Got a Flat on Your Bicycle, Dummy?

Yup: that's a flat tire

It's been a while since we looked into some of the stupidity about bicycles that has made it onto the internet. To be sure, there is good information in forums and at places like the website of the late, lamented Sheldon Brown. The cycling enthusiasts here at the Antisocial Network only look at supposed how-to cycling articles on eHow and HubPages to see just how dumb some of those asses are; and boy, did we find a winner for today! As you probably expected, our winning entry comes from eHow.com, where it's been online since 2007. The freelancer who sprayed this bull all over the internet called himself Zundy, and good ol' Zund was allegedly trying to explain "How to Change a Flat Bike Tire"¹ at Healthfully.com. We say "allegedly" because, well, the article reads  more like a prank than a how-to.

For starters, Zundy's list of "things you'll need" consist of (we kid you not)

• one inner tube with a hole in it
• your bike

We wondered why you'd need an inner tube with a hole in it, since -- obviously -- you already have an inner tube with a hole in it (we're assuming clincher tires here, not sewups). And that "your bike" crap goes without saying, unless you're changing a flat for someone else... But when we read through Zundy's list of steps, it became readily apparent that he had no earthly idea what he was talking about. Given that his Step Number One is

"REMOVE THE TIRE - depending on how tight your tire is on the wheel, you may be able to use two hands and pull the tire off the rim. Otherwise you will need some 'tire irons' which can pry under the tire and lever the tire over the rim." Our cycling mechanic has changed a lot of tires (you can find his instructions here), and he has never seen one you could just pull off the rim by hand. Maybe Zundy is a gorilla, though... but more importantly, our guy points out, the first step in changing a flat on a bike is taking the wheel off the frame: otherwise, you'll never get the tire off! Next, Zundy would have you "FIND THE HOLE - once you have the inner tube free of the tire, pump a little air into it. The hold [sic] may be obvious. If not, then get a bucket of soapy water and a sponge."

Again, correct, though the "soapy" part is unnecessary -- except the dumbass doesn't include a step for removing the inner tube from the wheel! And if you don't know how to remove a tire, you sure as hell don't know how to pull out a tube -- are we right? Sure we are... With the exception of the final step -- reinstalling the wheel -- Zundy pretty much gets the other parts of the process right, though we wonder how you're supposed to find a bucket of soapy water out on the highway twenty miles from home (carry a spare tube, people!)

Between his half-assed attempts to be funny, his failure to list the necessary tools and parts and his total lack of understanding of the steps, we find that Zundy was woefully unqualified to give these "instructions." No, people, learn how to change a flat and carry both a spare tube and a patch kit plus a pump. If you don't, you're as likely to be the Dumbass of the Day as this idiot.

¹ The original has been deleted by Leaf Group, but can still be accessed using the Wayback machine at archive.org. Its URL was   ehow.com/how_2000519_change-flat-bike-tire.html

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