the promised pics
These pictures really aren't that great. One, I've forgotten how to take pictures. Two, it was a bright sunny day and I with no polarizing filter. Three, it was a bright sunny day and I thought it a good idea to take shots into the sun. Four, I think this lens (the free one) is a little boogered up.
The setting:
The sunlight:
The stupid little hill that did in my chain:
The finishing chute:
The post-race "Huffy Toss":
The Huffy Toss winner got a case of beer.
3 comments:
So, did you participate in the "Huffy Toss" after practicing with your own bike? Sure, you didn't need the case of beer, but why not?
Everybody rags so much on Huffy, but there is a real need for low-end bikes for kids if cycling is ever going to come back in popularity.
I remember back a hundred years ago when I was eight and I got my first bike which was a Huffy. We were a pretty poor family and for me it was a pretty cool thing. It was a major form of transportation for me. My local bike advocacy organization just donated a bunch of used bikes to some refugee kids who needed something for transportation. All of them deeply appreciated the low-end bikes. So no ragging on low-end bikes for me. Now days, most kids don't even bother to get bikes, they are so busy being driven to all their activities by their parents.
Maybe next year, instead of a Huffy toss, the sponsors could have a "Huffy charity race", sort of like soap box derbies, where every rider buys a Huffy to ride one lap and (assuming any of the bikes survive the trek) they donate them to local at-risk kids. I think it would be a hoot just to get back to the crazy dirt bike days of being a kid (baseball cards in the spokes, etc) and would remind elite cyclists of the truly grand privilege it is to ride that masterful pieces of art and engineering that is the modern high-end mountain bike.
It may make you feel a little better to know that there were audible rumblings among the riders at the wanton destruction of a perfectly usable bike for mere entertainment. But, all things considered, we through away a lot more for a lot less...
Anyway, I think that's a wonderful idea... Maybe we could have a huffy crit. The cost of entry is the wholesale cost of the bike, minus whatever you can get from sponsors. All the entrants take one lap on the kids bikes. No bikes are destroyed. All the bikes are afterwards distributed to kids who need bikes. Another sponsor supplies the helmets.
I like it.
Post a Comment