Rabbit Box Blog

I knew we were in for trouble as soon as Chuck said, “Wanna race?”

He was my favorite cousin, but he didn’t get along with my best friend Brad. It was Brad he had just challenged.

“Yeah,” was Brad’s only reply as he started pedaling his bicycle hard up the hill we had been slowly climbing. Before Chuck and I realized the challenge had been accepted, Brad had reached racing speed.

I knew what the outcome would be. Brad was a racing fanatic, even among all the other rising sixth graders. Back before most of us knew what a racing bike looked like, he had pretty much invented one out of his standard one-speed, 26-inch Schwinn. The fenders, tank, and chain guard were gone, and the handle bars were upside down. He had replaced the original balloon tires with narrow, faster ones. He had even changed the gearing.

Besides all that, he rode everywhere. He was lean and experienced. He dreamed of being a professional bicycle racer, if such a job existed. He was always working on designs for bicycles and racing tracks, including a special track that would adjust automatically so the racers were always going downhill. He thought it would be close to a perpetual motion machine—he could coast forever, as long as he could work out meals and bathroom breaks.

Chuck was a racing fan, too, but NASCAR was more his taste. He was a city kid, and my aunt and uncle spoiled him with- what seemed to us country cousins, at least- lots of toys. Like his gas-powered go-cart, which my uncle built in his shop. And like the three-speed Western Flyer British Touring bike he had brought with him for his visit to our grandpa’s farm. It was an exotic machine for 1963. Nobody else we knew had a multi-speed bike, when most of us had basic store brand bikes, like the Pep Boys special I was riding.

But extra gears were no match for lean muscle, and Brad topped the hill before Chuck could even get back into first, much less get up enough speed to use third gear.

Brad circled back to meet us and rub in his victory.

“Pretty slow, you guys,” he taunted.

“I wasn’t ready,” shouted Chuck. He was about as mad as I had seen him, even at Brad.

“Well, wanna go again? I’ll give you a head start and still beat you and that sissy bike of yours.”

“No, I’m too tired. You’ve already finished and rested up,” Chuck said, recognizing there was no way he could beat Brad. But his ego wouldn’t let him leave it alone. 

“I could beat you easy when I’m fresh,” he said.

“Come on, Chuck,” I interrupted. “We’d better get back to my house in time for lunch.” We had plenty of time, but I was afraid this was getting out of hand.

“Well, okay, but we’re going to beat this punk before I go home this week,” replied Chuck, more to Brad than to me. “How about tomorrow at this same time?” he asked.

“Fine,” Brad said. “I’ll beat you any time you say.”

As we rode home, Chuck was silent. In fact, he was uncharacteristically quiet for the next hour or so. Normally confident, even he was worried that he had made a mistake in challenging Brad to a rematch. There was just no way he could beat Brad.

“You know, if we had a tandem bicycle, we could beat that guy,” he finally said after lunch. I knew what a tandem bike was; we had all seen the one in the Western Auto catalog on the page next to the three-speed model Chuck got. But even Chuck’s dad wouldn’t spring for such a special bike. And besides, our local Western Auto surely didn’t stock the bike, so we couldn’t get it in time for the race tomorrow.

“We can build one!” Chuck exclaimed.

“We can?” I asked a little doubtfully. Chuck had inherited Uncle Harold’s mechanical abilities, but I wasn’t all that skillful. And his dad’s shop was in Rock Hill, an hour’s drive away. Nobody around my neighborhood had the tools or parts I felt sure we’d need.

“Sure, it’ll be easy,” he reassured me.

“Well, where will we get the parts?” I asked, unconvinced.

“We don’t need any,” he replied. “We’ll put our bikes together into one super bike. It’ll be faster than a tandem bike because it’ll have two separate drive systems. You sit up front on your bike, and I’ll push with my three-speed behind. It’ll be the fastest bike ever.”

I was still dubious, but Chuck convinced me to make a trial. We removed the front tire from his bike, and after some difficulty, managed to spread the front fork wide enough to bolt onto the rear axle of my bike.

We climbed on our bikes and started pedaling while trying to hold the bikes upright.

It was a little like trying to surf on an accordion. The more we pedaled, the more unstable the whole mess got, and we tumbled in a heap before we had gone twenty feet. After several tries ended the same way, Chuck proposed a design change.

“It’s too flexible in the middle,” he said. We’ll have to add a stabilizer bar.”

“Stabilizer bar? Where are we going to get something like that?” I asked, starting to get nervous about what my dad would say if he came home from work and found any of his stuff missing or commandeered. I knew from past experience that Chuck was willing to risk trouble with our parents to solve engineering problems like this.

“Don’t worry. I know just what to use. And it won’t make any trouble or hurt your bike. I need to drill just one little hole, and I’ll put it in my bike.”

The bar he had in mind was a piece of rigid iron strapping from my dad’s garden tiller. It was already the right length and had a hole at each end. All we had to do was remove it from the tiller, a pretty safe task since my dad was at work and my mom seldom looked out unless we yelled for help.

Chuck unbolted the seat post on my bike, threaded the bar onto the bolt, and retightened the nut. Then he measured for the hole he would drill in his bike’s frame. But no matter how he worked things around, the frame was too small to accept a hole big enough for the bolt.

“Well, I guess we’ll have to switch the bikes,” Chuck said with an engineer’s matter-of-fact finality.

