Ah, sorry, I almost forget. There are a lot of web pages where you can get information on air pollution (or whaever it is what you are interested in) in Madrid. Take a look for instance at this one. It´s real time air pollution level: http://www.mambiente.munimadrid.es/svca/index.php?lang=es You can get historical, instant data or SMS alert., graphic, acustic pollution, etc, etc... Cheers!
Absolutely agree with that, I spent my Erasmus in R'dam and it was amazing how many bikes were in the road everyday. No matter if it was raining, snowing, you could see students, businessmen in suits, driving no hands while talking at mobile phone, eating or rolling a cigarrette...It is a different world. Also, I have to say I had 5 different bikes in 7 months. One day a junkie stole your bike and the day after the same junkie tried to sell your own bike....Well, I paid 5 or 10 euros for each one, so, not a big deal.
LOL ! :mrgreen: Consider it as a junkie-tax! So I guess you miss a lot your student days there in the Netherlands, the land in which the pride for an old, heavy and faithfull bike has nothing to do with what an oldie means around here... I was told that many of the dutch people prefer an old bike over a new one. If their bike proves to serve them well, they are reluctant to change it for a very long time, or even for ever, no matter what new model is around the corner. Cheers!
Probably your bike goes faster downhill because you've got your aerobars on and you're more aerodynamic. The faster you're going, the more wind resistence, and if you're aerodynamic, you go faster. On the other hand, you may be following the other rider and riding in his (or her) slipstream. That happens all the time on road bikes. You're following right behind another cyclists and you begin to think that he's going a bit slowly, so you pull out in front and suddenly you're hit by a strong headwind you didn't even realize was there because the other guy was breaking the wind. This is why road bikers like going in a peloton: it makes pedaling way easier. By the way, that's something else interesting. Road biking involves a lot of cooperation among the cyclists. That doesn't really exist in the same way among mountain bikers. http://www.bicyclesource.com/slipstreaming Today I rode up and down a hill on my hybrid. There was a fairly strong cool wind blowing, and I was glad about that. I figure it's probably blowing the pollution away, or dispersing it, or whatever. Cheers!
Doohan! Good to hear from you in English. And I know you're going to start commuting to work by bike. Maybe one day you'll be so good at it you'll ride along with no hands on the handlebars while closing major deals on your mobile phone and while zipping through Madrid traffic. I understand about getting attached to a bike. I know I am to my 20-year-old hybrid. I suppose this attachment is a bit old-fashioned in our consumer society, but my hybrid does its job well!
I think it´s a human approach feeling to an object or device. I mean, when you really like something you see it with human eyes, you feel it´s your personal stuff and even you treat it as if it were a human person... It happens with cars, bicycles or motorbikes. We tend to think of them in human terms, while we just see objects that we don´t like that much as mere functional objects. Doohan, we are looking forward to hearing how it is like commuting to work in Madrid!!!. This afternoon I will put a test wheel on my bike. It came with an all-porpouse 700x35 standard wheels and I want to test a skinny 700x28 I had deep in my garage... For safety reasons these wheels I have are too old to stay mounted (I´m gonna ask the forum what year they can be. They are a very very old - Michelin Carrera, not in the market for many years I guess- but in not bad apparently condition) but can serve me as a test to go -depending on the results- narrow in the future if needed. I will only install the rear one, so that I can test traction, rolling resistance and speed but keeping the grip direction with the 35 in the lead. Rim and tire size recommendations: http://www.jaxgtr.net/BFStuff/tiresize.jpg Cheers!
So you've come across some wheels in your garage, not tires, right? So have you put them on your bike and gone for a spin? You'll go faster with narrower tires. The tires are really thin (700x23) on my road bike and I keep them inflated to the maximum, so there's very little in contact with the ground. It's interesting that Mountain bikes often have wider front tires than rear tires, because the focus is on traction and not washing out. But road bikes usually have tires of the same width, or wider in the rear. In fact, my Scattante came with 700x21 up front and 700x23 on the rear.
