hubcyclist

here's some amusement for folks, adventures in selling kid bike on craiglist. got an email asking to send pictures of the tires. What I really wanted to say is that tires are cheap to replace if for whatever reason you don't like the bike's tires (tread pattern, wear, whatever), but parents who have no idea how bikes are going to wonder about things that don't really matter.

himespau 

I'd imagine the wanting to see the tires is hoping for an indication of how used the bike is. They don't realize you can change tires and are hoping to see the little nubbins that are on brand new knobbies, which would tell them that the bike was hardly ridden and they can pretend they're giving their kid a new bike.

We have a bunch of baby/toddler stuff that we'd taken pictures of (and I was being lazy about writing ad copy for) to put up on craigslist or nextdoor or whatever. Now it's all spread out in the basement, but I'm holding off on trying to sell it until after this whole social distancing thing is over. My son's 12" balance bike should probably be added to that as he's 5 (and did his first non-training wheel or attached to dad's bike) pedaling for a few yards over the weekend. His older sister's hand me down 16" bike has training wheels and I've been hooking his 16" bike (no training wheels) to the back of mine for about a year now. If he keeps growing and starts riding on his own, I've got a 20" bike that I bought the same time I bought his 16" (and his sister's 24") waiting to give him for his birthday in October. Who knows, maybe by waiting to sell all my baby junk, I'll time it right and be able to get rid of it as the baby boom hits this November.

topflightpro

My wife and I have 4 nephews and a niece. The Nephews are all about a year apart - at some point this year, they will be 5,6,7,8. Two are my wife's sister's and two are my brother's. My niece is 1 and my brother's. When the two oldest kids were born, we bought them Strider bikes.

The 6 & 8 year olds (my wife's nephews) love mountain biking. I don't really know how they got hooked, but their dad takes them to the local trails, and they are addicted to RedBull TV and downhill videos on YouTube. A couple weeks ago, I reached out to my sponsor shop who was more than happy to extend my discounts to them, so we helped my brother in law get them two beginner Scott MTBs for their birthday presents. The day we delivered them, they would not get off the bikes. With the gears, they were even able to ride up their very steep driveway, something they had not been able to do before. And their mother has even started allowing them to ride a loop around the neighborhood on their own, and one of them rode his bike to a friend's house. (This is big - for them and for her.)

My brother's kids, the 5 & 7 year olds, have not yet shown any interest in riding a bike. Part of it is because my sister in law is super paranoid about them getting hurt. She'd probably put them in a bubble is she could.

Last night, I got a call from my brother. He bought a bike for the 7 year old and wants him to learn how to ride it. His wife wanted to put training wheels on it, but my brother said no. He needs to learn to ride a bike. He said he read that it can help to take the pedals off so my nephew can learn to coast before pedaling, and asked if I thought that would work. I told him that I heard it was a good strategy, then we faced timed so I could help him take the pedals off - a lot of people don't realize one is reverse threaded. I also had him show me the whole bike, and I pointed out areas where he should double check things were installed properly - like the the front wheel. (The bike came put together from Dicks.)

My brother said he is hoping to make this just between him and my nephew, to keep his wife away from it. We fully expect my nephew to fall a few times as he learns, and if she over reacts to it, we know my nephew will too.

I'm pretty sure my brother was spurred to this decision by my wife's nephews, since they are pretty close in age, and he seemed a bit surprised that the boys were already riding bike trails and geared bikes. I really hope this works out, and my nephew takes to bikes like my wife's nephews have.

Flatballer

Striking the balance between letting your kids get hurt and protecting them is one of the hardest things to get right, in my opinion.

I think my wife tends a little too much towards protection, and she thinks I tend a little too much towards letting them get hurt. So it probably works out about right.

Obviously I'd like to protect them from some of the worst things that I experienced (concussions, big sets of stitches, still no feeling in my eyebrow or chin, broken bones, etc) but some of those things are inevitable if you're doing fun stuff and pushing yourself.

hubcyclist

Surprised I didn't post this, but this is the video we used to finally get our son riding, it took longer than 45 mins but over the course of two days I was able to get him to finally go unsupported

gsteinb

historically speaking, now isn't the best time to chance getting kids hurts. About the last place you want them is a doctor's office or hospital. PSA

Flatballer

A good point. Yeah, maybe not the best time right now.

gsteinb

#olddads

Flatballer

#wisedads more like it.

himespau 

I tried this with my daughter and it worked like a charm (she'd tried tricycles and with training wheels, but couldn't get the balance down), with one modification. When I just took the pedals off, she was always bumping the cranks. I ended up also taking the crank/bb off as well to make her a lot more comfortable. It helped that I had a chain tool and a spare quicklink (for when it came time to put it back on) handy. These are one piece cranks, so they're a bit more of a pain to deal with (I can't remember if the bb had loose balls or if they were collared). When I put the crankset, chain, and pedals back on after she'd been using it as a balance bike for a while, she took to it the first time she tried and didn't look back. The main thing with her once she got the pedals back on was to have one of us in front of her and keep talking with her and having her look at our faces. Otherwise, they look right down in front of them, their steering goes to crap, and they crash.

