Jim Langley - Bicycle Aficionado

Ten Reasons I’m Here

1. To provide faithful readers of Bicycling Magazine articles, other magazine stories and cycling books by Jim Langley, a place to continue reading and to contact . Be sure to visit my bicycle blog, too. And, here is a link to my latest bike book, Your Home Bicycle Workshop.

2. To share some worthwhile information about bicycles and cycling that I’ve gleaned in my 35 years in the sport/trade such as these two tips from my Crank section, which has tons of tips:

Chain Fell Off? Just Shift it Back On!
Sooner or later your chain will fall off the front sprocket while you’re riding. On most bikes, to get it back on, all you have to do is shift it on by moving the left shift lever as if you were shifting onto a bigger chainring. Pedal lightly and finesse the chain back into place. This will spare your hands a serious dose of chain grease. If the chain drops when you’re climbing, head downhill for a bit, shift the chain back on and turn back.

8 more tech tips

Bike Parking 101
Here’s the foolproof way to park your bike against a pole: Rest the side of the seat against the pole. Then backpedal the pole-side pedal until it comes up (to about 12 o’clock and touches the pole. Voila! The side of the seat keeps the bike from rolling forward and the pedal keeps the bike from rolling backward. So, short of an earthquake, the bike won’t slide, fall over, and get all dinged and dented.

15 more general tips

3. To thank all the people who tutored and inspired me one way or another.

4. To promote the great sport of cycling, an activity that’s so important and powerful that it keeps spinning along even though government organizations (notably highway/road departments) with billions to spend, seem only interested in autos.

5. To share some of my cycling memorabilia (25 years of collecting) that otherwise mostly gathers dust in my home.

6. To act as an advertisement for Jim Langley so people who want to find me, can.

7. To have a place to publish my stories and those from other cycling writers I admire.

8. To learn more about websites so I can do better work at my current job at SmartEtailing and help promote cycling.

9. To tell you about other useful and fun cycling websites.

10. To motivate you to ride; or if you can't ride, to appreciate bikes and cycling.