Bikes and Bikers.

Over the years we’ve seen more and more students and staff embrace the power of the pedal by commuting to Red River College by bike. Spring and Fall months, in particular, bustle with bikes.

While reported incidents of bike theft on campus are low (approx. 1/ year), having your bike stolen sucks. Full stop.

Take a read through these tips to help ensure that at the end of the day your bike is where you left it.

#1 Buy a good bike lock – a U-lock. U-locks are strong and the better ones come with theft warranties. Look for U-locks with flat or disc keys instead of cylindrical keyed locks since they are more easily picked. But unlike lottery winnings and bags of movie theatre popcorn, bigger isn’t better. Smaller U-locks give potential thieves less room to pry/ hack/ saw the lock.

#2 Try the Sheldon Brown bike locking technique. Do this by locking your back wheel *inside the rear triangle of your bike frame* to the bike rack. This will protect your wheel and frame, even though you’re not actually locking your frame to anything. While it may seem counterintuitive to only lock your wheel, bike experts will tell you that cutting a rear wheel to nab a bike is a difficult thing to do and rarely happens. Plus, front wheels are half the price of back wheels (with all of their special gears and such) so if you can only protect one wheel, make it the back one.

Sheldon Brown in action.

#3 Remove detachable items like lights, bags and quick release parts and take them with you.

#4 Register your bike with the City of Winnipeg Bike Recovery Program. Nearly 3,000 bikes are reported stolen in Winnipeg every year and, sadly, fewer than half of them are recovered. What’s worse is less than 10% recovered bikes are ever returned to their owners because ownership cannot be traced. By taking the time — and shelling out the $6.10 — to register your bike, you’ll be notified if your bike is recovered.

Happy cycling, y’all.