Morning Bike Ride in Shanghai

Exploring the mega city while most people are still asleep is a good way to experience many aspects of Shanghai. 

Here is a map of this particular bike ride

Shanghai, bike, ride

A ride through the streets of Shanghai

Check the video here 

 

More on Bike Sharing – More on Developments in the US

More on Bike Sharing (continued)

I just wrote a posting about Bike Sharing and immediately have an update…Just when I thought that the Chinese companies have provided a stimulus to the startups in the US, my friends pointed out that these same Chinese companies that have driven a kind of innovation revolution here, have now expanded not just in Italy, France….but also in the USA.

OFO, Bike Sharing OFO, Bike Sharing OFO, Bike Sharing

So now, if you have the APP for OFO in China – well, you can rent a bike in Seattle in the US and you can be on your marry way …

What do you think?   Drop me a line.  I promise to give you a view of how things are developing in the world of Bike Sharing applications…

 

 

Bike Sharing Coming to the US – Finally!

Bike Sharing

Bike sharing is good!  This could be the beginning and the end of this posting…Oh, well, let me elaborate some.  I have lived in China for a number of years.  Over that period of time, me and countless others in the country as well as visitors, have observed an incredible growth of its economy, but more importantly – the growth of innovation.  Yes, Innovation in China! 

China, BeijingMany years ago, both in the US and in other countries, the various city governments started developing Bike Sharing programs.  They relied on a very cumbersome system where you had to rent as well as return, the bike at a predefined station around the city.  That system has been nothing but trouble.  The stations were few, the programs to implement those stations and bikes – very expensive!

As a result (in my opinion) those Bike Sharing programs were doomed and I doubt many still exist today.  I wrote about some of these programs on this blog…

China, Beijing, BIke Sharing

Street in Beijing – Mobike and Ofo bikes…

Then Chinese entrepreneurs innovated!  Companies like Mobike and Ofo emerged (and several other newcomers followed).

The innovation these companies developed allowed the users to scan a QR code, receive a code via messaging on their smart phones and unlock the bike for use.   The bicycle then remains in your possession, and you are paying for it, until you lock it.   The convenience factor is huge!  Why?  You can pickup / unlock and start using a bicycle pretty much anywhere on the street in a Chinese city, and similarly, drop off the bike on the sidewalk after you reach your destination.  

The result – a great service for the users as well as low cost for the local governments – no longer do they have to fund the construction and maintenance of expensive bike stations.

Finally, in the US, local companies have noticed and together with some city governments are implementing similar system.   Way to go China!   The US is borrowing from your playbook!

Now, I am expecting another wave of innovation – the bikes are becoming a perfect platform for adding new services and capabilities.  I fully imagine a wide range of sensors to be integrated in the next generation bikes to enable new services for us the users and new streams of revenue for the bike sharing operators.

China, Shanghai

 

US companies like SPIN and LimeBike are getting funding to start operating what appears to be a proxy of the vary successful (from my, user experience) model of the Chinese companies.   Hope they succeed.  The US, with the lack of public transportation is a good ground for such services…!

Hot Summer Morning on the Texas Trail

Hot Summer Morning

Today I decided to beat the heat and get on the bike trail early in the morning. I was on my bike by 8am and actually enjoyed relatively cooler weather even though by the time I was reaching my house – at 9:40 – the temperature had risen significantly 

lesson learned – in the Texas summer – head out as early as possible – I know this is no rocket science but still needed to be reiterated

on the positive side – while on the trail I encountered plenty of wild life – a coyote and a roadrunner 

the coyote did not spend but a minute looking at me, turned around and ran back into the woods…I was too large for his liking.  

The roadrunner as usually just walked importantly along the trail until it decided to chase something in the brush and disappeared 

unfortunately I could not take pictures of any of them – too short of a encounter, but here is a pic from the trail anyway.

Texas hill country

Texas Hill Country Trail

 

Biking in Texas – Spring Views

Biking in Texas

The mountain biking season in Texas goes through its ups and downs.  There are months when it is cold and wet, I know somewhat counterintuitive statement about this state where draughts are more common than rains, but trust me it does rain here and it does get cold….The same temperature that causes New Englanders to break out the shorts and flip-flops, makes folks in Texas claim a cold spell is upon us.  

