2020 Goals

Okay it was a terrible year for biking for me in 2019. However, the upside of having a bad year, but still logging the stats, is that you end up with a clear goal to beat the following year.

For 2019 I only rode 88.8 miles with 4131ft of climbing.
Ugh. I know.

I actually rode just a lttle further because there were a few times I rode without my strava running.

So, there we have it. A yearly goal that at one time I would have come close to beating in just two weeks.

Why didn't I ride in 2019? That is a complicated question to answer as it was no one reason, it was a group of reasons. Here is a list of what I believe were the issues:

1. Congestive Heart Failure - I just don't have the oomph that I used to.
2. Boredom - I just got kind of sick of riding the same spots I always do
3. Loneliness - I got tired of hanging out on the bike by myself all the time and chose social activities that involved other people.
4. Money - It was a tight year for me financially. Tight enough that I budgeted for gasoline, which means that I would opt out of driving 15+ miles each way just to do a 7 to 10 mile ride.
5. Fear - see #1. With my condition, I am sort of scared to get too far away from the car when riding these days. I do not want to pass out back in the woods  or out on the road alone.
6. Anger - I am mad at all of the above.

But that was last year. This is a new year and I'd love to beat last year's stats, and I'd ove to eliminate or lessen the impact of the list above. This means that I'll need to make some adjustments to my expectations and also the way that I ride. Most of all it means I'll need to ride.

I also have a build that I have not yet talked about which I am looking forward to working on. Some time ago I acquired two -almost complete- but disassembled Schwinn Stingrays, and they have been in storage inside a giant container under my house. I'd love to get those back to rideable condition. Since I have two frames to strat with I'd like to make one stick and make one into an early BMX build.

Of course I'll be logging the year here and I hope you are along for the ride with me.

Happy 2020!

Huffy Pro Lightning

Yep, I had this one. I believe I got in at Christmas 1983. It is the least expensive of the Huffy Pro Lightning line.

Interesting choice for them to go with the aero shaped tubing for the seat tube and seat post. I can't remember if the seat in the pic was the original seat.

The rims had a U shaped cross section, similar to the rims that came on the black and gold version which was one level up from this one. Check out that high flange hub on the front wheel.

The downward slanted gooseneck makes me lol!

Over the course of owning it I upgraded some of the parts. I'm pretty sure that I broke the cranks but not in the way you may think. I broke the small stud that sticks into the sprocket on the drive side. Huffy, in what I am sure was a cost cutting measure, did not use cranks where this part was cast at the same time as the crank, they welded one on. I use the term welded very loosely. It broke off and I was still able to pedal enough to get home, but if I tried to get into it hard the sprocket would just slip lol.

Believe it or not I had a lot of fun on this bike. On a personal level this bike meant a lot to me because my mom got it for me even though she had dealt with some issues that left her hospitalized for the fourth quarter of the year. Even in her state of ill health at that time she managed to set aside enough money for me to have this for Xmas. Thanks Mom, I'll never for get your kindness and thoughtfulness.

Tracer Finn Boosting a One Hander

The caption says one handed 360 degree aerials but I don't think that is what Tracer Finn is doing in this picture. Regardless that photo is great because it shows a unique angle and direction of travel. He is absolutely boosting it for a jump from this particular era. More and more I am liking the classic era of BMX these days when it really was about imitating what was happening in actual Motocross. Sooner or later I'll do a Bob Hannah appreciation post and hopefully find a bunch of pics of BMX riders doing "Hannah's"

Lego Mountain Bike Babe

This Lego Mountainbiker MiniFig is a girl right? I think the lips are girl lips, but the long hair could go either way. I dig the aggressive eyebrows lol.

Montgomery Ward - Open Road BMX Shaped Object

Just remembering this "Open Road" BMX bike sold by Montgomery Ward. It was a fall day and my dad took me to Golden Ring Mall to see a movie. I'm not 100% sure but I want to say it was "Hangar 18" which was about the government covering up a collision that the Space Shuttle had with an alien spacecraft or something. If I remember correctly later in life I'd get flashbacks of the parallels between Hangar 18 and the Roswell UFO crash tale, in particular the Blue Room, which was supposedly the room where the aliens were kept, and was later memorialized by the sound system called The Orb. All of this is very loose as far a memories go.

Anyway, back to the bike. Before the movie we took a stroll through the MonkeyWards and went to the bike section. Dad knew I was going to ask for a bike for Christmas becayse I -always- asked for a bike, so I guess he figured he would get ahead of the game, and let me pick out the exact one I wanted. This was not the exact one I wanted. This one is:

Unfortunately this was out of our price range. In fact at this point in my life I had never even been to a real bike shop and seen a Redline in real life. But on this particular day it didn't matter, I was stoked that I at least got to pick out the exact bike I wanted from the row of stingray clones and ten speeds. This was the only thing even close to what I needed. Boy was I happy when he walked up to the counter and put it on lay-away!

The next few months were torture, waiting for Christmas day and my new ride. Soon enough the day came and I couldn't wait to take out my new bike and check out the other new bikes that all the neighborhood kids had gotten. Whether mine was nicer or not I was sure I was the only one with this model.

Overall, I had a blast on this bike, thrashing the bejeezus out of it until some point about mid summer when I cracked the rear Lester Allow Mag. This was an interesting failure...the bike would still roll, but it made a noise that said "when this thing finally fails completely, you are gonna end up bloody and hurt. I listened to that message and soon enough traded something or other for some spoked wheels from Crazy Gary, the neighborhood tinkerer and electronic genius.

Ended up getting a bit more lifespan out of it and of course as it grew closer to Christmas I started thinking about what I was going to replace it with, so it soon faded into oblivion like a zillion bikes before and after. Now that I'm, older it is very easy to see that this thing was most likely made in the same factory as the Huffy Pro Thunder series. Open Road, you were not the best bike I the world but I'm fond of the times we had together.

2020 Olympics Tokyo Cycling, BMX & Skateboarding Mascots!

Ladies and gentlemen, here are your 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics Cycling, Mountain Biking, BMX Racing and BMX Freestyle mascots!

BMX RACING

BMX FREESTYLE

ROAD CYCLING

TRACK CYCLING

MOUNTAIN BIKING

SKATEBOARDING

How freakin' awesome are these? I love them. Share this post!

Just an Awesome Vintage BMX Photo

Wish I could explain what some of these vintage photos do to me. It's more than just bike memories. They take me back to being a kid in general. Full of hope for the future, I really thought that I would eventually move to SoCal and be involved in the BMX industry. Things didn't really turn out that way but that's okay. I still like to feel the nostalgia for that time period when I can. The person in this pic is not me, but I've done lots of powerslides, has lots of tuff wheel mags, and ridden loads of shoes so long that the sides blew out.