Why a recumbent? Why a recumbent trike?
There are many reasons. (My daily commute rider will be one of these Matt. Under "cruisers" check out the GhostRider. ) My primary reason was comfort. Depending on how I describe my lovely neck pain, I could say I have a pinched nerve, compressed vertebrae, or shooting pains down my arms. However it's described, I stopped riding bikes because the enjoyment was, oohhhh: how does one say -nonexistent- and the pain would have turned a lesser person into a cripple. I hated to ride a bike. The Patron Saint of Instigation: Matt ShepardMatt and I started conversing about commuting to work, by bike. He does; I don't. I wanted him to go veggie and he wanted me to become communist, er, I mean a commuterist. (But I really wanted to get back into cycling not only commuting.) You start down one path and you get led to another. In looking at the forward crank designs, body-geometry improvements, and scientifically & technologically refined frames, a person could find a bike to fit their body. No more spanish inquisition torture rack for me. Why would anyone use a bike that pains their body? I have no idea. I didn't just want to ride though, I also wanted to spend more time outside, in the outisde world, in nature, away from a computer -and I like the internet. I've spent enough years exercising inside lifting weights. I will be sticking with Aikido though for the rest of my life. In getting back to commuting, I wanted to stick to my word yet I wanted to get more out of this for myself. Since, I've been shaving my spending down for nearly a year while devotedly siphoning funds into an account I had no access too, I finally could afford outright my (used) Catrike. The fruits of building a substantial ancillary savings account, led me to have enough for two things: buy a recumbent trike & (semi-regular) bike & a Tabletpc. The ride feels great again. Added to this the satisfaction of stuffing so much money away in such a short time to reach this objective my reward is doubled.triCycling for life:For my recumbent, once I tried a few of the industry designs, I decided to settle on: comfort, performance, and stability. Based on these fixed points, once I tried the Catrike, I found this trike fit my body like a glove. Obviously, I chose comfort first because I actually wanted to be able to ride free of pain -for a very long distance. I chose performance as the next point because I like to exercise; it's a de facto part of my life. Tie this with my want of spending more time outside. I already top over 40+ hours looking outside; so wistfully at times. Finally, stability has the lock on comfort and performance in my opinion; you will never achieve the kinds of rides you want to achieve if you don't feel at home on your ride.
Out of the recumbents of various designs I tried, the Catrike met my criteria. While this unique design may not make yours, remember the point that we're as different as we're alike and I personally thought Spider-Man 3 was awesome.There is more to come on this. I'm still compiling my thoughts. I'll give you more detail later and update you on my rides. I will race next year; it's at a velodrome in Florida!I'm still testing my ride out. I've clocked myself at over 25 m.p.h and rode for a 3.5 hour stretch with little body fatigue. My legs were wiped out though.Linkshttp://www.bikely.com/http://clevercycles.com/blog/?p=186http://recumbentcyclist.blogspot.com/http://bikeroute.com/WhyBent.php A number of towns have recently focused on making roads more accessible to bicycles. Here are some of the top spots chosen by the Bicycle Friendly Community Campaign from the League of American Bicyclists, an advocacy group based in Washington, D.C.
| CITY | % OF ARTERIAL ROADS WITH BIKE LANES | % OF COMMUTERS WHO BIKE | COMMENTS |
| Boulder, Colo. | 97% | 21% | Boulder has spent an average 15% of its transportation budget on building and maintaining bicycle traffic over the past five years. The goal is to create a system that's "equitable for all users," with no hierarchy among pedestrians, cars and bikes, says Marni Ratzel, who runs the city's program. |
| Chicago | 11% | 1-2% | Mayor Richard Michael Daley bikes to work, setting the example for this city, which released an ambitious new bike plan last year. The goal: making all of Chicago's streets safe and convenient for cycling. |
| Davis, Calif. | 95% | 17% | Mostly flat and temperate, this town's logo is a bicycle; it has more bikes than cars and is the only place to earn platinum status on Bicycle Friendly Community's list of top cities. The city is about to build a $1.7 million bike-only tunnel under a major road. |
| Madison, Wisc. | About 37% | 3.2% | There are 32 miles of bike lanes, 35 miles of bike paths and more than 100 miles of signed bike routes. On University Avenue, the major street in the downtown and University of Wisconsin campus area, there can be over 10,000 bicyclists a day -- plus 30,000 cars. |
| Palo Alto, Calif. | 13% | 5.7% | Along with the bike lanes on roads, the city also has nine miles of bike paths. In 2004 it spent about $5 million on a rail line under-crossing and $1.5 million on a 0.8-mile bike path. |
| Portland, Ore. | 28% | 5.4% | Though there are lots of hills and rain, this city has 163 miles of bike lanes. All but two bridges accommodate bicyclists. There's still a long way to go: The city still has 38 miles of bike lanes left in order to achieve its master plan. But in some neighborhoods bike commuters are as high as 9%. |
| San Francisco | About 4% | 2.1% | In November 2003, San Francisco voters approved a half-cent sales tax measure, estimated to total $2.6 billion over 30 years. Of that, $56 million (a little more than 2%) will go to bike-related projects. |
Labels: catrike, Recumbent Bicycle, spider-man_3, trike
