Special Guest:  Roger Bowersock of the Colavita Ohio Time Trial Series

The Two Johns are back to podcasting in this self proclaimed ‘podcast of giving back’, which is without a doubt, our best yet.  There is all ready meat to talk about in this season’s early action:  Team Sky, John G’s team, has already shown themselves to be playing well together, Paris- Nice is underway & John K speculates of a resurgent Jose Rujano.  Locally, John G gets back from the sun of the southwest training with juniors & other talented cyclists, John K. SMART goaless, races first race of season.  Next is the interview with Roger Bowersock, followed by our full flavor listener feedback segment where we catch up on our emails from the past month, resubmitted & new:  the ethics of #2 in ADA, Shimano Shifter advice, who are the longstanding teams?, life shaving experience, tire selection, tire picking worth the trouble?, leg exposure ratio & different conditions for race/training, the Data Base of our knowledge is under way! when do your legs arrive?, tooth rot?, tandem racing for the blind, explosive recovery & as mentioned above, we group a number of emails together mentioning that Clara Hughes both skated in the Olympics & raced as a pro.

As usual, this week’s feedback of the week winner gets an Epic Planet DVD.  Thanks to our Listener Feedback of the Week sponsor - epicRIDES Virtual Rides/Real Workouts

By the way, those wishing to help out with the Two Johns data point knowledge database project can do so by contacting:  AuditorBlue2@gmail.com

Special Guest:  John Howard

After a brief respite, the Two Johns are back to podcasting.  With the season revving up we talk a little early season spring racing, The Shiv gets the shove by the UCI & Rock looks to be dead.  Through all of this we cannot help but talk some Winter Olympics, the Canadian bibs over jersey skinsuit, ski jumping, speed skating, snowboarding… we can’t get enough.  Locally, John G gets ready for some AZ riding & pillow talk with The Pilot , John K gets back from Utah knuckle dragging & meeting Western Super Fan.   Following this is the John Howard interview.  A US cycling legend & genuinely a nice guy to talk.  He shares some of his wide & varied past experiences & ideas about cycling.  Finally, is Listener Feedback.  Due to the overflowing in box we decide to pick 16 emails which include:  questions of motivation, texting ban?, big bag theory?, The Pilot elaborates on air temperature & drag, Alva asks John G if he would raceface someone on one of these?  vasectomy follow up, my wife wants me to wear a helmet while on the rollers, Don’t forget Nick Crumpton! & much, much more.  At the end we select a couple winners of the emails of the podcast.

Thanks to our Listener Feedback of the Week sponsor - epicRIDES Virtual Rides/Real Workouts

For the last 4 years I have been using one of those Rudy Project back packs they sell for a very friendly price.  A nice basic back pack that has seen better days, not the least symptom being that the plastic backing has disintegrated into many tiny particles that swish around like sand between the two layers of fabric making the back of the pack.  It was to my pleasure when I was presented the opportunity to review a backpack, the Banjo Brothers Large Commuter Bag.

Here is a photo of it in my typical loading routine in the morning.

The first thing I found a little peculiar, only because I have never used a bag like this, is the closure of the bag which is best described to be like the brown bag my mom used to send with me for grade school lunch.  Only this time, that set up is one better because if my brown lunch bag were to get wet, chances were pretty good my ham sandwich would get soggy- not with this bag.  

The light colored liner is water proof & removable.  The closure is by folding the open top over, like the brown bag and snapping the clip, as shown below.  On the outer face of the bag is a zippered pocket, a velcro’d pouch, and three pen slots as well as a large side pocket that will easily fit a newspaper folded in half.

Pictured below is what it looks like with the outer water proof flap down and closed.  The outer layer is a durable nylon with two nifty reflective stripes.  It also has a loop for a rear facing blinking light- which is a very nice touch.  Many evenings my ride home requires a blinking light, so both of these features are handy.

The waterproof qualities were utilized today.  With sensitive  contents in my bag, if it is raining when I leave the office, I am normally scrounging around looking for a plastic bag to put all my valuables.  Below is the wet bag.

This was the case today, but voila!  Everything is dry!  No dodgy bag needed.  Now my laptop will fear not the rainy day & will be ready for the next podcast!

The rest of the bag details are sturdy construction that looks to wear well, closures to snug everything up & shrink the bag if needed, adjustable, padded & comfortable straps & 2,000 cubic inches of capacity.  The capacity is such that I will likely not exceed it barring the need to carry concrete block samples… for whatever reason.

One thing I noticed, due to the square nature of the top closure, when glancing over the shoulder to check for traffic, the corner of the pack is visible.  This is not a huge deal & can be mitigated with strap adjustment, but something that needs to be accounted for.  The bag retails for around $90, has a large capacity & high quality construction.  All in all a nice bag that has proven to be flexible, serviceable & waterproof.

For more information, see Banjo Brothers

]]> http://www.twojohnspodcast.missingsaddle.com/2010/02/23/product-review-banjo-brothers-large-commuter-bag/feed/ 4 http://www.twojohnspodcast.missingsaddle.com/2010/02/17/interview-john-howard/ http://www.twojohnspodcast.missingsaddle.com/2010/02/17/interview-john-howard/#comments Wed, 17 Feb 2010 14:24:03 +0000 john http://www.twojohnspodcast.missingsaddle.com/?p=2041

I had the pleasure of sitting down & hearing the thoughts of the broadest experienced cyclist I have met.  I apologize for the noisy audio, I I hope it does not take too much away from the material.

I did a search for ‘Soul Ride’ via Google & the above is one of the first results.  I am not sure if this constitutes a Soul Ride for either of the Johns, but it may for someone else.  One man’s souless ride could be another’s soul ride, whom are The Two Johns to judge?  In this podcast of attempted atonement, we put in the basemiles of listener feedback:  Binner figures out his problems,  Scottish Roadie changes his name to Le Blaireau & needs help with his goals- John G tells him to get S.M.A.R.T,  Jen Sprockets was making it up-we think,  Why did we attack Jen for this?  asks Fed Up North, calling us (or just John K) boorish,  stair climb to success?,  counter steering for dummies,   spring training to stomp jerks,  deviant? & we seek some professional legal advice from a rider that was kicked out of their local trail system!  As always, we select the Listener Feedback of the Week, only this time we roll out the new sponsor:  Epic Planet.tv!  Won’t you join along as the Two Johns try to walk the righteous path?