Tag: thoughts

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Sunday, the last day of every week, the highlight of any week for most cyclists I know, and still…I don’t feel too delighted on every sunday ride for various reasons. I mean, there might be great reasons for riding on any given sunday, just like I wrote in the last blogpost,“Why Sunday is the best day for cycling!”. However, if sunday is the perfect day for cycling, then why do I feel so angry and unhappy most of the time, when I return home from a sunday ride?
Well, I’m going to answer this question today! Here are some reasons for why I don’t like to go cycling on sundays:

–Popular places in town are so crowded by people!

On a sunday ride I usually like to do a quiet ride, with places and routes, that are impossible to visit or ride during the week, because of traffic or construction work for example.
However, everyone who ever tried to visit the Phoenix Lake or Phoenix West in Dortmund on a sunday afternoon knows, that it’s best to just stay away from those popular places, too. It’s noisy, overcrowded by people, the traffic is insane and it’s just no fun to ride bicycles in such environments.

-Sunday is the day after Saturday!

Saturday afternoon and evening is party time! That’s a worldwide phenomenom. Party time in summer time, means it’s outdoor party time, which leads to outside garbage, broken bottles and shards all over the town. As a cyclist on a sunday ride, you have to be so aware of shards and other garbage, that just waits to cut your tires wide open. There’s no time to enjoy the views at all, because of all the threats on the ground.

-“Sonntagsfahrer”!

The german word for unexperienced car drivers, who don’t drive cars on a daily basis, but like to drive on sundays to visit places for a walk or do a weekend adventure, because traffic is low and the streets are free.
They are not necessarily bad drivers in terms of skills, they just drive cars differently compared to commuters or daily drivers. As a cyclist on a sunday ride, you always have to be prepared for unusual driving and be ready for an unusual reaction on your bike. Keep your eyes on the road, there’s no time for enjoying views and landscapes!

-Long rides on the weekend take a huge part of your weekend time!

Spending the larger part of the weekend on your bicycle means you’ll miss every awesome roadbike race on TV. Of course, you can watch the highlights later in the evening, but it’s only live once. They don’t give you all the expert insights in the highlight show and there’s also no time for all the historic buildings and background knowledge to the race’s region and culture.
Besides, you’ll probably going to miss or at least be late for every summer BBQ with family and friends.
It’s a shame, but you always have to estimate carefully on what’s more important to you. Luckily, there’s the good old german summer. Heavy rain and strong winds in combination with a nice summer storm can have a huge impact on that decision from time to time…

Of course, not everything’s bad on a sunday ride. I had a lot of great sunday rides on the bike, roadbike as well as gravel and mountainbike and I know, that sundays are perfect for outdoor time on a bicycle. So, you shouldn’t take this article too serious. However, maybe you’d like to read about the great and awesome things of a sunday ride instead, here’s the link to the last blogpost:“Why sunday is the best day for cycling!”

-Dennis

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May has already started and I just realized, that I haven’t wrote a single word about the start of the official outdoor cycling season yet.

So, here we go … What are the most remarkable things about Spring 2021?

Let’s start with the #1 small talk topic of the galaxy:

The Weather – March and April had just a handful of overall nice days in stock and I tried to take advantage of every single second of them. Time flies and the nice times are like a lightning bolt – before you recognize them, they’re gone. That’s why it was important for me to be outside cycling as long as the weather was great.
However, the standard average March and April day went something like this:

Sunshine and no wind when I woke up.
Grey clouds and a light breeze after breakfast.
Rain, hailstorm and a decent headwind, while I had lunch.
Sunshine and no wind before coffeebreak in the afternoon, that made me dressup and get ready for cycling.
Rain, hailstorm and a decent sidewind as soon as I hit the streets on the roadbike.
Sunshine and just a few clouds, that designed a pretty nice sunset, but it’s just a trap, because the sun’s just laughing about the joke that the average spring day in March and April was!

– Dennis The Cyclist, Spring 2021

Let’s move on to the next remarkable thing:

Construction Sites – Phoenix West – the #1 roadbike spot in Dortmund – is officially dead!
The city decided to make this place a shiny flagship project by planning a modern tech centre right there. Currently, there are three or four huge construction sites, which would not be a problem, if they wouldn’t cause the roads to be closed, torn apart and covered with dirt and gravel. Now it’s a problem and it’s absolutely no fun to ride roadbikes there and it probably might never be fun again.
The only cool thing they ever build at Phoenix West is the brewery, which is only opened for take away right now.
So, whenever I do my casual one lap at Phoenix West to make sure noone’s forgetting that this is still a roadbike spot – I also consider on whether or not I should get some beers, so I could have some delicious ice cold after ride beverages … alone in my room, because that’s what you do in spring 2021, you know?

Finally, the most remarkable and greatest thing about spring 2021:

Cherry Blossoms – Not everything was all grey and cloudy in March and April!
Luckily, it’s the cherry blossom time of year, so it was almost too easy to get some great shots of all the colorful trees outside. Taking all these pictures, which I think turned out really cool, made up a lot for all the downsides of 2021 so far!

If you’d like to see more pictures like the header, here’s the link to the seasonal content on this website:

-Dennis

P.S.: There’s a brand new video on my YouTube channel! If you got four and a half spare minutes left, you might just give it a try? It’s right here: