The Soma Shikoro, named for the neck guard on a samurai’s helmet.
The Nobilette finally has some “new” rubber.
I call it “new,” but these 700×33 Soma Shikoros have been laying doggo in the garage for the better part of quite some time. I only just now got around to clamping ’em onto a pair of hoops.
They’re a pretty skinny 33mm. At 60/65 psi I make ’em more like 31mm. But they have a nice round profile, are armored from bead to bead to fend off the nasties, and went on smoove like butta.
As you can see I’ve already had them in the soft stuff, and they performed adequately, but then “soft,” like “new” and “33mm,” is relative. We’ve had an unusual amount of rain and the trails are nicely packed (where they’re not rutted all to shitaree).
You can get the Shikoro in 700×23, 28, 33, 38 and 42, steel or Kevlar bead, and in a 700×48 tubeless edition.
I’m shocked, shocked, that some people seem to believe that e-bikes are the modern equivalent of the philosopher’s stone.
This just in: E-bikes cure* Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s, arthritis, erectile dysfunction, post-nasal drip, gout, piles, dandruff, denture breath, and the heartbreak of psoriasis (Christ, you don’t know the meaning of heartbreak, buddy, c’mon, c’mon).
* You will note the caveat buried deep in the piece: “(A)ttaining these health benefits requires tackling the problem of poor street design and infrastructure in America. Everything from high speed limits to wide roads to light timing that prioritizes the flow of vehicles poses a threat to older people walking in their communities … and also creates barriers to people participating in cycling.”
MAGA, etc., et al., and so on and so forth. I’d speculate as to whether Art O. DeDeal is trying to croak the bike biz because of the relentless roasting I’ve given him, but he doesn’t know Schwinn from Shinola.
He apparently wants everyone else to lose money the way he did.
I’ve lived in all three of these cities. I didn’t ride much in Tucson, because I lived way out north on Orange Grove Road, and it was hotter than hell. Swimming was my primary activity down there. Well, to be strictly accurate, swimming was tertiary, behind drinking beer and eating Mexican food.
My old hometown of Bibleburg managed 12th, while the Duke City rolled in with the laughing group at … 240th?
I’m not a data nerd, but speaking as someone who has logged a few thousand miles per annum in both Bibleburg and ’Burque, I can’t say that I see such a vast cycling-quality chasm between the two. Your mileage may vary, of course.
The kicker may be that these city ratings reward “rapid progress.” Sayeth the People for Bikes: “We recognize hardworking cities that are implementing quick-building techniques to improve biking in their city.”
I haven’t hit the streets in Bibleburg lately to gauge their progress toward velo-nirvana, and maybe ’Burque is stuck on New Mexico Standard Time. We’ve been kind of busy being unemployed and killing each other lately.
But my admittedly casual observation is that we have about four times as many bike paths and trails, a metric shit-ton of cyclists of all types, more bike shops than you can shake a pedal wrench at, plus a considerably larger number of people commuting by bicycle and better weather to do it in.
And the annual BikeABQ bike swap crushes it. Two of Herself’s friends bought bikes there over the weekend, we sold one, and former BRAIN tech editor and first-time seller Matt Wiebe said the swap was bigger than he had expected.
Where does your hometown land on the list, and how does its ranking fit with your own observations? Sound off in comments.
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