Messages from the Pale Blue Dot

My New Resume

I'm home after cycling from San Diego to St. Augustine, riding over three thousand miles in fifty-nine days. It's now time to look for a new leadership position. 

Here is my CV

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Al Qudra and Nad Al Sheba Cycle Tracks in Dubai

With the bike all set up in my hotel room at the Hilton Al Habtoor City, I was ready for some rides on the margins of my participation in the World Government Summit in Dubai from 8-13 February 2019.

Over the last fifteen years, Dubai’s cycling infrastructure has grown steadily, from nothing when I first started riding here back in 2006, to some decent bike paths and some extraordinary dedicated bicycle tracks. On my first day of riding, I grabbed a taxi, put my bike in the back seat and went out to the Al Qudra bicycle track, about a half an hour outside of Dubai.

Got started at dawn and, surprisingly, it was pretty chilly. I’ve ridden many times in the mornings in the UAE, but the temperature had never gotten down to 15-16C, like this morning. They say that you are perfectly dressed if you are riding cold for the first twenty minutes. Well, I ended up being just right as the sun cleared the dunes.

I’d planned on doing about 80 km and somehow made the right choices at a couple of splits in the track as it crossed the desert. I’d certainly recommend taking along a hard copy map to avoid doing extra distance. But, I made it back to the parking lot where I had started and called a Careem car service, and was back at the hotel in no time.

The photo above pretty much captures the Al Qudra track… a good two-lane dedicated bike track with excellent surface out in the desert with minimal services. But, if you just want to ride your bike and you are in Dubai, this is the place to go. No hills.. just fast, flat track.

Over the days I got in three additional rides, all leaving from the Hilton Hotel and riding a short distance to the Nad Al Sheba (NAS) track, in the middle of Dubai in a rapidly developing area (lots of building cranes.) The city had recently finished the local bike path that connects the Dubai Creek and Business Bay areas of Dubai to the NAS, including a very cool bicycle bridge across a major highway.

This is a pretty representative shot of the NAS track, with cranes on the horizon, lots of greenery and flowers and about an 8 km loop with excellent pavement.

Winter 2019 Dubai Cycling–Bike Assembly

It was early 2006 when I first traveled to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for a meeting of the UN Environment Program (UNEP) and an international conference on Chemical Management. I was flying at the time on a round-the-world ticket that included Emirates Airlines and I took advantage of their lax rules on traveling with bicycles as accompanying luggage, I brought my bicycle, thinking that I might get in some good rides somewhere in Dubai. It was that year that I met Wolfgang Hohmann, who several years before had opened “Wolfi’s Bike Shop” on Sheikh Zayed Road. During that meeting and for several years following, I frequently flew through Dubai to ride with the Dubai Roadsters both on their Friday morning club rides and up in the Hajar Mountains, staying at the Hatta Fort Hotel. Emirates had a policy that if you were on a Business Class ticket, they would provide free round-trip transport to any location in the UAE for passengers interesting in breaking up their trip with a stopover. Over the last thirteen years, I have explored a lot of the UAE by bicycle, riding up the famous Jebel Hafeet, frequently up through the tunnels from Hatta over to Fujairah City, the capital of the emirate of Fujairah. It has been very cool to see how cycling has exploded in the UAE with so many more riders and lots of cycling infrastructure.

At the invitation of the UAE Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) as a Member of the SDG Council for SDG11 (Sustainable Cities and communities), I flew in to Dubai last week to participate in both the “SDGs in Action” meeting and the World Government Summit. The travel agency gave me the option of two airlines, Air France and British Airways, and it was a simple decision: BA allows bicycles to be brought for no additional charge as part of the passenger’s luggage allowance (AF does not allow bikes as part of the luggage allowance and charges about USD 150.) So, I bagged up my Seven Cycles Expat SL and flew off to Dubai for some cycling and some meetings, packing cycling gear and business suits.

 

Although the Seven has S&S Couplers and fits into an airline friendly, I decided to fly with my Aerus Biospeed soft case, since BA does not enforce the usual 115 cm (45 linear inches) for a bag. It might not have been as well protected, but the process of disassembly and reassembly is much easier without having to get the bike into the small S&S Couple hard-sided case. No problems at all with British Airlines, particularly since I had called ahead and mentioned that I was bringing the bicycle, so the message was in my reservation record.

On arrival at the hotel the bike was in good shape. Now time to put everything back together.

Here were the necessary tools and accessories.. pedal wrench, double-sided pedals, tail light, front spindle and Flouro Grease for the S&S couplers (so that the coupler joints don’t weld themselves together due to the static electricity arcing across the connection between the front and rear halves of the bicycle.)

