23.10.2008 von Ines.

The weather has been great this October. Especially from about October 7th to 19th it was clear blue skies and sunshine every day. The temperature has been still very pleasant in the daytime. It did get cloudy and grey in the past few days and but that ended with strong rain and wind last night. So today it is again clear blue skies and sunshine! Only difference is that the temperature is now lower. It is very beautiful autumn weather for outdoor activities like bicycling, hiking, climbing, running. Here is the forecast for the next few days:

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22.10.2008 von Ines.

This was sent out by the Benelux Chamber of Commerce in China to notify Beijing residents and visitors. It is amazing how huge streets can just be shut down for four days without much notice. Good that I ride bike and usually am not affected by road closures.

Temporarily closed Airport Expressway in Beijing
 

Starting tomorrow Beijing will host the Seventh Asia-Europe Summit from October 23 - October 26. The government will temporarily close the Airport Expressway and all the exits along it as follows:

October 23 - 8:30am - 11:00pm, Direction Airport to the City
October 24 - 8:00am - 1:30 pm, Direction Airport to the City
October 25 -    4:30pm - 11:00pm, Direction City to the Airport
October 26 -    8:30am - 8:00pm,   Direction City to the Airport

This will put extra pressure on the more local roads like Jing Shun Road with the potential to create major traffic jams and hazards.

Geschrieben in China, Beijing | 1 Kommentar »

22.10.2008 von Ines.

Currently China’s biggest Telecommunications Exhibition and FTTH Conference is going on in the China New Exhibition Center near the Beijing airport. That place is almost in the middle of nowhere and not so easy to get to or find a taxi to get back to the city. It was great to meet some of my dear ex-colleagues there. It was also fun to cycle there and cycle back home. I actually managed to arrive back home before the rain started.

Geschrieben in Asia, China | 1 Kommentar »

22.10.2008 von Ines.

The progress of the indoor climbing wall and bouldering place is amazing. Just a few weeks ago it was just an idea to open a place for rock climbing in Beijing during the winter and now it is almost finished. The bouldering place we all went to last year unfortunately closed in the spring and they now have a restaurant in there (but still kept the bouldering wall and all the grips on it).

My friends is the project manager for this climbing & mountaineering center project. It is in the Ole soccer facility near East 4th Ring Road. She showed me the progress of the climbing wall and the bouldering room. The experts from the Tibetean Mountaineering Association just arrived to set up the climbing routes and work in this center. I think the bouldering room is so beautiful.I can’t waittill it is opened for us to climb.

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19.10.2008 von Ines.

This was a great race despite short term change of location! Originally we should have been at the Goose and Duck ranch, but just the day before Trek was told that they cannot set up the race there. So it was changed to the Wenyu riverside in Shunyi. Getting ready for the race:

Here an extract of the race report from Tom Lanhove from Belgium (with some comments added):The “open” race (first time racers) was won by Samy Khoury from the US. He had a slow start but managed to come into second position, behind fellow USA Mike Bilan. Mike had a super race and quickly had a large gap to 2nd place Samy. Cruising on his way to victory, he met with cyclo cross’ Murphy’s Law: Sadly (though quite common) Mike punctured at 2 rounds before the end. Lucky for Mike he found a spare wheel and still finished 4th. Ines (GER) made 3rd in this race and thereby won the separate women’s classification ahead of Helen Melville (CHN).

The advanced category race was won by Todd (USA), ahead of a Chinese rider from the UCC team and Dieter (Belgium). Like the “open” race, disaster struck the likely victor of the race. Dieter from Belgium is a known MOB rider and I personally saw how awesome he is on rough terrain in Mongolia. With that specialized skill and the legs to finish it off, he was well on his way to victory when his front wheel literally exploded. This allowed both Todd and the UCC rider to overtake him. Luckily Dieter was able to jog (!) his way to third. And this because Tom decided not to overtake the jogging Dieter but stay behind and come in on 4th place. That was a great gesture of fairplay from Tom. That was awesome!

For pictures of the race go to Picasaweb of Cyclosportschina, Pictures on Dongfanghong, Picasaweb of Chris, Picasaweb pictures from Udo. More pictures from another friend are on flickr. Here is just a short video clip of the race.

Cycling back we came through the 798 Art District full of contemporary art galleries. My friend took some pictures:

Geschrieben in Cycling, Outdoors | 1 Kommentar »

18.10.2008 von Ines.

