After day to day biking, today seemed the day where we took a chill day off. We did some meditating in front of the Gleeson library to get great refreshed? This exercise was calming though. Outside seemed hot, so we moved into the library. In the library we all tried our best to catch up on any late blog posts. Towards the end of class, we did some mini presentations relating to our data we collected from the Panhandle. I worked on a creative design of a bicycle wheel and integrated some pie charts into the wheel. Even though it was semi incomplete it had the majority of the data I needed to present. Other than that, not much else occurred today.

I’m quite certain that this day was one of our longest bike rides. It was a wonderful experience riding through the wiggle even thought I didn’t quite know where I was going while leading the entire group, but eventually got the hang of it as we’ve gone through this route several times now. In my opinion, I would much rather go down the steep hills, but for that sake of sticking with the group we weaved through the wiggle. Going down market street was quite the experience as well, as this was the first time I’ve gone this far from the school campus. It certain felt right at home riding on the road, and was really funny to guide the group along the market street traffic. Eventually we all made it the end and got a nice treat out of it. Later on in the day we road to UCSF to meet a scientist and got to be in a group discussion about collecting data. He did share some quite knowledgeable research he has racked up over the years. Even though this was a longer ride than most of us were used too, the fact that it was fun made whatever fatigue I was suppose to feel like nothing.

Reflection of Project 2:What I wished I had prepared before hand was a slideshow, as it didn’t have much to base my speech onto. It might have been hard to visualize what I was describing especially if you aren’t the average cyclists. So for future presentations I need to take into account who I’m presenting to. Visuals also definitely help for presentations as they will be able to use your hands for hand gestures, instead of standing still looking nervous and such. Since I had no visuals I was so focused on my speech, I remembered that I kept reading off my phone for the majority of the speech. I occasionally looked up to make the speech look more natural, but I seemed much more difficult than I thought; something I need to work on. To sum what I need to improve on in my opinion is be bring visuals for the audience to follow along with my speech, to maintain more eye contact with the audience, and to be more knowledge of my speech so I don’t need to constantly rely on note cards.

I’m quite sure everyone has heard of doping. It was quite prevalent a few years back in the Olympics and Tour De France, but even with all the drug test requirements cheaters trying to find another loopholes.

In a short segment of 60 minutes Bill Whitaker investigate mechanical doping in the Tour De France. He meets the inventor Stefano Varjus behind this operation, in Budapest Hungary. He explains that with a small motor, a lithium battery, and some ingenuity, he was able to create an electric motor within a bike’s frame. With a few simple revolutions on the pedal, the motor would automatically assisted the rider. The motor was undetectable by any means as he used military alloys to reduce any chafing noises that could be produced from the motor.

Tyler Hamilton a former professional cyclist test runned one of Stefano’s prototypes and said, “That’s the difference between winning and losing for sure.”

In 2016 there were suspicions of motorized bikes in the Tour De France, but all the riders denied the use of motors. The Director for the French Anti Doping Agency has stated that there were motors in bikes since 2014. However, going back as late as 1998, Stefano stated he was paid a hefty 2 million dollars to keep his motor project behind the scenes for a client. It is still unsure til today if any current cyclist teams are involved with the mechanical doping scandals, as the International Cycling union is not doing enough to prevent cheating with motors.

To preserve the integrity of bike racing, infrared technology has been used to detect unorthodoxed heat signatures from bike frames or wheels.

I believe that from the 60 minutes video, they have accumulated enough evidence of mechanical doping dating back since 1998. Though is was plausible for these scandals to have started then, they have yet to have riders confess or come clean about their unethical use of motorized bikes in the sport of cycling.

Reviewing my footage, I compared to my first rehearsals is that I tend to speed up my phrases/speech. It may be because I tend to read off cards for than interacting with my audience, so it seems I need to work on my speech pacing. Also my eyes wander around often, it could be the fact that I’m staring straight into a camera instead of spread out crowd. I definitely thought need to work on maintaining good eye contact throughout my speech to keep that connection with the audience. As constantly staring at note cards doesn’t look at interesting or interactive for the audience members. Another flaw I probably would want to try to work on is my tone of voice, quite often I will keep talking in a monotone voice. Raising my voice a bit more just might be the difference into being able to engage with my audience or impact them more in way where they can take back something from my overall presentation.