While our weekends lately have been very busy with family related happenings – we were able to sneak in a bike ride here and there (late on Sunday – almost evening – after coming back to town).  The weather and scenery of the Texas bike trails were beautiful.  

The photos below make me feel very fortunate to have the opportunity to get on a mountain bike and cruise through the wilderness, calm and nature of the bike trails in the Hill Country…. What a great experience….!

Under Armor Record – Disappointing iPhone Application

iPhone Applications

I continue to look for interesting and useful new iPhone applications – ones I can use on  my mountain bike and keep track of rides and stats.  Over the last 3 years I have reviewed a whole bunch of apps and have found them overall usually relatively useful.  The list of the ones I have reviewed is long – Argus, Bike Brain, MapMyRideRuntastic Mountain Bike Pro, and a bunch of other ones.

Every so often I have come across some that are buggy and tend to be a disappointment.

My latest review is of the Under Armor Record – I thought since it is developed by a very popular and well adopted in the exercise circles brand – Under Armor – it will be well put together.  The application comes with tons of accolades from the company itself – it is promising and with a lot of features.  

Under Armor Application Dashboard

Application Dashboard

The front screen is a dashboard with a running feed of all your activity, which Record collects from your iPhone’s internal motion tracker.  You can also get sensors from main suppliers and interface to the app.  If you are so inclined you can also challenge friends, check on your friends’ progress, and track also food, sleep, and calories burned.  

This is all fine, but the application REALLY DOES POORLY on tracking your bike sessions.

You can see in the follow on screens a summary that makes you wonder – who designed the application that way.  Here is what happened – the result of which you see on the next application screens.  Earlier this weekend I went on a bike ride and used the Under Armor Record and in parallel ran the Runtastic Mountain Bike Pro, and Strava.  The results did not bode well for Record.  Why?  Well see below

Under Armor Record

History of sessions

Under Armor Summary

Session Summary

Check the time duration and the calories burned…!

This is “amazing” – I did 23 hours on the bike….NOT!

Well, turns out I did attempt to stop the application as I completed the bike ride.  As I did with both Runtastic and Strava.  But Record decided to keep on going.  And kept on going until the next day (today) when I was getting ready for my next bike ride.  I thought that behavior was a fluke.  So I just started a new session.   I biked for 1-hour 15 minutes…and then when I came home I tried to stop the application…. Well, I wish the programmer who wrote the app could see it.  I kept trying to stop – I kept getting the screen with Application Session Paused — with the option to slide the screen button to Finish it.  I did over 10 times – each time the Application just exited – i.e. CRASHED!   Every time I tried to get back in – Record went back to the same screen – with the request to Pause and then Slide to Finish – and the same repeated over and over again.   

Then I took the drastic action – I deleted the Application!   That is it – Under Armor Record was gone.  The app worked OK for tracking elliptical trainer workout, and walks but as far as the biking is concerned the assessment it TWO THUMBS down!

Thumbs Down

 

Winter: Mountain Biking in January

Winter

I enjoy living in Austin – why?  Because we can go mountain biking pretty much year round, even in the winter.  I know Colorado, Utah among several states offer really spectacular rides….BUT just in the late spring, summer and early fall.  The rest of the time, the weather is so cold that mountain biking becomes a difficult task.

This weekend, we took advantage of the bright sunshine and had a great ride in the green belt in our neighborhood.

Here are some photos to show you what winter bike ride should be 🙂  Enjoy!

Texas Austin Barton Creek Greenbelt

Austin Texas Barton Creek Greenbelt

And then there was the sunset – as we biked home…. Beautiful – isn’t it…

Texas Austin Sunset

Health Apps for iPhone

What is New in the Area of Health Apps for iPhone

Well, I have always been a believer that the iPhone offers a very versatile platform for tracking your exercise, your biking, walking, running…etc health related endeavors we all have.  As you know from this blog postings – I tried the Apple Watch and was rather frustrated with its lack of good repeatable measurements.  At the same time the iPhone has been relatively solid performer with a slew of applications – e.g. (in no particular order):

Earlier last week during the holidays, I decided to figure out how I can aggregate all the apps tracking information via the Apple Health application – why?  because I wanted to track all my walking, jogging, biking, hiking exercise as an aggregate.

