Sunday Style InSite Jan. 28, 2001

Sunday Style In-Sites Jan. 28, 2001

AMA Superbike.com: The 'Unofficial Home of AMA Superbike Racing' is the kind of place motorcycle maniacs, especially those who love big, sleek, fast machines and admire the speed-crazed men who ride them. It offers plenty of stories on races and bikes and interviews with riders, and covers almost all the major events on the international superbike racing calender. There's a 'News' section that fills you in on the latest happenings, and if you're mechanically inclined, you'll dig the photo-aided tech talk and maintenance tips in 'Garage'. The 'Features' link takes you to interesting superbike-related articles, including some pieces dating from as far back as 1976. The site is tastefully designed with a cool blue main page that has a great picture of a racer in action. And if you're fast enough (the link will probably be updated soon), you can actually rev up a Harley-Davidson VR 1000 virtually via Flash (the download takes only a couple of minutes).

Brain Teasers: Designed for kids of various ages, this fun-learning site is filled with puzzles that help young people build up their logic skills. It's a simple page that offers three new questions every week (for those in 'Grades 3-4', 'Grades 5-6' and 'Grades 7+'), with answers provided a week later. Puzzles and solutions featured previously are also neatly archived, and the links to 'Math Center' and 'Education Place' provide more ideas to tease the brain. There may not be any dancing bears or quacking ducks to delight quiz participants while they try to figure out the solutions but it's all presented in such an entertaining style that the kids won't mind the lack of animated illustrations.

Columbus World Travel Guide: There're tons of trusty travel guides on the Web now (just type "travel guide" at search engines to find them), but not many can match the exhaustive approach of this fine portal. You can find information on just about any tourist destination, and there're maps and search boxes that let you locate key info on just about any popular spot on the planet without frantic page flipping. The facts are neatly arranged in easy-to-find sections -- 'Countries', 'Cities', 'Airports' etc -- and you can even find out weather conditions in the places you're about to visit at a particular time. There're some useful tips in 'Attractions' and 'Free City Guides', and if you're into snow sports, you'll love the 'Ski Guide'. Of course, since Columbus is a publishing house, you can also buy some of the company's excellent guides online.

The Write News: Extensively devoted to news on the world of writing and publishing, this site will be of immense interest to book collectors and anyone involved in the publishing trade. It's updated daily with reports on the latest developments in the industry, like the recent AOL-Time Warner tie-up and the proliferation of online publishing entities. The links are conveniently located at the top -- you just click ('Archives', 'Chat', 'Marketplace', 'Classifieds' etc) and go straight to whatever interests you. The main page comes with hyperlinked headlined news summaries, and there's even a search box that lets you access old items from the News Archives. The home page is designed to communicate as fast and cleanly as possible, and if you have the time to spare, you can really dig into the database that boasts more than 1,000 links.

A Paleo Perspective on Global Warming: Of course, you knew that "the last decade of the 20th Century was the warmest in the entire global instrumental temparature record", right? So now that you're hot and bothered by it, you're probably dying to find out more on the subject. And there's no better place to start than here. Featuring data processed by paleoclimatologists through their studies of tree rings, ice core samples, sediments and other earth signs, the site tells you everything you need to know -- and then some -- on how global warming is affecting our environment. The information is presented in two sections -- 'The Story' and 'The Data'. In the former, you get crisply written pieces explaining 'What is Global Warming?', 'How do we study Global Warming?' and 'Weather, Climate, and Paleoclimatology', while the latter shows how the Earth's temperature has been rising over the centuries. Fun-seekers may decry the lack of quiz features here, but then topics like ozone depletion and the greenhouse effect are not quite things you'd want trivialised.

Sivananda Yoga "Om" Page: Your back getting stiff and your bones sounding creaky? Then you're probably badly in need of exercise. And if you plan to get spiritual while sweating it out, yoga is your answer. This official Web site of the International Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Centers has an excellent introduction to the subject and even offers up a lot of useful basic information. The 'FAQ' section helps to clear up various misconceptions about yoga, but the real interesting stuff is grouped under 'Teachings': 'The 5 Points', 'Yoga of Synthesis', 'Raja Yoga' and 'Philosophy'. There're also basic pointers for those thinking of teaching yoga, while the free downloads and animated multimedia feature show that yoga can be fun as well. It's a site with a soothing design that loads fast and has most of the links for immediate access on an almost screen-sized page.