Oh sorry, my fault. Not wheels but tires, just the rubber, not the rim. You can see the different color the tire has in the photos below. Anyway I went for a "spin", well a 120 Kmts - My record: 121.400 Kmts to be exact- saturday spin! on that rear 700x28 tire... 700x35 as usual on the front tire. I´ve to say that I couldn´t take a real feeling of what it is to ride that narrow for a hybrid, because I also put a set of panniers on, but I can tell how different it is a 28mm from a 35mm... smoother and for sure speedy. Nevertheless I am just testing some things and will probably go back to 35, but I am seriously considering a different front-rear width, narrower in the rear... I just don´t get the idea of a narrower in the front even in a road bike... I´m pretty sure The guys at Scattante or any other roadie with wider rear tires did it for some reason, but as far as I know, it is better not to loose control in the front, especially when you go that narrow... 700x21!!! Well, as promissed, here you are the photos of my aerohybrid-light-sport-touring bike, panniers attached: This is how the aerobar looks like from the rider view: This is the before. Take into account that I can remove all the devices installed whenever I want!: And finally, this is how I keep my bike, hanged up at home: Cheers! Pd.- Oh, one more photo. This is the reason why I can be 5kmts/h faster aero-mode on!: Anyway, I am also testing an "ECO_MODE" on. It consists of going on the aerobars but not pushing hard... I can save power. It´s a great idea to go touring biking for long distances. As you can see, aero mode is not only for speed... . I now think all the touring bikes should have a standard aerobar. It´s a lot of helpful!
Well, I have to say that your bike is looking cool and exotic. I think your bike would be particularly appropriate for the Santiago de Compostela trail, because you'll look like you're so devout that you couldn't wait to start praying :amo By the way, nice pictures! Where is that pretty place where you took the recent pictures of your bike? Changing gears, I recently mentioned that a friend of mine, Rod, bought a Torah 4.9. Well, today the two of us went for a ride in the Casa de Campo, and he is thrilled to pieces with the bike. I mean, he was just raving about it. Well, it's vastly superior to his old mountain bike, which was completely rigid: no shocks to be found anywhere. And now he has some very good Recon forks on his steed. I tried the bike out myself and I was definitely impressed. The bike felt like one that would cost far more than 590 euros. Actually it has a better front suspension than my bike has: I have a Tora and he has a Recon, one notch higher. In any case, the bike is a fantastic value. Hey, maybe you should get one! :saltador
Hello ! I´m new in this section, and if i tell the truth I like a lot the idea to practice english. I´m sorry first at all because its sure I´m going to write a lot of wrong words. I´m from the south of Spain in Alicante and normaly I ride with my BTT every saturday and i ride with my road bike sunday and two days more during the week. I would like use the bike to move in the city but here normaly its too hot. These days who are raining normally I don´t ride.
Hi Armentano! Feel free to comment here anytime you feel like it, and don't worry about making mistakes in English. It sounds like we have similar riding habits. I ride my road bike on Friday, and usually my mountain bike on Saturday and Sunday. Also I tend to get on my hybrid bike on a weekday and do hills, and I go jogging once a week, so five days exercising and two days off. I also try and stretch regularly. You know, it's preventive medicine, especially if you aren't as young as you used to be, but never mind that. In any case, what sort of mountain biking are you into?
