And the Memories Bring Back, Memories Bring Back You...
It's no secret my life has completely changed since the passing of my beautiful wife, Susan. I'm currently unable to take even a tiny step forward, so revisiting the past is the best I can do for now. A significant part of my past involves cycling.
For my 40th birthday, Susan bought me the bike I wanted, which at the time was a rigid-framed, Trek 950 Singletrack mountain bike. I installed semi-slicks and logged many miles on the road. I later installed bar ends and aero bars, and rode it like I stole it.
When I went on group rides with hardcore roadies, they were all on their slick road bikes, and when I kept up and sometimes pulled ahead, they weren't happy about it. My friend Bobby was on a slick Paramount, Schwinn's elite racing bike, and he told me I had to get a road bike, that I couldn't keep riding my mountain bike on group rides.
He said his friend Mark, who had been his riding partner at one time, had a high-end '88 Schwinn Premis with a lugged steel frame built with butted Columbus tubing (good stuff!), and that "after he got married and had a kid, he got fat and stopped riding." He bolted on a kickstand and installed a child's seat on the back, but it wasn't working out, so he bought a cheap department store bike for riding around the neighborhood. Bobby said Mark would take $50 to get it out of his garage.
I went to Mark's house and took it for a spin. It seemed well worth $50, even for a ten-year-old bike. I paid him cash and threw it in the back of my plumbing van and headed home.
Susan took a look at it and agreed with me, "For $50, it's a good deal." We paid $600 for the new Trek.
The first thing I noticed was how light it was, then how much faster I went and how much further I could go. It got me to train even harder…
There was a PMC training ride starting in Walpole, and I decided to do it with my buddy Doogie. It was supposed to be a training ride, but there's always a core group of competitive cyclists wanting to win the day. I was one of them.
At first, there were about 25 of us at the front, but as the ride progressed, that number dropped. First to 20, then 15, and then under 10. Eventually, it was down to three, and I was third in line.
The other two were experienced cyclists who were there to push themselves and complete a hard training ride.
On hills, they dropped me, but I pedaled hard downhill and on the flats, managing to remain in contact with them. It kept happening, and when I wouldn't go away, they finally slowed the pace a bit, and the three of us were bunched together. The lead rider said, "We could drop you, but we see the effort you're putting in, so we're not gonna do it…" Then the three of us introduced ourselves.
By the end of the 50-mile ride, I felt pretty accomplished, but then suddenly, the front wheel looked crooked and started rubbing against the brakes. Fortunately, there was less than a mile left, so I just kept pedaling hard.
When we stopped, I immediately took a closer look at the front wheel, and there were two broken spokes. Apparently, these old, tired, OEM wheels weren't race-ready…
I was told that Union Cycle, the bike shop in downtown Attleboro, was the best around, so I took my bike there to have the broken spokes replaced and the wheels trued.
When I rolled the bike in, Ron, the head mechanic and wheel builder, greeted me, stiff but cordial. "Is there something I can help you with?" At the time, he was five foot ten and about 240 pounds, a solidly built guy who was familiar with the martial arts. I always suspected he had a Samurai sword well-hidden in the back he could access in a hurry if he had to. He wore glasses and was well-versed in all subjects. Later, when he shaved his head for that cult-like look, I wasn't sure if he was gonna sell me on bar end shifters or Zen Buddhism…
He didn't race and wasn't an endurance cyclist. He was a daily commuter, and that meant he rode in rain, snow, sleet, and hail on bikes equipped with fenders, oversized saddle bags, and fat tires. Once you got to know him, you could pick any one of his bikes out of a lineup…
I showed him the broken spokes, and he immediately told me that the wheels were inexpensive and, at their age, not worth fixing.
I'd been reading all the cycling rags, and I knew exactly what I wanted if I ever got new wheels—Twenty-eight-hole Mavic Reflex SUP rims with butted spokes, alloy nipples, and Ultegra hubs. I told Ron…
He paused for a moment and then said, "That's not what you want… You want 32-hole rims with straight gauge spokes and brass nipples. I can build you wheels that will be light enough, stay true, and if we have to re-true them, the brass nipples won't round out like alloy nipples do…"
Advertisement
Well, "burst my fucking bubble!" I thought to myself, "What's this guy, the fucking wheel Nazi? No butted spokes for you!"
I stood there motionless while Ron stared me down, and he went for minutes without blinking, which was a little creepy…
Then he said, "Let me give you a price to build the wheels the way I said, with a Shimano Ultegra front hub and a Sansin Microlite rear hub that'll work with the Suntour components on your bike."
