Getting Ready for the New Season

A trip to the bike shop could have you spending money on things you all ready own. For the most part, this could be a good thing. Over the past year, improvements in Lighting, Travel Bags and Tools could make cycling a little more easy. Here are some of my favorite.

The Topeak "Quick Track" system. This is a great way to deal with carrying your stuff. That said, Maybe you don't need to carry much on your Recumbent and your rides, but for those of you that live on your bike and need it to get around, this design is the best I have seen, Check out the video:



The MTX/Quick Track system racks will fit most recumbent bicycles. There is a great way to do this that I will show later. The "Explorer" rack has an old school spring clip to hold things down when you just dont need a bag.

There is a selection of bags to fit. One has fold out panniers to expand to carry larger loads when needed.

The second item, also made by Topeak, is a new larger version of their "Morph" frame pump. The New "Mega Morph" is a larger version of the Topeak line of Morph Pumps.

Bigger is better with bicycle pump design. This may not be the best pump for those of you wanting to save weight, but for riders that don't have enough strength to use a convential style frame pump and dont care about the extra size and weight, this could be the tool for the job.

The larger fold out gauge makes it easy to read and inflate to the proper amount

The "Smart Head" allows you to switch from Presta to Schraider valves with out dismantling the head first.

The fold down foot stand keeps the pump stationary while inflating.
Again, the extra size and weight may not make this the pump of choice for lightweight riders, but its design may be a good substitute for having to carry a floor pump on your car, cycling trips.

The third item that I really like is the new Serfas Thunderbolt USB Head light and Tail light.
The Serfas Thunderbolt has endless mounting options for a great price.

The headlight has 15-micro (double strength) LED strip puts out 90 lumens, giving you plenty of light to see and be seen.
The USB-rechargeable Thunderbolt can be mounted virtually anywhere on the front or back of your bike.
Charges from any USB port. The lights Feature a non-directional beam to cover a wider area
Modes: high beam, low beam and two flash modes
Run times: 1.5 hours (high beam); 6.5 hours (low beam); 3.5 hours (high blink); 9 hours (low blink)
Highly Water resistant
Weight: 50 grams
Comes in 7 different colors
Colors: Black, White, Red, Blue, Pink, Green, Yellow I have used these lights on a couple of different bike and love them.

The items I have written above are an improvement of what I already had. Making things safer and easier is always in my mind money well spent. Check them out in person and I think you will be pleasantly surprised of these 3 great designs!