Icycling

I really enjoyed watching the stage yesterday! 1. Lance get dropped. 2. He even opens his mouth to breath. 3. He sweats. 4. He is not THE STIG he is human with or without the rocket fuel. 5. Their are far more pro out their in the current peleton who would prefer Lance not to win any races than to win them - it is an insult to them if he believe he is that much better them, and at his age, that he can come back to the sport and win races! 6. Conclusion - LA should have stayed retired!

Marius - and what has the power meter said?

Ryan and Olie, come on guys I know you were sprinting for the lower placing, but if not on your drops you are not getting max power in a sprint. So either you were putting on a show or you need to learn to sprint properly!

Porky - Most cyclist (sport cyclist - non commutors) fall into middle to upper class. In this sector of the ecc. one of this biggest mouthly expenses (not meant to be more than 25% of income) is bond repayment. In this cycle where interest rates have already come down by 3.5% it means on 1 million rand (in the western cape not much available still at less but price seem to start at 1.5 to 2 million for an avg home in the Southern Sub) at prime the bond holder is saving about R2500.00 per month, at bonds below prime its even more. On top of that with the price of car fuel having drop quite a lot in the the past 6 month quite a lot of money has already been put back in the pockets of the public. For example a person who is paying on a bond of say 2million who should have got about 2% below prime on that bond his saving per month are already over R6000.00 per month! But my point was more to do with price fixing and the fact that all business which borrows money is subjected to it as the gov. / reserve bank fixes the price of money to the banks which interm leads money to business / the public. Thus we all are subjected to price fixing as soon as we are involved at all with borrowing of money! I dont think this model will change so price fixing will always be here in some form!

Price fixing - yes the reserve bank drop the REPO rate today by 1%. Most business need money and thus most business suffer from price fixing. This intern should mean the rand will becomes stonger as overseas markets see RSA too is part of the globle ecc, and thus are more willing to invest in RSA. So its a double benefit easier for you guys to spend money and easier for the importers to buy stock at cheaper prices. Gov. should stop fixing the price of petrol etc before they look at the cycle industry - where even if they take 10% of the profits they may have to paying in certain cases!

Jan - as mentioned to you when I was in PE earlier this year I foresee 50% of Cycle shops country wide closing their door. As part of the bigger picture of world ecconomics. Some more thing have added to this prediction: 1. The weather at the Cape Argus cycle tour - normally after the Argus the shops are still doing good trade untill about now - but not this year - most people were just pissed off about thier time! Not to mention because of the slower times it ended up been thankfully a lot safer - so not to much crash business!! 2. Recession - SA is now in it! 3. Deflation - people will now ask themselves why buy now when in a months time it may be cheaper - so this winter could be very quite for the bike shops esp. now that it has become clear in the bike industry their is deflation. 4. Normally the rand does not improve as quickly as it has after a drop like it did last year (It does normally drop very quickly however). The last time round ?2002 it took about 18 months this time 3 to 4! But this impact on the depression side as thing come down in price - where as in the past their were improvement in the product i.e. 9 to 10 speed which meant items more or less stayed the same price instead of goig up! The other side of this is it seem possible to say with some degree of certainty that the trading range for the rand is between 6 and 12 rand to the dollar. A large range! So below 8 you buying on the cheap side and above 9 reduce the orders for the smallest stock holding possible. 5. Price fixing cases - which may amount to nothing! 6. The only plus side is what is happening to the interest rates and 1 more % today! So the bottom line is if your LBS is not their next summer don't be too suprized as if my prediction is correct their is only a 50% chance that it will be! Yes this impacts the importer and price again as their are less people to sell bike and thus less bike are sold and this in turn means less bike been ordered from china etc which means the Local importers may be put into a different price buying bracket and so the cycles starts all over! Probike is just part of the mix! Nothing wrong with that is their? We all trying do stay open till the next sunny days which will arrive eventually.

