What’s the bike scene like in Nagoya for females?
Nagoya girls love riding bicycles in any style. We always want to do unusual and fun things through riding bicycles, and share with lots of people. We believe “you can do anything on your bike.” So, we made bicycle dance team “Gacharinco!”, the 1st fixed gear bike dance team in Japan and Love Wheels Nagoya – 2010 Bicycle Calendar. We thought it would be cool if people saw our bike dance and calendar and thought that Nagoya is a great and fun place to cycle in. Through these stuffs, we want to share with the world all that is cool, exciting and fun about Nagoya Cycling Girls. Here are the fun bike events regularly and hope that many people would get interested to come and ride with us in Nagoya.
♥Girls Keirin Track Race
♥Girls Cyclo Cross Race
♥Girls bike trip (we took 180km ride from Nagoya to Kyoto)
♥Group riding to music camp fes
♥Monthly alleycat race (girls organize tasty race sometimes)
♥Girls café meeting (talking about bikes and boys)
What’s your favourite ride right now?
Coffee and Beer ride makes me happy. I love taking my coffee bike and making my special hand brewed coffee on my bicycle. Call me when you need caffeine, I’ll deliver my happy coffee anywhere I can♥
And I love drinking super cold beer after long riding, cheers!
Where’s your favourite place to ride?
♥Nagoya♥
Spinning around the globe: Sydney, Melbourne, Budapest, Leeds, San Diego, NYC… I love riding the city in different countries to explore & feel the locals and make lots of friends all over the world♥
Favourite riding outfit: Short pants + leggings, sometimes flower patterns skirts♥
What’s the bike scene like in Vancouver for females? It’s a mix, and there’s something for everyone. We’ve got sporty riders in gortex, roadies in spandex, trendy kids on their fixies, messengers, fairweather riders on their old clunker city bikes, year-round riders on hybrid or adapted bikes, freak bikers, cargo bikers, recumbent gangs, vintage cruisers and anything else you can think of.
In any of these groups, there are women riding, however they are outnumbered by men. Our current city council embraces cycling and we’ve had several great changes to our road system just in the past year, with more to come, backed by a $25 million budget. More and more women are riding in the city, which is an indication that the bike routes, paths and signage is getting better and safer. And when more women bike, more kids bike, too, which helps us move to a less car-dependent future.
Women are making great change for bikers in our city. A few of groups in Vancouver that are all-female run, or have a strong female voice are:
Vancouver and Area Cycling Coalition: http://www.vacc.bc.ca/
What’s your favourite ride right now?
Well, the one that gets the most action is my Devinci St. Tropez, which is a workhorse bike for everywhere/year-round riders like me. I can go light and fast without my panniers, or load up for a week-long camping trip. My other three bikes (a foldie, city bike and 80′s road bike) are parked and ready for when the weather is fair.
Where’s your favourite place to ride? My daily commute to work. It’s a 15 to 20 minute delight with a few other bikers here and there, very few cars, lots of greenery, and not many hills! I arrive at work ready for the day and at the end of day, my mind is clear and ready for fun. My only complaint is that it’s a little too short of a ride.
For an overnight trip, I love the ride/ferry trip from Vancouver over to Vancouver Island, riding up-Island, over to Denman Island, riding across Denman Island and finally ferrying over to the lovely Hornby Island. There are pubs and charming junk shops along the way, and the pay-off is the amazing scenery, people and relaxation to be enjoyed on Hornby Island.
Favourite riding outfit:
Knee-high boots, a dress, my bright red coat (for style and visibility) and one of my many helmets. Some vintage gloves are nice too, when it’s a bit cold out. Wool is my friend during the drizzly winter months and keeps me dry and cozy.
Favourite food: anything from Bandidas Taqueria (run by two local female bikers). Their breakfast is divine! http://bandidastaqueria.com/
Favourite movie: Big Night, The Royal Tenenbaums, Amelie
Favourite book: Knitting Without Tears – an amazing reference book forknitters
What makes you laugh? Dancing with my ladies at B:C:Clettes practice, my amazing fella, ridiculous animals caught on tape
What makes you angry? Oh, the list is long, but it usually involves people who are in their own little bubble, unaware of how inconsiderate they are to others.
What are you listening to on your I-pod? Hannah Georgas (local indie singer/songwriter from Vancouver)
Do you have any pets? Oh, touchy subject – Can’t have any kitties in our apartment building!
I recently received an email from Brie telling me about her blog called Ass Fault that has an ecclectic mix of video, imagery and art. What caught my attention was this video she’d made of herself dancing and leaping about with her lovely pink rimmed bike in front of some impressive LA buildings. This girl knows how to dance like nobodies watching, there’s even a bit of backward riding and some frantic footwork. I love this video, I love the music, the backdrop and the out and out freedom of her antics. You rock girlfriend!
