Chickleta - My SBRing and other Adventures

I wrote the article below on "How to survive a winter in the Midwest (and northern US in general)" for BikePanel , which was published today ( here ) . Below is the English version of it with some changes and add-ons. I could not wipe the smile off my face While in some countries with warmer climates the fall marks the beginning of the cycling season and the season reaches its peak in the winter. In the  Northern  states of the U.S. most riders start to enter into winter hibernation. In Israel, where I grew up, this season marked the beginning of desert riding, the Gran Fondo events season, everything is green and blooming and other than a day of two of rain the weather is just perfect for riding. This is not the case in the  Northern  states in general and in the Midwest (where I live now) in particular. At this time of year everything freezes and most riders move their training from the outside into the pain caves and start spending quality time...

It all started back in 2010 following a cycling accident that resulted in a broken wrist ( here is the reason why ). That was when I started to work for the first time in my life with a cycling coach. After a great summer of riding with a few triathlons under my belt, my coach came up with a new idea for me for fun riding in the fall and off-season.  It's called cyclocross. Cyclocross? what is cyclocross you ask? I asked the same question.   Google was my best friend to better understand this madness called cyclocross and images and videos of mud covered racers running carrying their bikes on the shoulders and jumping over obstacles popped. So what does a "normal" person think? This looks like FUN!!! Sure I'll give at a try. At that stage of the season I was burned out from just cycling and training for my next triathlon so something new was welcomed. Zoltan said, ok then, meet me at the park (i.e., Central Park) Friday 6am we will practice technique. ...

My teammates and me at the start line Last August I took part, along with some other VQ teammates in a unique gravel event called Rebecca's Private Idaho. I was asked to write a story about the ride for an Israeli on-line cycling magazine called  bikepanel . Flattered but a little worried (as it's been years since I wrote something in Hebrew that is longer than one sentence), I accepted (with the help of my friend Nimi editing and reviewing my Hebrew). Although it took me what seemed like forever to write, I enjoyed writing the article so much that I accepted the invitation to become a permanent panelist for the magazine. I also decided to translate my article to English (with some minor changes) and have that be my post about the event. I will skip the introduction to the article about myself (mostly written by Nimi) and head right to the article.  I am using the same photos that were used in the article.  The event photographer, Linda Guerrette, gave me p...