Rand/$ at 8.45 today if I add 30% to that I get R10.985 and the rand was trading at over 11.00 at the end of last year. So if your next shipment is coming at at 30% cheaper, droping your prices by 25% probably take into account the dollar base pricing and passes that onto the consumer! Probike still are probably making the same margins - and they need too! Do any of you guys work for free? Why should they! Who I do feel for is the LBS who have stock at the old prices - will Pro bike credit them for this or are they going to have to sell this at a loss? Remembering they would have at it on the floor for about 3 months - and that in itself cost! Or will this just mean more shops close?

IF CNBC is to believed it sound like SA may have electronic voting, as used currently in India for the next elections. This means that once voting stations are closed results should be out within 3 hours!

Well its seems most people have accepted they will have to Q! But why not as 2nd process in each booth have a template electronic pad which you put your unfolded voting paper on and make your mark which is recorded in ink and electronically? Thus allowing for the electronic unofficial vote to be announced almost immediately after all polling stations have close. While the official result would still be counted in the normal manor - with a bit of luck they would almost (95%) match! Two down side: 1. You would have to fold you own paper after casting your vote. 2. Their would need to be separate booths for the 2 different votes.

At no point have I said do away with the Qing / current system of voting - but I have suggested that the IEC should also develop an online vote system - I would expect that between 5 and 10 million people will would choose to cast their vote in this manner in 5 years time. If you don't have running water or if you may feel intimidated by an on line vote you will still be able to vote in the current manor.

And today elections went off 100% Ok. Fraud in one area, someone loosing all their polling stations stuff Qing after 9 and no doubt the list will go on!

Porky - thus the reason for registering online within the preceding months! Hopefully you have the brains to choose numbers you son and daughters do not know and can remember what you chose just a few months prior to the election. If not maybe your sons and daughters should be doing the voting in the family!

Um President - not likely! But I have asked winning time to look at system where in the Western Cape for funride you hopefully will be able to pitch and ride in your seeded categories without going to registration table for a helmet sticker. The Marshal will thus be making sure you have your Timing chip! Entry system to be decided - maybe a bulk online entry - replacing easy entries, online entries, or even sms entry, and maybe finally your credit card linked to your timing chip and as you go over the start mats you enter! So hopefully no more Qing at funrides if you a PPA member with a PPA number. Well we will see what comes of this in the future!

After Qing for about an hour today - why is it not possible to vote on line. Most thing these days are done online in a secure online environment - why not voting? Surely on voter registration days you should also be given the opportunity to choose to vote online? To write a secure program of this nature is certainly not impossible one would think, involving your name, ID no, then your user name and password like most banks have - that 4 items most banks have 3! Naturally providing a cell no and email address would be necessary thus enabling sms voting! Your ID no would need to be the key and would only allow 1 vote - sort of like a once of payment on internet banking When registering - this should be done online too - like with the CSA licensing a site map should come up and thus put you in your correct area! But if you live overseas you only would get to vote for the National vote. If this were to be implemented well the down side - would their need to be a holiday for voting day? The up side - I think far more people would vote and surely for all the people who travel life would be a lot easier no to mention the guys who are now allowed to vote who live overseas!

idrive - why the post - are you suggesting the N1 is a highway - for the most part it is just a National road so legal. On the Cape Town side it is legal to ride on the N1 from the Paarden island / North gate Cycle Lab intersection to the City. From North Gate to the other side of the Tunnel it is illegal from the other side of the tunnel all the way to Bleom it is Legal. Possibly in Bleom their is an area where it is illegal!

JenniGreen, I understand all that you have communicated. But also been part of an organizing body in the Cape where we also hand out empty envelops for much the same reason as you do and have been doing so for at least 3 years now. I have one question was this made clear on entering the event. If not make it clear for the next event. The reason are more than valid for handing out empty envelops!

