We’re moving to a new e-mail notification system. If you’re currently subscribed to the EcoVelo e-mail notification list for site updates, your e-mail subscription is about to expire. If you’d like to continue receiving once-daily digest e-mail notifications, please go to the following page and enter your e-mail address to be added to the new system.

http://www.ecovelo.info/subscribe-via-e-mail/

This new-and-improved system delivers higher quality notifications and should eliminate some of the issues we had with the old system.

I hate to do this, but managing our WordPress-driven mass email list has become problematic, so we’re going to close down our current system. The issue is that WordPress does not include a notification system built into its core, so blog owners like myself have to rely upon third-party plugins. Many plugins are developed free of charge, but consequently, they’re only partially supported and the developers don’t always keep up with the latest versions of WordPress. Also, as our list has grown (and grown, and grown), managing the undelivered e-mails, address changes, and general errors of every sort has become too much of a time-suck.

For those who would like to continue receiving notifications via e-mail, I’ve set up a new system with Google Feedburner. The notifications will be essentially the same, but the system should run much more smoothly. If you’d like to opt-in to the new system, visit this page: Subscribe Here

If you’ve been receiving e-mail notifications but you’ve been thinking about trying a newsreader, Twitter, or Facebook, check out the links in our left-hand sidebar at the top under “Subscribe”. There you’ll find 4 ways other than e-mail to track our post updates.

So to be sure everyone understands, if you’ve been receiving e-mail notifications about new posts, those are about to cease. If you’d like to continue receiving e-mail notifications, you’ll need to opt-in to our new Google Feedburner system on the following page: Subscribe Here

And if you already subscribe via RSS, or you follow us on Twitter of Facebook, this won’t have any effect at all on your daily updates.

Our server swap is complete and we’re already seeing greatly improved response and load times. According to tests run at Pingdom, our full page load times have dropped by one half! We hope this boost in performance makes for a better user experience.

It looks as if a few comments were dropped in the transition. If you submitted a comment over the past 24 hours and it didn’t appear on the site, feel free to re-submit if you’d like.

We’re in the process of consolidating our Facebook presence onto a single page. If you’re on Facebook and you’d like to track our updates from within your Facebook News Feed, visit the following page and join us!

EcoVelo on Facebook →

We’re down to the last few days of the photo contest. If you haven’t submitted a photo yet, now’s the time! The deadline for entries is November 20th. Click here to view details about how to enter, and click here to view the entries that have been posted so far.

Sponsors
The following companies have generously donated a bunch of cool prizes for the Contest. The goodies are still pouring in; we’ll post a complete list before the entry deadline.

Please welcome our latest sponsor, AdventureCORPS. From their website:

AdventureCORPS →

It’s time for another EcoVelo photo contest. Since fall is in the air and some of us are already wistfully looking back on summer, we thought an “Endless Summer” theme would be apropos. Some nifty prizes and buchoo bragging rights are up for grabs, so fire up that image sorter and send us your best photo from the past few months that tells a story about bicycling in the summer.

Contest Rules

• All are welcome — amateurs and pros alike.
• Please submit only one photo.
• The work must be your own.
• Please submit only photos that include bicycles and express something about summer.
• Photos should be sized no smaller than 1000 pixels on the long side.
• Sorry, but prizes can only be shipped within the continental U.S. (but please do enter anyway if you’re from outside the U.S.).

Send your entries as e-mail attachments to alan@barnardesign.com. Include your name in the body of the e-mail and “EcoVelo Photo Contest” in the subject line. Please note that we’re running approximately 7-10 days behind on posting photos, so please be patient.

The call for entries starts today and we’ll close it off on November 20. Like we did for our previous photo contest, we’ll publish the photos on the blog as they come in. Once the entry period is closed, we’ll pick the winners by jury and announce the results here.

The linear flow of the standard blog format works very well for its intended purpose, but the reverse chronological layout can sometimes make it difficult to locate posts on specific subjects. To help you find those needles in the haystack, we provide 4 ways to search for archived posts on EcoVelo:

• Search Box – This is probably the best way to locate something very specific. Located at the top of the left hand sidebar.
• Category Archive – Use this if you want to isolate a specific category and browse backwards through the posts chronologically. Located mid-way down the left hand sidebar.
• Date Archive – Use this if you want to isolate a specific month/year and browse backwards through the posts chronologically for that time frame. Located mid-way down the left hand sidebar.
• Main Site Archives – This is our new high-zoot archive that lists every individual post, organized alphabetically by category, and chronologically within each category. Each listing links to a single post and opens that post in a new window. The page is quite long, but this is a really cool way to look back over the entire span of approximately 1200 posts and pick-and-choose those that catch your eye. Located in the menu at the upper right of the main page (look for “Archives”).

