Continental Bike Shop presents the Spoken Wrench vol4 no8

Continental Bike Shop presents the Spoken Wrench vol4 no8
Its August and someone’s forgotten to turn off the HEAT, edition.

This edition of the Spoken Wrench is brought to you by the letter “U” for unicycles and unified fronts. Now, I’m pretty certain that everyone knows what a unicycle is. For those that don’t, its one wheel with a crank, that you pedal. You can’t coast. Sometimes, if they’re really tall, they’ll have a chain. (think circus clowns on unicycles.) What I doubt most people know, is that there are some very adventurous people who mountain bike on them. I’m not one of them, though we’ve seen a number of downhill and mountain unicycles.

As for united fronts, read on to find out what the City of Detroit decided about bikes and licenses for bikes in the city.

Bike Licenses go Away.
Tuesday, 29 July 2008, Detroit City Council voted 7-0 to repeal the 1964 city ordinance that allowed police to issue $55 tickets to anyone without a license beginning 7 August. It was a pretty unenforceable law, that some of the people who went to City Council on Monday had already been ticketed for. So, thankfully, the city’s done something intelligent this summer. I will leave all other comments about Detroit politics for sharing over beer with your best mates. So, Thanks to everyone who’s worked so hard to make the City of Detroit a little more bike friendly, and especially everyone who went and spoke in front of the the public health and safety committee.

Jersey de Amarillo
No, there’s not a new race beginning this fall, the Vuelta a España awards the Jersey de Oro, the Gold Jersey. But this year’s Tour de France winner was Carlos Sastre, CSC rider from Spain. It seemed like a fairly dope-free tour, which makes for better racing, if less news and hype surrounding the tour. The next big race is the Vuelta which begins 30 August in Granada, Spain, near the Mediteranian coast of Spain.

New BMX Racing!
Question: What can you put on land that is constantly settling?
Answer: A BMX Track.

Now that’s important because Lise Blades, Chair of the Lyon Township Parks Committee wants to use part of James F. Atchison Memorial Park (situated conveniently, between 96 and Grand river, just east of Kensington Metropark) for a BMX race track. The park was constructed on a closed landfill, and while permanent structures won’t stand up to the settling, a dirt track really wont mind it, who knows, it could add character. Now, Blades is looking for help to get the project going.

If BMX is your thing, or you’d like to get involved, check out http://www.newhudsonbmx.blogspot.com/ for the latest news and progress on the New Hudson Track.

And, as an added bonus, BMX makes its medal debut this year at the Olympics. If you want to watch, all cycling events will take place 9-23 August, but how much coverage cycling will get, we don’t know yet. Be sure to check CBC-9 and NBC for their schedule of Olympic events.