Sheldon Brown is hurting

I just learned that Sheldon Brown has a bad-case muscular disease. Perhaps a particularly bad kind of M.S. (and even the good cases aren’t great).

At some point, he’s inspired a whole lot of people on bikes. And anybody who has ever put wrench to bike has looked at his web site, the first source for bike information.

You can read his updates on his health blog.

I feel for him. Having been to hell and back with my wife’s emergency heart surgery earlier this year, I know how hard and frustrating it can be to even figure out what’s wrong with you. Good luck, Sheldon!

From the very first post on this blog:
Harris Cycles, outside of Boston, sells them and almost everything. They’re perhaps the best bike store in America. Not the least of all because Sheldon Brown works there. He’s undoubtedly the most famous person in the world when it comes to strange, technically, and downright nerdy bike issues.

Don’t believe me? Just type in “‘Sheldon Brown’ bike” into google and you’ll get 22,800 results. By comparison, “Mayor of Boston” gets only 20,500; my name turns out 353 (and they’re not all for me). Sheldon Brown is a true professional (as Ali from Kebab Café defined professional): “somebody who does what he loves and makes enough doing it to support himself.” Sheldon’s website is a treasure trove of everything you could possibly want to know about bicycles.

If you have any questions about the bike terms used here, check out Sheldon Brown’s bike glossary.

November 2006 update: Sheldon still has Mumbles Menino beat: 111,000 to 93,000. I’m still a distant third with 967 hits.