We wrote this book mainly to introduce cyclists who don't realize what they're missing to the wonderful online cycling community. We think it will also serve as a convenient directory for cybercyclists who can't remember whether the information they want is at Cyber Cyclery or Cyber Cyclist or who don't want to keep all the pages they occasionally visit on their hot lists.

The book starts with an introduction to the types of online resources available: bulletin board systems (BBSs), commercial services, and the Internet. Rather than go into detail about the history, jargon, and individual commands needed to use these online resources, we provide an overview to help you envision and understand them. You should be able to sign on and try everything out--this is a much better way of learning about the Internet than reading a book. The software available to access online resources has gone far beyond Unix and generally looks like any other graphical interface available for Windows or Macintosh platforms (text-based software is also available). We couldn't possibly review each individual piece of software for each operating platform, so we have described the basic tools and components themselves, such as e-mail, file transfer protocol, gopher servers, and the World Wide Web. Because America Online is very easy to use and offers the best cycling resources (compared with the other commercial services), we've shown sample screens from this interface. But as we've said, don't be afraid to play around with whatever software or account you have.

We then review scores of individual sites, giving their names, electronic addresses, and major features. Please realize that we've only scratched the surface. We've included all the largest and most popular cycling resources and a wide range of smaller specialty sites to give you an idea of what is available. We separately list the addresses for sites that cater to a specific city, state, province, country, or region (rather than a cycling specialty, such as racing or unicycling). In the appendices, we've organized even more lists of addresses for companies, organizations, bulletin board systems, mailing lists, and newsgroups. Because we couldn't cover every bicycle-related online resource--and because electronic addresses often change--we have also included a chapter of "index" sites, which are basically online directories of cycling resources organized by topic, and search engines, which allow you to type in keywords to hunt for specific information on the Internet.

Finally, we have tried to prepare the novice cybercyclist for what he or she will encounter online. We suggest some imagery to keep in mind when typing away at your keyboard and reading messages from other cyclists. We also give a few pointers to help make your time online a bit less frustrating.