Good job JB! Another good reason not to use the gels! They should be banned!!! esp in this country where people have no sense of responsibility. As for the Spinergy wheels - no wonder my business is having a rough time - if wheels sold in the 90's are still going strong where will I get new business from?

This has even made Summit TV news!

Is it not time the UCI grow up - machanical inervation make the sport intresting. When they can say the have 100% control over the doping problem and they have not found a cyclist quilty world wide for lets say 5 years then maybe they can start imposing rules on Bike! Beleive it or not the bike has a small effect on performance compared to doping My 2c worth

I think I was really lucky! Maybe phoetic jutics. I probably would have been hit today by a motorist! I was riding up Constantia nek from valley road and just before the 1st corner by Phantom corners the car behind me slowed to overtake - I was to the left and riding alone but the road is quite narrow. The car behind that -I think a Merc ML 500 also slow and the car behind that went straight into the Merc! So if a motorist is so distracted for what ever reason to drive striaght into the back a large Merc ML 500 what chance would I have had if the 1st car had not slowed? Conclusion we will never be able change stupid motorist

I probably would have been hit today by a motorist! I was riding up Constantia nek from valley road and just before the 1st corner by Phantom corners the car behind me slowed to overtake - I was to the left and riding alone but the road is quite narrow. The car behind that -I think a Merc ML 500 also slow and the car behind that went straight into the Merc! So if a motorist is so distracted for what ever reason to drive striaght into the back a large Merc ML 500 what chance would I have had if the 1st car had not slowed? Conclusion we will never be able change stupid motorist!

Something I wrote this morning to my fellow committee members. Bye the why the motorist / bike problem is all over the world, some countries just manage it better! "I think what I am saying is correct - the last 3 deaths of cyclist have been where the road is quite wide. 1. Simonstown - that road although no yellow lines is wide enought for 2 cars to drive next to each other. Their are other circumstance around his case. 2. Ou Kaapse Weg - yellow lines. 3. This past weekend again road wide enought for yellow lines - I am not that familiar with this road so I may be wrong here. Why? Where we think as cyclist it should be safer to ride as the road is wider it seems not to be the case - coincidence? If we consider the Dutch road management system they are alway slowing car down. In the small town on a 2 lane road they put islands (sometimes with speed bumps) so cars cannot go past each other but have to allow 1 car at a time. On the freeway they (create their own traffic jam) have overhead boards flashing speeds for example in a 120km/h speed limit they have electronic boards flashing 90km/h then 70 km/h followed by 50km/h and all motorist slow down thinking their may be a problem ahead. It seems to me that their is a strong possibility that motorist naturally just become complacent when the road is wider - consider sms's on their cell ph etc as their margin of error for driving has just got that much wider. But then an obstacle like a cyclist is in the road and well we seen what has happened! Is fighting for wider roads the right thing for cyclist to be doing? Or would it not be better for cyclist to be fighting for islands on roads to reduce motorist speed and keeping their concentration focused?"

Captain Slow - that is so tipical of a cop. I still want to see cops pulling people for sitting in the fast lane on the freeways when their is free flow traffic - lets face it motoris cannot drive in this country - it is not that cyclist cannot cycle. The whole education of motorist has to change for all road users sake! When last did you see a cop pulling somebody off for having 2 wheels over a solid white line?

Although cyclist are probably the only people who obey one of the most important road rules i.e. stay as far left as possible/ / safe! (Keep left Pass right - and the JHB holiday makers in CT never seem to obey this on the freeways i.e. the slow lane becomes the fast lane!) Is it not time that motorist learn to drive properly? i.e. when overtaking a cyclist indicating and doing it in the other lane and obeying the rule of never putting 2 wheels over a solid white line? Once again been in Europe way to often! The road are not only for motor vehicles! But for all road users. Is it not about time that motorist learn to drive properly and respect the law - and that law enforcement officers do law enforcement and not only speed control for monetary gain?

Also found in Nasal tablets and our Cape boys make TIC from it I been told!