20 Responses to “Your Friend, Mr. Tailwind”

• Mike says:
  

  Today was one of those days when I felt Nature had it in for me. I rode the bike trail west in the morning, into a stiff headwind. I relished the thought of how easy the ride home would be… By quitting time, though, the winds seemed to have shifted and I rode into a stiffer headwind home. Not fair.

  Or am I mistaking cross winds for headwinds?

  Posted on 9.7.10 at 9:47 pm
• Dave Iriguchi says:
  

  I’ve heard tall tales of tailwinds…but never actually experienced one. I believe they are a myth.

  Posted on 9.7.10 at 10:04 pm
• Lee Trampleasure says:
  

  It’s important to plan one’s house/work locations to get a predominance of tailwinds after work. Unfortunately, I have the opposite (but both my house and work are great).

  Posted on 9.7.10 at 11:14 pm
• Andreas says:
  

  I like tail wind so much. Had it for two weeks cycling up to the north of Sweden on my trip around the Baltic Sea. It pushes my mood like choco ice cream but for a longer while :-)

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 1:42 am
• brad says:
  

  For our recent bicycle touring vacation (Toronto to Montreal), we initially planned to ride from home in Montreal west to Toronto and take the train back home, but quickly realized it would make more sense to take the train first and ride home from Toronto, because the prevailing winds blow west to east so we’d have the wind at our back. That was the theory, anyway. For much of the week, we were riding into strong headwinds! Sometimes you can’t win.

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 2:29 am
• Bob says:
  

  I’m with Dave. Tailwinds are a fiction promulgated by the international cycling lobby to lure us into pedaling everywhere. ;-)

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 6:38 am
• David says:
  

  Headwinds both ways, all the time.

  I knew I’d become a true bike commuter when I accepted this reality without complaint (mostly).

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 6:45 am
• thomas says:
  

  Had the opposite. Blowing straight at me all the way home.

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 6:46 am
• Pete says:
  

  My commute is uphill, into the wind. Both ways.

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 8:16 am
• Lee Trampleasure says:
  

  Pete: In sleet all year also, I suppose :-)

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 8:25 am
• Sharper says:
  

  Considering the wind shifts around midday, leaving me with a headwind both ways most days, I’ve long since stopped paying attention to the wind.

  I got home today my girlfriend and I had this exchange:
  Me: “It was an amazing ride. I was keeping around 20 mph with almost no effort!”
  Her: “You probably had a tailwind.”
  Me: “… A what?”

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 8:59 am
• Graham says:
  

  In my coastal town there are relatively few bicyclists and I’m convinced that the sea breezes keep a sharp eye out for us… Whenever we’re spotted on the road the wind will immediately shift into our face regardless of which direction it was blowing minutes ago. Strange, but true.

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 9:05 am
• Pete says:
  

  @Lee: It’s even worse than that!

  “Right. I had to get up in the morning at ten o’clock at night half an hour before I went to bed, drink a cup of cold poison, work twenty-nine hours a day down mill, and pay mill owner for permission to come to work, and when we got home, our Dad and our mother would murder us in our sleep and dance about on our graves singing Hallelujah.”

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 9:13 am
• Terry S says:
  

  With a tailwind the best bike to have is this one:
  http://www.pterosail.com/
  One just completed a cross country trip.

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 9:13 am
• Alan says:
  

  @Pete

  :-))

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 9:20 am
• Lee Trampleasure says:
  

  Terry, I used to have a Pterosail, but the cars kept honking at me when I had to tack to move upwind…

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 9:37 am
• GTPowers says:
  

  Question.
  I’m looking to swap to bar like these on my Safari and I am wondering what a good length of new cable to pick up for replacement. Any suggestions? Just get 12ft and cut out what I need?

  Thanks,
  GT

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 2:40 pm
• Alan says:
  

  “Just get 12ft and cut out what I need?”

  That’s what I typically do, or you can take measurements after you have the bars installed and buy just what you need from your LBS…

  Posted on 9.8.10 at 7:45 pm
• George says:
  

  Alan:

  A quick question–totally unrelated–to your post, as enjoyable as it was: what shoes are you wearing in that photo? I’m looking for some SPD-compatible casual shoes that I can use year-round for clip-in commuting in to work or around town, but can still enjoy walking around in. A “Friday workday” shoe, if you will. One that doesn’t look to cycl-ey, but works for that. (And, if possible, one that works with both brown-based and black-based clothing.

  Thanks!!

  Posted on 9.15.10 at 9:23 am
• Dave Iriguchi says:
  

  Headwind both ways, cold, rain, darkness…still beats sitting in traffic. I love pedaling past people stuck in gridlock even if I don’t have a tailwind.

  Posted on 9.18.10 at 7:25 am