Rolling Stone's Fortieth Anniversary

This week’s issue of Rolling Stone includes “Twenty interviews with the artists and leaders who helped shape our time.”

Here’s who on that list, with their ages.

Bob Dylan: 65
Jimmy Carter: 82
Paul McCartney: 64
Ringo Starr: 66
Norman Mailer: 84
Tom Wolfe: 76
Bob Weir: 59
Patti Smith: 60
Steven Speilberg: 60
Martin Scorsese: 64
Jane Fonda: 69
Jack Nicholson: 70
Bill Moyers: 72
George McGovern: 84
Stewart Brand: 68
Michael Moore: 53
Mick Jagger: 63
Keith Richards: 63
Jackson Browne: 58
Neil Young: 61

So, the youngest person on the list is 53? Average age is 67.05? Seriously?

But hey, nice vinyl cover, though.

Review: Mavic Cosmic Carbone Ultimate Wheels

The short version: holy crap!

The longer version: The boom in carbon wheels has been massive over the past few years. In the professional peleton, nearly every rider is on carbon hoops, even in the most demanding races like Paris Roubaix or the Tour of Flanders. Of course, those guys have the luxury of a team car carrying dozens of spares right behind them, just in case something goes wrong.

The other car there is Mavic's famous neural support car. The French wheelmaker had been conspicious in its absence from the carbon market, with just a couple of models out there, some of which use carbon as a non-structrual faring. But they've entered the arena in a big way with these wheels, which are fully carbon, from the rims to the spokes to the hubs.

I had a chance to ride the first pair of the wheels in North America over two weeks -- look for pictures of them in Wired magazine soon. But I wanted to post some snaps, and some impressions.

That's the front wheels on our scale, with a Hutchinson tubular (yes, they're tubulars) and the skewer installed. That's 821 grams out the door. Woot, as they say.

That's the rear wheel, with tire and skewer, but no cassette. Just over a kilogram, at 1006 grams.

So what does it mean when your entire wheelset is under two kilos, including the tires? It means that they spin up amazingly quickly. The biggest difference I felt riding these over other wheels I've ridden was in acceleration.

You know when you're on rolling terrain, and you look to stomp up a hill in a big gear, trying to keep your momentum going? That moment when you stand and pound on the pedals is just silly with these -- they just seem to rocket forward when you apply the power.

How do they keep the weight down? A couple of tricks:

The front wheel is all one piece, like Lightweights wheels. The spokes are molded directly into the rim, and then into the carbon hub. There's no adjustment, and no truing available. That means that the mold better be damn straight, and Mavic's seemed true and perfect.

In back, there is some adjustment available -- nipples molded into the non-drive side allow the wheel's dish to be tweaked. Again, the models I had were just fine as delivered, but it's interesting that they've made some provision for tweaking.

Braking performance on carbon wheels is a fraught topic -- no matter what steps you take, a carbon wheel, right now, isn't going to stop as well as an aluminum rim. I installed Zipp's carbon pads on the bikes Campagnolo Record brakes, and was reasonably pleased with the braking. One ride had a good bit of mist during it, and stopping power was fine. There was the usual squealing that one gets with carbon rims.

Now, a 2 kg set of wheels that retails for $2,750 (Oh, I didn't mention that before?) isn't for everyone. These are definitely racing wheels, and are the stiffest wheels I've ever ridden. Even though they're carbon, they're not absorbing vibration. The goal of these is to transmit power from rider to road, and they do that exceptionally well.

That pricetag is pretty tough, as well, although its much less than the very comparable Lightweights. Mavic also has a wheel protection plan that will pay for replacement wheels if there's damage -- that seems like a well-spent $220 in this case.

Those yellow cars following pro races are a symbol of quality and reliability, and Mavic's been working on this wheelset for several years. They're very confident in them, and after my time on them, I am as well. Suffice it to say that as I box them up to return to Mavic, I'm wondering just how I can go back to regular old wheels.

Was Floyd Set Up?

Not to turn my far too-infrequent posts here into a running blog on the Floyd Landis situation, but Martin Dugard, a well-known cycling writer and friend of Floyd has some pretty incendiary things to say today on his blog:

I'm not saying I can prove he [Floyd] was set up, but it certainly is beginning to look as if a concerted effort was made to sabotage the 2006 Tour de France by higher-ups within the UCI. They seek to elevate themselves, paying absolutely no heed to the damage they do to cycling, and all sports. That stinks.

