THE BICYCLE (C)1989 Alan M. Schwartz The ordinary image of a bicycle rider is that of a common person sitting upright in the saddle, pleasantly touring through the countryside, smiling at the passing gentry and endeavoring to avoid being transformed into hamburger by passing traffic. At the other extreme there are the bicycle racers, whippet-thin engines built of tensioned gristle and muscle, clad in conformal spandex racing togs, bent over aerodynamically slippery surrealistic engineering constructs, propelling themselves at the limits of human endurance. Toward the middle we have the fashionably dressed rider who looks like a racer and moves like a slug. I mount my ten speed wearing a decrepit polo shirt and a pair of rotting shorts. My gloves are worn torn leather, my sweatband is frayed and discolored. I do not ride for scenery or social status, I ride for pain. A bicycle has ten gear ratios to allow the itinerant rider to maintain a constant leg rhythm over varying terrain. Theory suggests that your rate of travel is irrelevant as long as your legs spin at 60-80 rpm. My bicycle has ten gear ratios - third gear to push off from a standing start, tenth gear to do everything else, like blasting past people spinning their legs at 60-80 rpm. Within a wide band of physiological performance I have but two goals: With back bent low over the handlebars, teeth clenched and lungs heaving, to do my 50 miles over the mountains each weekend and to leave those sorry spandex-clad pudknockers in my wake. If you enjoy the feeling of having white hot fishhooks tearing through your thighs for three or four hours, it makes for a pleasant Saturday morning ride. Orange County has been most benevolent to the bicycle rider by providing a large supply of breathable air and a most respectable network of bicycle lanes along and even in addition to the usual vehicular venues. The morning air is cool and still and the humidity is almost always very low. Being clammy with sweat is unappealing. Feeling soft salt crystals crush every time you move your leg or neck is interesting. I use the Back Bay trail to cross to San Diego Creek, past The University of California at Irvine, up to University Avenue turnoff, University Avenue over the 5 Freeway to the Alton bike path, Alton to Irvine Boulevard, to El Toro Road, up Santiago Canyon Road, past Modjeska Canyon and van Ingen Schenau, past Irvine Lake to Crawford Canyon Road, a quick cut over the northernmost limit of Redhill Avenue, south on Redhill and back home. In retrospect I suppose that the 50 mile round trip is not nearly so challenging as the 1100 foot vertical climb and drop. Driving the route by car is really rough on the engine. Those parts of it that are hardly wide enough for the car are really rough on the mind. The small sign on a very robust steel post planted in the exact center of the bike path just before Irvine Park is really rough on everything: You come up an appalling hill with your head down and dried sweat crumbling off your skin, and then you look up and THERE IT IS! Or may be you don't look up, and THERE IT IS! anyway. The foothills are home to the last orange groves, and often have I grunted my way through sweetly flowered air. One morning a gate which had been heretofore always locked was open, so I went in intent upon going up and over the not too gently rolling terrain. Who would imagine that a plot of land owned by a salt company would be used for deer hunting? Who would suspect that a bicycle rider in a yellow shirt and blue shorts looked like a deer? It sure inspires to here the crack of bullets flying through the air -- around you. The barbed wire surrounding the fence at the eventual end of the road was a rapidly negotiated barrier. The cows were unarmed. Over the years I have worn through six sets of tires, two axles, a seat, and the patience of a judge presiding over a disputed radar speeding ticket. Bicycle spokes can strobe cheap police radar units, although one should avoid making the point by asking the officer in question whether clocking a bicycle at 43mph on flat ground is a consequence of special training, brain damage or natural stupidity. University students are fodder for venal City services. What good is a police state without police? People have asked me, "Al, how can you eat the outrageous quantities of food we have, with awe and disgust, all witnessed and maintain a reasonable body weight?" "Aw shucks, I just ride a bicycle for three or four hours each weekend." If you were body fat, would you sign on for my Saturday bike trip through the mountains?