Bike Trails, Bike Stories and Articles

This page is dedicated to bike trail information, cycling articles and casual bike stories, comments and articles...

12/04/2004 - I&M Trail History

I was just studying up on the I&M canal for a potential book deal that I was offered (then later turned down due to the time involved and a heavy schedule right now) to author a book on bike trails in Illinois. The publisher asked for 2 bike trail articles to review my writing. I wasn't real sure, at the time, about how committed I wanted to be anyway, and wasn't sure if I was going to send in the articles...

Regardless, I decided that if I did do the articles, the I&M trail would be a good choice and it has a lot of history... Then I actually got interested in it myself anyway (picked up a book at the library)... If you study up on Illinois and Chicago history, you find out that the I&M canal pretty much made Chicago into the city that it is today... Then I checked Google for some more info and typed in "I&M canal" (no reference to bike trails even) and found that the about-bicycles site comes up on page 2... and if you do the "images" search I have the number 1 and 2 pictures for the I&M canal in Google! So the about-bicycles I&M trail pictures take their place in history! I think that is pretty cool...

I also just did a little update to the I&M Canal Bike Trail page to include a little bit of the history that I have been learning about. I actually wanted to write more on the historical significance of the I&M canal, but since these pages were more related to the bike trail, I kept it brief.

11/23/2004 - Watch that Left Brake!

Wow, it's really been a long time since I've done any updates here, but I really do have a lot of casual bike info that I have been wanting to get posted (here). For starters I have been meaning to put in some real common sense comments about the "Left" or Front Brake on mountain trails... OK, I am using the term "mountain trails" to distinguish the trails that I am referring to from the regular paved, dirt or crushed limestone (easy) trails. I live in Northern Illinois, so these are not really "mountain trails" in any way! But you can find some very rugged trails around here if you look hard enough...

Anyway, the point is I have been thrown a few time recently and it can be dangerous as well as very embarrassing (especially when you have ridden thousands of miles and make a dumb mistake and look like a total beginner! :-) ) when you use the front brake at the wrong times! Part of my problem is the fact that I just got a new bike with very tight brakes and I have been used to an old beater bike that would barely stop when you laid on both brakes!

Well, after a while, I just decided that it just seems more practical to just keep your hands off that left brake out on these kinds of trails. Sure, if you are very experienced and are paying close attention, I'm sure it can be done right, but in my opinion, it is really a lot safer out in the back woods trails to just stick to the back break...

I welcome any other opinions... (but then again, since this page hasn't been real active for a while, I may not have many readers out there at the moment... :-) ). Well, drop a line if you like and stop back soon...

10/17/2004 - Deer Grove Trail Pages... My New Book!

I've done a lot of work on my Deer Grove Mountain Bike trail pages this week and last... and they are finally up on the internet... The original Deer Grove pages were the very first "trail pages" that I wrote... I went back and added the "off the road" "unpaved" "mountain trail" sections and I guess I am doing better than before and am putting in more text on the newer pages. I have update the Deer Grove Main Page, but the real photo tour starts here with the Deer Grove Mountain Bike Trail Page Photos . Check them out... These are some great rugged paths (for the Chicagoland area).

In a related story, I have been asked if I want to write a book on Illinois bike trails from a book publisher who visited my bike site and liked my bike trail pages! I am considering taking on the project... It would require quite a bit of time and effort and, from what I understand, the actual proceeds from the book may not be that much (I don't actually have the details on that yet), but the PR from being a published writer could have some benefits... I don't know, I'm still undecided... The "fun" part of it would be that I would need to travel around Illinois and do about 60 or 70 bike trails in the state and write about them and take photos... (like I do for my bike site articles...)... Nice work... just don't know about the ROI...

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