cmh

I did the standard 'hold the back of the seat and run along with them then let go' to teach my kids to ride on their own. Both of my kids had it down within a day of doing this with a few wipe outs into the grass. It was actually a lot harder on my back then it was on them. The hardest part was to keep them from looking back at me - I was pretty much telling them to look ahead the whole time. I agree it might be best to wait a few months to avoid a Dr. visit.

burnthesheep

Bought some sun sleeves with tattoo pattern. Can't wait to try them out. Tired of the whole take a bath in sunscreen thing. Fit well, good length. A tiny loose at the wrist, but wtf ever, they fit and are decent quality and weren't a fortune.

At least now I can only do the legs/face/neck stuff. Save a little.

big john

I just like the picture. Real ink on the arms. He's actually younger than I am, don't know why the pic made him look so old.

kensuf

I called those "dirty 30s". They're brutal.

Tabatas, for me, were always based on the 20s full on, 10s recovery protocol. You get two per minute, a total of eight, for a 4 minute session. The first 3 always seem easy, then the fun starts. To really do them effectively I usually needed to be on a trainer, if I tried to do them on the open road I'd frequently fall over, ride into a ditch, or something else.

furiousferret

In this post apocalyptic society, I've developed a new trade which should help me survive.


I thought my Marine Corps rifleman training, boxing and grappling classes, or Boy Scout training would keep us alive, but apparently I hold more value as a barista to my wife.

topflightpro

My brother put my nephew on the bike without pedals. He seemed to get the gliding part, but he did fall and hit his crotch on the bike while my SIL was watching. She gasped, and he started crying. My nephew is quick to cry. My brother pointed out that he hadn't started crying until his mom was there. She agreed to go back inside. And my nephew decided he wanted to try it with pedals the next day.

I texted my brother to ask how it went. It did not go well. My brother said my nephew has no balance, and he doubts he will ever learn to ride a bike. At this point, my brother said my nephew may be the first kid ever to be dropped off to college with swimmies, training wheels and velcro shoes.

Flatballer

I can't find the exact example I wanted, but there's a bunch of meme's with "what I thought the apocalypse would be like vs what it looks like" with guys with full tactical loadouts and ammo and everything sitting at their kitchen table with TP and coffee.

Cypress

Some people don't trust the good of man.

himespau 

This past weekend, I was pushing my son on his bike and he'd make it maybe 2 pedal rotations after I let go before he stopped. Yesterday, I was standing at one end of the driveway and gave him a push and he'd go maybe 10 yards. Last night, when my wife got home from work, I told her he had something he needed to show her outside (she hadn't seen him ride unassisted at all before). He said he needed to put his helmet on, so I said ok. While waiting for her to come out, I did the whole push thing and he went to the end of the driveway. Did it back the other way.

Then I showed him how he could start himself because he didn't want me to have to push him, and he went out to the end of the driveway. My wife came out, and I asked him if he wanted to try it in the road where the was a longer shot without stopping so he could show her. He wasn't sure, but said ok, He started off on his own, went to the end of our cul de sac (maybe 100 yards away) did 2 laps of the little roundabout there, came back, didn't slow down as he passed us and rode to the other end of the road and back (a bit over 1/4 mile), then did the cul de sac again before we could stop him. Had a giant smile on his face the whole way. I was just shocked silly that before that he'd only gone 10 yards on his own and only with help getting started and suddenly he did about a half mile as if it was nothing. Tried turning onto our driveway and immediately racked himself on top tube hitting the big lip of our drive (our driveway slopes down so the entrance is almost as tall as the curb) and crashed into a bush, but it was awesome. I asked him if he'd been secretly getting up in the middle of the night to practice. My daughter wasn't quite as extreme of a flicking of a switch, but, when they get it, they get it and boom.

Edit: I get you about the parental reaction thing though. When he wiped out at the very end, I saw he wasn't hurt and tried to downplay it so he wouldn't get scared, but my wife ran over and checked out his palms and made a deal about how brave he was being but how we needed to check his hands and get them washed (I didn't see any broken skin). I was just hoping he wasn't going to get scared and not get back in the saddle.

Flatballer

furiousferret

I keep telling my wife to avoid her sister. Her social distancing isn't like our social distancing. She has her kids, and they all come in contact with at least 1 person a day and collectively it adds up. For them its just no large social gatherings or browsing at Target.

We just found our her cousin has coronavirus from working at a rest home that has a major outbreak, and someone from that house was over last night. I guess we're going to see how it pans out in the next few days....

Cypress

Yikes! Sending good smoke that way.

big john

That really sucks. Sure hope everything is ok.

Hermes

furiousferret That really sucks. Clean all surfaces and points that may have been touched. I suspect you will be okay but sending you some good luck just in case you need it.

furiousferret

We haven't came in contact with them, so we're good....