Welcome to this part of the forum, Armentano. I use to go to Alicante in the summer time, as many madrileños do!. Nice places over there and great people. The only problem at least for me- is the hot humidity. Well, the humid weather you have due to the Mediterranean Sea from Barcelona to Almeria- make me feel like as if it is 8 more degrees!!!. Oh man, I sweated like a pig when I went to ride my bike there!. Even when I didn´t push a lot!. You have to constant rehydrate when riding there But Alicante is one of my favorite provinces to spend a week on the beach!. Feel free to write in here whenever you want. I also have a rusty English but Chainring will forgive us. This thread I guess was intended to be a non-native Spanish speakers gathering but since I only saw 3 or 4 foreign people, we Spaniards can do our best to take over Chain, Glad to hear that about the Torah. You know mate, It´s a Berg. It will never let you down!... CaN YoU DiG iT???. The Torah 4.9 is a great deal, but Im still deciding if I´m anything else apart from being a hybrid touring man I definitely don´t like the downhill modality, so I guess I won´t have the problems you have in choosing one of those expensive full suspension bikes Concerning bikes like the Torah and the like, I´ve to decide if I enjoy travelling fast in the dirt. I mean, I already have an old non-even-1-single-suspension, rigid as it can be, steel frame, and at least 14 y.o. MTB . It Serves me well. I think I don´t like going fast in the dirt like I sometime enjoying going fast (well, relatively fast) on the road so my old MTD is not that bad for me. I bought a rack standard this time- and it´s also a versatile MTB But above all I LIKE THE FEELING OF A STEEL FRAME!!!. Call me nostalgic or old fashioned, but I like it a lot. My next hybrid (if there will be one) will be totally steel made. Obviously it wont be the case if I´d decided to buy a road bike. But for now I get by with the two bikes that I have. The old one is simply a careless bike. I just don´t spend too many time in cleaning it. I can go for a ride and forget the bike wherever I wanted. Nobody will think of stolen it!... I will take a photo of her Just for the sake of the ego of old bikes!!! That place in the photo is somewhere between Cerceda and Navacerrada town. There are a lot of pathways along the road, or cañadas for the live stock I guess not in much use nowadays- , that I will explore someday. I saw many bikers over there. Certainly nice places to ride Today was a rainy day in Madrid. Some years ago you couldn´t see a single biker in the rain, but we will see better times for the biking side of transportation Today I saw several commuters by bike. Just the top of the Iceberg I foresee Cheers!
Hi chainring! First at all thanks for your welcome. If I tell the truth i like road and mountainbike the first one I like because you can practice with any traffic, and I like ride by the mountains. I´m this kind of rider who enjoys when arrives uphills, of course I enjoy more when it´s downhill, normally the route we can make every saturday have long distances near 65km or 85 km it´s depend the area we move. For example our idea for next saturday it´s throw Sierra Mariola until Alcoy, I think it´s the best area you can ride here, you can practice all with your bike up, down, complicated tracks and of course Moncabrer hill include it´s a hard uphill with out traction. This route it´s near 77 km but it seems 150 km, we make twice every year. My mountainbike it´s a Cannondale Rush with 120 it´s very confortable, a marathon bike. For other part I like road bike too. It´s diferent than the Btt, normaly I use more because in one hour and a half I can ride 50km and you can take this point very important if you can take part in a competition, normaly when it´s posible for me I make something .My last one was I ALEJANDRO VALVERDE . In the past I had practiced running too. But now I prefer only ride because I had a lot of problems with injuries and finally I decided ride only.
Hi Interaptor! All you are telling about this area in summer it´s true. I think the biggest poblem who have people in general it´s think than bikes are only for the summer. And here normally we ride in summer with the road bike more than the BTT, the reason it´s always the same it´s too hot. The most important hills in the area we only up in winter, obviosly our winter it´s perfect to ride, we have same tyres in winter than in summer, when it´s raining we don´t ride, because it´s posible in all the last year we lose only three or four ride days. For example just today I´m going to ride with the same clothes than in summer, normaly until december we use summer clothes. I think this it´s one of the reason because there are a lot of riders in this area, in Murcia too normalle sunday I ride there it´s incredible the number of riders you can see on weekends. For other part I would like one day ride for places were the views are in green jejeje because normally here it´s all too dry.
