Ok kids, I’ve decided to start keeping people up to date with my week-to-week grind. Partly because I’ve started falling off the radar as things are getting so busy with work, riding and work. The other part it is simple; I’m an interesting character that never sleeps, so I’ve got a lot to talk about, so y’all should listen.
Every day I’m going to serve up a helping of what is going down in my Open Bicycle bubble, my creative world at Soldier Design or the adventures behind the bars of my pavement abusing bicycle, who we will refer to as Sparkles. Don’t laugh at the name, because you probably can’t keep up.
With all that said, I’ll start the posting of actual ‘Grind content later – its 1:30am and I’ve got to do some laundry, wash dishes, clip my nails and put some new double-straps on the whip.
Japanese bike brand, Inzist Bicycle, stepped out of their BMX comfort zone and teamed up with Wisconsin’s Waterford Cycles to produce a track frame. They forgot to tell someone to skip over the drilling of the fork, other than that, its a finely detailed frame. Check out the frame and Nervex-styled lugging below. We also came across some Paparazzi-shots of Inzist BMX team rider on the velodrome – don’t worry, we won’t tell anyone, Kenji. Here’s the frame:
Perusing new urban bike shop blogs, (there seems to be a new one popping up every other day) I ran across Velo Cult. Open just two weeks, these San Diego kids have a jaw-dropping array of new and vintage steeds and parts. Amidst the deep deep H+Son rims, the classic Romic, and the bar-spinnable Traitor frames, I noticed these:
Yikes! Nitto just won’t let up! Tracing down the US distributor, Euro-Asia Imports, I found out the B259 is the stainless steel version of the popular B259 AA, an aluminum riser that one sees in an incredible spectrum of anodized colors. However, the B259 Stainless comes only 500mm wide (consider it pre-cut) with a nice upright 50mm rise, and the bar ends are capped, welded, and finished smooth. The entire bar is mirror polished. Expect these to pop up everywhere as a bombproof (and classier) alternative to easily-bent aluminum bars. MSRP seems to be in the $90 range, Ben’s Bike has them for $91.99. Nitto made a foray into steel risers seven years back, the venerable Cro-Moto collaboration with Salsa, but low demand meant production ceased after two years. (I’m still rockin’ em!)
Also pictured is a yet-narrower straight bar, reminiscent of the Metallico Tsuchinoko-bar AKA Dildo Bar, the Ocean Cycles (formerly Vivalo) collabo. No word yet on model designation, exact dimensions, or price on the Nitto version.
During a recent hike through my never-ending bookmark forest of design studios, I found some newly posted work by Add Innovation, a duo of Swedish product designers. They recently finished two amazing cycling related projects – the Pilen Concept bike and the Piano bike-rack.
The Pilen Concept is a Le Mans-insipred racer, designed for Swedish bike brand Pilen Cykel in Målilla. This thing is definitely the Cafe Racer of the cycling world:
Addi has also crafted a beautiful Bike-Rack Bench, the Piano. I hope they don’t mind if I build my own and save a few bucks.
MassBike is holding its annual meeting tonight at Coogans Pub in downtown Boston. The event is open to the public and will kick off at 6:30PM with Exectutive Director David Watson adressing the cycing community and letting us all know what MassBike has been up to the last year and its plans for the coming one. Free Harpoon beer will be provided to the first 100 attendees and after the meeting, BoldSprints races will give us all a chance to spin hard without sucking cold air… come on down and connect, relax, and compete!
Some kid from Toronto submitted this image to Rebel 8 / Mike Giant. I’m pretty sure its the Stephanie sticker that I’ve been showing off to those behind me via my Ortlieb. Something to be said about artwork on components.
