The program teaches the “balance first” method whereby the pedals are removed from the bike and the students walk and roll until they can coast comfortably with their feet raised. We then we replace the pedals and the students learn to pedal, having already conquered the “balance” half of the process. It works extremely well and some students pick it up right away while others may need more than one session.

Sunday morning I woke up sore from the 100+ squats I did on Saturday while removing/replacing pedals. Oh, my poor knees. Nevertheless, I had tasks that needed doing so I got started after a coffee and bagel for fuel. First, I installed an A/C window unit in the back of the apt. I hope to not need it for a while but I’m ready when I do.

Second, I finally got around to doing a task that had been on my list for the better part of a month, installing solar shades and new curtains in the front part of my apt. That room gets the afternoon sun and usually gets much warmer than the rest of the unit so I’m hoping the solar shades will cut down on the heat.

The solar shade installation was pretty straightforward, just attach a couple of brackets to the inside of the window frame, tweak the adjustment, and you’re good to go. The curtain rod installation was a little trickier. I bought a laser level to help but, thanks to a wonky apartment, it proved to be both a blessing and a curse. In the end, I used a combo of level and eyeballing to get things more or less square. Anyway, once I got the curtains installed, I think they turned out pretty well and they’re a nice addition to the living room. What do you think?

Empire from Empire on Vimeo.

Slow it down to half speed though and you’ll get close.

My American Lock long shackle padlock. I was playing around with my Gorillapod tripod and liked how this photo came out. The stainless steel looks really nice against the wood grain.

Combine this lock with a Kryptonite bike chain and you can almost keep your bike from getting stolen in NYC.

The pace was very slow this year so I was able to take a lot of photos. For your sake, I’ve only posted the good ones. Of those, here are a few favorites and the rest can be found over at Flickr.

I did what I usually do in these situations, suck it up and get busy. I pulled over to the sidewalk, parked the bike, took off my helmet and gloves, and removed my pannier from the bike. I retrieved a spare tube, tire levers, and a 15mm wrench from my seat bag then pondered how I was gonna get the rear wheel off.

This bears a little explanation. You see, my bicycle has an internal hub in the rear not the more common dérailleur. Think modern version of a 3-speed from the 70′s but with 8 speeds not a 21-speed racing or mountain bike. I’ve never changed a tube on a bike with an internal hub. I printed out the instructions several weeks ago with the intent to read them and do a practice run at home. Unfortunately, “intent” never turned into “did”. So here I am on a NYC sidewalk with a flat and no firsthand experience with the internal hub. Oops.

Nothing to be done but jump in with both feet so I did. Gratefully, I’m fairly mechanically inclined and was able to sort out the correct procedure for getting the wheel off the bike. No cussing, either. I swear. Once the wheel was off, I was back on familiar turf. I used the tire levers to pry one side of the tire off the rim then fished the busted tube out.

I gave the tube a once over looking for a hole but didn’t see anything obvious. The next step was to gently run my fingers around the inside of the tire feeling for anything that may have caused the puncture. At the same time, I’m visually inspecting the exterior of the tire looking for any problems. Again, I didn’t find anything so I’m not sure what caused the flat.

With the wheel off the bike and the old tube removed, I was over the hump in the process. Now I just needed to start putting everything back together beginning with the new tube. I pumped a little air into it to make inserting it back into the tire a bit easier. Next, I had to roll the side of the tire back onto the rim. This took a little effort but I finally got it back on there. Next step, replacing the wheel on the bike.

I more or less reversed the process I used to remove the wheel to get it back on the bike. It was a little fidgety but again I managed it without any cussing or throwing of tools. Not that I’ve ever done that in the past, wink wink. Once the wheel was properly secured to the frame, I had only to inflate the tire and it was ready to go. I, on the other hand, needed a little work.

My hands had gotten absolutely filthy and I still had 60 or so blocks to ride before I could wash them properly. The only thing I had with me was a bandanna that normally gets used for toweling me off once I get to the office. So I start using it to wipe my hands as best as possible when the nicest thing happened.

A gentleman who had stopped to get coffee at a street cart nearby was watching me after he got back in his vehicle and decided to help. He retrieved some type of industrial hand wipes from the back of his truck and offered me a couple. And they say New Yorkers aren’t nice. Anyway, I was super grateful and the wipes were a wonder. My hands were clean enough in no time.

I put the pannier back on the bike and put on my gloves and helmet and was all fixed up. I repeated my thanks to the nice man before riding off. The rest of the trip to work was thankfully uneventful. Other than the inconvenience, the whole process was a positive experience. I started the day with the kindness of a stranger and I now have the knowledge necessary to change future flats which I hope will be few and far between.

