Candy Cranks

downtown airport/skyline

This past Tuesday, David J, Tylor, Bryce, and I crossed the Missouri River and headed north to the Downtown Airport. There’s a lap around the airport that’s roughly 3.7 miles. Our goal was to ride for an hour and see how far we could get.

A history lesson for those who are unfamiliar. Frank Dodd’s for the first person to ride for a conservative hour and record his distance. This was in 1876 and he rode for 16.47 miles. In 1972, Eddy Merckx set a record of 30.715 mi which stood for 12 years. The current record stands at 30.9 mi which was set in 2005 by Ondrej Sosenka.  Due to advancements in equipment and other technologies between the Merckx record and present day, the Union Cycliste International [UCI] has established to classes of records.  There’s the UCI Hour Record [which requires competitors to use the same equiment as Merckx. They can not use time trial helmets, disc or tri-spoke wheels, aerodynamic bars, or monocoque frames] and the Best Human Effort aka the UCI “Absolute” Record.

Merckx Hour Record Bike

Our hour ride went pretty okayyy for the first attempt. We probably should have rode the opposite direction, the head wind was so strong if I would have stopped peddling my bike would have come to a hault. Also, none of us drank enough water before hand. I would not recommend racing against yourself slightly dehydrated in 103 degree sunny weather.  ha! Our final results were as follows.  David J and Tylor both rode about 18.9 miles. I rode for 15-ish, I stopped with five minutes left to vomit [so shocking, I know!] Bryce gave in half-way through so his distance is unknown.  Despite the vomit, the ride was exactly what I needed. I’m convinced I could sustain on endorphins and vitamin d alone. We’ll be repeating this ride next Tuesday as well. Meet us at Broadway Cafe around 4 if you want to ride with us!

Tylor and Bryce waiting for the train on the way back to midtown.

The awesome guys at Urban Velo just put out their September issue (#21). It’s now available for online viewing here! Copies should be available in your lbs soon so go pick some up!

This issue also includes an article by John (Prolly) on the continual evolution of fixed freestyle and the 26″ movement. It’s a really interesting read so go check it out!

I meant to post this last week, but better late than never I suppose. My ESB is finally ready. Big thanks to Velocity, Profile, Shop 14, and Super Ted. The full bike check is now posted up on Zlog so go check it out here!

I’ve been running Brev M’s Drop Bars and Track Grips on my Vigorelli lately. These bars are so gorgeous and have a really classic look. The pista grips are awesome, and by far the best track grips I’ve used so far; they’re grippier and have a lot more cushion (they’re significantly more comfortable than the champ grips). Thanks, guys! Check out other great Brev M products here!

Meg made me a hella cute Candy Cranks chainring for my Vigorelli. Thanks so much girl, I love it! You can get your own here!

FIXED FEST 2010 present by ROCKET

TRICK CONTEST (Quickstop/Trackstand/Trick Battle).MASH RACE.BICYCLE ART EXHIBITION.BICYCLE FILMS.DJ’s and PARTY

Everybody was having a blast!, many people from out of town are coming to celebrate this  first Fixed Gear annual event present by Rocket, in Jakarta, Indonesia. So many prizes, nice people, good food, and the most burnin’ is the trick battle contest, I must say that Bandung riders have many great potential to be the king of trick contest cuz their showin’ their hot stuff to the surface with full of soul and very entertaining, yeah! they really got their got attitude.. salute!. Yogyakarta got their own special hardcore tricks, rough and tough. And special from Jakarta you got a very promising young star, 18 years old Bari Sony Wicksono and 19 years old Herry Patriawan. That’s it for today folks, can’t wait for the next fixed gear events. Cheers!

Saturday, 24 July 2010
@ ROCKET Concept Store, Basement Bengkel Night Park (SCBD), Jakarta, Indonesia.

Supported by : San Mig Light/ID-Fixed/Cixie/FxFw/FuFuFu/Sumvelo/SSS/Woof/Cyclonesia/Arafix/WFG/Cyclo/SouthBeachQueen/Tremorz/Velodome/TLab/SatcaSash/SoberDen

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Have a good summer biking story to tell?  Enter the Summer Story Contest and maybe you will come away with some cool prizes.  Deadline is September 10th, so hurry!  More information here.

Last night, our friends at AlohaFixed set up a Honolulu premier of Tokyo to Osaka.

Though it was a short film, it was rather enjoyable. Michael Keany caught me watching the epic journey:

Hipster locking overload:

It was pretty awesome to see the bike racks and trees completely full of colour and wheels on this block!

Its the 9th month of the Muslim Calender, where Muslims celebrate the holy month of Ramadan. For the whole month, we will fast from dawn until sunset. For this month, we would gather about midnite to go for the Sahur Ride. (Sahur = referring to the meal consumed early in the morning by Muslims before fasting).

During this holy month as well, there’s a famous night market in Geylang that sells just about anything related to the upcoming festive month of Shawal, celebrated right after Ramadan. There’s plenty of street vendors selling snacks, curtains, lights… you name it, they’ll have it. Its our 2nd week riding down to Geylang, to eat all the tasty snacks, feeling the festive mood, people watching and some of us dancing stupidly (with their bicycles, hah) to the festive songs that were played all over the street.

Here are some of the picture’s of last night’s ride.

I go to school in Springfield, Missouri so I am officially back here for the school year. A lot of people ask me why I like it down here, or why I decided to come to school here since I’m from Chicago. I took a chance coming down here my first year of school, and I just fell in love with it. I have amazing friends from school, bike friends, and I love the feel of the school. It’s just a relaxing city.

Down here I have a group of bike friends, some who are called the Shiftless Bastards, and they do weekly and monthly rides.

Wednesday night was the Thai Ride in which we meet at the local bike shop, hang out, and then ride to a Thai restaurant that isn’t too far away. It was absolutely great seeing everyone again and it made me really happy. After some delicious food we usually hang out a bit longer.

Last night though was the monthly Final Friday ride. Usually we do some sort of bike event that includes tricks and contests - but since a few of the Bastards were out of town we did a ride down one of the Ozark Greenway Trails instead. We met at a local bar and then rode the Galloway Trail to Galloway Station which is a bar/grill that’s at the end of the trail. We stop there for some snacks then ride back. It’s a nice ride and it brings a lot of bikers together which is why I love it.