When cycling in cold weather I find a snood to be extremely useful. I’m sure there’s a more manly name for this essential piece of kit, but I know it only as a snood. While googling for more information I came across this. I am currently revising my understanding of the word bizarre.

I was cycling in this morning (yes, another cycling story) listening to a podcast that was dicusssing fuel efficiency in cars. It got me thinking about the bikes I use. I have a crappy Schwinn that was my only bike for a few years here, and is now used for wet weather commuting and towing kids.

My main bike, by contrast, is a decent road bike, only a notch up from the lowest model, but still much better than a $99 Wal-Mart special. I have it in part because it’s nice to go fast, and perhaps just a little bit because it’s cool (especially now that I have a carbon fork and seat post; carbon fiber is a well-known aphrodisiac). But the main reason I bought it, and why I still enjoy it, is because it’s fuel efficient. I cycle for fun, but most of the time I’m cycling to get somewhere (work, home or rowing, primarily). While the act of cycling is fun, so is getting home as soon as I can, and that’s what my Giant lets me do.

And so to my current obsession, a recumbent trike (see here for a review). Part of my interest is my natural inclination to find something interesting and learn as much as I can about it (something that has come in surprisingly useful over the years). Part is down to it being a bit cool and interesting. Much of my interest is as a way to motivate my better half to get out more (“It’s like a comfy chair with an ultra-widescreen nature program showing”). But mainly, I think, it’s about travelling more efficiently, and more comfortably (which often amount to the same thing).

We’ll see if I can get over this obsession of course; my natural tightwadness is a pretty powerful force in the battle against frivolous expenditure (though Claire will hotly deny that I’m sure).

Here’s an account of an amateur cyclist doing a mountain stage of the Tour de France. I particularly like this bit, while he is cycling up the Col d’Aubisque:

At times I was going so slowly my computer stopped registering my speed

I was cycling home from work on Friday, and while still around 5 miles from home I got a puncture. No problem, think I, as I whip out my repair kit. That didn’t work (for some reason I always puncture inner tubes on a seam, where patches don’t stick so well), but I carry a spare inner tube as well so I just swapped to that. As I was pumping that up, however, one of my spokes broke, which pretty much put an end to cycling (you can ride with a broken spoke, but it’s not a great idea).

On the walk home, among the many people who stopped to ask if I needed help (score one for my faith in humanity) was a guy I used to work with. Let’s call him Hans, because that’s what his parents called him. He stopped without knowing it was me, which was nice, and we had a bit of a chat. One of the topics covered was weekend activities. I mentioned that I would be rowing, and he said that he knew someone who rowed. After a little back and forth it turned out that his new girlfriend (except-it’s-only-been-a-couple-of-weeks, so-lets-not-get-ahead-of-ourselves) rows in the same program I do, and I’d had an email from her that day. Small world.