Ups and Downs

Ramping up daily

When you live in a house your sidewalk usually does not move and your driveway may be on a slant but it stays that way day to day.  If you live on a mooring you go up and down with the tides so the changes appear relative. If you live on a dock as I do which floats in place tied to a piling you go up and down but inside the boat everything remains the same.

piling at high tide

So the docks go up with the tide and back down again but the land stays put. The gangway between the docks and the shore slides on a large steel roller as the water rise or lower. The angle of the gangway can change dramatically and at very low tides or swing tides the hike up can be a workout.

In fact I have seen older seniors unable to go up the hill. Using a dock cart with a good load of two deep cycle batteries might required and extra hand to help or a motor. Walking up the ramp at real low tides wearing cycling shoes with cleats could kill you. I use three different styles of cleats, one is for old style platform pedals that have toe clips, one is for newer Shimano Dur-Ace and my Fixie use Time pedals.

6 inches more at it will flood

This week we are having King Tides which are extremes compared to the normal spring tides. The calendar is about to change in about a week making it officially winter. The spring tides occur twice a month and the reference is to the spring action of the tides not the seasons of the year.

Please don't step on me

For some tides and ocean waves can me a baffling mystery. Many moons ago we were driving up the coast from Santa Monica to Lake Cachuma to go water skiing. Little did we know that you couldn't ski there. On the way up I got in to an argument with Carson about the waves. He said the waves were caused by the tides and said "No, it the wind". Carson probably grew up with Dorthy in Kansas where I grew up by the beach.

Old Man's at high tide

The tides makes the wave take different shapes at the sea bottom changes with the depth. If you have every surfed a rocky beach the walk in at low tide can be a real pain.

Cabrillo Beach

Last month when we had a Super Moon my neighbor flatly refused to consider the sun and its tidal influences. An avid fisherman and boat owner denied the sun was involved.

Sea Hare Cabrillo Beach Tidepool

Low tides are hard on the creatures in tide pools that get invaded by shit heads resembling an invasion of Japanese picture takers.

gangway rides on this roller

Since your house or apartment stays put you over the air TV stays the same or if you are a slave to cable or Direct you don't need to worry. But today my sailboat will change in height by 8 feet so at spring tides my Telly reception improves or sucks.

Samsung hidden behind bicycles

The above nonsense is my son Dylan YouTube Channel breaking 5,000 subscribers.

Tandem is from Epic Bike.

All my pictures shown here were taken with my Nikon D80. In the sidebar there is a video of the high water mark at Cabillo Beach YC and that was taken with my Samsung S6

Another late afternoon edition. My son has a new Stranger BMX 20 inch frame out.


 

This Video above was taken Wednesday afternoon at extreme low tide by Point Fermin during my afternoon bicycle ride.

Industry Speedway June 9, 2010

Well if you leave early you get there early. Confucius didn't say that, I did. Does take a lot of the stress of driving out of the trip leaving early but it does find me napping on the starting line when the tapes go up.

The place is pretty empty at 4:00 O'clock then slowly riders start to show up.

Last week I had problems with my throttle cable in the main and did some readjusting and added a rubber band at the carb to put tension on the cable. It worked a lot better but I didn't.

The drought of riders hit second division and two riders from third moved up. The second division main was a runaway with Tyson Talkington taking charge. When Costa Mesa, IMS and Industry all race the same week something has to give. Last week there were two riders down from Northern California to race here but this week nada. When you add entry, tires, gas money, plus time off your job, if you have one, the expenses really add up.

You will not find any eighteen wheelers in the parking lot here like you see at Super Cross. Sponsorship is hard to obtain and the majority of sponsors support riders because they love the sport. Motorcycles shops don't seem to be interested in speedway as they don't sell any products at their stores. When my son raced speedway he did get help from a parts manager with free clothing and some parts but when the store owner was asked for help with the Honda two stroke we were running it was not available.

Years past you could read the results from Costa Mesa in the newspaper the next day. The Auburn, California newspaper still puts a story about the races there but that is a popular local event and Auburn is still a small town. Even Cycle News does very little to promote the sport and would rather run the results on-line that take up print space.

I have heard riders grouse about having to try an explain to a sponsor why his name didn't appear in Cycle News or why was his name was even mentioned 4 or 5 weeks later.

Wednesday night the crazy sidecars were hard at it. In one race they added a new trick to their bag of getting the fans to scream, "THE FLYING SIDECAR". Then later a demolition derby. We need more sidecars but you just cannot go to your local motorcycle dealer and buy one.

You also can not go to your local dealer and pickup a speedway bike. There is basically only one way to buy a new bike here and that is at Cody's.

Joey Holt destroyed his frame at IMS recently and he wasn't there last night. Beside being a sport that is hard on the frames it is also hard on bodies. Yogi Isgro failed to avoid a down rider and clipped the front wheel and then hit the dirt. He did get good care and attention from the medical team but I am not sure he will be back for a few weeks.