On Friday night, Time’s Up! The cycling and environmental group, held a “Ladies Night Dance Ride.” In honor of International Women’s Month, a gathering of female cyclists met in the twilight at Tompkins Square Park, where they performed an R-rated (for “Ride”) dance with their bikes before pedaling off to Astor Place and Union Square to repeat the performance. In some countries, the group said, women are not allowed to ride bicycles. They held the event in solidarity with women the world over in a call to get out of cars and onto bikes.
February 12th, 2010 · Erin - Vancouver · 1 Comment
I’m part of a group called the B:C:Clettes. We are an all-lady bicycle-inspired performance collective based in wonderful Vancouver.
Every week, throughout the year, we get together to dance, talk, dream, and have a great time together. Over the winter we choreograph new performance pieces and refine our collective process, by assessing our goals and making new plans. In the summer we are either preparing, participating or recovering from performing on tour or at a slew of shows around town.
We have traveled our show to LA and back, run a cabaret featuring the B:C:Clettes and other amazing local acts, filmed a music video/public service announcement, presented workshops and talks, and completed two bike-powered summer performance tours. And all while dressed in red, black and shiny!
As a way of highlighting not just our performances, but our process and the wonderful people involved, I thought it worthwhile, and perhaps even interesting to do a few posts about the group. For a more fleshed-out description and history of the group, plus links to photos, videos and press coverage, please visit the B:C:Clettes website.
I recently photo-documented an average winter practice for the B:C:Clettes. On Thursday nights we trickle in to our winter practice space, chat while we peel off layers of rain and bike gear, and then get right into the fun. Each week a different B:C:Clette acts as the facilitator to keep us on track, take notes during our discussions and ensure that we have a great time. As far as moving around, we do a warm-up followed by dancing in the form of learning new choreography, reviewing old numbers and brainstorming new moves.
Pre-practice meeting of our website team.
Deep into one of our discussion sessions.
Our beautiful indoor winter practice space. The B:C:Clettes practice outside over the spring, summer and fall.
Dance-off to warm up those leg muscles.
Working in pairs to go over the moves for one of our numbers
Mini-rims makes great props!
Working in front of the mirror to perfect our moves.
Blocking our starting pose for our robot-inspired bike dance.
Experimenting with new choreography.
Gliding across the floor in pairs.
Learning choreography for a new dance for the 2010 season.
Another awesome all girl bike crew with a twist based out of Portland – Irondelles.
If you’ve ever ridden a tall bike, you can understand the attraction: Finally, for the first time in your bike-riding life, you’re not just traffic, you’re above traffic.
There’s something exciting and fun about pedaling at such heights. Do it with a few friends and it’s even better. That was the basic inspiration that led southeast Portlander Skye Blue to create Portland’s newest bike gang, The Irondelles.
Blue fondly remembers her time riding around NE Alberta Street with friends from the (now defunct) Alberta Street Clown House and she wanted to share that experience with other ladies. But The Irondelles are more than just riding partners, Blue has offered up her shop (she’s a seamstress by day) and driveway as a dedicated workshop.
The goal? Teach women how to build their own tall-bikes, without the usual, male-ego-laden testosterone flare-ups that can sometimes creep into other bike-building sessions she’s been around.
Blue describes The Irondelles as, “A tall-bike gang and a group of women who empower each other and have fun riding tall bikes.” They meet once a week to teach each other bike building and welding skills.
So far there are eight members. Blue says five of them just recently learned how to ride. “We taught them one-by-one, in a parking lot. It took a while, but now that they’ve all got the bug they want to build their own bike.” Blue says building their own bike is “stage two” in the process of becoming an Irondelle.
According to member Emily O’Connor, The name Irondelles comes from the French word, Hirondelle. The inspiration comes from France-native and friend Carole Giraud-Sevigny (who happens to be married to one of Portland’s veteran and highly-decorated tall-bike jousters, Corey Sevigny). Hirondelle means “swallow” in English and it’s the name of a rare type of bicycle used at the turn of the 20th century.
Viva Candy Cranks! I can’t thank you enough for sharing this. I have received lots of wonderful comments through this awesome blog. It is amazing and impressive! I hope everyone of you enjoy our 1st virgin stage here…
Konnichiwa! I’m a leader of Gacharinco! – the 1st fixed gear bicycle dance team in Japan. We just wanted to have fun with dancing and bicycle together!
Music + Bikes + Dancing = three of my favorite things!
The first time I saw Bikedance was via Rie from Nagoya. I had no idea there are bicycle dance teams all over, here are just a few I’ve come across recently.
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