Is it really possible that the men in charge of international competitive cycling would fake a positive drug test to make the biggest event in their sport look stupid? Sadly, it's not beyond the question. The UCI has been feuding for years with the organizers of the Tour, and if there's one thing that my experience in covering the Olympic movement has taught me, it's that many of the guys who run these international governing bodies care more about their power than their sport.

I don't know if this is true, but the fact that it's even plausible is tragic.

Doping's Dirty Secret: Therapeutic Use Exemptions

So, here's the deal. If you're an athlete who's subject to testing under the World Anti-Doping Code, you can file for a Therapeutic Use Exemption. What that means is that you get a doctor's note that explains that you must use a banned substance for some legitimate medical purpose. Any positive tests for that performance enhancing substance are then written off, since you have a magic TUE.

Makes sense, right? Well, what if I told you that of the 199 riders in the 2006 Tour de France, 60 of them had TUEs. Whoa. That's kind of messed up, right? Nearly a third of riders in the Tour have a pressing medical need to take a drug that has some sort of performance enhancing characteristics? What are the odds....

Thirteen riders in the Tour suffered a positive test -- only one, Floyd Landis, is facing punishment. The other 12 had TUEs. The most prominent of those riders turns out to be Oscar Pereiro, who finished second to Landis in the Tour, and who has been campaigning to be declared the winner.

Pereiro, according to Le Monde, tested positive for salbutamol, an asthma medication. Pereiro has been called before the French Anti-Doping agency to explain his use of the drug, and his TUE. Like they say, people in glass houses probably should put down the inhaler.

Dick Pound Story in Wired

The new issue of Wired just hit the streets -- it includes a profile I wrote about Dick Pound, the head of the World Anti-Doping Agency. The story is also available online.

First things first: There's one factual error in the story which made it way in there during the editing process. The story reads, "Tour winner Floyd Landis tested positive for abnormally high testosterone," which is incorrect. As those who have been following the Landis case closely know, Floyd didn't have abnormally high testosterone; he had an abnormal ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone. In fact, the absolute levels of testosterone in Lansis's system, by my reading of the lab data, were in the normal range. I regret the error made it into print, and we'll get it fixed online after I get back from the holiday.

Now, onto the reaction, and some more thoughts.

Over at Trust but Verify, the essential clearinghouse blog about the Landis case in particular, they write:

Wired runs a long story by Mark McClusky about Mr. Pound, including Landis. It's a double edged article. Email to us about it splits between views that it puffs Pound, vs. it being reasonably fair. It appears to us that it accepts the idea of WADA, but is skeptical of Pound's ability to lead with credibility, highlighting many of his ethically challenged utterances.

I'm surprised to hear that there was email viewing the story as a puff piece about Pound. I think that to read it that way, you have to be utterly convinced that Dick Pound is evil incarnate, and that any attempt to understand the man and his career is puffery.

That's simply not the case. Pound's an easy man to demonize, but in person, I found him sharp and funny and easy to be around. And I think it's important to acknowledge his achievements. They really don't make them like Pound these days. He's a throwback to a different time.

Spinopsys makes this point well in his post about the story:

Pound is entrepreneurial in the old fashioned sense of the word, something seen in his negotiations with the networks and rights holders - the kind who used to build railroads and newspapers - hardheaded, idiosyncratic, demanding, full of bluff and bluster, and not afraid to crack a few heads or eggs in the process of building something new.

I find there's a lot to admire in that sort of drive and determination. But as I hope the story makes clear, there's a difference between being the visionary who can wrangle an organization like WADA into existence, and being the right man to lead it going forward.

Rant Your Head Off takes a moment to analyze the construction of the story:

The article strives for a certain balance between Pound’s legitimate accomplishments, and his inability to live up to the rules he, himself, created. To analyze the reporting a bit, one common technique in journalism is, rather than inject your own opinion, let the subject, him/herself, do the job of pointing out their own foibles. Dick Pound fell right into that trap.

Pound's public statements really are a mystery to me. It seems clear that he thinks that the lawyerly disclaimers he throws in at the start of an interview are enough -- I don't know why he doesn't realize that, from a perception standpoint, they aren't nearly enough. As he says in the article, he views his role as prosecutorial, and that's clear from what he says and how he says it.

And I think that's the clear failing of WADA under Pound. It's turned the system into a adversarial process. I don't know that there's anyone who's happy about the use of performance enhancing drugs in sports, from administrators, to fans, to clean athletes. And I do think that WADA can provide a framework to help decrease the problem.