The disk brake rotors travel separately from the wheels so that they don’t get even slightly bent. They need to be reattached.

The handlebars get reattached to the stem.

The derailleur needs to be unwrapped and removed from between the rear seat stays.

The spacer between the two front forks, which protects the forks from being bent while in the case, needs to be taken off.

And the derailleur reattached.

The S&S Couplers joined.

And wrenched tight, making sure that the special grease is in the connection.

The cable splitters for the rear derailleurs and the rear disk brake need to be re-attached.

And the seat post inserted and tightened down. I keep a pipe clamp on the seat post to mark the height for where the post should be set and to make sure that the seat post does not accidently slip down into the seat tube.

And, the bike is assembled!! Just about thirty-five minutes from unzipping the bag to attaching the frame bags.

New Business Cards

33 Days Until Start of the Adventure Cycling Southern Tier

Four short weeks and a few days until we’ll dip our pedals in the Pacific Ocean in San Diego and begin riding east over fifty-nine days to St. Augustine, Florida. There will be fifteen of us (thirteen plus two tour leaders) and one van with trailer, riding and camping our way across California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas (two and a half weeks getting all the way across Texas), Louisiana, Mississippi, a bit of Alabama and Florida.

The Southern Tier has been on my bucket list for many years. I was prepared to do it this year self-contained but Adventure Cycling Association is offering a van-supported version and I am happy to have someone else schlep my tent and gear, as well as provide cooking gear each night. We are still riding and camping our way across the US, but with just a dash of convenience for what should prove a challenging adventure.

Training during the winter for a ride that starts on 3 March is always a challenge in the Northeast, where snow, black ice, bitter cold and freezing rain (as well as living in the middle of Midtown Manhattan) are often impediments to outdoor exercise. So, I’ve been coping, stealing a week of cycling before Christmas while transiting through South Africa, spinning indoors at Flywheel, running at the YMCA and, like today, waiting for the moment when the temperatures climb above zero and the pavement is free of snow and black ice, to get on my bike and spin around Central Park.

Not a long ride today, but with temps hovering just above zero C and blustery winds, it was just enough to say that I’ve worked out and not killed myself doing it. Preparing for touring during the winter is much different than training during the offseason to be ready to race in March. There is no pressure to hammer up the hills in the cold, knocking out barf-inducing wattage intervals and going deep into the pain cave during long anaerobic mitochondria-producing climbs. To ride 100-130 km per day, day after day, with no real pressure to go fast, is not so tough and so my training regime is less than brutal.

One more week in Manhattan, meeting with the lawyers and winding down after twenty-five years of working in a high-pressure job, before heading off to put my head back in the game for a week at the United Arab Emirates World Government Summit in Dubai. One more week of spinning indoors (as the temperatures drop down well below zero again), time on the mat at Yo Yoga and some running at the YMCA if my back spasms will behave. 

Effective 14 January 2019, my previous email is no longer working. Please use [email protected] to contact me

Preparing for the Adventure Cycling Association’s “Denali Adventure” Part II

Following my crash in late-March 2016, racing in the Carnival City Classic outside of Johannesburg, I’d vowed to shift my riding and training from racing and touring to mostly touring, eliminating the racing. The risks that come with high-speed pacelines and tight pelotons had been somewhat acceptable when I was younger and bounced better off of the pavement, but this latest shoulder separation and broken ribs had taken longer to heal and had ruined a perfectly good vacation in South Africa. I needed a good touring bike and some tours that would fill up the “adrenaline vacuum” that racing had provided.

Through the summer of 2016, I worked with John Tsang at Conrad’s Bike Shop in New York City and Neil Doshi at Seven Cycles in Watertown, outside of Boston, to build my dream touring bicycle. My idea was that it was time to transition from racing (on my Pinarello) to touring on a perfect bike for multiday, fully-contained or bikepacking (credit card touring) trips. The decision to choose Seven Cycles for my next bike was strongly influenced by their support to my friends Kate Harris and Mel Yule during their Cycling Silk expedition, in 2011 when Seven Cycles had built and donated touring bikes for their adventure cycling for ten months, over 10,000 kilometers through ten countries along the Silk Road. I was proud to have also supported this great adventure.

I wanted a sturdy bike that could handle the rigors of both hard-pack and gravel road, fully-contained touring and also being assembled and disassembled and packed in a case for the kind of international travel that I do year after year. I wanted a Titanium frame, certainly S&S couplers so that the bike could be broken down and packed in an airline-friendly no-fee suitcase and the geometry that would keep me safe and comfortable week after week on long tours.

