You’ll never hear me apologizing for not posting a lot.

But you will from some other bloggers (Tim… cough… Jill… cough… Donna).

Here’s the real reasons we don’t blog as much.

Submit a video by August 30 and all this can be yours.

Quickrelease.tv, in association with Shimano, is hosting a YouTube video contest. The submissions must be “TV adverts extolling the virtues of bicycling to a mainstream audience. So, go light on the Lycra. No techie stuff. No Critical Mass protest videos. No art installations. Just great images of cycling that could make Joe and Joanna Public get out there and ride…for the sheer fun of cycling.”

Click here for official rules and click here for the latest update.

The contest will be judged at Interbike by Tour de France TV commentators Phil Liggett and Bob Roll. The other judges include David Bernstein of the Fredcast, Tim ‘Masiguy‘ Jackson, Donna Tocci of Kryptonite and, you guessed it… I’ll be there judging to.

The winner receives some high-end Shimano shwag.

I lied about the fame and riches part.

The most realistic Tour de France game ever!

BicycleRetailer.com has launched a new website. It looks a whole lot better and is much easier to navigate and (gasp!) even has an RSS feed!

You can read what they wrote about the new launch here.

This is the part that disappoints me:

“Our goal was to create a Web site that would offer the rich and deep content that is essential for it to serve as the online hub of industry information,” said Megan Tompkins, editor of Bicycle Retailer & News. “The revamped Web site will continue to offer the same timely news on a daily basis that many in the industry have come to depend on every day.”

Unfortunately it sounds as if the new website will continue without reporting any real news. It’s widely known and accepted that the “news” section of the site is nothing more than regurgitated press releases and it’s obvious they don’t see any problem with this.

Apart from that, they’ve now got a forum and their events and classifieds sections are a whole lot easier to navigate.

Check it out and see what you think…

We’ve broken 2000 posts on Blue Collar MTB. That’s a lot of bike blather.

Over the past 3+ years I’ve learned a lot about what it takes to run a successful and sustainable site…

Marry an understanding spouse. For the first two and a half years this stuff was done during family time and vacation days were spent going to Interbike. That takes a lot of patience from your mate and Candace has given more than her fair share.

Be willing to adapt. I’ve made a lot of dumbass mistakes that hurt the sites. I don’t really mourn them or think “if I could just go back and do it different”. I’m constantly learning and changing my approach in order to better serve my readers and sponsors. The sites are better now because of all my mistakes and in three more years they’ll be better for the mistakes I’m making now.

Realize that nobody cares about you. Your readers care more about themselves than you (just like you care more about yourself than the authors of the sites you read). If you’re writing a personal blog, then be as selfish as you want, but if you are writing something you want other people to keep reading, think about what you can do to add to their life.

Read, read, read. I have over 250 blogs that I keep up with. Most of the people writing them are a lot smarter than me and I am constantly learning from them. There are a lot of bloggers out there giving away their secrets… don’t ignore them!

Have fun! This is my last and most important tip. Keeping this thing fun is one of my top priorities.

When I was at the Trek/Fisher/Bontrager product launch in Santa Cruz last April we had a choice after the meeting to go ride the new bikes or take pictures and hang around. I was the only one of all the media people to opt for the ride. I was in flippin’ Santa Cruz! I’m going for a ride!

Keep what you’re doing fun and you won’t go wrong.

Now get out there and get started, there’s room for everybody!