First off, I’d like to send my best wishes for 2009. I hope that this fresh year brings new adventures and experiences, I hope it keeps you challenged and on your toes, and I trust it will leave you some time to enjoy the quiet moments away from the rush of the daily bustle.
I want to share with you an imaginary retrospective of 2009. So I am going to jump ahead one year and recap what is yet to come…
Where did the year 2009 go? Seems to have just flown by!! As I get older (yup, turned 30 this year), the years seem to just fly by. Another 100 shows under my belt, and I am anticipating at least that many in 2010.
I have more balance than I did a year ago, and no, I’m not talking about on the bike this time! It’s a feeling I want to have every New Year. Complacency doesn’t work for me; I am insatiably curious, and have a new appetite for learning-I suppose it’s the same tendency that gave me the patience to learn how to ride trials, and it’s a trait that I am trying to apply elsewhere in the journey through life. The problem is that my interests are so broad; it’s hard to focus on just one thing!
One area that I did manage to focus on this year was yoga. Trials riding is inherently hard on the body. The forces to absorb are quite jarring, and the cumulative effect over a period of about 15 years is enough to make any human walk awkwardly, and perhaps with a dowagers hump. I have to credit my yoga practice to saving my posture, and many bodily aches and pains, particularly my back. Ashtanga (power) yoga has been so beneficial in so many facets of my life, so like anything good, I was impelled to share it. After 200 hours of yoga teacher training, and many embarrassing moments practicing on my patient friends, I managed to teach some yoga at a couple of late season cycling events-and there will be more to come in 2010.
I spent much of the year preparing to write a book; as my friend Dr. Coope told me, I must “review the literature” before proceeding to put word to screen. And the amount of literature on the subject is huge-that subject being the mental and psychological aspect of sport, along with various offshoots such as climate change (thank God 2009 was the year that most deniers finally got over their denial). My ambition for publishing something for the end of ‘09 was perhaps a little overzealous, and I’m just happy to have had the education that comes with such an initiative. We’ll see which way all this research leads me, whether it is a book, or a workshop, or who knows! There are so many opportunities to create new directions for ones career.
Although I didn’t progress my riding skills at the same pace as I have in the past, my desire to perform trials shows remained surprisingly high. Although the number of shows I performed in 2009 was down while I was busy ‘broadening my horizons’ 
I still have no better way to captivate and connect with people than through my trials shows. Along with my demonstration rhetoric, and poster signing, the buzz and reward I feel after a show remains just as high as ever.
I was glad to visit over 25 schools this year with my Trials of Life presentation. We live in complex times; the amount of ambient noise that our culture creates is so immense that it has become hard for young individuals to listen to their heart. There is great opportunity in the world today, despite the headlines; but we have much work to do in order to create the bright green future that is so desperately needed.
It’s hard to remember all the amazing times I’ve had this year, whether it be the career action as mentioned above, or during the free time I spend with my family and friends-Caryn, my love, thanks for another awesome year together, our rings are now almost seven years old!
I truly am blessed and grateful.
Peace and Love for 2010!
Ryan Leech
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You note that “2009 was the year that most deniers finally got over their denial.” Fraid not. Swing by your local library and pick up The Deniers by Lawrence Solomon, an environmentalist. He quotes “world renowned scientists” and to back this up prints a brief CV of each scientist, and their scientific credentials are certainly impressive. One such, an academic meteorologist says; ” I’m no climatologist, but when the AGW lot talk about my particular field of expertise, hurricanes,and say that hurricanes have become more frequent and more severe recently, they are talking rubbish.” This is a recurring theme in the book that experts say that when the AGW lot talk of their particular field of expertise they are talking rubbish.Or try Climate Confusion by Roy W Spencer, a meteorologist. As a meteorologist he can’t be expected to know anything about climate, right? You might also care to look at The Cooling Stars, A new Theory of Climate Change by Henrik Svensmatk and Nigel Calder. This is real science based on observation and experiment and not, as AGW is, on computer modelling, which is pure fantasy. If you don’t want to go to the library, check out;
http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/Articles%202007/20_1-2_CO2.Scandal.pdf to read a paper CO2 The Greatest Scientific Scandal Of Our Time. (I’m sorry the reference came out in two lines. If you send me your E-mail address I will send you the link.)