Apple iPhone Health App

Apple iPhone Aggregation point

Apple iPhone

Next level of detail

So I tried to accomplish that.  Took me a while to figure out what applications actually interface with the Apple Health app.  

Well, turns out all of the apps have gaps in their ability to synch up with the main Health app

So I am using Argus, Bike+(b+), MountainBike-Pro, and Under Armor Record – all of these applications have the ability to measure relatively accurately the distance, steps, calories, miles of walking, hiking, biking,  BUT – there is the big disappointment – they all have gaps in their ability to interface, synch and feed into the iPhone Health app.

Here is the summary of what I have found so far:

Under Armor Record

The Under Armor Dashboard

 

Under Armor’s Record is the application which allows you to capture your Hiking, Walking and Biking exercise – but when I tried to synch up and connect the app with iPhone Health – I was able to, the apps connected – but I was only able to get the walking results into the Health app.

Why?

I could not tell…!

I tried all sort of options – but NO luck with getting the biking info into the aggregation app.

 

Under-Armor-Record

Dashboard for a ride on Under-Armor-Record

Here is the information from the Under Armor Record application – it properly captured the exercise info but no luck getting it into the Health App

The other issue that i found, although I would say that is a smaller issue as it only relates to how calories are counted.

The Under Armor Record captured my biking distance and calories at a much lower level vs what both Argus and MountainBike Pro recorded.

Again – no big deal as it just means one of them is more accurate – who knows.

 

Here are the other two (Argus, MountainBike Pro):

Argus Mountain Bike

Summary of a ride on Argus Mountain Bike

MountainBike Pro

Summary of a ride with MountainBike Pro

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So, net-net, Argus injected the information of calories into the Health App, Under Armor Record injected the Walking data, and the actual Cycling info from all three Apps (Argus, MountainBike Pro, Under Armor Record) never made it in…!  Very frustrating.  Next few days I will try Bike+(b+) to see if it will feed into the Health App – it is supposed to….!  I want to find the way to get all my excise data / results into one place….and I will find a way  to do it.

Will report on my progress in the next posting…

Christmas Bike Ride in the Texas Hill Country

Christmas Bike Ride

Austin continues to amaze me…!  Why?  Well, today is the day after Christmas, it is December 26th, however the weather was beautiful – warm, sunny, a perfect day for a great bike ride in the Texas Hill Country.

Texas Austin Warm Weather As you can see from my iPhone Weather App, today was a very warm, sunny, and overall a great day, unusual even for Austin in December….!

Having said that, we are not complaining 🙂

Instead, we put on the biking gear, pumped up the mountain bike tires and off we went into the green belt in West Austin.

It was almost too warm….

You can see some great pics from the bike ride below.  I took photos of the winter landscape, the Barton Creek, the trails in the Green Belt and the dormant trees which even in this state are quite something… Well, enough said – take a look at the photos and let us know how you like them… Happy Holidays!

 

Biking Kentucky

Biking Kentucky

Biking in Kentucky is something that at first did not come to my mind.  Then I went to visit a good friend of mine – someone I have known since I was 14!  Yes, indeed, it is great to have the ability to stay connected with your classmates from high school and be able to visit and spend time together…But enough of the touch and feely stuff – let’s get back to the topic…

I have always associated Kentucky with horses, horse races of course, and tons of beautiful farms with endless bluegrass covered meadows.  Well, since my visit earlier this week, I now know that this state also offers great opportunities for enjoying the rolling hills, horse farms, and yes, biking!

Kentucky Biking

 

Here are a bunch of photos I took during the week of Thanksgiving to help you see the opportunities to have some great rides – in this particular case in the Lexington area.

Kentucky Lexington Biking

Kentucky Horse Country biking road

Kentucky Lexington Biking

Just outside Lexington

Kentucky Lexington Biking

Lexington bike road view

Kentucky Lexington Biking

Near by Lexington Horse Farms

Kentucky Lexington Biking

Biking road – near Lexington