But right now, the athletes don't trust the system. They see it as arbitrary, and out for blood. Until you have some sort of system that athletes buy into, I don't know that you'll ever get anywhere.

There's also more discussion at the Daily Peloton Forums, where I'm gratified to see that most folks seem to think it was a solid story.

Thomas Keller and Me

Thomas Keller and Me

Not the sharpest photo ever, but cool to have met Chef Keller in person.

As the Ball Bounces

Before the start of this year's NBA season, the league introduced a new game ball, made of a microfiber material which was supposed to be more consistent than the old leather balls. The new ball, it was claimed, would absorb moisture better, giving players a better grip.

Just one problem. The players hate it.

Since the beginning of training camp, players have been upset with the switch to a ball that was supposed to have more consistency in the way it handles and bounces. Instead it has less. According to many players surveyed over the past two months, the new ball has stuck to the players’ hands, become frequently lodged between the rim and the backboard, and has also not been able to absorb moisture as well as the leather ball.

Steve Nash, the Phoenix point guard and two-time league most valuable player, wore bandages on his fingers last week because of cuts caused by the new ball. The Nets’ Jason Kidd, and the Dallas Mavericks’ Jason Terry and Dirk Nowitzki have all spoken out against the material, complaining of cuts on their hands.

The league didn't bother to talk to the players beforehand -- instead, they reached a deal with Spalding to create the ball, and then had a big marketing push this summer about it (in interests of disclosure, I featured the ball in Wired).

It's kind of unfathomable that a league would overhaul the one essential tool of its sport without talking to the players who use it on a daily basis. NBA commissioner David Stern, not one for backing down, has admitted the league made a mistake; meanwhile, the player's union has filed a grievance, looking to return to the old ball.

My guess? The leather ball will be back within weeks, and this whole episode will be another case study in the law of unforeseen consequences.

NPR Morning Edition

It turns out that of all the media I've done recently, the one that my colleagues listen to is NPR -- at least seven folks here at work today have told me that they heard this interview, about the limited lifespan of gadgets. Check it out.

One More Interview

This one was radio -- the NPR station in Boston, WBRU, gave me a ring for more hot gadget talk. If you're Real Player-enabled, you can listen to the archived audio.

CNBC Morning Call segment

The McClusky media tour continued on CNBC, where I talked with Liz Claman about some of the best gadgets for the holidays this year. And it turns out, she loves us at Wired magazine, which is nice to hear.

More Media: Attack of the Show

I just want to say, no one told me that the guy I was on with had a mohawk. Because, trust me, I would have said something. Anyway, a fun discussion about the Microsoft Zune media player.

The Today Show!

Yesterday, I spent about a hour talking to the Today show, doing a bunch of shots, b-roll of me sitting at my desk working intently, the whole thing.

Behold, the results! Seven seconds of yours truly, starting at 2:10 if you're impatient.

Seriously, though, it was a lot of fun to learn more about how a segment like this is put together, and to be part of it.

CNN International Appearance

It's been crazy busy at the office, trying to get the Test issue out the door, and doing all the other work we've got, a little shorthanded. I've been writing a feature that's going to appear soon, and I'm excited about that, too.

Yesterday, took a little time out to go on CNN international to talk about the launch of the PlayStation3.

Quoted by ABC

I know, I'm a bad blogger. Life's taking away from this blog, that's for sure.

All's well, just busy. Doing what? All sorts of writing and editing and reporting, for sure, but also, being interviewed by other folks. Here's an ABC News story about gadgets of the future that quotes yours truly.

More TK soon. really.

Still Alive

My huge apologies for the utter lack of activity here -- I'm trying to close the special issue of Wired Test which I edit, and we're really slammed.

So, I haven't had a chance to tell you about that cute baby who just gets more fun, or Kristen's new job, or Ohio State's big win against Texas, or the A's leading their division, or the fun of HD TiVo, or any of that stuff. But I swear, some day I will.

Anniversary Flowers

Anniversary Flowers

So, two years ago today, Kristen made me the luckiest guy in the whole darn world when she married me. Today, she made me the luckiest guy in my whole darn office when she sent me these lovely flowers, which have inspired a lot of comments, as well as admiration, especially from my female co-workers.

Happy anniversary, honey. I love you.