In early October 2016 I picked up my Seven Cycles Expat SL from Conrad’s.

In preparation for the Denali trip, I purchased the following equipment to modify the bike for the rigors of riding self-contained through Alaska, particularly on the rough gravel and 9% grades on the 140 km Denali Highway from Paxson to Cantwell. Turning my setup from a normal touring bike into one that could handle big hills, fully loaded meant that I needed to get some mountain-bike gears and some wider tires.

1) Shimano XT M8000 11-speed cassette

This cassette would give me the 42 gear (11-42T: 11-13-15-17-19-21-24-28-32-37-42) but I would need to change the derailleur to be able to handle that big gear.

2) Shimano XT RD-M8000 Rear Derailleur

This would allow my Shimano Dura-Ace 9000 groupset to handle the new cassette, but there was one more item that I needed.

3) Wolf Tooth Tanpan

This allows Shimano equipped dropbar bikes to use mountain derailleurs.

4) Marathon Mondial HS 428 37-622 700 x 35 Evolution line tires

These tires are the absolute best tires and worked perfectly on the Denali Highway

5) Racks and Panniers

Working with Wayne Boroughs at The Touring Store I bought the following:

1. Ortlieb Back-Roller Pro Plus (Pair) Granite-Black
2. Tubus Logo Titan Titanium Rear Bicycle Rack
3. Tubus Nova Stainless Steel Front Lowrider Rack

6) Frame bags

I chose Revelate frame bags. I added in four bags:

a) The large Sweetroll and pocket bag:

These bags between my handlebars,carried my “holy shit” gear (Showers Pass top and pants, shoe covers and cold weather gloves) and the pocket bag on top full of things that I would need during the day (lightweight windbreaker, USB battery for recharging phone and Garmin as necessary), Deet mosquito repellent, bear whistle.

b) A Tangle frame bag

This carried all of my tire repair gear, small tools, tubes, pump, Brave Soldier crash pack (in case of an accident) and my small bivouac sack in case the “holy shit”gear did not work and I was stuck in bad weather with no way to stay alive without some help.

c) Gas Tank

This is for those need to grab easily things like glasses, small battery pack for recharging a phone, sunscreen, ride cards (business cards for cyclists.)

Here is the bike nicely tucked in its soft case.

Here is my touring Seven Cycles Expat SL fully loaded on the morning of my self-contained ride from Seward to Mt. Denali National Park. Next chapter… a blog post of the eighteen days on the road in Alaska.

Yoga Core Training: Done and Dusted

In preparing for this month’s ride from Seward to Anchorage and onwards to Mt. Denali, half of my preparation was to build up my core strength (and the other half cycle training each morning). Not all of self-contained cycling is just pushing pedals, but includes all sorts of activities including setting up camp, negotiating the confines of a small lightweight tent, wrestling a bicycle when not riding that is loaded with 28 kg of gear and some off-bike activities this month like hiking on a glacier and whitewater rafting on the Nenana River. One of the things that I had noticed doing other Adventure Cycling trips over the last few years is that the non-bike stuff was sometimes as exhausting (and possibly injury producing) as the riding and that the getting up and down, in and out of the tent took a couple of days to get used to… so, this time, I decided to compliment my cycle training with six weeks of yoga classes.

My “kula” (yoga studio) for the last three years has been Yo Yoga http://www.yoyoganyc.com/ , a really cool yoga studio located at 59th Street and First Avenue in Manhattan, just under the 59th St. Bridge (as in the 59th Street Bridge Song…  “slow down, you move too fast, got to make the morning last” by Paul Simon.”) And, for the last six weeks that I have been home in Manhattan (perhaps a new record for this time of year) I’ve been dedicatedly going to class five times a week.

As you can see from the photo above, Yo Yoga has an outdoor deck for classes when the weather is above 20C and in the morning and afternoon/evenings (not full sun, too hot or too cold.) Otherwise classes are held in an indoor studio,

Photos from the Yo Yoga webste

So, today (3 July) was the last of my yoga classes. Almost twenty-five sessions on the mat over the last six weeks! Ready to go tomorrow morning.. off to Anchorage from La Guardia, connecting in Houston!

Preparing for Adventure Cycling Alaska “Denali Adventure”: Cycling through the Appalachian Mountains

On 4 July 2017, I’m flying from New York to Anchorage to begin a two and a half week adventure cycling self-contained from Seward to Anchorage and joining up with the Adventure Cycling Association “Denali Adventure” group of fourteen cyclists on a ride up to Denali National Park.

