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Despite economic downturn, mountain bikers have helped IMBA notch great successes all over the country. But threats fueled by anti-bike philosophies loom large over 2010.

IMBA’s role is to ensure you can enjoy outstanding trails. IMBA needs your donation today.

Without IMBA-led action, an evolving U.S. Forest policy could force the closure of hundreds of miles of trails, including key sections of the Continental Divide Trail (editor: read about that threat on this post). And worse, such policy could be adopted in other areas, limiting the places you can ride.

IMBA has a Regional Director working near you. Click on the map to learn about what IMBA’s doing in your area.

Donors giving $35 or more receive a full-color IMBA calendar, and every donor will receive 20% off any item at the IMBA store. As a mountain biker, you can’t leave it to someone else. Please make your tax-deductible end-of year contribution to IMBA now.

Thanks for your support and here’s to great riding in 2010!

A $158,000 grant by the Alabama Department of Transportation will fund an educational and awareness campaign in Huntsville starting in 2010. The planned campaign comes on the heels of three cyclist fatalities since 2008.

From the news article on AL.com:

Rolling billboards attached to city buses will try to hammer home the point “that bicycles are vehicles, they’re allowed on the road,” Miernik said Wednesday.

“There’s a percentage of drivers out there,” she said, “that really think bikes are not safe to be on the road with them.”

James Moore, a senior planner with the city, said the ads need to be compelling enough that drivers can’t ignore them.

“I’m hoping to make the buses loud, so to speak, so that it generates some interest,” he said Wednesday. “It’s trying to bring awareness and wake the drivers up.”

Both Moore and Miernik are working to make the city a more bike friendly place and have made efforts to widen streets and include bike lanes in future development.  In addition to the awareness campaign, Huntsville police are undergoing training regarding cycling laws and rights.

Hopefully, some of those funds will also go toward getting cycling laws and awareness included on their Drivers Licenses test like they’re starting to do in Colorado.

The Prohab Helmet Society’s 2010 Calendar features lady cyclists with their bicycles with proceeds going toward the non-profit Society’s goal of promoting and providing helmets to bike riders that need them.  The calendar goes on sale Nov. 13, but you can preorder it from their blog.  Click the images below to enlarge and preview January (Janet) and March (Sarah).  Now if only someone could figure out how to embed these images in the background of iCal, we’d be golden.

The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) is celebrating 10 years of helping keep sports clean with a special edition of their Play True magazine.  You can download it here as a PDF (click on your preferred language, then look at bottom right of the page that comes up for the download link…or just click here for the English version).

It discusses the results, responsibilities, goals and actions of WADA and related agencies throughout the world.

Bikepure.org has some new socks available through Silverfish in the UK, and they’re made by SockGuy, so you might be able to hit them up via their website if you’re interested.  At least, until, they’re available via BikePure’s website.

What’s BikePure?  They’re the ones that promote dope-free cycling and have been signing some pretty respectable teams and racers to their honor code.  Join for free, or make a small donation and get a cool blue BikePure headset spacer (check it out in our interview with BikePure founder Myles here.).

Interesting observation from Gothamist regarding NYTimes’ coverage of cycling over the past 100 years. Apparently New Yorkers are still grumbling about the same cycling issues they were in the 1890’s: Speeding Cyclists (called “Scorchers” back then), brakeless bikes, and bicycle access to the Brooklyn Bridge. Check out the article here with links to both past and present articles. Are we always doomed to repeat history?

(by way of Polly Is Not Probably,image via nycgovparks.org)

Climate change activist/filmmaker Franny Armstrong has a lot of things on her mind these days. With the debut of her documentary The Age Of Stupid this past February you can’t blame her. The film chronicles six people in six different countries and their experiences with oil. Long an activist for reducing one’s carbon footprint, it was only karma that on Monday night she was saved from a group of hoodie wearing girls welding an iron bar that ambushed her (while she was distracted by her phone) by the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, as he was riding home on his bicycle.

Mayor Johnson has made tackling youth crime and the environment  his top issues. Tackling both in one fell swoop, he chased the girls away on his bike and returned to make sure Ms. Armstrong made it home safely.

Although Ms. Armstrong didn’t vote for the current mayor, she admitted that he was her “knight on a shining bicycle”.

*You might be thinking that Mayor Armstrong looks a bit familiar…I just realized that he was the guy at the 2008 Olympics Closing ceremony who took the torch from the mayor of Beijing. I’d recall that hair anywhere!

Sotheby’s auction of Lance Armstrong’s race bikes from the past 12 months generated $1.3 million for the Livestrong Foundation.  The Damien Hirst-designed Butterfly bike (above) generated almost half of the total by selling for $500,000!

Hit ‘more’ to see each bike and the final bid price, and check our prior post for links to the PDF auction catalog that tells about each artist and their collaboration with Lance…

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FROM ELLSWORTH: The new Ellsworth holiday promotion with Trips for Kids is officially here!  Throughout November and December donate a complete bicycle to your local Ellsworth dealer and receive $500 off any Ellsworth Full Suspension mountain bike or frame.

