Charles Bukowski

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Books & Review | Cole Garner HillUpdated: Aug 16, 2012 04:23 PM EDT

Today would have been author Charles Bukowski's 91st birthday. One of literature's dirtiest, crotchetiest old men, and damn proud of it, Bukowski died on this day in 1994 of Leukemia, shortly after completing his final novel, "Pulp."  

If you've been to art school, taken a poetry class, or had an unusually disaffected adolescence, you're likely aware of his work. But even to the uninitiated, Bukowski's presence should still be recognizable. Much like William S. Burroughs, and Hunter S. Thompson, Bukowski's writing, and the man himself, has coalesced to such an extent with popular, and counter-culture, that it has been absorbed into the fabric of American consciousness.  His influence on art, music, writing, and our culture as a whole is undeniable.

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Even if you're unaware of the embarrassment of riches hiding in Bukowski's collections of fiction and poetry, it's likely you've rubbed elbows somewhere along the way with his distinctive spit-fire spirit. His writing has been championed the world over by rock stars like Kurt Kobain, and celebrities like Johnny Depp, and was the subject of a documentary that featured Sean Penn, Tom Waits, Harry Dean Stanton,  and Bono  -- not to mention several film adaptations of his books, the most recent, 2005's "Factotum" starring Matt Dillon.

In honor of that cantankerous wisenheimer, read along below for some timeless Bukowski wisdom.

"Some people never go crazy. What truly horrible lives they must live."

"We have wasted History like a bunch of drunks shooting dice back in the men's crapper of the local bar."

"Pain doesn't make anything, nor does poverty. The artist is there first. What becomes of him depends upon his luck. If his luck is good (worldly-speaking) he becomes a bad artist. If his luck is bad, he becomes a good one."

"It was true that I didn't have much ambition, but there ought to be a place for people without ambition, I mean a better place than the one usually reserved. How in the hell could a man enjoy being awakened at 6:30 a.m. by an alarm clock, leap out of bed, dress, force-feed, shit, piss, brush teeth and hair, and fight traffic to get to a place where essentially you made lots of money for somebody else and were asked to be grateful for the opportunity to do so?"

"An intellectual says a simple thing in a hard way. An artist says a hard thing in a simple way."

"if I suffer at this

typewriter
think how I'd feel
among the lettuce-
pickers of Salinas?

I think of the men
I've known in
factories
with no way to
get out -
choking while living
choking while laughing
at Bob Hope or Lucille
Ball while
2 or 3 children beat
tennis balls against
the walls.

some suicides are never
recorded."

"Death, at last, is a bore - no more than pulling a shade. we do not die all at once, generally, but piece by piece, little by little. the young die hardest and live hardest and understand nothing. but they are the most generous and the truest and better fit to lead than the cautious wise."

Did we forget your favorite? Let us know in the comments?

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Books & Review | Cole Garner HillUpdated: Aug 16, 2012 04:23 PM EDT

Today would have been author Charles Bukowski's 91st birthday. One of literature's dirtiest, crotchetiest old men, and damn proud of it, Bukowski died on this day in 1994 of Leukemia, shortly after completing his final novel, "Pulp."

If you've been to art school, taken a poetry class, or had an unusually disaffected adolescence, you're likely aware of his work. But even to the uninitiated, Bukowski's presence should still be recognizable. Much like William S. Burroughs, and Hunter S. Thompson, Bukowski's writing, and the man himself, has coalesced to such an extent with popular, and counter-culture, that it has been absorbed into the fabric of American consciousness.  His influence on art, music, writing, and our culture as a whole is undeniable.

Like Us on Facebook

Even if you're unaware of the embarrassment of riches hiding in Bukowski's collections of fiction and poetry, it's likely you've rubbed elbows somewhere along the way with his distinctive spit-fire spirit. His writing has been championed the world over by rock stars like Kurt Kobain, and celebrities like Johnny Depp, and was the subject of a documentary that featured Sean Penn, Tom Waits, Harry Dean Stanton,  and Bono  -- not to mention several film adaptations of his books, the most recent, 2005's "Factotum" starring Matt Dillon.

