I have a bike!

Okay- so I cheated a tiny bit. Instead of rummaging around through the array of parts from the community bike project, the very generous Amber volunteered to give me her bike to play with. She was going to donate it to the bike project, but instead I decided I should give it a home with all its limbs before someone at the project disassembled all its parts.

It’s very different from the bike I’ve been ‘practicing’ on. This bike is a road bike, as opposed to the mountain bike I was riding earlier in the summer. This means, the tires are tiny (how in the world are those tires going to balance my entire body??), and the handle bars are more narrow to create a more streamline feel (I’m going to pretend I’m a piece of paper refusing to fly away with the wind).

Other than getting used to riding a new bike, there are a few things that  need to be done. The bike only has a front brake, and I need a back brake. I’m already working tremendously hard to learn how to brake accurately (bias the back brake over the front brake, completely stop before dismounting, etc), so it’ll be nice to get those back stoppers.  The bike is also in a fixed gear, and I have the option to mount a derailleur (or two) and give a little more oompf when I need to get on those hills. Other than that, there is nothing I absolutely have to do on the bike. I’m just excited to start biking around the city.

And 4 days later…

I rode my bike to school! I had anticipated to work on the bike after classes at the Bloomington Bike Community and I reckoned it was necessary to actually have the bike when I did the work that needed to be done. So after my helmet was strapped on, Scott and I began the trip NOT on tenth street. I only live about 1.5 miles east of SPEA on 10^th, but there is nothing more reassuring to hear that there are paths I can ride that do not involve crossing the bypass and construction haven. I ventured through the ‘hills’ of Bloomington, the zooming cyclists (without helmets!), and the slight bumps on the road that seem to appear just when I’m a foot away  and aren’t so slight  when I have to go over it. However, I did manage to follow stop signs and hit a couple of posts to avoid crashing into people or the ground, but other than that, I remained unscathed. And I feel pretty good about it.

I did not make it to the bike project today but I will be there on Wednesday (and probably subsequent Wednesdays), as I have been in the last couple of weeks. Find me there!