In preparation for the event, I’ve been home in New York City, riding almost daily laps of Central Park, building aerobic capacity but I needed a few long days on my Seven Cycles Expat SL. A few weeks ago I contacted Brian Managan, who was leading the Adventure Cycling van-supported ride from Chicago to New York City to ask if I might be able to ride along with his group from Western Pennsylvania through the Appalachian Mountains from State College to Port Jervis. My deal was that I would ride self-contained, not relying on them but camping/staying in the same locations so that if something went wrong, I would have a friendly assist.

On Thursday 22 June, I rented a Hertz car one-way from Midtown Manhattan to the airport in State College and drove about five hours to drop off the car. On arrival I put my bike together and took off in a thunderstorm to ride about 30 km to the KOA Campground where Brian and his group were camped.

On the way, I had a lovely stop in Bellefonte at Good Intent Cider, a lovely Cider Bar where I stopped to avoid some rain showers and had one of those magical encounters while cycle touring. When I walked into the bar and ordered a pint of their Good Charmât and in walked five folks who were from the area and looking for a drink. One of the group asked, “Is that your bike out front?” Come to find out he had ridden across the US on the BikeCentennial route from East to West using Adventure Cycling maps during the summer of 2016, just missing the 40th Anniversary and Montana Cycling Celebration by a couple of days. We all had a good chat and several points of cider before I rode the remaining 10 km to the KOA for a rainy night. (While I was at the Good Intent Cider Bar, I charged my GPS and recorded this segment:

Following a night in the rain, I started my ride in the rain and finished the ride as the rain was letting up in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania. At the KOA Steve and Brian had a good laugh getting the Adventure Cycling Van mired in the mud… in their defense the field was dry when they drove in two days before.

The full day ride in the rain was good practice for Alaska, where it could be raining some or most of the time. But, at least, the temperature was up above 20C and so riding wet was not so uncomfortable. I alternated between a light windbreaker and a solid “Showers Pass” rain jacket.

The Adventure Cycling group decided to stay in a motel on Friday night, a good decision since we had packed up in the rain, ridden all day in the rain and the forecast was for rain all night (it did.) So, I also booked at room at the Day’s Inn. It was good to dry out the gear and find a good wine store for a bottle of Pinot Noir from New Zealand to recharge the calories.

On Saturday, 24 June, it was a long, long ride through the mountains. The weather had improved and it was great riding weather, but just a long day. 106 km and 1190 meters of climbing, but some of the pitches were 8-9%, which is a different animal when fully loaded.

We are following the BicyclePA Route V that crosses most of Pennsylvania

On Saturday night, after a long ride, we camped at the Sandy Valley Campground, Not a bad place, if you don’t mind listening to country rock blasting from nearby campsites.

I broke a tent pole setting up my tent:

Luckily, Big Agnes was pretty good about replacing the pole segment, which I received this weekend and replaced in time for the trip to Alaska.

On Sunday, we continued our ride through the mountains across Pennsylvania, descending out of the Appalachians down to the Delaware River in Delaware Water Gap, at the border with New Jersey.

After a long day, I decided to book a cheap motel room in Delaware Water Gap, which was a good decision I think. I was not eating and cooking with the Adventure Cycling group that I was riding with and there were absolutely no restaurants or stores anywhere close to where they were camping across the river in the Delaware River Water Gap State Park.

The Pocono Inn was a dump, but cheap. However there was a barbeque at Apple Pie Cafe in Stroudsburg and I found a cool biker bar (not my kind of bike but I was smart enough not to wear Lycra to get get some beers.) I really liked the Minisink Hotel and highly recommend it as a place to stop to recharge (food and liquids.)

On the final day of riding, I took off early to thank Brian and Steve with the Adventure Cycling group, who were camped about 10 km outside of Stroudsburg. After a quick visit there, I had a bit of a challenge getting about 65 km down the road in time to catch the New Jersey Transit train from Port Jervis that left the station at 11:30 am. This ride was the first time that I had ever ridden through three states in a single day, starting in Pennsylvania, riding through New Jersey and into New York 

It was a fast and persistent ride through those final big hills as the route paralleled the Delaware River. But, I made it in time to grab a few beers and a couple of slices before catching the train home.

 

So, now, Sunday 2 July, just two days before leaving for Alaska, I’ve gotten in my last ride on the Seven, working out the last tweaks before packing it all in the suitcase for the trip.

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