In honor of that cantankerous wisenheimer, read along below for some timeless Bukowski wisdom.

"Some people never go crazy. What truly horrible lives they must live."

"We have wasted History like a bunch of drunks shooting dice back in the men's crapper of the local bar."

"Pain doesn't make anything, nor does poverty. The artist is there first. What becomes of him depends upon his luck. If his luck is good (worldly-speaking) he becomes a bad artist. If his luck is bad, he becomes a good one."

"It was true that I didn't have much ambition, but there ought to be a place for people without ambition, I mean a better place than the one usually reserved. How in the hell could a man enjoy being awakened at 6:30 a.m. by an alarm clock, leap out of bed, dress, force-feed, shit, piss, brush teeth and hair, and fight traffic to get to a place where essentially you made lots of money for somebody else and were asked to be grateful for the opportunity to do so?"

"An intellectual says a simple thing in a hard way. An artist says a hard thing in a simple way."

"if I suffer at this

typewriter
think how I'd feel
among the lettuce-
pickers of Salinas?

I think of the men
I've known in
factories
with no way to
get out -
choking while living
choking while laughing
at Bob Hope or Lucille
Ball while
2 or 3 children beat
tennis balls against
the walls.

some suicides are never
recorded."

"Death, at last, is a bore - no more than pulling a shade. we do not die all at once, generally, but piece by piece, little by little. the young die hardest and live hardest and understand nothing. but they are the most generous and the truest and better fit to lead than the cautious wise."

Did we forget your favorite? Let us know in the comments?

The impeccably engineered French Canadian builders Devinci have created a superb mix of state-of-the-art hard-riding balance and bombproof long-term strength with their Dixon aggro trail bike. 

Ride & handling: Super strong on the trails, if heavy on the climbs

Haven supply a shock-volume reducing shim with the bike, which allows you to create a more progressive spring rate by unscrewing the air can and clipping the shim onto the damper shaft.

The spacer addition isn’t a cut and dried choice. Full volume means more bounce and occasional wallow when you get caught deep in the stroke, but bottom-out is never harsh. The bike swallows square-edged slaps like sweets, and more sag means a lower centre of gravity for extra stability. 

Adding the shim definitely gives a firmer feel through your feet if you’re pushing hard through berms, but it’s more abrupt off big stuff. It still manages to drive forward through rock heaps and step downs as though it’s self-pumping. 

Whether you stay with the stock XV air can or stick the shim in to make knocking the travel indicator less likely, the initial travel is remarkably smooth. Part of this is due to the plush initial stroke of the Split Pivot design. The smooth and easy-free movement of the perfectly aligned bearings (very noticeable if you take the shock out) makes a massive difference, letting the bike glide over small rocks, stutter bumps or roots without skipping a beat or losing traction. 

Add the impressive braking and pedal stroke isolation plus decent ground clearance and the Dixon delivers unerring propulsion whatever’s underneath your wheels. That easy initial movement means you’ll be glad of the shock firming ProPedal lever when you’re grunting up a long, smooth climb though.

The extra beef also makes it less playful to hop and flick about at lower speeds. Get some momentum behind you and the surefooted ground connection and beautifully balanced handling is inspiring. The cockpit dimensions are just right, and while the mid-height BB means it’s not an absolute cornering scythe, it’s clearance means you can get on the power earlier. 

Add in that fluid suspension and it also means you can drive it low through rooty, rocky or rutted ‘natural’ corners without pole vaulting off a stubbed pedal. Even on groomed trail centres you can still leave the brakes off, lean in hard and look for the exit very aggressively – as far as the Kendas let you, in fact. 

Having done several runs with our test Fox 34 fork in place of the 32s, we can also confirm it’s more than stiff enough to team up with a tougher fork. You really don’t want to raise the bottom bracket much higher than it is, though.

Frame & equipment: Functional but heavy 

Devinci have stayed resolutely homegrown. No containers of Far Eastern bikes unboxed, stickered up and bolted together for this company – they go for billet alloy and raw tube stock going in, and finished bikes rolling out the other end, giving them total quality control. 