If you’re curious, you can see the course for the Five Boro Bike Tour online. And if you’re curiouser still, here’s the route I rode today. Now I think I’m gonna go get some much needed rest. Night night.

I learned a few lessons riding in the rain that I’d like to document in hopes that I can help others who might be considering a similar challenge. Let me start off by setting the scene, weather-wise. The temperature was in the low to mid 50′s with a robust wind out of the east-northeast at 20mph. As you can see from the radar picture, the rain wasn’t real heavy but it was steady.

Now let’s move on to what I wore to cope with the rain. My general philosophy was to keep key parts of myself dry and not worry about others getting wet. Starting at the top with my helmet, I put a rain cover on it to keep my head as dry as possible. It worked really well and its bright yellow color made me more visible in traffic, always a good thing. I decided not to wear any eye protection and that was the right decision. It’s much easier to blink raindrops out of your eyes than try to see through rain spotted lenses.

That takes care of my head so we’ll switch to the torso. The temperature was relatively mild so for a base layer I went with a short sleeve wicking polyester shirt and a pair of board shorts. Both of those garments are designed for coping with moisture so I was pretty confident they wouldn’t pose any problems. And they didn’t, the shirt kept me warm enough and wicked away sweat while the board shorts got wet and functioned just fine. Lastly, I wore a lightweight rain jacket. It kept most of the rain off me and I stayed a comfortable temperature by undoing the pit zips. I’m pretty happy with the clothing choices I made and given similar circumstances I would wear them again.

The last decision I had to make was footwear and socks. I considered going with teva style sandals but it seemed a little cool for that. Instead, I wore a lightweight pair of sneakers that I didn’t care if they got soaked. The more important decision concerned which kind of socks to wear. Wicking polyester comes to the rescue again. My shoes and socks got wet throughout but my feet were totally fine. They didn’t get cold at all and were quite comfortable.

All in all, I don’t think I’d change a thing about what I actually wore to deal with the rain. What I would do though is add gloves. My handlebar grips got slippery once they got wet and I think gloves would have improved that situation as well as keeping my hands a little warmer. Everything else I wore worked very well and performed exactly as expected.

You may be wondering at this point what happened once I got to work. It would be a little difficult to get through the day in wet shorts and shoes so I used my waterproof pannier to bring a change of clothes. What I should have brought and didn’t though was a towel and possibly a wash cloth. The lack of a towel wasn’t too much of a problem today because it quit raining before I got to work so I’d mostly dried off by the time I got there. The wash cloth would be handy for wiping my legs as they got a scosh dirty from road spray.

A couple of other essentials that I’d like to mention concern the bike itself. Fenders are a must if you choose to ride in the rain especially on the rear of the bike. That is unless you want an ugly skunk stripe of muck up your back. Another key thing to consider is making yourself more visible. Rain usually means it’s darker than normal so I suggest treating your commute as if it’s night time which means riding with a flashing red light in back and a flashing white light in the front. Anything you can do to help drivers see you is effort well spent.

Other than everything I’ve mentioned so far, the only other advice I could give is slow down a bit. Wet roads are slick. This is critical information particularly for turns, take them about 1/4 of the speed that you normally would. Also, pay special attention to crosswalks and those large steel plates that sometimes cover road construction. They’re like glass when wet so slow way down for them.

I’m glad I finally attempted a rain commute and I hope I’ve helped anyone considering it themselves. If I can do it, so can you!

Yours truly shot by Joshua’s camera phone during the Five Boro Bike Tour ’08. I’m Twitter’ing with my cellphone while we were stopped on the Queensboro Bridge. Some cyclists had been involved in an accident on the bridge so we were held up while medical attention was administered.

UPDATE: I just found out what happened on the bridge that temporarily stopped the tour. A man had a heart attack and fell off his bike. Another cyclist saved his life by administering CPR until the medics arrived. The Daily News has the full story. Wow.

It was really cool riding on those sections. Other favorites of mine from the tour include riding through Central Park, the well organized and stocked rest areas, and reaching the crest of the Verrazano-Narrows knowing it was all downhill to the finish. Here’s a few pics, there’s a couple more over at my Flickr account.

My friend and co-rider, Joshua.

The mass of riders waiting to cross 57th St. The course itself was closed to cars but in a few sections they made us wait for cross-traffic.

Cruising through Central Park, one of the nicer sections of the course. It was really pretty.

The Verrazano-Narrows Bridge viewed from the final rest stop. Intimidating does not begin to describe how it looked. We still had to cross it to reach the finish on Staten Island. Thankfully, it was mostly bark and only a little bite.

All in all, I had a super nice day. It was an awesome experience bicycling around one of the greatest cities in the world without having to worry about cars and all they entail. My thanks to Bike New York and all the tour sponsors for a wonderful and exhilarating bike ride.