It’s time for our round up of favorite links from the week:
- Need some fuel for your ride this weekend? How about the new downhill mountain bike speed record? 102.4 miles per hour…
- Drawings and paintings make intersections much more fun.
- “Hit The Dirt“… music to our ears.
- Who better to explore Capetown than Danny MacAskill?
- Where exactly is the world’s largest bike share?
And we’re pretty sure that if you haven’t seen it already, this little video will make your weekend:
Image: Adventure Journal
Turns out that there were a lot of good “I Choose Two Wheels Because…” submissions, and picking a winner was hard. But this one certainly stuck out, first because it was simple, and secondly because it was a good dose of inspiration for motivating others to get on two wheels:
I choose two wheels because it’s what keeps me alive!
At 33, two heart attacks and just avoiding a third one, it’s all those long miles on my two wheels that’s kept me here. Since then I’ve taken on ultra endurance racing and feel better all the time!
Congrats to Craig for scoring a new VIS 360 to light up his ride, and maybe even his ultra endurance races. And thanks to everyone for submitting, we’ve certainly been inspired by all of your responses. Now go ride!
Image: tabsinth
It’s always nice to see people doing good things with bikes. Shannon Galpin is a prime example. In 2009 she became the first woman to ride a mountain bike in Afghanistan.
In honor of that initial ride, Galpin is using bikes to raise awareness for her nonprofit that does extensive work to empower women and children in Afghanistan, Mountain2Mountain. She’s doing so with the Panjshir Tour, a bike ride hosted on October 8, 2011 in cities across the United States.
You can even get in touch to host your own tour!
Find out more about the tour and how to get involved.
Welcome to Life in Motion, a weekly feature where we bring you some of the best in bike related videos. Shorts, trailers or just viral goodness, check back every Wednesday for a good mental health break.
We’ve received some excellent submissions for our “I choose two wheels because…” contest, so today we’re featuring some of our favorites.
I choose two wheels because not only does biking to work save on gas, but when you can shower there, you can save on your water bill too 
I choose to ride two wheels because… of the emotion and exhilaration of the downhill.
Riding past a car with a wallet and phone on the roof, I realized it was good to be on two wheels.
Haven’t entered yet? Hop to, we’ll be choosing the winner next week! All you have to do to enter to win a brand spanking new VIS 180 is complete the sentence “I choose two wheels because…”
You can answer here in the comments or on our Facebook page. At the end of the month we’ll choose a winner at random!
Note: We can only ship to U.S. addresses.
Image: andymangold
Got Memorial Day plans? If not, you might want to check out BURN 24 Hour Challenge, taking place this weekend in Wilkesboro, North Carolina and presented by one of our favorite sites, BikeRumor.com.
We’ll got some lights up for grabs: a Seca 700 to the male and female with the fastest individual lap times turned under the cover of darkness. Night laps will be timed between 9pm and 5am.
We pulled some photos from previous Burn 24 Hour Challenges to give you a visual of just what to expect.
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!
It’s national Bike to Work Day, and since we’ve been talking about Bike to Work Week for the last few days, we’re devoting this week’s list of favorite links to commuting on two wheels.
- First off, be sure to stay safe. (Rocking lights are just the beginning)
- If this little old lady can ride her bike to work, what’s your excuse??
- People for Bikes made some rocking posters. If these don’t make you want to bike commute, we don’t know what will.
- Biking to work helps you reduce your risk of heart disease… by up to 50%.
- Still not sure about bike commuting? Here are 11 tips to get you started.
- And if you missed out on today’s Bike to Work Day, this sweet event is only a month away.
And whatever you do today, don’t overpack. You don’t want your commute looking like this:
Happy Friday!
Image: Wired
I won my first major bike race the other weekend.
This may not seem like too big of a deal. People win every weekend in races all across the country; someone rides faster than the others and walks away stoked. However, for me, this race, and riding in general, has been about joy, healing, support and strength.
Driving down to Colorado for the 2011 18 hours of Fruita, I had a moment where I flashed back to where I was a year ago. I was 29 years old. I had been diagnosed with a relatively aggressive type of breast cancer in February which had already spread to my lymph nodes. I underwent 3 surgeries almost immediately, including a mastectomy and axillary dissection (where they essentially use an “ice cream scoop” technique to take out the lymph tissue in your armpit).
My at-the-time fiance (now husband) and I had to decide within one week if we wanted to have children — odds were good that the chemo would kill off my chances of that. Because we did, we underwent the first part of IVF. Then I started chemo.
1 year ago I was 2 rounds in. I had stopped riding my bike, though I was still trying to run, but my blood counts were low and I would get dizzy if I went too far or too fast. The worry was that I would black out, fall off my bike and end up in the hospital. I kept running for a while and then when that became too much I would walk with little jogs thrown in for good measure. Eventually all I could do was walk. I was too weak to carry more than one grocery bag in from the car at a time. At the encouragement of my husband I kept moving, I just walked and walked. It is a good thing my dog is about 11 and moves pretty slowly, because slow was the only pace that I had.
Since that time I completed another 6 rounds of chemo, 25 doses of radiation and one more surgery. I signed up for the race with my teammate, Bec Bale, in November. I’m not sure what I was thinking really, I just knew that it was a long ways off at that point and it sounded like fun.
I hoped I could be ready to ride.
For this week’s Life in Motion, we’re featuring the new PSA by People for Bikes. We can’t get enough of it!
Although we might change the title to Bikes and Lights Make Life Better…
We’ve received some excellent submissions for our “I choose two wheels because…” contest, so today we’re featuring some of our favorites.
- I choose two wheels because it’s a way to experience the sights and sounds of my city. When you ride, you’re part of your environment. When you drive, you’re isolate and miss out on so much.
- I choose two wheels because… I am the engine and it brings me great pleasure to motor my way to explore new places, faces and experiences.
- I choose 2 wheels because… of the freedom and the clarity it brings! A bicycle has given me freedom for as long as I can remember; from my first banana seat, to my super light carbon road bike. Nothing like a bike ride to let everything go!
- I choose two wheels because on the trail, there’s no phone calls, no deadlines, no traffic, and NO ANGRY DRIVERS!
Haven’t entered yet? Hop to! All you have to do to enter to win a brand spanking new VIS 180 is complete the sentence “I choose two wheels because…”
You can answer here in the comments or on our Facebook page. At the end of the month we’ll choose a winner at random!
Note: We can only ship to U.S. addresses.
Image: richardmasoner
Katy Crane on 
Charles Allen on 