The Optimum G04 tubeset is triple butted and pressure-formed into curved, box and convex-sided rhomboid tubing to match the loads in each frame section. Convex rectangular section rear stays get cleanly machined, open-ended terminals and an asymmetric junction behind the relatively high main pivot. 

The bearing seats in the mainframe, the rear pivot and the rocker linkage are all final-stage machined once the frame’s been heat treated and assembled. It’s more awkward than machining each piece before putting it together and hoping it stays straight during welding and age hardening, but it means the tolerances in bearing alignment are far more accurate than on most bikes. This translates into a noticeably smooth and easy suspension movement, plus better bearing and shock bushing life. 

Switchable ‘Full Response Geometry’ chucks for the rocker link pivots let you slacken the head and seat angle half a degree and drop bottom bracket and standover height 7mm. 

Devinci have hooked up with renowned suspension engineer Dave Weagle to use his Split Pivot design. This joins the chainstay and seatstays at a concentric pivot around the outside of the 142x12mm bolt-thru rear axle. A rocker link then drives the vertically mounted Fox RP2 shock. 

There are chainguide mounts around the BB and mounts for a remote hose/cable for a dropper post under the top tube. There’s a bottle cage mount on the down tube and the rear brake is post-mount-style for easy alignment. 

Tyre clearance is adequate for a 2.35in tyre in filthy weather or a 2.4in in the dry. It’s not the lightest frame in the 145mm category at 3.17kg (7lb) with shock, but the lifetime warranty shows Devinci are confident they’re more than strong enough. One niggle is the noise from the guide-free gear cable as it clatters around inside the chainstay.

While everything works fine, the frame quality and Canadian origin mean component levels on the complete Dixon RC are par with a mainstream bike several hundred pounds cheaper. The hefty frame and bombproof wheels also mean a chunky overall weight, although adding £250 worth of RockShox Reverb dropper post and a titanium seat collar for £205 is still tempting. It would add another pound or so, but allow you to easily get more from the bike.

There was a definite divide between testers on whether they preferred the shock spaced or full volume with slightly higher pressure, but everyone agreed on the Dixon’s awesome overall balance and performance. If you don’t mind a bit of effort on the climbs to give yourself a big advantage in terms of traction and control on the descents – plus superb hand-built strength – then the Dixon really has to be on your shortlist. 

This article was originally published in What Mountain Bike magazine, available on Apple Newsstand and Zinio.

The products in Gatorade's new G Series Pro range are designed to be used in conjunction with one another before, during and after your rides.

The range consists of Prime, a 118ml (100kcal) pouch, Perform, an energy drink (125kcal per 500ml) that replenishes electrolytes during exercise, and Recover, a 500ml protein (16.5g) and carbohydrate (13.5g) drink that aims to kick-start recovery and begin the replenishment of depleted energy stores. 

The question is, does it work? For a week in July – a week that turned out to be the hottest of 2012 so far, for the UK – we disregarded all other energy drinks in favour of Gatorade's Pro system, to put it to the test.

The Prime pouch (we had the orange flavour, but mixed berry is also available) is an extremely palatable, very sweet shot of concentrated energy. It's not exactly gel-like but it is a little more viscous than your average energy drink.

It's great straight from the box but even better chilled from the fridge, and served as a terrific addition to our pre-ride ritual. We often find it hard to get enough food down before early-morning rides, so a drink like this got us in the groove from the off.

When diluted, the Perform powder has the same orange flavour as the Prime drink but in a less concentrated, less sweet form, with a salty aftertaste. It was easy to get down early on in the ride when it was still chilled, but later on, with a combination of sunshine and over-familiarity, we were craving something more savoury in taste.

At the end of the day, it's about the job an energy product does rather than how it tastes. We were braking training records almost five hours into our ride when powered by the Perform. The only criticism is the bizarre measuring system – its lid. Powder ends up getting everywhere, so you're better off using a spoon.

Taste-wise, the Recover drink is the weakest of the three products. It comes as an already diluted 500ml drink (mixed berry flavour only) with the consistency and flavour of an energy drink, but is much heavier on the stomach, a reflection of its 16.5g of protein per bottle. Served ice cold is the best way to drink it – if you leave it brewing in a warm gym bag all day it has an insipid taste.

