Bike Buddies Turn Commute Into Workout

"One rainy morning earlier this year, T.J. Kelly, general manager of Sportgenic, Inc., a start-up sports media company in San Francisco, was sitting in traffic on the bus ride to work and noticed a surprising number of bikers outside. Mr. Kelly, a bike enthusiast, started crunching numbers.

With gas hovering around $4.69 a gallon; parking ranging from $17 to $30 a day; a monthly bus pass costing $80 a month, or adding up to $150 a month on a purchase-per-ride basis, his commute -- a combination of car and bus -- was costing him close to $600 a month. Plus, with the 12-to-16-hour days he'd been putting in at work, he'd been struggling to find time to exercise.

The bus ride took about 55 minutes each way. Biking takes 50 minutes each way, plus about 20 minutes of shower time at the gym on the first floor of his office building. "It all just clicked," says Mr. Kelly, who decided to turn his workout into his commute.

Frank Colson moved to the Bay Area from Texas in February to become Sportgenic's senior director of ad operations. "Being in California I had to find a way to be outside more," he says, adding that back in Houston he was a five day-a-week gym guy.

When he noticed Mr. Kelly coming up the freight elevator in the morning, bike in tow, Mr. Colson -- also a bike enthusiast -- decided to jump on the bike-to-work bandwagon.

The two co-workers now bike to work together, logging more than 75 miles per week, and have also become good friends outside of the office."