Review: SRAM Force Road Gruppo

Courtesy of the very nice folks at SRAM, and especially their media person, Michael Zellmann, I was able to get a chance to ride their new Force group of road components. The high-end component market has been dominated by Campagnolo and Shimano for the 20 years that I've been riding bikes -- in fact, SRAM's gruppo is the first full road group that's been released in that period of time.

Armed with a lovely Specialized Tarmac SL equipped with the Force components and Roval full-carbon clincher wheels, I hit the roads in Northern California to see if Force is a legitimate challenger to Shimano's Dura Ace and Campy's Record line.

The crankset is a lovely piece, wrapped in very pretty carbon fiber. The chainrings are shot-peened, and have a nice grey color to them. Although you can't see them, the bearings for the bottom bracket are outboard, similar to Dura Ace.

I had no compaints with the crank/bottom bracket combo. It was plenty stiff, certainly for the amount of power I can generate. There was no creaking or play in the bearings, and the build seemed very solid. Frankly, there's not a lot that can really go wrong here, and SRAM didn't make any mistakes.

One real problem I've face with my bike (equipped with Dura Ace) is getting it to shift well on a compact crankset. Especially on the way from the large to the small chainring, it's very prone to throwing the chain completely past the chainring, and onto my bottom bracket. Which sucks.

I was very impressed by the front shifting on the Force. There's one front mechanism that's used for either standard or compact chainrings -- but there's a clever way to lower it to make sure that the tolerance is right for the size you're running. Also, the cage is wide enough that there aren't any trim settings to mess with. You just get it to the right chainring, and forget it. All in all, a major upgrade for me.

In the back, shifting was equally good. There was a very solid feel -- some might argue inelegant. With Dura Ace and Record, you sometimes aren't quite sure if your shift has finished; by the time you're trying to sense it, it's already over. But with Force, there's a very positive action, almost a THUNK, that lets you know for sure. Some people might not care for it, but I like it.

The other nice thing is how unfussy it seems. I feel like after (or during) most rides, I'm tweaking my cables just a bit, trying to insure that upshifts and downshifts happen with the same speed, and equally smoothly. After adjusting the rear once, I didn't have to futz with it at all, even after swapping out the cassettes, which I have a hard time imagining with Dura Ace. One of the things that SRAM is touting in their marketing is that each shift requires the same amount of cable to be pulled (unlike the other groups), and from my testing, that consistent mechanical action does show some benefits.

Not pictured here is the SRAM cassette -- I had to wuss out and put on a 25 in back for the hills around here. SRAM is going to be shipping an 11-26 rear cassette, which is great news, I think. Perfect for compacts in tough terrain like NoCal.

Here's the cockpit. Like Campy Record, all the cables are under the handlebar tape, leading to a nice, clean look. It's a little hard to tell from this shot, but the left and right hoods are sculpted differently, and are canted slightly to fit the hand -- they were comfortable while on the hoods, and provided a good platform on top. They're a little smaller than the Shimano hoods, a similar size to Campy.

In this closeup of the left brake lever, you can see the cant I was talking about.

The shifting on Force uses what SRAM called Double Tap. A small inward movement of the lever downshifs to a higher gear, a longer throw upshifts into a smaller gear. It's was actually completely intuitive -- imagine using the upshift lever on Record for all the shifts, but just tapping is slightly to get bigger gears. Seriously, it sounds much, much more complicated than it rides, and I didn't find myself having to think about it at all, even after just a few miles.

I found the brakes to be really nice looking, especially the cutout in the top arm. Modulation was very good, and the action at the lever was smooth and controlled. Stopping power was harder to evaluate for me, as I was riding a test bike with carbon rims, and therefore had cork pads, and not the standard pad that SRAM ships for most wheels.

Another look at the calipers, this time up front.

Overall, I was really impressed by Force. SRAM's done a ton of work and research to get this right, and it's a hugely ambitious undertaking. It's certainly right there with the top of the line from the big two, and I'll definitely consider it when I need new gear.

Lessons Learned

Pete Greene was one of those teachers that every kid who grows up in a small town needs to encounter -- he taught me to dream.

You see, Franklin, PA isn't a hub of international activity. In fact, by the time I reached high school, I was pretty much over it. There wasn't any real culture that I could see at the time, and beside my best friend Mike, not a lot of people who I felt much connection with. The horizons seemed so nearby, but I knew there was more out there.