We drank a Recover immediately after each ride during a week where we were doing hard hill reps for 2.5 hours each day. While it's difficult to be scientifically sure of what effect it had, we were going better at the end of the week than we were at the start.

So, as a system, the G Series Pro products performed as well as we could have hoped. We can't see a reason why they wouldn't work individually too, should you have preferred recovery drinks you'd like to mix them with. The range is a neat idea from Gatorade, and with the company's Team Sky connection it's sure to be a winner.

The price is the only sticking point. We ordered in bulk, receiving 20 Prime pouches, 20 500ml servings of Perform (two canisters) and 24 500ml bottles of Recover, which should last a committed cyclist about a month.

The Xelius frameset is the top race model in the Lapierre line-up, with a naturally aggressive ride and the position to match. You’re paying for the frame quality in the componentry though, which makes it slightly heavy and leaden for the price. 

Ride & handling: Aggressive race position offset by high weight

While most big manufacturers position their 55cm size in the middle of their range, our 55cm Xelius sample counts as the large out of the three size options. This means a 570mm top tube that stretches reach out further than you’ll find on other bikes.

The narrow 400mm bars also give it a thin shouldered feel that’s definitely oriented towards the tucked elbow race crowd, not relaxed cruising. It certainly feels the part with your head down and heart rate up, showing no signs of suffering any loss of power delivery from having a conventional bottom bracket and spindle size rather than a BB30 setup. 

The alloy bar and stem might add weight, but they give a firm setup for stomping a gear round when you’re out of the saddle. The same can be said of the Mavic Aksium/Aksion wheel/tyre combo, which are stiff and anchored under power but relatively heavy. 

Mavic’s black-valved wheel and tyre combo look slick but they’re a weak link

There’s no doubting the extra componentry weight does sap some of the potential get-up-and-go from the frame though, with the Xelius surging forward rather than snapping into life as you apply the pressure. 

The narrow bars and slightly high bottom bracket also mean a firmer hand is needed to tip the bike into corners and then hold it there if the radius or road conditions change. The Aksion tyres and alloy seatpost also give a harsher top note to the ride on rougher sections compared to the suppler tyres and more compliant carbon equipment on some similarly priced bikes.

Thankfully, Lapierre haven’t just laid up the carbon for giving you and the opposition a battering though. While it’s got a precise and obedient feel to it when heading into corners and a strong sense of purpose underfoot, the Xelius isn’t remotely punishing.

Even with the stock tyres there’s a definite sense of glide and float over even the worst road surfaces. Spending some of the test on an upgrade Zipp wheel and Schwalbe tyre set really confirmed in our minds just how much potential the Xelius has as a great base to upgrade from, as well as its suitability for aero bars and deep-section wheels. 

You can’t ignore the fact that in its stock shop floor format it’s noticeably off the pace compared to other lightweight bikes. It’s disappointing because the frame is well worth the money but the kit is well off the mark.

Frame & equipment: Pro level frameset with weighty extras

The Xelius frame is a full carbon monocoque with tapering triangular top tube and angular down tube running smoothly back from the tapered head tube. The curved aero blade fork also gets a carbon steerer to keep weight under 400g. 

The bottom bracket is a conventional external screw-in design stiffened up by flared ends to both the down tube and seat tube. Multi-shape chainstays swing right in alongside the tyre before curving back out, while the straight seatstays blend into a narrow wishbone above the rear brake. 

Gear cabling is internal, but the rubber shrouds constantly loosened and fell out. The full length outer brake cabling through the top tube also adds a few needless grams. 

Despite being significantly larger in overall dimensions than most 55cm frames, our sample frame still just ducked under the magic one-kilo frame weight barrier. There are only three frame size options available too, so if you’re particularly tall or small then you’ll have to forget about the Xelius.

The Xelius is definitely a race bike when it comes to ride position

Buyers using a Top Trumps style shopping technique are going to be disappointed with the Lapierre, as the high quality frame has obviously eaten into the complete bike budget. We’ve no complaints about the smooth, functional Ultegra stop-go gear, but the Tiagra cassette they’ve tried to sneak through is significantly heavier than Ultegra. 