Yeah, you are right. I´ve never experienced a warm wintertime. It sounds weird to me, but I Know how winters are over there. Here in Madrid you have four very different seasons concerning weather, so you have to be ready to go ride with very specific clothes depending on what season we are in. Winter time is really cold!. Just see it this way: You save a lot in biking clothes!. Madrid´s winter requires the biking clothes to be warm, transpirable, waterproof and wind-stopping... Too many adjetives in just one piece of material... I really enjoy cold weather but sometimes I think you are living in a paradise where there is no need to worry that much about what you are wearing when you go to ride. A mistake in Madrid means 5 days in bed!!! Cheers!
Hmmm, it sounds like there's better riding in Alicante in the winter than in the summer. As interaptor says, over here dressing for a ride can be a challenge, for example, last weekend I went to the Sierras (Moralzarzal) with some friends. When we got there at about 9:30 it was about 8 degrees: cold! But by the time we left at about 1:30, it was 17 degrees, which is alright. So I dressed fairly lightly and froze in the morning, but later on was all right. Armentano, you mention that you'd like to see more green. Well, last August I went on holiday (with my mountain bike) in the Ferrol area (Galicia), and I tell you, it's green there. Very nice, especially compared to Madrid which is normally dry as a bone in the summer, and everything is sort of yellow-brown. All this talk of different areas of Spain makes me think of how much fun it'd be to go mountain bike touring around Spain. You know, drive somewhere like Alicante with your mountain bike in tow and check out the trails in the area. Well, I guess that's just a pipe dream for now because I won't be doing that too soon. Must keep my nose to the grindstone I guess. Cheers!
It´s true than here in all this area the weather it´s warm, but there are one thing who it´s very hard ,and it´s the humit, sometimes here in winter you can put all the clothes you can imagine but with humit the cool you can feel in your bones it´s too much. I can remenber very well all the times I was in Madrid the weather it´s total dry and I think with good clothes you don´t have any problem too ride. Only I imagine you have got some months too complicates to ride , I can see here in the foro a lot of riders using the rollers. For us the most complicated to understand it´s imagine all this riders in Madrid who makes long distances only to exit from Madrid and then take the tracks. Today we are going to ride 2 hours with the mountainbike at 2 o´clock with some friends at 5 o´clock all of us will be working, we have enough to ride at lunch time.
Uff... this degrees here are too much, only you can imagine here we start every year riding at 8 o´clock in the morning, only when I go to Murcia it´s when we star at 9 o´clock because there it´s too humit, more than in Alicante and the biggest problem there it´s the fog. I was thinking in Madrid the views were very green and I can see it´s very diferent. It´s posible next summer I would like make a riding travel a long the north of Spain, or in other case it´s posible I will ride in some tourist cyclist there. If next summer you came here to Alicante, you can tell me, without any problem and I can show you some tracks. I now very well all the area of Santa Pola ( light area) Elche were I live on these moments and Crevillente this is the most hard area to ride but it´s the place where you can enjoy more riding with your mountainbike there are a lot of tracks for riders with a good level in downhill. I now very well Sierra Espuña too, but the biggest problem comes in summer all it´s close there.
Yeap, you´re right again. Luckily here in Madrid humidity is not a problem. The traffic is, but the best way to get rid of it and get into the dirt, if you wish, is to take the Anillo Verde, the 70 Kmts bike-lane that goes around Madrid. I just took it this morning and stopped to take these photos of my old MTB. It is 15 y.o. or more!. Old school steel frame, baby!!! Oh, Madrid is brownish in the fall!. Cheers!
Ok! I can see ! I was imagine all riders needed a lot of time to go outside the city.But I can see this tracks are perfect to ride. Here we have some tracks similar but are too short and I prefer ride during five kilometers by asphalt until I take the tracks. For other part I think your old bike is perfect to ride there, you don´t need more, it´s perfect. It´s posible I´m going to make an urban bike to ride across the city and my idea it´s something similar because If I buy something in good conditions the burglars are there in five minutes. And I don´t want to be worried every time I use it. I enjoy a lot in places like these, I love autumn with these trees. Cheers!
