Velo and his Manupede
Bicycle Visionary-or Dangerous Crank???
by Eric Jenson, who continues his tale (begun in OYB #5) of an urban wild-man bike experimenter and bike-store proprietor.
This story really begins in the Catacombs.
The catacombs were the basements underneath Velo’s store. His store itself was not that big, but Velo had the use of the basements built under all of the stores on the block. He also lived down there. For reasons unknown, the basements had been divided up into many rooms. One benefit of this was that it made it easy to sort and keep track of stock; a six foot pile of old frames in one room, two hundred old rusty wheels in another, piles of cranks, pedals, and handlebars in another. Plenty of raw material for any number of projects.
I happened to stop by late one Saturday afternoon to find Velo working on a new project: A Manupede. His goal was to build it and race it in the Chandler Park criterium the next day.
The Manupede is hardly a new idea. The concept of arm-powered pedalling been tried many times with varied results. The idea is simple: more muscles = more power = more speed. Maybe. The tradeoff is usually that the resulting lack of control does not allow the extra power to be fully utilized.
Intrigued, and eager to see the machine race the next day, I volunteered my help. Other people dropped in and out throughout the afternoon to lend a hand. Gradually it went together. It was a Concept/Project/Too Kool Machine, and we worked straight through, pretty much making it up along the way. But the afternoon turned into evening, and after six or seven hours enthusiasm was waning. I became doubtful it would be ready in time: the design-as-you-go fabrication was taking too long, regardless of the simplicity of the concept. Velo was talking about going to the bar. Disappointed, I went home.
In theory, a Manupede is easy to build: Take a bottom-bracket shell and braze it onto the end of a handlebar stem. Install a crankset on the custom stem. Take some pedals and cut off the cages so that only the spindles are left, and attach them to the crank. Braze some cut-off handlebar pieces to the pedal remnants to allow hand pedalling. Standard brake levers go right on the bar pieces, and a couple of bar-end shifters control the derailleurs-for both the back and front wheels. (By spreading the front fork, a rear wheel with a 5-speed cluster will fit.) As a final touch, use a 65-tooth chainring on the main crank. Voila! A Manupede is born!
Sunday morning I arrived at the park early so I could watch all the races. After the Juniors, Veterans, and Womens’ events I was wandering around, and was amazed to spot Velo riding into the park on the completed Manupede! Apparently he had found some inspiration at the bar and had returned to the shop the finish the project overnight. The three miles to the park had served as the only test-ride, and now he was ready to race. He laid the bike down and wandered over to register, just a few minutes before his event was to begin. Afterwards he reclaimed his bike and discreetly took a place at the back of the pack. He casually lit a cigarette.
Velo was race-ready in cut-off denim shorts, an untucked long-sleeve oxford shirt, a borrowed hockey helmet, and a beautiful pair of Detto Pietro cycling shoes. His blond hair and beard, both at least a foot long and uncombed, completed the picture.
He had, in the past, actually done some racing. He even had a trophy, from the Belle Isle 24-hour Marathon, inscribed 305 MILES COMPLETED.
The riders nearest him noticed his unusual mount right away, and within a few minutes, everyone in the pack and most of the spectators were straining to get a glimpse. Of course, the officials noticed as well and wandered over to check things out. Some protests were voiced and the rule book consulted. Some riders expressed concerns about safety, afraid this bike might cause an accident. Others who knew Velo slightly were worried that he might be a ringer, and that the bike might be his secret weapon to steal the race. Through it all, Velo maintained his composure, casually sitting on his top tube and chain-smoking. Finally all the doubts and protests were disposed of, the rule book put away. The race was ready to begin!
The Chandler Park criterium course is a circle of about a half a mile that follows the main park road. Almost all of the spectators view the race from the start/finish area, where the pack is only visible for a few hundred yards. The starting gun went off, and the pack moved away.
Velo was a bit wobbly. He was having trouble reaching down to strap in his feet while still learning the new hand positions the extra drive required. He was further hindered by the loose-fitting hockey helmet, which slipped down over his eyes every time he looked down at the pedals. He finally got his feet strapped in, pushed the helmet back on his head, and disappeared from sight, hanging onto the very back of the pack.
When the pack came around on the first lap, Velo was holding on at the rear. The combination of arm and leg motions required to propel the Manupede was, oddly, as graceful as it was unusual and it inspired the crowd to raise an ovation for the struggling Velo as he passed. On the second lap, he was about twenty yards off the back , but struggling valiantly. The crowd cheered again in encouragement. By the time he came around the third time, he had lost so much ground that he was only about a hundred yards ahead of the onrushing pack, the racers close to finishing their fourth lap. Some of the crowd, thinking he had actually gotten ahead of the pack, began cheering wildly!
By the time the pack came around again he had been lapped, and so, according to the rules, he was directed to drop out of the race. He coasted across the road to the curb directly in front of the spectators, and, forgetting to loosen a toe strap, he and the Manupede fell over-into the crowd! Now people encircled Velo and his Manupede, hoisted him and his machine back up, bombarded him with questions, and generally made such a fuss that next time the pack passed by hardly anyone noticed or cheered.
The Manupede had not won the race; but there was one victory. A local TV station had sent a crew to get some highlights of the races, and on the news at 11:00, there was the typical minute or so of race footage: exciting sprint finishes and a few vignettes of the pack whooshing by But wait! The astute TV reporter had noticed Velo’s unusual-looking machine, and decided to interview the inventor of this “Bike of the Future”! The coverage of Velo and his Manupede lasted at least three minutes. It ended with him demonstrating the bike by riding it (still very wobbly) around the baseball diamond in the park, while the reporter pondered aloud whether this was, truly, the bicycle of tomorrow.
EPILOGUE
Later, I got to test-ride the Manupede. I found that it was more stable than I had imagined it would be. The trick to riding it was to get the arm action and the leg action coordinated so that the two forces were roughly in opposition. Exerting both forces on one side of the bike at the same time caused a very wobbly ride, and a frightening lack of steering control.
And the Manupede’s fate? It ended its life hanging from the ceiling of the bar where Velo found the inspiration to finish it, on that night before the big race.