Sorry, the link should read;
http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/Articles 2007/20 1-2 CO2 Scandal.pdf
Boy, I wish those climate skeptics were right. But the debate is over. I appreciate your concern, and from the looks, that site you linked to has nothing but good intentions.
Ask any reputable scientist about climate change, the answers are unanimous. The only scientists denying the clear facts are either trying to make a quick buck, or in terrible denial. In other countries, typically European, the debate is long over; it’s only North America where the media likes to play both sides no matter what because it sells better.
Of course, climate change is just a message to us that we are messing up our planet in myriad ways and we better get our act together, otherwise the messages will get louder and louder-not that they aren’t already.
I am so happy the worlds eyes are on Obama, only a few days in to his presidency and there has already been positive action.
I am not a climate change denier. Climate change has happened and will probably always happen. (Mediaeval Warm Period, The Little Ice Age,which the AGW lot deny ever happened because to admit it would destroy their case. Why is Greenland called Greenland? Do a google search on Greenland.) I do deny that CO2 is the main, or indeed the only driver of climate change. The AGW hypothesis is based on pure fantasy (computer modelling.) Edward Lorenz, who was the first guy to try to apply newly invented computers to weather forecasting around 1960 was forced to the conclusion; “any physical system that behaves nonperiodically is unpredictable. (And this gave rise to Chaos Theory. Do a Google search on Edward Lorenz.) This fantasy is backed up by lies;( current CO2 levels of 383ppmv are the highest for 265,000 years. What about the peak levels of 440ppmv in 1825 and 1942?) The lies are backed up by attempts to fan hysteria. “The Greenland ice cap will melt and raise sea levels by 6-7 metres.” (Yeah, right. The Greenland ice cap is three kilometres thick. It will take a lot of heat to melt that baby. Were sea levels 6-7 metres higher than now in the Mediaeval Warm Period? In The World in 2009 published by The Economist there is a section on the environment. The lead article in this section admits that the Kyoto protocol is a mechanism to transfer wealth from developed nations to developing nations, ( or as it has been put, taking money from poor people in rich countries to give to rich people in poor countries.) And already attempts to reduce CO2 emissions are having perverse effects. Diversion of agricultural land to produce biofuels was a factor in last year’s food shortages which drove up the price of food and forced 1-2 million people below the poverty line, and led to to the first food riots for fifty years ( and just when we thought we were getting a grip on global poverty.)
The Debate is over?? I would have to debate that!
Ask any reputable scientist? How about this?
“For quite a while global warming has been presented in the public forum as a universally accepted scientific reality. However, in the light of Al Gore’s new film An Inconvenient Truth many climate experts are stepping forward and pointing out that there is no conclusive evidence to support global warming as a phenomenon, much less any particular cause of it.”
http://science.slashdot.org/science/06/06/14/209235.shtml
Even NASA has people that don’t believe in global warming:
http://siliconinvestor.advfn.com/readmsg.aspx?msgid=25373800
Quote: “I appreciate the opportunity to add my name to those who disagree that global warming is man made,” Theon wrote to the Minority Office at the Environment and Public Works Committee on January 15, 2009.
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Here’s a good one of an environmentalist hiding his head in the sand (oh, and this also involves a country from the “other side of the pond” too):
http://newsbusters.org/node/13833
From my own recent trip to California, the guide was commenting on the air conditions within California – specifically that a type of shrubbery by the side of the highway shouldn’t exist, let alone thrive. But there it is, and it’s doing well. He went on to say that some of the shrubs were taken to the University and placed in a controlled environment that it “should” like (complete with correct air ratios – including CO2). The shrub died within the week. You say we should get our act together and change… it seems that the other life forms have already started to adapt, and any sudden change “for the better” could have catastrophic results.
Because of J M Davidson, I did a search on wikipedia on CO2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide
So, our atmosphere is about 385 parts per million of CO2. Is that a lot? I ask because a there are many stories that say that the magic “Point of no Return” is 400ppm – but we’ve been beyond that… a couple of times… in recent, recorded history… And we need some CO2 and other green house gases less the planet become an ice-box. And we need some CO2 as the plants need this for photosynthesis.
It takes a wee bit of looking, but there is mention of GreenHouse gases in the CO2 link above. Follow that link, and we see that water vapour contributes WAY more to global warming than CO2 does. Yet nobody is freaked out with water vapour as they are with CO2!!! This is not logical or scientific!!!