Now I had had my bike only since Christmas, and there wasn’t a scratch on it. I still don’t know how Chuck convinced me to let him drill the frame. But soon the hole appeared and the behemoth was reassembled, with my bike in back and a stiffening bar running from the top of my frame to the seat post on Chuck’s bike.  We climbed on for a test.

Getting started was tough. Even with the three wheels locked in line, it was hard to get enough speed to balance. We struggled through a series of falls and false starts.

And then we got rolling.

How can I describe the feeling? The bike chaffed and fought like an old plow horse that had suddenly developed the speed of a quarter horse. Chuck and I yelled instructions back and forth; he didn’t dare look back, because we fell every time he tried.

Finally, when we gained enough speed, the bike became like a gyroscope—steady, unstoppable, and, we discovered, unturnable. When we rode over uneven ground, the middle wheel came off the ground, then bit again, making the bike surge forward, going faster and faster as we cranked our pedals.

It was the fastest I had ever been on a bicycle. We both yelled with joy and a little fear. The fear, we soon learned, was justified. Our first attempt at negotiating a sharp curve threw us into a heap. The bolts holding my front fork onto Chuck’s axle popped loose, throwing my fork into his spokes, locking the middle wheel instantly. Luckily, the bike had already slowed enough that no real damage was done.

“Boy, if that happens when we’re going at full speed, this thing will be nothing but shredded spokes and bent metal,” Chuck said.

Not to mention what’ll happen to us, I thought.

We carried the bike back to my house and retightened all the connections. We rode a few more times, gaining experience and confidence. We knew now to check and tighten all the bolts after each practice run. We learned to stop before trying to turn around, and to communicate by shouting when we needed to make any other maneuvers. 

By the time my dad got home from work, the stabilizer bar was back on his tiller and our bikes looked normal except for one ½ inch hole in my bike’s top frame bar. No one noticed.

The next morning, Chuck and I took the stabilizer bar off the tiller, put the bikes back together, and pedaled to Brad’s house. The bike was fun, but I dreaded the race. Not only were we going to race a bike I found more than a little scary, but I was forced to take Chuck’s side against my best friend. If we lost, would Chuck blame me? If we won, would Brad ever speak to me again?

Brad came out to meet us as we stopped at the end of his driveway. When he saw our invention, he was clearly impressed, but skeptical.

“Let’s make the race long enough so the front tire won’t cross the finish line before the back wheel leaves the starting line,” he sneered.

“Just name your course,” Chuck said confidently.

The course Brad chose was the road which ran in front of his house. After a gentle quarter-mile climb, it plunged down a steep half-mile hill, across a creek, and up another steep hill. This time of day there would be no traffic.

“Race you to the bridge,” Brad said. 

“Okay, but no head starts this time,” Chuck said. “This thing takes a while to get going.”

Brad agreed to a standing start at his driveway. Chuck and I wrestled our beast into place, and Brad pulled up beside us. We recited the starter’s chant in unison.

“Ready. Set. Go!”

Brad dashed ahead of us as we labored to keep our mount upright while pouring all our muscle power and weight to the pedals. The bike fought us, then gained stability and settled down to business. Brad watched in disbelief as we zipped past him, gaining more and more speed.

By the time we topped the hill, we were already far in the lead. Feeling triumphant, we pedaled hard down the first fifty feet of the steep downhill. Then, realizing we were already going faster than I had ever gone before, I stopped pedaling. Chuck was still pumping hard.

“Chuck!” I shouted. “What if the forks come loose?”

“Then we die!” he yelled back. “I think I got ’em tight enough. But don’t hit the brakes just in case.” Then he stopped pedaling too. I knew we were in trouble. Chuck didn’t scare easily.

The rest of the ride down the hill was at once the most fun I ever had as a child and the most scared I’ve ever been. Fifty, a hundred miles an hour? Who knows. The world streaked by in a blur as we screamed in terrified joy. I kept watching the fork of my bike, searching for any sign of metal fatigue or loose nuts. Not that I could have done anything if I did spot a problem. Putting on my brakes would be the same as hitting the self-destruct button on a NASA rocket. What would happen when we hit the bump on the bridge? The road made a slight curve on the other side. Could we hold it? And what if we met a car?

Then, suddenly, we were at the bridge. We bounced over it intact, flew around the curve, and started up the hill on the other side.

“Don’t use the brake!” shouted Chuck. He was still thinking about the fork, too. Even without brakes, we lost our speed quickly on the steep hill and soon stopped. We got off and turned the bike around. Grinning ear to ear, we war-whooped and waited for Brad.

“Boy, you guys were flying!” he yelled, nearly as excited as we were. I gave up halfway down the hill. But what if your bikes had come apart going that fast?“

“I wasn’t worried,” bragged Chuck. “We build ’em better than that.”

We pushed our communal bike up the hill together toward Brad’s house while Brad walked alongside. At the top, I held Brad’s bike while he and Chuck went for a short ride. Then we all said good-bye, and Chuck and I rode back to my house.

Chuck got our tools and took the bikes apart. He bent the forks back to fit my front wheel, and replaced the stabilizer bar on my dad’s tiller.

“We can do this again and race other kids,” I suggested. The taste of speed had appealed to me, and I saw a chance to build a racing dynasty. We could be famous.

“Nah,” replied Chuck. “That thing’s too dangerous.”