods has suffered over the last 18 months.

Ask yourself “Why were so many people angry at Tiger in light of his transgressions?”. And the answer is that the revelations of his ‘transgressions’ made him appear like a phony corporate pitchman. Armstrong may soon face a similar fate if these latest allegations are eventually corroborated.

As someone that lost a parent to pancreatic cancer, certainly I respect and admire anyone that has raised significant money for the fight against cancer. Armstrong clearly should be commended for his efforts in this area, and this Forbes video details some of the efforts of the Livestrong Foundation [VIDEO].

Who knows? Maybe in some crazy way, Armstrong’s cheating (if he cheated) helped pave the way to his global brand which afforded him the opportunity to ‘spread his wealth’ through charitable work and raise significant funding for cancer research. Without this alleged cheating, perhaps millions of dollars don’t get raised in the fight against cancer.

But the shine on the story will lose luster as Armstrong’s veracity is further questioned and eroded, and quite frankly, it’s getting harder to believe his story in light of comments from past teammates.

Floyd Landis and Tyler Hamilton may come off as weasels, but so too did Jose Canseco and Brian McNamee when they were in front of a nation talking about baseball and Roger Clemens. Is anybody doubting the veracity of Canseco’s and McNamee’s statements now?

As much as I want to believe Lance, we know that:

- There was rampant usage of performance enhancers in the sport of cycling over the last 20 years;

- Lance Armstrong won 7 consecutive Tour de France events starting in 1999 and ending in 2005, a period of time where teammates and competitors alike were using performance enhancers;

As such, you either believe that:

a) Lance was so much better than the competition that, for 7 consecutive years, a completely clean Armstrong defeated guys who were doping; OR

b) Lance indeed crossed the line and used performance enhancers despite his repeated denials and numerous drug tests passed.

Are Andreu, Landis, Hamilton and Hincapie all lying?

If Lance knew that these guys were cheating and, as his teammates, their cheating helped his eventual position in the races, isn’t that still cheating on some level?

Sadly, as I watch this story unfold, I can’t help but think about Roger Clemens and Marion Jones.

Roger Clemens has shouted his innocence from the rooftops for over 2 years, yet most don’t buy his story. Armstrong has had as many as four former work associates claiming that he used performance enhancers. But Lance keeps referencing the 500 drug tests that he hasn’t failed.

Marion Jones denied cheating for years before finally confessing to the use of performance enhancers. Is a similar admission in the waiting from Lance?

And as Clemens argued that his former teammate and friend Andy Petite “misremembered” when Petite revealed steroids transgressions undertaken by Clemens, will Armstrong use a similar argument in explaining away the alleged remarks of his long-time friend and former teammate George Hincapie?

At the end of the day, if Armstrong’s past cycling colleagues and teammates continue to find unity, solace, and closure in speaking out against their past boss, then the world of Livestrong might be biking down a bumpy trail towards ‘Tigerville’, ‘Clemenstown’ or ‘Berrywood’.

And that won’t be a smooth ride down the Champs-Elysees I can assure you.

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Dr. Rishe is an Associate Professor of Economics at the Walker School of Business at Webster University in St Louis, MO as well as the Director of sports marketing firm Sportsimpacts. Find more at www.patrickrishe.net