For project 2, the focus of my project will be on a new form of doping. Electrical doping which isn’t entirely new news, but has recently come up as more Tour De France cyclists have been caught with motorized motors within the frame of the bike. There is even video footage of participants pedals free spinning from a crash; it’s was quite peculiar to see the pedals spinning on the ground when planted flat on the ground.

My sources for my presentation was from a video segment of 60 minutes with Bill Whitaker investigating mechanical doping in the Tour De France. He digs searching for clues that could possibly relate to the Tour De France incidents. He meets the inventor of the hidden motor himself and gets a first look at the power and engineering that went into his project. The video later on went to interviewing professional cyclist testing out the electrical bike. They described it as a tool that could definitely tip the tides of who pulls forward with the championship title. At the end of the clip, they go more into the organizations that are trying to preserve the integrity of bike racing, by using infrared technology. Hopefully this technology is advanced enough to prevent further cheating with motors.

Keeping bike related, what came to mind first when deciding on a topic for the next presentation the electric doping scandal seemed a topic I would easily talk about. To get a general idea on the top first, I watched a short segment of 60 minutes of Bill Whitaker investigating mechanical doping in the Tour De France. A bit of background of the video, Bill meet the inventor Stefano behind the first creation of the electric motor within a bike’s frame. My goal for presenting this type of matter is to inform the audience about these scandals. I’ll be keen to showing the eye opening perspective of what competitors do to win the championship title, no matter the cost. The impact this presentations could have will change their perspective on how authentic the Tour De France really is. To sum what my topic, I’ll be presenting on current problems with the Tour De France specifically on mechanical doping, and how organizations are working to put an end to this scandal.

Today we had a guest speaker come into give a little information on her experience on data collecting and the process it goes through to get published. We also briefly talked about the stories Bertine and her adventurous journey and Solnit’s essay about the upbringing of mansplaining. Towards the end of class we formed groups. In my group, I was with Aaron and Jordan, we worked on a presentation for bicycle fundraising and awareness. We did some research on the types of campaigns trying to bring awareness of diseases through bicycles, specifically I found an the organization MS: Bay to Bay ride. This bike ride is an event that is suppose to help fund people with Multiple Sclerosis, a disease that affects both the mind and nervous system in the spinal cord causing no functionality in the spinal or paralysis.

Political scientist Erica Chenoweth used to believe that violence is the most reliable way to get rid of a dictator, or the only solution to our problems. From history that is the case, from the decades of civil wars and government rebellions, violence was prevalent everywhere. Erica believes that peaceful resistance and protesting can be an arguably powerful force. Below she put together a chart suggesting that even though there was success through violent actions, nonviolent forms of action proved to have a higher rate of success and lower failure rate.

To wrap up her statement, Chenoweth states that even if violent resistance movements succeed, they still result in long term problems. It turns out the way you resist matters in the long run too. So nonviolent acts should be ruled out as it might actually be the better choice.

Segment the Audience: My group

Duarte says that when giving a presentation, zero in your ideas into a subgroup, a group you believe will agree and support your ideas. Even though you are catering towards this subgroup, you will need to appeal to the overall audience. I think this is most effective in business pitches, or political speeches, not so much towards a broad audience. Through out the writing, Duarte talks to his audience in a way that is very much like a client, “present to the one person who is most influential.” The gist of Duarte in Segment the Audience is that when presenting to an audience, you are zeroing in your idea into a subgroup, particularly a group of people who you can benefit off of.

Side notes from class:

Don’t fluff presentations especially towards upper corporate people

• Getting to know your audience
• Walk in their shoes, to understand their point of view
• Knowledge of audience
• have the power through speaking and progression to change their opinions
• what makes you qualified to take to this audience
• get common grounds with the audience, makes it easier to get your point across