Carrying Soap on a Bicycle Tour

Soap can end up having a considerable weight penalty on a trip if one carries 1) hand soap, 2) shampoo, 3) dishwashing detergent, 4) soap for washing clothes, and 5) a degreaser. To save weight and yet have all the soap I need, I carry a single bottle of concentrated dish detergent. It is an excellent hand soap and has anti-bacterial properties and seems to clean my hair just fine and of course works on dishes. A small amount washes my clothes without being harsh on them, and I will explain how to use it as a degreaser in the next tip.

One environmental note of warning: never discard soapy water into or use soap in a stream or lake. Instead, wash yourself and your pots away from the water and rinse away from the water too. I have found that a good swim in a creek or lake will clean the body fairly well without the use of soap. All that soap does, anyway, is to dissolve grease, and there is only a small amount of skin oil on our bodies.

Source : Ken Kifer's Bike Page : Tips and Tricks for Bicycle Touring / Photo from Bike Nerd.

Lance Armstrong Says: Commute by Bike!

Lance Armstrong can do amazing things on a bicycle (most notably, ride it very quickly up very steep mountains). Yet it turns out that, for all the individual glory he has achieved as a professional cyclist, his greatest contribution to cycling may be his promotion of the bicycle as a form of transportation and recreation. Armstrong is about to open an 18,000 square-foot bicycle store in his hometown of Austin, Texas where, apart from selling the usual bicycle products, he will "promote bike culture and bike commuting" by providing showers and a locker room, as well as bicycle storage, for bicycle commuters that lack those facilities at their offices. As Armstrong himself noted, "This city is exploding downtown. Are all these people in high rises going to drive everywhere? We have to promote (bike) commuting..."

So you don't have to have Armstrong's quads to commute to work (although it wouldn't hurt), but having him in your town certainly helps.

Mat Touring'd say...GO LANCE!!!!

Source: Trehugger.com

Cycling Tips of the day

After a long uphill, don't coast downhill without pedaling. As you climb up the hill, lactic acid builds up in your muscles and can contribute to muscle soreness. By pedaling lightly but constantly while coasting downhill (even if there's little resistance) you can help remove the lactic acid.

Source: UC Berkeley Wellness Letter.com

Street Surfer

When browsing the Net today, I found this 'funny' looking bike and wonder whether we would see it on Malaysia roads soon. (Bet, we will coz Malaysian cyclists are 'kiasu' too!) After watching the video (below), it seems to be more an 'X-treme' kinda biking rather than the 'normal' on-road or off-road cycling. Due to its 'free-styling' ability similar to the bmx, i think it will be big one day and who knows, may be we will see it in the Olympics or at least the X-Games.



Visit the website here

Source: Tasty Adventure

Sheldon Brown: RIP

Sheldon Brown: 1944 - 2008

Visit his website (click here)

Source : harris cyclery - visit their website for 'hard to get' parts & accessories.

Apology

Being a guy who love cycling, I set up this blog to provide information for my friends and other cycling enthusiast and I don't make any profit out of it. However, on September 4, 2007, I have been warned about one of the photo that was used in my blog titled 'Tire Rotation' that was used without permission. Hence, I would like to apologize to www.DownTheRoad.org for my error and have taken out the photo from my blog to avoid any legal implication in the future.

SORRY..

A Long Way Home

Fresh out of school, 23-year-old Malaysian Law Tzuo Hann is cycling back to Malaysia from the United States. Chow How Ban meets up with the Duke University graduate during his stopover at Suzhou in China.

Click here: http://videos.thestar.com.my/default.aspx?vid=811

Source: The Star Online