Today I again did a performance in the Ditan Park. It was still for the Beijing Book Festival. I think it is great to inspire people to read books by doing tricks on a bike. As I do not have a camera right now these pictures were taken by two of my colleagues.

Some more really nice pictures from a friend are here on flickr. That is the difference of a nice SLR compared to small pocket size cameras.

Here are some more impressions of the book festival:

My friend brought his beautiful old track bike. But he installed a free wheel single speed on it. Old bikes are just very beautiful. Too bad I currently do not have a nice camera.

Then went to the Ole soccer venue opening party. They have 2 indoor fields and 2 outdoor fields. Plus a soon to be opened climbing wall and bouldering room. The indoor climbing wall is 10 meters high. Today it was already painted yellow and had an easy climbing route and an overhang route screwed in. I climbed the overhang route which was not difficult but fun. They have nice La Sportiva rock climbing shoes for rental. I cannot wait for the opening.

After that we went for a nice North Korean barbeque dinner.

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14.10.2008 von Ines.

Tonight we met up for a fixed gear ride. We were 5 riders. We rode along Changan Boulevard and to the National Theater. Jack took some really nice pictures. Then we did a loop via the Financial Street and back East to Snalitun. On the way back we stopped to have some Xinjiang food with lamb skewers and nan. We chained all our bikes together to make this bike pile:

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13.10.2008 von Ines.

Today we had a meeting to discuss some of the final details of the association of International Performing Arts in China that will be soon formed. The association will be called CIPA. All different kinds of performing arts groups of Beijing are invited to join, for example the Bentationeijing Actors Workshop, the Beijing Improv group, the Beijing Jugglers, Dance groups, Jazz groups… After the meeting we had a short theatrical presentation with actors, dancers and jugglers in Club Obiwan. As I have no nice camera anymore I took these pictures with my mobile phone.

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13.10.2008 von Ines.

There is an article about me on YNET.com. Click here for the full article.

小红帽看点

“绿色出行　小轮车大赛”引来民间“高手”———

本报讯　延续了“绿色奥运”精神，由本报举办的“骑上小轮车　绿色好出行”活动昨日不仅吸引了众多市民的参与，还迎来了一位特殊的选手——来自德国的工程师，自行车表演艺术家伊泉女士不仅饶有兴味地挑战了“百米赛道”，还现场展示了高难度的车技表演。

来自德国的伊泉女士不仅是一个身体力行的环保人士，也是一位出色的自行车表演艺术家。她从小是一个体操运动员，13岁开始迷上花式自行车，她现在的职业是工程师，４年前来到中国。伊泉住在东大桥，每天骑车到西单金融街上班。

伊泉称她平时骑的是难度较高的固定齿轮车，这种车速度快、轻巧，没有任何刹车等装置，全部靠脚蹬和齿轮来控制骑行，一般用于杂技表演。记者了解到，她是骑固定齿轮车的高手，网上她的车技视频广为流传。

在昨天的地坛书市，伊泉的表演引来了大批市民的围观，“这跟中国杂技很像，但是又不太一样。”一位市民对此很感兴趣，大家对她的表演都报以热烈的掌声，有人怕伊泉不明白，还用英文大喊，“太棒了，谢谢你！”没想到伊泉用标准的中文回答道，“不用谢！”

在大家的鼓励下，伊泉还现场挑战了“小轮车大赛”百米赛道。这是由本报为广大市民量身定做的设有六种障碍的“Ｕ”型赛道，每一站都设有一处特殊的“站牌 ”和诸如鹅卵石、废胶皮之类的路障，选手必须完成从“北京青年报”站到“小红帽”站的整个赛程，用时最短的选手将有可能夺得大奖。

据悉，到目前为止，一位10来岁的小孩创造了20秒左右的纪录，伊泉决定对这个速度发起冲击，一圈下来，25秒，“太慢了！”她显然对自己的成绩不满意。“ 小轮车比赛不见得是成年人或者专业自行车手的强项，它要求体态轻盈和很好的平衡性，小孩子反而有优势。”活动主办方称。

■摄影/本报记者　袁艺

Geschrieben in Media, Cycling, Fixed Gear, China, Beijing | Keine Kommentare »

13.10.2008 von Ines.

Someone wrote a comment about the book festival in Diatn park on douban.com website. they also made a comment about my trick bike performance.

在方泽坛的前面，来自德国的工程师，自行车表演艺术家伊泉女士正在做精彩的自行车表演：
　　怎么样，精彩吧，不过千万不要随便模仿哦。

Geschrieben in Performers, China, Beijing | Keine Kommentare »