Every Day Adventurers

Jessy Clonts, our neighbor in the Bay Area, test rode a Radish for 30-days this spring. This is a journal about her expectations, experiences and feedback. Enjoy!

Day 6

After a long Saturday night, another trip to the gym took a lot of will power to hop on the bike and not beg a ride from a friend. Of course, once I was pedaling downhill in the beautiful 75-degree weather, I was more than glad to be on wheels.

More friends wanted more rides on the SnapDeck and I happily obliged. This Xtracycle really breeds community (or slackerism). I love it!

Jessy Clonts, our neighbor in the Bay Area, test rode a Radish for 30-days this spring. This is a journal about her expectations, experiences and feedback. Enjoy!

Day 5

I channeled Bill Withers and was ready to ride on this Lovely Day. A friend and I rolled to The Trappist in downtown Oakland, a pub that specializes in ridiculously expensive artisan-made beer.

It was way warmer than anticipated and I was truly grateful to have a place to store my jacket and scarf. My afternoon buddy also shed her extra layers into the FreeLoaders.

After a glass of Trappist ale and some hand-cut noodles at a Chinatown noodle shop, we smartly decided to take BART back to Berkeley. Carrying the Radish down the three flights of stairs fully loaded with clothing and purses was an interesting endeavor. While the front end was light as a feather, the back end was…Not. Light. At. All. And as tempted as I was to grab the back end by the Snap Deck, I knew it had the potential to pop off. So I decided to roll, or rather bump, the back wheels down the stairs while lifting the front end. Flights one and two went somewhat smoothly. By flight three, I made a new friend in a woman who helped lift the back end for me. Thanks, lady!

On the BART, I met a woman named Angel who complimented the Radish. This led to a bike conversation for champions for the rest of the seven-minute ride. It ended with an exchange of phone numbers for future bike talk.

Considering the struggle to get the Radish down to the platform, I decided to take the elevator back to street level. It seems the BART engineers didn’t account for long sports utility bikes when designing the elevators, for it took some severe front wheel manipulation to load the Radish. While it was pretty hilarious, I deemed the Radish a little BART un-friendly.

Jessy Clonts, our neighbor in the Bay Area, test rode a Radish for 30-days this spring. This is a journal about her expectations, experiences and feedback. Enjoy!

Day 3

Didn’t ride the Radish today.

Day 4

Rode the Radish to the gym again. The ride down was nothing to write home about, but the ride back was kind of hellatious. Maybe it was the 30 minutes I spent on the elliptical after bouldering for an hour, and maybe it was the gale force winds I was pedaling into on the way back uphill, but my legs were jelly. Almost toast.

Jessy Clonts, our neighbor in the Bay Area, test rode a Radish for 30-days this spring. This is a journal about her expectations, experiences and feedback. Enjoy!

Day 2

I rode the Radish to my trainer’s studio for a kettlebell session, and when he opened the gate to greet me, he chuckled.

“What’s that?”

“It’s my new Cadillac! Isn’t it great?”

His wife stopped by to say hello and noticed the Radish parked out front.

“This is what I need for grocery shopping,” she said as she sized it up.

“That’s exactly what you can use it for!” In just two days, I have become Xtracycle’s newest Roots Radical.

We discussed how she is currently shopping for groceries, by slinging the bags on her handlebars. Her front tire gets wobbly, she can’t turn very well. Very unsafe.

I explained how the Radish handles (so smooth), how easy it is to turn (so easy), and how much it costs (so totally worth it).

I told her how I’ve used it so far and how I plan to use it in the future, and she was visibly excited. She wants one.

“I can really see this being a revolutionary urban bike,” she decided. I concur!

Later at the downtown Berkeley library bike racks, I pulled up next to a woman unhitching a bike that was longer than mine by a good twelve inches. She had a trailercycle attachment on her standard bike for her four year old daughter.

“Now that’s what I want,” she said wearily as I locked up.

Eager for more Xtracycle talk, I told her how much I’ve loved it in the two days I’ve been on it.

“I highly recommend it. It’s just so easy!” I said, as she struggled to maneuver out of a tight clearance area.

She explained that she had checked it out before at a Solano bike shop, but the Radish is just too expensive for her. My inner Xtracycle saleswoman kicked in.

“Oh, well you know they also have the Free Radical kit for your standard bike. It’s significantly less expensive.”

“Really? I didn’t know that. Thanks! I might have to check that out.”

In my Xtracycle conversion, I’m also trying to create other converts. And it feels good.

Jessy Clonts, our neighbor in the Bay Area, test rode a Radish for 30-days this spring. This is a journal about her expectations, experiences and feedback. Enjoy!

Everyone talks about living their lives more “green,” and reducing their carbon footprint, but beyond taking reusable bags to the store in the City CarShare Prius and composting the recyclable compact fluorescent light bulbs, who truly walks the walk?

When a friend challenged me to forgo driving for riding an Xtracycle for 30 days, I secretly panicked for a moment, then accepted enthusiastically. Like many Californians, I enjoy an active lifestyle that includes biking for fun.

But this challenge required me to run all of my errands on bike, and the Midwest in me couldn’t imagine hauling groceries on two wheels. I know people do it everyday, but I am notoriously clumsy; my last bike crash was about three weeks prior to the challenge and I’m still nursing a sprained wrist.

I’m determined to prove not only that I can rise to the challenge and do well, but that I truly can modify my lifestyle in a positive, healthy, responsible (and less expensive) way. Anyone can try anything for a month, but I want to want to embrace a bicycle lifestyle permanently.

I don’t expect this 30-day challenge to be easy, but I do expect it to be interesting. And so it begins.

Day 1

I have to admit I was nervous to convert from a “regular” bike to an Xtracycle. I worried about the safety, the handling, and whether or not I could be trusted not to crash it. As I took it for a test spin I worried about my turn radius; could I cut sharp corners if I needed to? Could I brake hard and fast? What if I needed to bail off the seat? In the midst of my concerns, I had somehow turned into some sort of danger-wielding stunt master. But once I rode it around a parking lot a couple of times, I realized it actually handled better than my “regular” bike.

For the inaugural trip out, I loaded the Free Loader saddlebags with my heavy backpack, climbing gear, a change of clothing, and a water bottle. I put my U-lock in the handy hidden pocket and off I rode to the gym. Cruising down the bicycle boulevard, I got nods and smiles from nearly everyone I passed. Was that normal? Having rocked a rusted vintage Specialized for the last year, I felt like a million bucks on my shiny new Radish.

Pulling up to the bike rack at Berkeley Ironworks, I worried that I wouldn’t be able to lock up the bike as I normally would. But my U-lock did its job. The back end of the bike protruded an extra 15 inches further than the other bikes, and I couldn’t help but smile to myself when I looked back at my Radish parked alongside the rest of the bikes.

My friends were intrigued. They wanted a ride on the back. We jetted to an empty parking lot where we took turns giving each other rides on the Snap Deck. One friend managed to give both 115-pound girls a tandem ride; the triumph of the evening.

When I got home, my landlord was pulling in the trash cans from the sidewalk.

“Nice bike. It looks like a station wagon!”

“Thanks,” I said. “That’s sort of the idea!”