TELEGRAM & GAZETTE Worcester,
Mass.
Sept. 2, 2001
Pedaling pol pumps up bicycling voters
By Lynne Tolman
Senate President Thomas F. Birmingham took
some guff from Boston pundits and rival Republicans for
his eight-day bike tour across the state last month, but
he has earned the respect of cyclists from Great
Barrington to Cape Cod. Birmingham went the distance, some
250 miles, on an aluminum Specialized Allez Elite, with
numerous campaign stops to get his 2002 run for governor
in gear.
Ending his day in Worcester on Aug. 24, Birmingham
said two-wheeling was "a great way to see the state.
You're going at a slower pace and you're experiencing
things on a human scale."
He also relished the contrast to his workday bike
rides, pedaling a hybrid bike six miles from his home in
Chelsea to his office in the Statehouse. He noted that the
commute via Route 99 and Rutherford Avenue usually takes
25 minutes by bike, versus 40 to 50 minutes by car at peak
traffic times.
Anyone who braves those congested, potholed, poorly
designed roads by bike is no poser, said Steve Winslow of
Malden, a MassBike
activist who pedaled along with the senator for two days,
from Springfield to Worcester. MassBike, a statewide
cycling advocacy coalition, planned and supported the
ride.
Winslow said Birmingham was instrumental in helping
pass the 1996 state law that requires new road
construction and old road redesigns to take cyclists and
pedestrians into account.
"If you're ever going to have significant numbers
of (bike) commuters, you need that," Birmingham said.
"It'll be a cultural shift as well. People in cars and
people on bikes have to get used to each other."
Friction between motorists and cyclists
certainly seems to be minimal in Montreal and its suburbs,
thanks to a well designed network of bike paths and lanes,
I noticed on a bike trip there last month. Massachusetts
transportation officials could learn a lot from their
counterparts in Quebec.
~~~
The first group of students to attend Olin College, a new
engineering school in Needham, will try to design the
world's smallest rideable bicycle this fall. Mechanical
engineering professor Dan Frey said he was looking for "an
interesting technical challenge" as a way "to bond this
new group of students ... who are going to be partners in
developing the curriculum over the next year."
Flipping through the Guinness
Book of Records, Frey learned that the smallest
rideable bike has wheels one-half inch in diameter and has
been human-propelled for a distance of six meters. He said
the Guinness world record requires that the bike be ridden
by a person, but there are no restrictions on the person's
size or other characteristics, or on the riding surface or
distance ridden.
"You learn a lot of things by miniaturizing
something that you can bring to the actual size later,"
Frey said, admitting that the world-record quest in itself
is rather whimsical. "One thing we'll do after we break
the record is see if we can't take what we've learned and
see if it has some practical significance, like a foldable
bike or new type of scooter, maybe a new means of
propulsion, maybe something I haven't thought of yet. This
is not a very practical project, but hopefully it can
generate some very practical things."
~~~
TIP OF THE HELMET to Sam Talbot, 29,
of Sterling, who finished the Mount
Washington Bicycle Hillclimb on Aug. 25, a very
steep 8-mile ascent, in a very respectable time of 1 hour,
14 minutes, 43 seconds. He was 84th of 532 finishers
overall and 35th of 120 men in the 20-34 age
category.
Other finishers from this area were Thomas
Boudreau, 40, of Leominster, at 1:25:09; Tom Gormley, 42,
of Harvard, 1:27:35; Bob McKenney, 40, of Worcester,
1:30:36; Tim Eichner, 30, of Thompson, 1:35:09; Kevin
Furrow, 31, of Marlboro, 1:35:30; David Broganer, 48, of
Harvard, 1:37:44; Michael LeBlanc, 39, of Worcester,
1:44:43; Allan Edwards, 43, of Harvard, 1:44:44; Ken
Daignault, 39, of Holden, 1:51:00; and Marc Belanger, 29,
of Leominster, 1:58:06.
Marilyn Ruseckas of Waitsfield, Vt., who grew
up in Westboro, had the best time among women ages 40-44,
at 1:13:15. Ruseckas, who held the women's record for
Mount Washington in 1997, was the fifth woman overall this
year. The women's winner was Karen Bockel of Fort Collins,
Colo., at 1:09:20.
Team Saturn rider Tim Johnson, 24, of
Middleton won the race with a time of 53:31. Tyler
Hamilton, the U.S. Postal Service team member who hails
from Marblehead, set the record of 50:21 in 1999. French
rider Jeannie Longo set the women's record of 58:14 last
year.
~~~
This is the last cycling column for the
season, although there should be plenty of good road
riding weather for another two months or so. The T&G
cycling calendar at www.telegram.com/home/bikecal.html
contains listings through October. And cyclocross season
starts Sept. 30 with a race in Maine; details are at http://www.necyclocross.htm/
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