Trips For Kids will use your old bike to bring underprivileged kids on mountain bike trips and increase bike advocacy with kids in cities across the country…and for donating a bike we’ll give you $500 off your next Ellsworth!

For more details call 760.788.7500 or email Ellsworth.

This 23+ minute video shows John Burke, Trek’s President, at the Taipei Bike Show describing how bike companies should divert money from marketing and R&D to help promote bicycling in cities throughout the world. Genius. Make communities bicycle friendly and more people will ride their bikes! More bikes will be sold, people will be healthier–gasp! healthcare costs will go down… Good feelings all around.

Dr. Christopher Thomas Thompson was found guilty on Monday of assaulting cyclists and could face up to five years in prison.

Thompson, who abruptly stopped his car in front of two cyclists, was handcuffed and ordered held without bail following the guilty verdict by the Los Angeles Superior Court Jury.  He was charged with six felonies and one misdemeanor.

Thompson was accused of assault with a deadly weapon, reckless driving causing specified bodily injury, battery with serious bodily injury and mayhem. The most serious charges stem from a July 4, 2008, incident on Mandeville Canyon Road, the road where Thompson lives, where he was accused of abruptly stopping his car in front of two cyclists. Other charges relate to a similar incident on the same road that did not result in injuries.

Get the full story on VeloNews, photo by Chris Roberts.

Sotheby’s is getting ready to auction off Lance Armstrong’s custom Trek bicycles on Sunday, November 1, 2009 at 7pm in New York. Proceeds will benefit Livestrong, and all seven custom bikes are there to bid on: Yoshitomo Nara, Kaws (above), Shepard Fairey, Damien Hirst, Kenny Scharf, Mark Newson and even the Project One time trial bike that was stolen from the Tour of California! Here’s Lance’s letter about the auction, more pics of the bikes after the break:

It’s not about the bike. Never has been. But if 2009 taught us anything, it’s that change is truly the only constant in life.

When I returned to professional cycling this year to address the global cancer burden, I needed every bit of ammunition I could find. To help engage the creative community in this mission, I invited six very different artists to customize my Trek racing bikes to raise awareness for the STAGES art show benefiting LIVESTRONG that debuted in Paris during the Tour de France.

Presented in conjunction with Nike and featuring more than 20 of the most important established and upcoming artists in the world, STAGES brought an incredibly diverse range of painters, sculptors and photographers together in a visual dialogue about cancer - a disease that touches everyone and is expected to be the leading cause of death worldwide by 2010. The results were nothing short of incredible, and these bikes you see now proved to be the perfect rolling billboards for this unprecedented collection.

I’m not a gearhead, and my garage is anything but a cycling museum, but I can honestly say that letting go of my bikes has never been harder. From Damien Hirst’s masterpiece Tour de France “finale” Trek Madone covered in real butterflies, to the KAWS “Chompers” cycle that I broke my collarbone on in the Vuelta Castilla y León, every ride is a treasured piece of personal history that I’m proud to offer up to benefit LIVESTRONG.

Each of these artists gave their time freely to this cause, and, because of their generosity, all proceeds from the sale of these bikes will go directly to help LIVESTRONG continue to inspire and empower people affected by cancer. Through the dollars that we raise, we’ll increase awareness, fund research, and work to end the stigma about cancer that many survivors face. For the first time in my life, I can now say, “it’s about the bike” and mean it.

Please bid generously and LIVESTRONG,

Lance Armstrong

Hit ‘more’ to see the rest of the bikes…

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(Editor’s Note: Now with updated images)

PRESS RELEASE: The nation’s first Bikestation Secure Bike Module, a new concept in cost-effective, compact, multi-use bicycle transit center, is contracted for installation at the Covina Metrolink station in Covina, Calif. According to Andrea White-Kjoss, president and CEO of Mobis/Bikestation, the company that plans, designs, implements and operates alternative multimodal transit systems across the U.S., “The new bike modules overcome a top concern people have that keep them from using their bikes — theft.” The new Bikestation Covina Secure Bike Module is 10 x 25 square feet of high tech, “green” design offering 36 secure parking spaces to accommodate up to 80 users through digital access.

Click ‘more’ for the rest of the press release and more images (also, click on images for a larger view)…

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Thanks to our eagle-eyed reader Stephen for having too much time on his hands and alerting us to the freeze-frame face of the Lego cyclist in the bicycle safety PSA video right when he’s about to get nailed by the car.  Sweet.

Streetfilms has put together this video to explain the 200+ miles of new bikes lanes that New York City has installed over the past few years.  Over the three years they were put in place, bicycle traffic has increased 45%, and NYC is well on their way to meeting their goal of 1,800 miles of bike lanes by 2030.

The NYC DOT has put in place three different types of lanes depending on the road type and width, including some left-side lanes to help prevent cyclists from getting doored.  Even if you don’t live in NYC, it’s worth watching to see what can be done when you can widen the roads…a perfect lesson for any city.  If NYC can do it, it can be done pretty much anywhere.