Schwalbe Marathon Winter Tires

So I finally picked up my studded tires, or rather one of them, I get the other tomorrow.
Anyway, I went with Schwalbe Marathon Winters with 240 studs a tire. It is a very nice tire, I must say. Kind of heavy at almost 1kg... but I can deal with heavy tires if it lets me ride in the winter safely.
I'll ride on them for a little while and then give a review of my experience with them.

Adventure Cycling Association

One of my fellow adventure club members turned my on to the Adventure Cycling Association. They have a set of cycling maps you can buy as well as several other useful tools. However, their Cyclists' Yellow Pages is what I really was looking for. It lists cycling publications, tour operators and generally a lot of links to good adventure cycling resources.

Light Dead

So my Planet Bike Beamer 5 LED headlight died this week. It's been with me 3.5 years. Through rainy Vancouver, and frozen Edmonton. However when the temperature hit the negatives this week it just crashed. Nothing, nada, zilch.... it's dead. I am tempted to buy this light again, but for the $15 more it will cost me I'll get their Blaze 2 Watt LED light... so much brighter. LED lights have come a long way in the last 3.5 years.

Tire rotation

Yes I'm as guilty as many others. I'm frugal. Not in the miserly way (well sometimes), but in that I like to make things last. To that length I used to rotate my tires... however that is a no-no. See Sheldon Brown's article on it here. I haven't done that in a long time, but was reminded of it when thinking about which tires to put on my bike now that it's snowing.

I was fairly proud of myself this year. I went through 4 rear tires squealing down the river valley and through out the city. Wasteful? Yes! But ridiculously fun!

Spoke Punchers Cycling Cap

Next on my list of potential cycling caps is from Spoke Punchers. Apart from having an awesome name, and a dinosaur eating a bicycle (go look at their site), they have an excellent selection of already made caps and you can always have them make you a custom one. I was really happy to see a merino wool cap, that is reversible, and looks good with flaps up or down. Ear protection is important in winter people. I think it looks excellent, however it could be the model; she is cute.

Seat sale

Not cycling related at all, unless you want to go away for a ride. Big seat sale started today by both Westjet and Air Canada. $99 each way for southern California from Edmonton. Some really great deals in there.

Studded bicycle tires

So I saw another commuter with studded tires this afternoon, and thought: hey buddy, it's cool, but still too early for that. Then I got home and looked at the forecast for tomorrow... and I saw the next few days too. That's right, flurries on Thursday. I think it's time to change tires too.