He came back with a number under $250 for the hand-built wheels, and then he started staring me down, again, no blink in sight.
I felt powerless. Here's a custom wheel builder, recommended by people I knew, and he was refusing to build me the wheels I wanted…
I sheepishly agreed to his terms, not wanting to rock the boat or start challenging an experienced wheel builder. When I rolled my bike out, I felt defeated. The ultra-lightweight wheelset I dreamed of was not in my immediate future. Instead, I went with the wheel builder's choice. I ended up buying a new pair of Continental Grand Prix tires as well.
After determining the spoke lengths based on the rear wheel's dish, it took Ron a week to gather all the parts, but then I received a call. And with the same cordial but stiff voice, he said, "Your new wheels are all set and ready to go." He told me to bring my bike, sans the old wheels, and he'd install the new ones so I could take 'em for a test ride…
I drove to Attleboro thinking the entire way what a pushover I had been, a real fucking putz!
Ron greeted me and grabbed my bike, put it on the stand, snapped in the new wheels with the new tires and tubes, and adjusted the brakes. When he had the bike off the stand and was rolling it towards me, he confidently said, "Take it for a ride. You're gonna love it!"
As soon as I started to pedal, it rode incredibly stiff and straight. The bike felt so much lighter than it did with the old wheels, and it was quick as hell!
When I went back in, Ron was waiting for me. "What do you think?"
I had a big smile on my face, like the one a kid has after having sex for the very first time. I liked it!
I continued to have Ron do everything on my bikes, despite doing the same dance with him every time. I'd want something, and he'd tell me what I actually needed. And not for nothing, he was always spot on.
Over the years, I won some races on that Schwinn, and although I trained hard, I would be remiss if I didn't give Ron a share of the credit. He had become my personal bike mechanic and two-wheel confidant. The guy could wrench!
After Susan passed away and I decided to start riding again, I began on the '96 Trek 950 mountain bike, a 32-pound beast, and then progressed to the '86 Club Fuji, which also spins on custom wheels that Ron built.
Then, one day, I was looking at the Schwinn hanging high on my homemade bike rack in the basement, where it had been suspended for many years, unused, and decided to take it down and have a look, for old times' sake. I remembered that as I got older and lost some flexibility, the handlebar was too low for me, and when I tried to slide the quill stem up, it had seized inside the headtube and wouldn't budge, so I hung it up for good and rode other bikes.
When the Schwinn was my daily ride, it was during a great time in our lives. Susan and I were young, healthy, and cancer-free. Seeing that bike brought me back to that time, and I so wanted to be there again…
I wanted to return to the past so badly that I put in a much bigger effort to unfreeze that stem so I could ride the bike again and somehow transport myself back in time. I loosened the stem bolt and put a rag-covered block of wood over it, and after several purposeful hits with an Estwing straight claw hammer, it freed up.
Advertisement
I slid the stem up a good 1/2", enough to put me in my comfort zone. I cleaned and lubricated the chain and pumped fresh grease into the grease guard bottom bracket, which Ron had also encouraged me to install on both the Schwinn and the Fuji. By pumping fresh grease in, you're forcing the dirty grease out. The ball bearings love bathing in fresh grease and reward you mightily for it with a smooth spin. Are they better than sealed bearings? Not sure, but they're a lot more fun to maintain. I love my mini grease gun, and it's so satisfying to see dirty grease ooze out of the seals like it's supposed to.
I finished the ride prep by installing a new battery in the bike computer, which involves reprogramming, and pumping the 700x22 Vittoria Open Corsa SL clinchers up to 140 psi. Then I went out and achieved a Summer '25 personal best. Eleven miles with an average speed of 16.1. Not too shabby for a 69-year-old retired plumber with bad knees.
For 41 minutes, riding that Schwinn transported me back to a better time, and it felt damn good. It brought me some peace, even if only temporarily. Although it couldn't bring Susan back, she was in my thoughts the entire ride.
Almost 30 years after Ron built the wheels, they still run true, and both my vintage road bikes continue to work as they should.
Moral of the story? Old bicycles and wheel Nazis aren't necessarily bad things, and an occasional trip down memory lane can be very cathartic, at least it was for me.
Here's to the ones that we gotCheers to the wish you were here, but you're not'Cause the drinks bring back all the memoriesOf everything we've been throughToast to the ones here todayToast to the ones that we lost on the way'Cause the drinks bring back all the memoriesAnd the memories bring back, memories bring back you…
I always believed Susan's favorite Levine was Adam…