Mr. Greene taught 11th grade honors English. I had spent most of my academic career unchallenged and uncaring, until I hit Mr. Greene's room; he proceeded to force me to think and argue and learn to express myself clearly. The half-assed work I had done before, coasting, wasn't enough. He was going to push me to discover what I could actually do when I put pen to paper.

Today, in addition to teaching, Mr. Greene writes a column for the local newspapers back in Franklin, which he thankfully archives on his blog. His most recent one, I'm gobsmacked to say, mentions me.

One benefit of teaching, particularly in a small town, is that you get to see your students grow up and become admirable, accomplished adults. Some become the good, solid citizens who keep the world spinning. That’s a great, honorable thing.

Some pursue something a little chancier, a little riskier, and it’s a great, proud thing when they find a measure of success. In the last few weeks, I’ve been reminded of four former Franklinites doing just that.

He then goes on to say some very nice things about me, and my career and writing that caused me to blush.

As I sit here thinking about it, I don't have any memory of a specific conversation with him about what was out there in the world outside of our little town, but there was something in his insistence that I could do more that made it crystal-clear to me that there was more -- to do, to see, to strive for. And so I did.

But there's something else that's hard to articulate. I wonder if what Mr. Greene does, or what Mike has done, is somehow the more noble endeavor. It's easy to move somewhere like New York or San Francisco and find like minded souls. It's another thing altogether to stay in an area like Venango County and work to educate, to inform, to improve. Building that community, that's the hard part, and it leaves me in awe of them.

I've been lucky enough in my life to get to places, personally and professionally, that thrill and excite me, that I'm proud of. And part of me wonders if that would have been the case without Mr. Greene. I don't know how to repay that sort of debt, so I'm left with saying, simply: Thank you.

Say It Ain't So, Floyd

(Update, 1:54 PDT: Austin Murphy at SI got Floyd on the phone, and Landis denies using testosterone. Worth reading.)

Word comes today that Floyd Landis, the recent winner of the Tour de France, has tested positive for an elevated level of testosterone after stage 17 of the race, when he came back from a 10 minute deficit through one of the epic rides in cycling history. Here's the text of his team's announcement:

The Phonak Cycling Team was notified yesterday by the UCI of an unusual level of Testosteron/Epitestosteron ratio in the test made on Floyd Landis after stage 17 of the Tour de France.
The Team Management and the rider were both totally surprised of this physiological result.
The rider will ask in the upcoming days for the counter analysis to prove either that this result is coming from a natural process or that this is resulting from a mistake in the confirmation.
In application of the Pro Tour Ethical Code, the rider will not race anymore until this problem is totally clear.
If the result of the B sample analysis confirms the result of the A sample the rider will be dismissed and will then pass the corresponding endocrinological examinations.

I've, sadly, written a lot about doping in cycling on this blog. Here's some quick thoughts and reactions.

1) It's important to note that this isn't over yet. When athletes get tested, the sample is split in two -- this is an announcement that the first sample showed elevated testosterone. What will happen now is that the second sample will be tested; it must confirm the result of the first test before Landis would be stripped of the win, and banned from competition for two years. Were that to happen, there is an appeal process that Landis could follow.

2) At the Tour, the winner of each day's stage and the overall race leader are tested daily, along with two other randomly selected riders. That means that Landis was (at a minimum) tested after Stages 11, 12, 15, 17, 19, and 20. Presumably, the tests on the stages before Stage 17 have been completed, which would mean that Landis passed those three tests, as no positives have been announced. I would guess that the tests for Stages 19 and 20 would be completed today or tomorrow. If Landis were to pass all the other tests, it would certainly raise questions about the (not yet confirmed) positive result on Stage 17's test.

3) I've often wondered aloud if it's possible to ride at the top level of cycling without doing drugs. I don't know that answer, but these guys are doing such amazing things that there's part of me that will always question it.

4) Hearing this news today, it felt like a punch in the gut. I've really grown to like and respect Landis, the race he rode, and the pain he overcame due to his degenerative hip. I'm hoping against hope that there was some mistake at the lab or some other easy explanation for a result that I'd be crushed to have confirmed. And not just because I like Floyd -- because I worry that cycling really can't withstand another blow like this.

Babies are Great Marketing

Kristen and I were talking about the blogging thing the other day, and realized that the single best promotional opportunity is the cute little baby we have. After a little design work, here's what we came up with. What father could resist? Grab your own at Cafe Press.

We've also got a little something for the ladies. Sorry, baby not included.