And as a last resort, run a search on Google that includes the search term for what you’re looking for along with the keyword “ecovelo”. Happy hunting!

We’re super-excited to have Calhoun Cycle on-board as our newest sponsor. We’re long-time customers and can’t say enough about their eclectic product mix, high level of technical expertise, and exceptional customer service. We’ve ordered through their online store many times and our experience has been nothing short of outstanding.

Here’s some background information taken from their “About Us” page:

Calhoun Cycle →

If you’ve been visiting EcoVelo for a while you’ve seen our road tests and product reviews and recently you may have noticed a new category called “Stuff We Like”.

Road tests are simply bike reviews under a different name. They usually involve an extended period living with a bike (2 weeks to 2 months or more) and include multiple photos and a detailed description and analysis of the bike.

Product reviews are in-depth looks at products other than bicycles (typically parts and accessories). Like road tests, they usually include multiple photos and a detailed description and analysis of the product.

Somewhere along the way we realized there was a need for a third type of “review”. Something less formal, a sort of, “Hey, we like this product and you might too. Check it out sometime.” To meet this desire/need, we created a new category and called it “Stuff We Like”.

These new mini-reviews won’t replace our full-fledged road tests and product reviews, but we’re hoping they’ll enhance what we’re already doing and provide another source of ideas and inspiration.

Interbike is fast approaching and I keep forgetting to mention this. A while back I mentioned that we’d be attending Interbike this year, and we had every intention of doing so (going so far as obtaining press passes and making travel arrangements), but as so often happens, real life intruded and disrupted our best laid plans. I won’t go into the details, but just know that other, more pressing responsibilities require we stay close to home at this particular juncture. We’ll be there next year come heck or high water! In the meantime, this year we’ll do our usual best to cover the show from EcoVelo headquarters here in NorCal.

We started EcoVelo back on May 16, 2008 and today we passed a major milestone; you’re looking at post #1,000.

People occasionally ask what motivates us to keep moving forward, finding new material, doing everything we can to keep it fresh. A recent note from one of our regulars sums it up:

“By the way, I hold Alan personally responsible, and am thankful, for our car-light decision.”

We’re super-excited about how far we’ve come, but we’re even more excited about where we’re headed. Many thanks to all of our loyal readers (and newbies too!) for coming along for the ride; let’s keep it rolling!

—Alan & Michael

We have a number of bicycle reviews in the works for this summer:

• Breezer Uptown 8 Diamond Frame
• Renova Pandurban Bamboo Commuter
• Independent Fabrication Club Racer
• Currie Technologies Electric-Assist Hybrid
• Something from Rivendell

The list is likely to grow as the year progresses. We also have a number of accessory reviews in the works and a headlight shootout planned for the fall. And of course, as promised, we’ll host our second photo contest later this year, this time focusing on a specific theme (we’re looking for ideas).

Stay tuned, and if you aren’t already following us via RSS or e-mail notifications, consider subscribing so you don’t miss anything!

A number of people have asked how they can upload photos to EcoVelo. There isn’t a convenient provision for that within the blog itself, so I set-up a Flickr EcoVelo Group where we can all contribute and share photos. Now, if you’d like to reference a photo in one of your comments, you can add that photo to the EcoVelo Group for others to view. I’ve added a few of my own photos to get the group started, but I encourage you to join the group and add your own images! There’s a link below and I’ve also added a permanent link to the group in the left-hand sidebar under the “Subscribe” heading.

EcoVelo Group on Flickr →

Please join me in welcoming Breezer to our list of site sponsors. We’re big fans of Breezer and we’re super-excited to have them onboard. Since 2002, Breezer has been a leader in producing transportation-oriented bicycles for the U.S. market, and they’ve done a tremendous job helping to raise awareness of the benefits of transportational bicycling and car-lite/car-free living.

The Breezer line-up includes Town Bikes, Range Bikes, and Folders. Town Bikes feature internal gear hubs, chain guards, racks, and in some cases, integrated lighting. Breezer Range bikes have many of the same features as Town bikes, but with 700c wheels and wide range gearing for longer distances and more demanding terrain. Breezer folding bikes are great for short commutes where storage is an issue, and longer multi-modal commutes that involve train and bus transfers.

Here’s a bit of background on the company:

I’ll have a Breezer Finesse in-house for a road test later this season.

