Bike Beat









An Open Letter for the Open Road

I write to you as a neighbor, fellow road user and cyclist. In 30 years of riding in and around Chapel Hill, I have seen and, at times, nearly been the victim of some awful driving behavior…





The Why of BMX

I didn’t ride BMX bikes when I was a kid, but plenty of kids I knew did.  There was even a (sort of) hit BMX movie in 1986, “Rad,” which included a very young Lori Loughlin and plenty of awesome biking sequences.


Bicycling Towards Recovery

For many of us, it’s been a very hard year. Now it’s December, we all are ready to move on, and we still are facing a tough few months. In this community especially, we have many who serve on the front line at UNC Hospitals and other clinics.



How Businesses Adapt When New Competitors Arise

Like any small business, bicycle shops have had to grow and change over the last 40 years in response to increasing competition as our retail economy shifted dramatically. In the Chapel Hill-Carrboro and surrounding area of 1980, there was no Amazon, no Best Buy, no Target, no REI.



Gifts for Good Bicyclists

Yes, there were some few extraordinarily lucky riders out there who might have gotten a new Santa Cruz full suspension carbon mountain bike or a camper van with a custom bicycle rack and an outdoor hot shower. But what about the rest of us?


Recreational Forests & Trails

Chapel Hill and the University of North Carolina are linked historically, economically and physically. Chapel Hill’s fire trucks are not only painted Carolina blue but our town was created at the founding of UNC to quite simply “serve the University”.


A Few “Best Rides”

Chapel Hill and Carrboro have much to offer, but it isn’t always easy to find the best suggestions for bicycling. Everyone has his or her own favorite rides, so below are a few of my own. I’d suggest making sure you have Google Maps on your phone — it has a bicycling function that clearly shows greenways and bike lanes.