So, we’ve had higher CO2 levels, but not higher temperatures. Therefore we cannot make a one to one relationship between CO2 and global temperatures. I’m going to have to agree with StJimmie and say that we stopped looking for causes to global warming, so we don’t really know if what we are seeing is man made, or just another cycle of the earth.
Thanks for the response Penny.
So what you’re saying is that we have nothing to worry about? Forget about climate change for a moment, perhaps a more important question to consider is whether we can go on treating our one and only earth the way we have over the last century and continue to expect her to provide endlessly. Do you not agree that we must change our ways to preserve what is left of our resources and adopt a more sustainable way of life that will ensure our great great grandchildren have the same natural luxuries we enjoy today (as in a clean lake to swim in with a view of old growth trees in the background, etc. etc.). Forget about climate change, contemplate our impact on our one and only source of life. Are you okay with our current direction?
Don’t change the subject Ryan. Now you are saying “forget about climate change, we are talking about sustainability.” In the interim budget report at the end of last year the Alberta Government, because of the global financial meltdown, announced that several programmes would be scaled down, others put on hold, but the $4 billion marked for carbon capture and storage would be unaffected. That’s $4 billion that could otherwise be spent on things that would actually benefit Albertans. We will still burn coal to make electricity, the only difference is that electricity will be more expensive. How does that help sustainability? (People will still use electricity, it gets cold here.) It is especially important to get the true facts on climate change now, because in November of this year the United Nations will hold a Climate change Conference in Copenhagen to come up with a replacement for the Kyoto Protocol which runs out in 2012. (And will China, now the major emitter of CO2 on the planet, as a “developing nation, be again exempt from the Protocol?) It is important that our legislators make decisions based on facts and not on voodoo science.
I’m saying that if the change in temperature is a natural global phenomenon, then our attempts to stop it would be about as successful as any attempts to stop the tide from coming in, or the day from ending, or possibly even Mount Redoubt from erupting.
Last summer, I had an opportunity to visit the city that I grew up in, and I brought my bike to retrace some of my favorite rides, and even relive a little of my childhood. There was one ride that, as a kid in the seventies, I remembered that the air was different. It was close to a major road that was at the bottom of a ravine. The air used to be thick, and had the smell of car exhaust. Last summer, the air in the ravine was like that at the top of the ravine – not thick, and there was no exhaust/gasoline smell. I paused and watched the cars go by for a while. It wasn’t until later in the day when I came across a 70’s era car idling that I got the smell that I remembered from the ravine. That’s when it hit me that what had changed is that the cars today are almost all cleaner burning. So I’d have to say that we’re not treating the world the same as we did even 30 years ago, we have gone the right direction with at least one thing.
I’m curious about your comment on “preserve what is left of our resources…” Given that matter cannot be created or destroyed – that which is on this planet, came from this planet, and stays on this planet. So the matter is still here, it’s just been recombined.
Do you not agree that over the past century that we’ve improved? Stores now ask if I want my purchase in a bag or no. Shopping centers proudly display that they are powered by wind farms. Crickey – even with the advent of iTunes that the volume of plastic intended for CDs has dropped dramatically. Oh, and for my ride last summer, I crossed over the river, and for the first time, not only could I see the bottom of the river, but I could also see fish swimming – a testament as to just how much that river had been cleaned up!
I’m wondering how somebody who seems to be upbeat and cheery as you are in your shows, views the world with such doom and gloom regarding the environment. Especially when there are so many examples of things that we’re doing right (or at least better).People respond far more favorably to the good than they do the bad.
So I challenge you! Find a good environment story and promote it, (like my summer ride segment above) and you will find that you’ll have a lot more favorable comments on your Blog, and you’ll open the eyes to those that read your story and they’ll look to see where they might be able to apply the concepts from the good environmental storey to their corner of the world.
Thanks Penny,
I really appreciate your response, and I agree with you on the importance of promoting positive environmental success stories. There are plenty of them, and it’s a challenge I am willing to take. Much has been accomplished, but little celebrated.
I frequent the following website actually, and often link to it via friendfeed:
http://www.thingsaregood.com/
For now, we’ll have to agree to disagree on the cause of climate change; this divide between those who believe climate change is caused by humans, and those that don’t is a messy one. I’m not quite sure the best way to approach it at this point. But the conversation between us, and Mr. Davidson, has got me thinking about a number of things of which I’ll have to ponder for a while.
