The Slow Lane: Smugness by the Shedload

As I mentioned on Friday, this past weekend I traveled to whatever that country in Europe is in order to compete in the 417th running of the Paris-Roubaix road race. Also known as the l'enfant du Nord, Paris-Roubaix is famous for its giant cobblesones (or "pavé," which is pronounced "LAY-oh-pard Trek") which rain from the sky bringing death and destruction and crushing the hopes and dreams of all who taunt their skull-crushing power. Also, there's cake, and at the end they have a big naked shower party. (Legend has it that hirsute Classics specialist Peter Van Petegem once clogged the drains so badly with his body hair that the Roubaix vélodrome was flooded for weeks afterwards, during which time the local children simply used it as a community swimming pool.)

Alas, I'm sorry to report that I failed to win Paris-Roubaix this year due to a mechanical (my bolo tie got caught in my drivetrain at a crucial moment again), which allowed Garmin-Cervelo rider Johan Van Summeren to ride away from me and take the victory. Then, in a touching moment, he proposed marriage to his girlfriend:

Sadly she kicked him in the "pants yabbies" and told him to go "eff" himself, but at least he'll always have his Paris-Roubaix novelty trophy. Team director Jonathan Vaughters, for his part, was up to his ascot in smugness, and he celebrated by having an uncharacteristically raucous celebratory tea party with both of his sideburns.

Meanwhile, in addition to missing the decisive move in Paris-Roubaix because I was being strangled by my tie, I'm also almost exactly three months late in mentioning that the good people at Vecchio's Bicicletteria in Boulder, CO have a new three month-old website:

I've never actually been to Vecchio's (only because I've never been to Boulder) but as an erstwhile reader of the rec.bicycles.tech newsgroup I've long fantasized about producing a "Firing Line"-esque TV show about wheelbuilding and owner/patriarch Peter Chisholm would easily be my top choice to play the William F. Buckley, Jr. role if Jobst Brandt were not available. Anyway, visit the website, or better yet the shop--or, just do what minimalists do and stand around in the shop while browsing the website on your iPad.

In any case, while I was off humiliating myself on the cobbled roads of northern whatever-that-country-is, I missed The Prospect Park West Bike Lane Smug-In, though thanks to Streetsfilms I feel like I was there (minus the all-consuming sense of self-satisfaction):

Prospect Park West Family Bike Ride/We Ride the Lanes from Streetfilms on Vimeo.

I very much regret having missed this ride, partially because I support this bike lane, but mostly because it consisted of a bunch of total slowpokes so I would have totally "thrown down" and "Cat 6"-ed the hell out of everybody:

As any seasoned competitive commuter or charity ride menace can see, the move here is to rocket up the left side. Then, when you encounter the riders heading in the other direction, you just hop the curb, hit those cobbles, and "Whap!" with your elbow any orange-shirted smugness marshalls foolish enough to get in your way:

I'd have been at the Connecticut Muffin in Windsor Terrace before half those smugmongers were even finished zipping up their DayGlo windbreakers. Amateurs. (By which I mean amateur amateurs. A "Cat 6" racer is, of course, a pro amateur.) I mean, seriously, who would have challenged me? A bunch of smuggies on "bake feets?"

I don't think so.

Besides missing an opportunity for victory, it looks like as the participants passed each other they also missed a perfect setup for a truly "epic" high five train:

I was also tremendously disappointed by the safety-minded chanting and general air of positivity:

I kind of hoped that they'd go with something more confrontational, like "All You Stevens Spirn My Balls:"

("My balls have been spurned for years, now see how you like it.")

Anyway, last I checked, this was America (Canada's wobbly step stool), and the only thing Americans respect less than yielding is Canadians. Did cars take control of the streets by yielding to pedestrians? No they did not--they did it by killing them indiscriminately and in huge numbers. Maybe instead of emphasizing the whole "safe, clean, and healthy" thing cyclists should just start threatening to crush all opposition beneath our wheels, and to pile their lifeless bodies into the boxy wheelbarrow parts our "bake feets." Americans have no interest in surrendering even an inch of their streets to any vehicle that isn't deadly, but I bet if bicycles killed hundreds of people last year instead of like nobody that they'd be giving us bike lanes twice as wide. Maybe if we ratchet up that death toll we'll have our very own infrastructure faster than you can say, "Yay, smugness!"

("Yay, smugness!")

But how many victims is enough? Perhaps a "shed-load" will do it. As it happens, a reader tells me that the "shed culture" and the "bike culture" have finally come together, and that the bicycle industry has finally embraced the shed as a unit of measurement:

The pedal body is 63mm wide, which is exactly the same width as Look Keo Carbon Blades (£274.99 with titanium axle, £179.99 with cro-mo axle), so you get a shed-load of stability.

So, to recap:

--To measure frame weight, you use either milk or babies;

--To measure spoke strength, you use diminutive Frenchmen (or DFUs);

--To measure road hazards, you use sunglasses;

--To measure smugness, you use a complex formula which yields the "smugness quotient;"

--To measure pedal stability you use sheds.

As of now I'm still unclear on how much a "shed-load is" (to say nothing as to whether or not DFUs can be converted into shed-loads), but I'm guessing that, since this is a Dura-Ace pedal, it's even more than a "shitload" (Ultegra) and maybe twice as much as a "buttload" (105).

That's definitely a worthwhile upgrade.

Posted in: cycling in nyc