A Gift Guide for 2020

Hello. Happy holidays.

See that fella in the picture above? That’s Horatio. Know what he’s doing? He’s not getting COVID. Or, if he has COVID but no symptoms, he’s not giving it to anyone else. Way to go, Horatio!

When the pandemic hit and we could no longer be indoors together, a lot of people pulled their old bikes out of the garage or bought their first new bike in decades. Obviously, this is one of the few benefits brought by the pandemic. Now that the weather has turned, many folks who are newer to riding may not know this wonderful little secret: riding bikes in the winter is (almost) always pleasant. Thus, we thought we’d suggest a few gifts that will help keep your loved ones riding all year long, and thus keep them socially distant and safe. Help your loved ones be like Horatio, not like poor Yorick (alas!).

In addition to the inherent social distance of riding a bike in the winter, there is the additional benefit of mental and emotional distance. Certainly we aren’t suggesting that one can bike away from all of your problems, but one can—and should—take breaks from them. Standing in a snowstorm in the middle of a deserted wild place with only one’s tracks in the snow behind them is a great way to experience meditative solace.

With a little preparation, riding in the winter—either for recreation or just to get around—has produced some of my favorite rides of all time. If you or someone you know needs a little convincing, here’s an old blog post about riding in the cold and the snow.

In order to face the winter, your loved one will need to prepare both 1) their bike and 2) their body.

1. Gifts for bikes

Tires

Winter days in Denver are often dry, but sometimes ice and snow on the streets persists for weeks. On ice or in slush, the wrong tires can make riding scary or dangerous. With the right tires, you can keep riding in just about any conditions. The Continental Winter Contact tires (left) are grippy for snowy or wet days. Studded tires (right) are often necessary for icy days. Some folks swap out tires seasonally, while others will install studded tires before storms and then put their other tires back on for a week or two when the roads dry out.

Alas, there’s no magical perfect tire for all of the conditions we see between October and April. However, the drawbacks of either riding too much tire on dry pavement or swapping tires now and then are small compared to the drawbacks involved in not riding. Winter tires range in price from $65-95 apiece.

If you still aren’t sure which tires your loved one might need, come on into the store and ask Duke E. Bear. He doesn’t know anything about tires but he’s a very good boy yes he is yes he is.

Pogies

Unless your loved ones are Mario and Luigi, their fingers will be the first thing to go numb. Even big fat mittens that are good for other winter activities don’t always work well on a bike. Pogies are the solution. We have pogies that are suitable for mountain and road handlebars. They can be nice to use even when temperatures are warmer, because either a thin glove or no glove is all that’s needed. Wearing thin gloves means it’ll be easier for your loved one to eat snacks and take photos of their bike leaning against things. They cost $75-99.

(Note: Some of the 45NRTH Draugenklaw pogies come with a flask!)

FEnders

There are two schools of thought when it comes to fenders:

School #1: These people know that snow can get packed between the tire and fender, causing lots of extra drag. Ergo, they do not use fenders in the winter.

School #2: These people love having wet, cold feet. They love the feeling of totally numb toes coming back to life, the intense, raw burning that hurts so bad it makes one nauseous. Ergo, they don’t use fenders.

Often in Denver, we commute to work when it’s 25 degrees and then commute back home when it’s 45 degrees. Fenders are pretty great when all of that morning snow turns into cold, dirty afternoon grits. You know what I mean; when the snow begins to melt and everything becomes a greasy gray color, and all of the road grime and goose poop and mud and gutter sludge mix together in grits-n-gravy consistency. Keep in mind that when those grits are flung into the air by a passing bicycle tire, fenders are the only thing between those grits and your loved one’s mouth/eyes/face.

Lights

We have lots of data linking darkness to depression. Especially when daylight savings time ends and we all have to start riding home in the dark, it’s really daunting. It makes me want to ride home in a hot tub. But! Once I get started, the ride is really lovely. Every time. It’s often so nice that I take an extra lap around the park. Sometimes I put on my earphones and ride through the endless tunnel of my headlight, and I have the world all to myself. It’s grand.

Dynamo lights are pricey, but the best, as you don’t have to worry about any battery weirdness in the cold. The setup (one needs a dynamo hub as well) usually costs upwards of $500, but it really is great. Otherwise, Niterider makes many fine USB rechargeable lights that start at $60 for a set. We’d recommend a headlight that’s at least 500 lumens, and we’d also recommend front and rear lights, both. Gift the brightest lights you can afford. Your loved one will be grateful.

Pedals

When it’s snowy or wet, some pedals get packed with snow and become slippery. Having a foot slip off a pedal unexpectedly is dangerous. We recommend a flat pedal with pins, which help feet stay where they belong. While pedals have been tough to come by this year, we have a few brands and colors in stock, and they start at about $50.

Storage

Riding in the cold means wearing layers, and shedding or adding layers happens all the time. Having a place to stow a jacket or heavy pair of mittens can be the difference between a 1-hour ride and a 4-hour ride. In fact, if you guessed that we carry a large number of bags because we think bags are so important, good guess! We carry bags by Oveja Negra, Swift Industries, J. Paks, Revelate, Portland Design Works, Surly, Velo Orange, Lizard Skins, and maybe some others I’ve forgotten.