Thanks for your time and for sharing your thoughts and stories, much appreciated.
Hi Ryan,
I am grateful that our conversation was open, and that we did listen to the other intently.
I’m also grateful that you’ve noted that Mr Davidson and myself were not deniying that global warming is occuring.
I look forward to seeing one of your environmental success stories that you believe in – hopefully in the near future.
Cheers,
Penny
Hi Ryan,
I’m writing an intro for you for the International Bike Show guide and have gone over your website and blogs but wanted a personal angle.
What would you most like us to feature or concentrate upon, for your trials shows in Toronto this upcoming month?
Will they be called Trials of Life or ought we to refer to them otherly? And what would you tell Toronto, if I were to get an interview quote from you?
Cheers and please respond fast: we this goes to press on Sunday!
Thanks for your time and inspiration: I too do school presentations for part of my living (I’m a hang glider pilot, focus on aviation and the link to science).
All the best, and leave a message by phone if easier 4165882396
Sbellerby@hotmail.com
Stephen
As I immerse myself in the various shoes of the various opinions on climate change and attempt to feel each perspective and understand each worldview, I have to accept that they are all true. It is easy to jump on the bandwagon on one side and attack, not even attack but passionately and often emotionally attempt to persuade–but like any conflict, we must be careful. I must be careful.
So I wanted to share an important integral slogan that I am slowly coming to share:
Things are getting worse, better, and are perfect.
Consider these paradoxical words, toss them around your thought processes, what do they mean to you, and let me know where they may lead you.
Hi Ryan,
You sound confused. let me try to un-confuse you. The AGW brigade says that incoming solar energy warms the surface of the earth and that this heat is “trapped” by the CO2 in the atmosphere, acting like an enormous space blanket, keeping the earth warmer than it would otherwise be. This “trapping” and “space blanket” effect is IMPOSSIBLE. The earth is warmed by solar radiation and in turn warms the air above it. This warm air expands, and being less dense, rises. It also cools. Boyle’s law, which I am sure you learned in High School, outlines the relationship between the pressure, volume and temperature of a gas. You must have seen the same effect in reverse when you inflate the tires on your bicycle. on the upstroke the pump sucks in air and on the downstroke compresses it. You must have noticed that the barrel of your bicycle pump gets hot. It is a well known fact that air temperature decreases by about 1C for every thousand feet gain in altitude. And here we run into another scientific fact – the Second Law of Thermodynamics which can be stated as; heat cannot pass from one body to a hotter body. Heat can only run down a temperature gradient, and in the air that direction is upwards. Once the sun has set it is a different matter. The greenhouse gasses will delay the radiation of the earth’s heat to outer space, acting more like a sponge than a blanket.
If you look at the range of radiation wavelengths absorbed by water vapour and CO2, water vapour absorbs over a slightly larger range of wavelengths than CO2, though there is a large degree of overlap. Water vapour constitutes between 1% and 4% of the atmosphere and CO2 0.038%. Water vapour is responsible for about 90% of the heating effect and non-water vapour greenhouse gasses ( OK, CO2) for the other 10%. “Human activity”, SUV’s, factories, coal fired power stations etc dump about 30 billion tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere every year. Natural sources on land and the oceans dump 550 billion tonnes into the atmosphere every year. (These sound like huge numbers but the whole atmosphere weighs in at 5 quadrillion tonnes.) So human activity is responsible for about 5% of CO2 emissions into the atmosphere every year. It has been estimated that global temperature rose 0.6C (+/- 0.2C) between 1880 and 2004. (And so it should. The world was emerging from the Little Ice Age, which ended around 1850.) You can try to calculate how much of this warming is due to human activity ( 5% of 10% of 0.6C) but you needn’t bother for two reasons; 1) there is a rule that you can’t calculate more significant figures after the decimal point than were present in the input. 2) the number you calculate will be smaller than the margin of error (+/- 0.2C ) The only conclusion you can reach is that human activity had no discernible effect on global warming between 1880 and 2004.
For more information go to the web site drroyspencer.com. Dr Spencer is Principal Research Scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. Previously he was Senior Scientist for Climate Studies at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Centre where he and Dr John Christie received NASA’s Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal for their work on global temperature monitoring using satellites.
@will I’d giv it an 8/10
quality post…
I have spent a bit of time going through your posts! http://danika.blogdiario.com/1308326045/ ,i had a good read….