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Black Beauty

I spent the last year living just outside the most bike-stealingest city I can imagine, but I had to come all the way home to sleepy Austin Texas to become a victim of cycle thievery, myself.

Last week I finally took the time to write out the details of my employment exile in New Jersey. It was great to read all the feedback from friends who appreciated the sentimental story of sacrifice and family reunion. I thank you all...but sadly I have no such happy tale to tell you this time.

Of course, it starts out happy enough, in fact, it starts out as a love story. 

Four years ago I was wasting away my 2nd summer in Connecticut, looking for ways to get myself off the couch during down time. Even though I was trying to stop watching quite so much TV, a television experience ended up as my inspiration to start rolling.

I'm a lifetime sports fan, but it really kicked into overdrive when I started working at ESPN, and after a couple years there my obsessions extended far beyond the standard American fare. I actively proselytized for European soccer, and began immersing myself in the esoteric doctrines of the Tour de France.

Faithful study of Le Tour is a demanding discipline. Riders can be difficult to tell apart, the "team" concept isn't quite what you think it is, and it's tough to understand the motivation for so many competitors who admit from the start they have zero chance of winning the thing.  It's part of the reason I never really followed the event day-to-day even though I was living in Austin during Lance Armstrong's heyday. 

But once I started putting in the time, following the Tour was profoundly rewarding, and it's become one of my favorite sporting events of the year. Shane Ryan at Grantland wrote a great post the other day recapping Stage 11 of this year's Tour, perfectly capturing the thrill and confusion that hits when you first watch a dramatic mountaintop finish. 

In that piece, Ryan notes how his interest in the Tour was piqued after he started doing more biking, himself.  For me it was the opposite, my growing fascination with bike racing on TV made me want to start riding a bike more myself.

The affair begins...

So I headed to Biker's Edge in Bristol looking to buy. I probably should've looked for a used number on craigslist, but subconciously I think I knew I was looking to let somebody upsell me. I looked around for a bit, talked with the salesdude on duty, and in less than an hour I rolled out of the store on two wheels, the proud owner of a Specialized Hardrock Sport. 

What followed was a torrid romance between man and machine. I took Black Beauty everywhere, and cycling around Connecticut truly changed my life. I improved my health and improved my outlook....I fell in love with pedaling around the state that I'd previously hated on, a lot. I often took pictures along the way and turned more than a few rides into cherished memories. I became known as "The Bike Guy" at work and I crashed a few times, bad. Through it all my love of the bike itself grew right along with the love of cycling in general.

Our explorations only got better once we moved home to Austin right at the end of 2009. Even though no city is immune to the disease of Motorists Who Loathe Cyclists, the ATX has a very established biking culture and you have many options for avoiding cars altogether, as well as plenty of bike lanes along main streets. 

Just a few of the places you can ride in Austin, TX

Besides just the improved routes and scenery in Austin, I also noticed that I was crashing a lot less, and buying fewer replacement parts. The bike and I reached that point in the relationship where you just feel each other's beats a little more naturally, things couldn't have been better.

So last year, when I moved to New Jersey for temp/freelance work, there was no doubt Black Beauty was coming with me. She'd been with me longer than my actual girlfriend, after all!  In a perfect world I'd never have had to leave home and live alone up there, but in looking for silver linings, I have to say the job was amazing and so was the cycling.

Urban Riding: A World of Possibilities

Living around Secaucus, I had easy access to NYC, a premier biking city even beyond what Austin offers. I took advantage as often as possible. The sights were fantastic, and the thrill of riding next to traffic up and down the busy avenues was the best feeling I'd ever had on a bike, what a rush. 

Inevitably though, riding almost exclusively on roads without hitting any trails, I started realizing just how outclassed my little Hardrock was out there. I developed a wandering eye. I left the bike in the bed of my truck most of the time, subjecting it to rain storms and almost inviting someone to jack the thing. I didn't really want anyone to steal my bike, but I wanted a new bike. The magic was gone.

Despite my least efforts, Black Beauty was still safe and sound in that truck bed when I finally started driving home again to Austin for good. I was happy to learn that some friends in Washington D.C. who I'd be visiting along the way had also become avid cyclists recently, and we got together and went for a great ride together on the second day of my trip.

I didn't know it was the last time I'd ever ride her. Two days later, at 1:30 a.m. and after a 23 hour road trip from Raleigh, NC to my driveway, the universe finally punished my neglect. Too tired from the mileage to get the bike out and store it in the garage, I went in and dropped immediately to sleep.  When I woke up 6 hours later and went outside, my beloved bike was gone.

I blame myself, of course. Not that I'm not pissed off as hell knowing that thieves are cruising my neighborhood before dawn. I realize thieving jerks have always been everywhere but the romantic side of me liked to think that Austin had a lot fewer of them than other places do. There's also a part of me that blames the city's explosive growth over the years for the fact that that's no longer true...But I know it's actually my fault she got stolen.

As crummy as it is, I will say the theft came at the right time for me to be hit with a mild tragedy of that nature. Since I'm just so damn happy to be back in Austin at home with family again after a long time away, I can't really let a material loss get me down too much. I know there are resources to get the word out about a stolen bike online, but I can't seem to be bothered.

I've also realized that the true love affair wasn't between me and the machine, so much as it was between me and the actual activity of cycling itself. I've tried out a few loaner bikes in the weeks I've been home and of course I remember the envious eye I developed on the streets of New York. Though I've never advanced past amateur status as a rider, I've also never lost my newbie's enthusiasm, and now with a few years' experience under my seat, I believe I might even have a better relationship waiting for me with a future bicycle.

But I'll never forget Black Beauty, my first two-wheeled love. To send her off, I put together this little tribute video with the help of Animoto, enjoy it!