Chain

Your loved one doesn’t need any special kind of chain for winter, but they will need to take good care of the chain they have. A snowy chain can rust overnight. Chain lube and a chain checker will make sure their drivetrain stays healthy despite the extra wear and tear caused by ice and magnesium chloride. This Rock n’ Roll Extreme chain lube and Park Tool chain wear indicator are $11 apiece. Buy them together for $20 until December 23rd.

2. gifts for people

Merino Wool

Most outdoor clothing will work for winter bike rides, but much of it isn’t ideal. Because riding is aerobic, one tends to get warm pretty quickly. Good riding clothing will wick and breathe and still shield from the wind. Merino wool is the best material for cold weather riding (and maybe everything else). Surly makes great wool beanies that fit under a helmet, Neck Toobs, Raglan base layers, scarves, socks, and jerseys.

The 45NRTH Greazy caps are a little heavier for very cold days.

We also have some merino Surly Pocket T’s with our logo on the sleeve. The Soigneur merino jerseys are some of my favorite riding clothing of all time. $75 and $150, respectively.

Happy hands and feet

If you’ve had hands and feet before, I don’t have to tell you that they get cold in the cold. That’s why we have these Gore Windstopper and 45NRTH gloves for all kinds of temps, as well as these 45NRTH Wolvhammer boots. These boots utilize Aerogel, which was designed for outer space! Gloves range from $70 to $130. The boots are $325. You might think that $325 is a lot of money for boots—and you’d be right—but there really is nothing else like them for long rides in very cold temperatures.

Flasks and Thermoses

Food and water are just as important during winter rides as they are in any other season. However, water and foodstuffs tend to freeze when the temperatures are, um, freezing, so stowing food near the body is important, and using insulated water bottles helps, too. Beyond that, an insulated mug full of hot cocoa can be the difference between a delightful afternoon out and a grueling slog. In fact, winter is the best time to ride out to the middle of nowhere and make #coffeeoutside. The Stanley Travel Mug is $23. Surly flasks are $25.

There you have it. Thanks for reading. If you’d like to check out gift guides from years past, links are below.

2019 | 2018 | 2017 | 2016 | 2015

Hello in There

Supposedly it’s the year 2020. I’m not sure whether that’s true, because time suddenly feels non-linear, unpredictable, and meaningless. I don’t know if it’s been the same for you, but here at the shop 2020 has been populated almost entirely by WTF moments, and even though we are all healthy and upright, our minds are fatigued as chewing gum affixed to a public commode, cold and unpliable.

I have a friend who, when she was four years old, used to sneak old chewing gum out of the ashtrays at the mall that were full of something like kitty litter and chew it, cold and gritty and rock hard and diseased. Perhaps that’s a metaphor for the mouthfeel of 2020.

I’m not complaining. We are employed and healthy when a lot of people are not. But I do want to address our almost total absence from social media, as well as from our own blog and newsletter. The shop has been incredibly busy, and because of our social distancing measures we’ve been spread very, very thin. Part of the truth is that we’ve been too busy to post on the interwebs. The other part of the truth is that so much feels broken, and many of our friends and customers are experiencing new hardships. To an extent, publishing content on the internet has felt kind of like saying we’ve figured out just what our downtrodden followers out there need: they need to be marketed to!

Obviously, there have always been hardships while Yawp! has existed, and we’ve managed to create quite a bit of online content in that time. Right now, though, just about everyone is facing new problems. Stoking the fires of the giant capitalist Want Machine in a time like this feels empty, worthless, and a betrayal of our values. Bicycles are valuable to me and, presumably, to you. Bicycles have helped people stay healthy when we couldn’t otherwise exercise during the stay-at-home order, stay sane when there was little else keeping us sane, and get around town to hunt for toilet paper. In fact, there are a fair number of essential workers who ride bikes to their jobs at hospitals and grocery stores, and obviously we have been honored to help those people continue to help us all. I know that what we do can be important, I just don’t know how to present it on the internet right now, when so many things—including a public heath crisis, a racial reckoning, and a politically savage election—are far more important.

We are a bike shop that has always valued and spent a lot of time with our community. Right now it’s not safe to spend time with our community. We used to also engage that community through social media, but right now we aren’t sure how to do that either. People in our community may be losing loved ones to COVID. People in our community have lost their livelihoods. People have lost their futures and their certainty. They are questioning everything. Perhaps touring on a bike for some number of months to let their minds unspool might be the absolute best thing for them. So is interrupting the ongoing conversations about disease control and equal rights to natter on about bicycles a service or just plain inappropriate? I don’t know. Possibly it’s both.

While it’s time to move forward, I don’t know how. We might get through this and we might not—either way, there’s not much point in getting through it alone. So we’re going to meet our community where it’s presently safe: online. Perhaps we’ll try to meet you outside in the near future as well.

In the meantime, keep riding your bike, and please be excellent to one another.