Ahhh, Burley . . . I have a yellow Burley tire sock which I still use to carry my spare sew-up on my early 80s Ciocc San Cristobal. Good stuff!
Steve Whitting
"The Ciocc Cat"
Prairieville, Louisiana USA
Website at http://ciocc-cat.angelfire.com/
From: Jon Spangler <jonswriter@att.net> Subject: [CR] Happy New Year, thoughts of Oregon in the 1970s To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org Cc: "Linda Hudson" <LHudsonLHW@att.net>, "Jon Spangler" <jonswriter@att.net> Date: Friday, January 1, 2010, 5:57 PM
Dear Bikies,
With Oregon playing in today's Rose Bowl I am once again reminded of my cycling "salad days" in Eugene, OR, where I first discovered "serious" group cycling, including racing, c/o Collins' Cycle Shop and my friends at the U of O. (Ah, for the days of riding my champagne- green PX-10LE with its LJ derailleur set, gold Mafac 2000 cp brakes, bright yellow cable housings, Phil Wood BB and hubs, 27" "touring" wheels, and Blackburn racks... :-)
There was no waterproof-breathable rain gear (Gore-tex, which arrived in the late 1970s, is probably off-topic here, right?) so we rode around town in all manner of 60/40 cloth and Ventile Cloth parkas, vinyl slickers, US Army surplus fatigue jackets sprayed with water repellents, and, of course, in coated nylon rain gear of all types. Occasionally I came across folks using waxed-cotton oilcloth gear, but not in patterns made for cycling use.
The arrival of Burley Bev and Al Scholls in the mid 1970s with their rain capes, half-a-gaitors, panniers, and (eventually) their now-famous Burley bike trailers, brought a huge improvement in our riding comfort. Of course, the "traditional" vinyl jersey-pocket cycling jackets and other non-breathable racing rain gear was available then and persists to this day, despite the subsequent revolution(s) in waterproof-breathable rain gear for cycling.....
All of our bikes (2 off-topic road, 2 somewhat on-topic commuters, and my still-unbuilt 1970s Allegro on-topic road bike) are in storage as we try to fit our 3BDR/2BA household into a 2BDR/1BA apartment (1300+ sq ft down to 800+ sf is tough, folks... :-). But I still feel connected to our international CR community and my local Bay Area brethren, and hope to actively rejoin our discussions as soon as I can create the room to set up my computer desk and my Mac.
May you all enjoy many happy cycling miles and productive on-line exchanges here in 2010, and my our not-so-peaceful and not-so-green world become a safer place for cyclists around the world in the new year.
Affectionately yours,
Jon Spangler
>From Linda's computer in our tiny and so-far bikeless :-( apartment
at 2060-B Encinal Avenue in Alameda, CA USA