More significantly, while the Aksium wheels are solid and dependable performers, they’re heavier and less responsive than some. 

The black-stemmed inner tubes and matching logos of the Mavic tyres are a nice aesthetic touch. The actual ride is noticeably wooden, and the alloy bars and seatpost aren’t light either, all of which leaves the Xelius relatively heavy.

This article was originally published in Triathlon Plus magazine, available on Zinio.

View the original article here

Tue 28 Aug 2012, 10:00 am BSTBy Triathlon PlusThis top-end lid is worn in the pro peloton and weighs in at a scant 260g for size medium. 

Despite the price, the MPS Fitting System, which does allow good horizontal and vertical fitting, is a basic ‘push together’ type rather than a dial, making on the fly adjustment tricky. 

We were also a bit disappointed by the sharp plastic strap clips under the ears, which needed a little bit of sanding down to avoid irritation. And the use of a comic-style font on the rear looks a little cheap on a premium product. 

Regardless of this, the helmet itself is light and comfy once fitted with a ‘forget it’s there’ quality that’s hard to beat. It’s also got exceptional ventilation, with 39 distinctive oval vents sucking in air even at climbing speeds to keep the head as cool as a helmet can. 

Catlike also claim the design of the vents means impact is absorbed and distributed more effectively in the event of a crash, while the low rear coverage is also a safety bonus.

This article was originally published in Triathlon Plus magazine, available on Zinio.

Tue 28 Aug 2012, 10:00 am BSTBy Triathlon PlusThis top-end lid is worn in the pro peloton and weighs in at a scant 260g for size medium. 

Despite the price, the MPS Fitting System, which does allow good horizontal and vertical fitting, is a basic ‘push together’ type rather than a dial, making on the fly adjustment tricky. 

We were also a bit disappointed by the sharp plastic strap clips under the ears, which needed a little bit of sanding down to avoid irritation. And the use of a comic-style font on the rear looks a little cheap on a premium product. 

Regardless of this, the helmet itself is light and comfy once fitted with a ‘forget it’s there’ quality that’s hard to beat. It’s also got exceptional ventilation, with 39 distinctive oval vents sucking in air even at climbing speeds to keep the head as cool as a helmet can. 

Catlike also claim the design of the vents means impact is absorbed and distributed more effectively in the event of a crash, while the low rear coverage is also a safety bonus.

This article was originally published in Triathlon Plus magazine, available on Zinio.

3 out of 5 stars

As far as we could tell there’s nothing revolutionary about the ingredients; each tab makes up a hypotonic drink containing five ION electrolytes (sodium, potassium, magnesium, chloride and calcium). 

They are low calorie, giving just 1.3-2kcal per 100ml, so you can use them alongside other carb products to keep you hydrated during a hot race. 

The instructions that come with the tabs say each one makes a strong drink in 500ml of water and a weaker tasting drink in 750ml water – with the lemon/lime flavour we actually found the more concentrated 500ml impossible to finish, but at a weaker concentration it’s refreshingly sharp. 

Each tube contains 20 tabs, which represents good value.

This article was originally published in Triathlon Plus magazine, available on Zinio.

The impeccably engineered French Canadian builders Devinci have created a superb mix of state-of-the-art hard-riding balance and bombproof long-term strength with their Dixon aggro trail bike. 

Ride & handling: Super strong on the trails, if heavy on the climbs

Haven supply a shock-volume reducing shim with the bike, which allows you to create a more progressive spring rate by unscrewing the air can and clipping the shim onto the damper shaft.

The spacer addition isn’t a cut and dried choice. Full volume means more bounce and occasional wallow when you get caught deep in the stroke, but bottom-out is never harsh. The bike swallows square-edged slaps like sweets, and more sag means a lower centre of gravity for extra stability. 

Adding the shim definitely gives a firmer feel through your feet if you’re pushing hard through berms, but it’s more abrupt off big stuff. It still manages to drive forward through rock heaps and step downs as though it’s self-pumping. 

