Cool article posted over at Decline Magazine online about how your muscles are being used during each pedal revolution.
One of the most persistent objections I hear from riders who have never tried flats is that without being attached to the pedals you can not use your hamstrings properly which forces you to rely too much on the quads the power the pedal stroke. By not being able to curl the knee joint during the upstroke of the pedal stroke you create muscular imbalances and tire out the quads faster, or at least that is what these riders say. However, this understanding of which muscles are used and how they are used during a pedal stroke is completely wrong and potentially dangerous over the long run.
When I ask why someone thinks that the muscles are used this way during the pedal stroke I am invariably led to some variation of this picture/ chart:
According to this theoretical model of muscles used during the pedal stroke the hamstrings are used maximally from 8 o’clock to 10 o’clock position while the glutes and quads are responsible for the downstroke part of the pedal stroke. This paints a completely false picture of the situation and leads a lot riders to assume that the hamstrings are only there to flex the knee joint on the upstroke, which would be impossible to do if you weren’t attached to the pedals. This, of course, would mean that it would be impossible to optimally pedal without clipless pedals, which is where the faulty logic stems from.
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A nice vid of 50 sweet no hander bike moves…. and one crash 
Wonderful day in the life of a man on his bike by Montreal-based director Guillaume Blanchet.
Check out the video clip from Momentum’s Urban Fashion Show: IMG_MomentumFashionShow
The Urban is a beautifully designed light in which form meets function in a small and powerful package. The Urban 180, 300 and NEW Urban 500s are packed with features and deliver more lumens per gram than anything in their class.
The Urban projects a powerful and graduated beam of bright white light to provide the cyclist with high visibility and a long-line of sight – See and Be Seen. One touch High-Medium-Low-Flash provides multiple output settings for urban riding in dense traffic day or night.
The amber side emitters of the Urban provide cyclists greater visibility at intersections where over 70% of accidents occur.
The Urban delivers accurate battery charge status, so you are never left wondering if you will make it home on the current charge. And, the all-in-one system means that there are no external batteries or cables. This rechargeable system saves you more than $800 over the life of the light vs. throw-away battery type lights and is better for the planet too!
With amber side emitters for 180 degrees of visibility, tool-less mounting for bar and helmet, and an accurate battery gauge indicator, the Urban answers the performance and safety requirements of the most ardent commuter.
If you are heading to Interbike this week stop by and check out our new line of lights! Light & Motion will be at booth #19105.
Digging this shot from Flickr user habi, where he used both his front and back lights to “paint” his bike. The dashed effect comes from setting his light on the flashing, “strobe light,” mode. Here’s another one we like:
Do you take fun night shots with your bike? Send them our way! Either post to our Facebook page or upload to our Flickr group. We want to see how you paint with light!
Last week we celebrated San Francisco Bay Area’s official Bike to Work Day by setting up a booth on the Monterey bike path and serving up free breakfast for anyone making their way to work on two wheels.
Lots of fun and great to see so many people out!
We sure do have fun with our lights. Here’s one of the shots we took at our photo shoot last year in Sun Valley.
Want to try painting with light for yourself? Score your own set of Light & Motion commuter lights, find a dark space and then show us just what work your creative spirit inspired!
Check out our upcoming Urban series of commuter bike lights for 2011.
76% lighter and 30% brighter than any other light in its class, the Urban brings rechargeable, all-in-one light systems to a new level.
Along with the popular Vis 360 and Vis 180, Light & Motion’s commuter lights ensure that you can see and be seen.
Katy Crane on 
Charles Allen on 
