Sponsored Post: Fossil Fuels Are The Blood of Jesus!

("I read the news today, oy vey...")

Well, if nothing else, whether it's running people down with your car or simply executing them in public for the sheer fuck of it, New York City sure is a great place to kill.

But let's not dwell on all that right now.  Instead, let's celebrate life, and the casual risking of it in pursuit of fleeting Internet fame, local bragging rights, and relatively small amounts of money from multinational beverage conglomerates with annual revenues of almost US50 billion:




On an overcast 70-degree day in mid-October, about forty thrill-seeking bike messengers and cyclists sped off on an illegal bike race known as the alleycat, zig-zagging through traffic, running through red lights, and evading NYPD to compete for a hefty first place prize of $1,000 courtesy of the Coca-Cola Company, one of many sponsors. None of the competitors — mostly men on road and fixed gear bikes — knew where the 34-mile course would take them until the start of the race.

Not like I'm exactly crazy about the idea of people salmoning over the Willis Avenue Bridge, but to me the paltry purse offered by the Coca-Cola Company is by far the most egregious offense here.  I'd expect a measly grand from Chrome Industries or some other bunch of shants-wearers, but Coke?  They could have at least offered the winner some stock, for fuck's sake.

Then again, I'm not so sure this "collabo" was so good for Coke's bottom line:

Note that their stock price dips around mid-October, which is when the race took place.  Then it recovers during the following weeks, only to begin falling again yesterday which is exactly when the above video "dropped."

So is the alleycat scene in fact undermining the entire global economy?

Well, I'm not an economicalist, but clearly all indicators point to "yes."

("The economy is a seized cog, and low interest rates are the chainwhip."--Paul Krugman)

Anyway, my advice to the so-called cycling underground is this: next time a gigantic company wants to sponsor you, grab those fuckers by the balls and squeeze!  You're selling yourselves short with this penny-ante crap.  Tell them you want a purse of at least US$1 million, or else you'll expose how they're putting mind-control drugs in Dasani water.  (Fun fact: Dasani is rejected water deemed not sufficiently pure for the Coca-Cola bottling process.)

And people call me a sellout because I blog for an artisanal British bicycle saddle manufacturer?

Jeez.

By the way, have I mentioned that Brooks saddles are not only comfortable, but they also complement the aesthetic of your fine custom bicycle?

Sure, I've ruined it again with the dorky grips and corporate saddle bag, but still.

Also, I've got some jerseys for sale, just so you know:

I'm not selling out.  I'm selling in, baby!

Speaking of selling, the folding nerdists at Bike Friday have launched a Kickstarter campaign for a new cargo bike:



Not only that, but it's been funded more quickly than a multinational beverage corporation sues a lowly blogger for claiming that Dasani water contains 14% urine:

(Just looking at that makes me have to pee.)

And no, that's not true about the 14% urine.  The fact is that nobody is certain exaclty how much urine Dasani water contains.  According to Wikipedia, "Dasani uses tap water from local municipal water supplies," so presumably its urine content is dependent upon that of the respective municipalities' tap water.

You don't want the Cleveland batch is all I'm saying.

Anyway, back to the Bike Friday "Haul-a-Day" (which I would have called the "Smugtanic"):

(Leave your caucasian fleshtone expansion/contraction jokes in the comments below.)

Not that anyone cares what I think, but I wholeheartedly approve.  As a Big Dummy rider, my only real quibble with it is that it is a bit unwieldy at times:

So being able to truncate your smugness flotilla when you need to dock it in the ol' bike room or force your ungrateful child to shuttle you around for a change makes good sense to me.

Of course, as intrigued as I am, I completely forgot I saw one at the Philly Bike Expo until just now:

In my own defense, when you're in Philadelpha you only have two things on your mind: 1) cheese steak procurement; 2) your subsequent escape.  So I'm sure I missed a lot of nifty bike stuff.

Meanwhile, a far less inspiring Kickstarter campaign is this one, for the "B-Link Gear Bicycle Safety System:"


Basically, the inventor figured out he was more important than everyone else because he has a child:

("See this?  I'm the only person in the world who has one.")

So he came up with a set of "smart bike lights:"

So what is smart exactly about a yellow bicycle light?  Well, surely not the color, but it does automatically signal your turns when you input your route into your phone:

Which is great just as long as you NEVER DEVIATE FROM YOUR PRE-PLANNED ROUTE.

I mean really, you're riding a bicycle, not filing a flight plan with the FAA.  What happens when you suddenly decide to swing by so-and-so's house for some marijuana salad and a couple hits off the kale vaporizer?  You've got to stop and log a new route first?

Not only that, but it rats you out to mom when you get to where you're going:

And by way of obsessing over his family's movements, he's hired this guy and his creepy outline of a beard:

Presumably securing his services for the price of one (1) Scattante:

Best of all, let's say you get in a pretend crash with a Subaru:

In this case a timer starts:

And if you don't reset it within the allotted time it just assumes you've died, at which point it sends a still image of your final moments as well as a press release to your preset list of media contacts:

I feel safer already.

Lastly, here's some vintage velodrome porn:



The music, alas, is comtemporary.