Cycling

The arrival of high-intensity LEDs has certainly made a huge difference to the brightness of bicycle headlights. Some people, however, are now looking at using the bulbs not just as a means of lighting the cyclist’s way, but of making their bicycles more visible to motorists. A couple of examples include the Aura and Revolights systems, both of which incorporate LEDs into a bike’s wheel rims. Another system, that looks like it might be considerably less involved yet still effective, is called LED by LITE.  Read More

Canada's 4iiii Innovations has developed a Head Up Display for athletes that can be mounted on virtually all glasses thanks to included universal attachment points, so there's no need to stop wearing your favorite pair of sport sunglasses. Sportiiiis - pronounced "sport-eyes" - receives crucial performance data from any paired monitoring device via ANT+ wireless technology, compares actual performance with desired workout zone parameters and then feeds real-time indicators back to the user via colored LED lights and audio updates.  Read More

Sports Tracker is now shipping its Bluetooth Heart Rate Monitor, a chest-worn unit that pairs with a smartphone app for viewing stats in real-time as well as storing your data on the company website or sharing it with others through social media.  Read More

If you're a cyclist who wants to turn a few heads on the road, you should ride a recumbent tricycle ... people can't help but notice something that appears to be a low-riding lawn chair on wheels. If you want to get noticed by other recumbent trike riders, you might look into getting a Catrike 700. With its 700C wheels and relatively light weight of just 33 pounds (15 kg), it's said to be one of the fastest production trikes that money can buy. However, how do you get noticed by other Catrike riders? Well, you could try equipping your trike with just about every accessory imaginable, all of them in black. That's what Fayetteville, North Carolina native Jim Artis did with his. The result - which he named "Silk" - looks like something designed for dispatching evil-doers by dark of night, before tearing off in a swirl of dry ice vapor.  Read More

Given that wireless gear-shifting for bicycles has been around for the past few years, perhaps it shouldn’t come as a surprise that someone has now developed a wireless braking system. Created by computer scientists at Germany’s Saarland University, the current prototype still looks a little boxy, but it does do away with cables and brake levers. According to computer algorithms that would normally be used in control systems for aircraft or chemical factories, the system should offer 99.999999999997 percent reliability – that means it would fail three times out of a trillion braking attempts.  Read More

Automobile manufacturers have been leveraging their brand names on other modes of transport for years, with bicycles a common focus from companies including BMW, Audi and McLaren. Porsche has also been producing bikes for years and has now expanded its Driver’s Selection range with the addition of two new bikes – the Bike RS and the Bike S. Both models are 29-inch wheelers and are constructed from lightweight materials and high-end components with performance in mind.  Read More

When Canadian media artist Nicholas Hanna first moved to the Chinese city of Beijing, he was quite taken with the water calligraphy that he saw people creating in the parks. The art form consists of using a large brush to paint Chinese calligraphy on the road, in water, so the characters disappear as the water evaporates. Hanna decided to put his own spin on it, and rigged up a cargo tricycle with a computer-controlled dot matrix water release system, that squirts out passages of Chinese poetry on the road behind him as he rides.  Read More

Relatively obscure though recumbent bicycles are, many people appreciate the ergonomic and aerodynamic advantages of the quirky two-wheelers. If quirkiness is your thing, however, then a recumbent tricycle might be even more to your liking. Not only do they look pretty sharp, but they're also more stable than the bicycles. Unfortunately, however, most of them are also quite cumbersome to transport - can you imagine trying to carry one up a flight of stairs, or fit it inside a car? Fortunately, there are some recumbent trikes that fold up. One in particular has been lighting up the recumbent forums lately, as it folds very small, very fast.  Read More

Whether you have the wind whistling in your ears on the highway, or the sound of scrunching tires coming from beneath you on a singletrack trail, it can often be difficult to hear what other cyclists are saying. While most of us are just content to yell “WHAT?”, Swedish wireless tech company Free2Move has what it thinks is a better idea – it’s HIOD One, a Bluetooth communications system designed specifically for cyclists.  Read More