Visit the Breezer website →

Well, we finally did it. Five judges spent two weeks poring over 400+ photos to come up with the 10 photos shown below. There are easily another 20 that deserve to be here as well, but alas, we only have 10 prizes, so we were forced to make some hard choices. For the winners, congratulations! For those who didn’t make the list, know that judging art is a subjective process and a different panel of judges would’ve come up with a different list of winners. Hopefully, winner or not, everyone enjoyed the contest as much as I did. It was a lot of work, but it was also a lot of fun, and I hope to host another at some point.

So finally, and without further ado, I’m pleased to present our top ten.

[Click here to view the complete set of 400+ entries]

1. Gert-Jan Rodenboog

View Gert-Jan Rodenboog’s full entry →

2. Dick Brooks — Thinker

View Dick’s full entry →

3. Marc van Woudenberg — Soaking Cycling

View Marc’s full entry →

4. Vincent de Waleffe

View Vincent’s full entry →

5. Syd Winer — Salar de Uyuni y bici

View Syd’s full entry →

6. Dottie White

View Dottie’s full entry →

7. Damir Ivankovic

View Damir’s full entry →

8. Jim Thill

View Jim’s full entry →

9. Richard Wezensky

View Richard’s full entry →

10. Patrick Malloy — Mimio

View Patrick’s full entry →

Prizes

I’ll be contacting the winners this week to make arrangements to ship their prizes. As mentioned in our contest rules, we’re going to allow the winners to choose their own prize in the order they placed. In other words, first place gets first pick from the list, second place gets second pick, etc., etc. That way, each person has a better chance of getting something they can use.

• Planet Bike Blaze 1W & SuperFlash Light Set – Courtesy of Planet Bike
• Terracycle Accessory Mount – Courtesy of Terracycle
• Camdapter CamStrap – Courtesy of Camdapter
• 4pk ChicoBags Reusable Shopping Bags – Courtesy of TwoKnobbyTires.com
• Klunkerz DVD – Courtesy of Billy Savage
• Japanese Brass Bell – Courtesy of Rivendell
• Japanese Brass Bell – Courtesy of Rivendell
• Acorn Bags 2-Strap Roll Bag – Courtesy of EcoVelo
• Alloy Water Bottle Cage – Courtesy of EcoVelo
• Alloy Water Bottle Cage – Courtesy of EcoVelo

None of this would be possible without the generous support of our sponsors. Please return the favor by giving them your support!

Judges

Tim Messick — Tim Messick Photography/Graphics →
Chris Austria — Digital Imaging Specialist, ICF Jones & Stokes
Larry Goral — Senior Editor & Graphic Artist, ICF Jones & Stokes
Andy Guibord — Freelance Photographer
Alan Barnard — BarnarDesign

If you clicked on a link pointing to www.recumbentblog.com and ended up here, welcome to EcoVelo. The Recumbent Blog is a site I maintained for a few years before starting this site. I left it online in a dormant state for approximately a year before shutting it down yesterday and setting up a redirect that points to this site.

You can read our mission statement here. Thanks for visiting and we hope you stick around! —Alan

Many of you may be wondering where we’re at in the judging process for the EcoVelo Photo Contest. Right now we’re mid way through; I have five jurors sorting through the photos as we speak. They’re all busy professionals, and the gig doesn’t pay much (a beer), so I’ve asked them to take their time providing me their picks.

All of the prizes have arrived. Our prize list is below. Please support our sponsors!

• Planet Bike Blaze 1W & SuperFlash Light Set – Courtesy of Planet Bike
• Terracycle Accessory Mount – Courtesy of Terracycle
• Camdapter CamStrap – Courtesy of Camdapter
• 4pk ChicoBags Reusable Shopping Bags – Courtesy of TwoKnobbyTires.com
• Klunkerz DVD – Courtesy of Billy Savage
• Japanese Brass Bell – Courtesy of Rivendell
• Framed Bicycle Print – Courtesy of EcoVelo Photo
• Acorn Bags 2-Strap Roll Bag – Courtesy of EcoVelo
• 2/Alloy Water Bottle Cages – Courtesy of EcoVelo

If all goes well, I’m hoping we can wrap up the judging this week and announce the winners this coming weekend. Keep an eye out!

The entry period for the EcoVelo Photo Contest is officially closed. If my tally is correct, we ended up with 411 photos! We’ll start the judging process this week and if all goes as planned we’ll have the winners for you within the next 10-14 days.

View the complete set of photos →

We’re running a photo contest through March 15th. Details here. The contest is dominating our front page for now, but we’ll be back to a more balanced mix of bike culture, advocacy, news, and reviews on the 16th. In the meantime, enjoy all the wonderful photos from around the world!