Whether you stay with the stock XV air can or stick the shim in to make knocking the travel indicator less likely, the initial travel is remarkably smooth. Part of this is due to the plush initial stroke of the Split Pivot design. The smooth and easy-free movement of the perfectly aligned bearings (very noticeable if you take the shock out) makes a massive difference, letting the bike glide over small rocks, stutter bumps or roots without skipping a beat or losing traction. 

Add the impressive braking and pedal stroke isolation plus decent ground clearance and the Dixon delivers unerring propulsion whatever’s underneath your wheels. That easy initial movement means you’ll be glad of the shock firming ProPedal lever when you’re grunting up a long, smooth climb though.

The extra beef also makes it less playful to hop and flick about at lower speeds. Get some momentum behind you and the surefooted ground connection and beautifully balanced handling is inspiring. The cockpit dimensions are just right, and while the mid-height BB means it’s not an absolute cornering scythe, it’s clearance means you can get on the power earlier. 

Add in that fluid suspension and it also means you can drive it low through rooty, rocky or rutted ‘natural’ corners without pole vaulting off a stubbed pedal. Even on groomed trail centres you can still leave the brakes off, lean in hard and look for the exit very aggressively – as far as the Kendas let you, in fact. 

Having done several runs with our test Fox 34 fork in place of the 32s, we can also confirm it’s more than stiff enough to team up with a tougher fork. You really don’t want to raise the bottom bracket much higher than it is, though.

Frame & equipment: Functional but heavy 

Devinci have stayed resolutely homegrown. No containers of Far Eastern bikes unboxed, stickered up and bolted together for this company – they go for billet alloy and raw tube stock going in, and finished bikes rolling out the other end, giving them total quality control. 

The Optimum G04 tubeset is triple butted and pressure-formed into curved, box and convex-sided rhomboid tubing to match the loads in each frame section. Convex rectangular section rear stays get cleanly machined, open-ended terminals and an asymmetric junction behind the relatively high main pivot. 

The bearing seats in the mainframe, the rear pivot and the rocker linkage are all final-stage machined once the frame’s been heat treated and assembled. It’s more awkward than machining each piece before putting it together and hoping it stays straight during welding and age hardening, but it means the tolerances in bearing alignment are far more accurate than on most bikes. This translates into a noticeably smooth and easy suspension movement, plus better bearing and shock bushing life. 

Switchable ‘Full Response Geometry’ chucks for the rocker link pivots let you slacken the head and seat angle half a degree and drop bottom bracket and standover height 7mm. 

Devinci have hooked up with renowned suspension engineer Dave Weagle to use his Split Pivot design. This joins the chainstay and seatstays at a concentric pivot around the outside of the 142x12mm bolt-thru rear axle. A rocker link then drives the vertically mounted Fox RP2 shock. 

There are chainguide mounts around the BB and mounts for a remote hose/cable for a dropper post under the top tube. There’s a bottle cage mount on the down tube and the rear brake is post-mount-style for easy alignment. 

Tyre clearance is adequate for a 2.35in tyre in filthy weather or a 2.4in in the dry. It’s not the lightest frame in the 145mm category at 3.17kg (7lb) with shock, but the lifetime warranty shows Devinci are confident they’re more than strong enough. One niggle is the noise from the guide-free gear cable as it clatters around inside the chainstay.

While everything works fine, the frame quality and Canadian origin mean component levels on the complete Dixon RC are par with a mainstream bike several hundred pounds cheaper. The hefty frame and bombproof wheels also mean a chunky overall weight, although adding £250 worth of RockShox Reverb dropper post and a titanium seat collar for £205 is still tempting. It would add another pound or so, but allow you to easily get more from the bike.

There was a definite divide between testers on whether they preferred the shock spaced or full volume with slightly higher pressure, but everyone agreed on the Dixon’s awesome overall balance and performance. If you don’t mind a bit of effort on the climbs to give yourself a big advantage in terms of traction and control on the descents – plus superb hand-built strength – then the Dixon really has to be on your shortlist. 

This article was originally published in What Mountain Bike magazine, available on Apple Newsstand and Zinio.