close to the end-o-summer

and i for one am glad to se it go. i've whinged enuf about all the various ways it sucked, so let us say i am looking forward to what comes ahead.

but, one last lookback at a sweet last dad-girl bonding ride, before she heads off to school. fitty one miles ( the luckiest number in bike racing, and my racing age next year when i git back on it . . . . ). beautiful first day of the cool breezes after the insane heat, too. also had 2 most cool unexpected friends stop by, one we hadn't seen in 12 years or so, and another for only months, but too long nonetheless.

so, bye bye girl !! daddy will miss you. we found a favorite ride-spot for a pic - not many door cty non-locals have seen this spot-o-interest - a gate of a most ominous and eerie nature tucked away in a wood of a seriously enchantedish threatening demeanor. i would tell you what is behind it, but i we woulda had to have looked back there to know . . . . . . . and i ain't going and MK damn sure ain't. vampires, most likely. perhaps witches, and possibly both.

there is only one story this week

and that is the uncovering of surfin turf skatepark, in greenfield. i guess a road project took down the old building and LO !! contrary to rumour, the bowls were still entirely intact ( with a couple extensions missing. then, it picked up some press, teevee coverage, and a ton of guys with shovels dug out the smallest bowl.

only to have the powers that be knock the gravel back into it.

at this point the future is uncertain. i hear the roadway is NOT going over the site, so there is hope. this spot should be saved. it was one of the last great skateparks built before the bowlriding bust came ( due to insurance, land values, and other factors ). while small, some of its features were among the best ever built - and the park can hold its own among any mention of the best parks of all time. . . . marina del ray, cherry hill, getaway, you name it. to this day, the construction techniques used are a bit of a lost art, and the transitions and smoothness of the place is not felt in modern offerings.

letters are being written, and support sought with the biggest players in action sports. in cycling terms, this would be like uncovering a velodrome in NYC where major taylor once raced. god. i hope they do not blow this one. it's a one-time chance to restore a legendary and completely irreplaceable spot for everybody.

youtube " santa cruz streets on fire ", and witness. that was almost 20 years ago. this place rules.

what, no unicorns ??

so, with my new firm resolution in mind, i set out for some ridin. a friend noted to me that jesse lalonde kick-started his fitness by winning the duo class at 24-9. i decided on a SLIGHTLY more modest approach to my own comeback effort, however.

above we see a small portion of the famed "bianca strada" of door cty, discovered by russell, and now a staple of every 50 mile ride outta town. i rounded up two suitable training companions, MK ( who has also been slacking off the bike for a year, albeit with far better reasons ) and - just in case MK has gotten back into shape without me knowing and thus likely to crush me - a raw beginner 20 y/o daughter of a friend of ours, who is also a D-1 heptathlete. first order of business was adjusting the heptathlete's new trek into ridable shape after the pathetic - nonexistant, really - job stadium did when they they sold it to her. talkin a saddle height 2 inches too low, etc etc. . . . . . sigh.

anyway, we headed up to see if those butterflies pictured above were still hanging out on the bianca strada, and to peer deep into the surrounding enchanted forest for unicorns. it was a fine ride indeed.

but - lemme just say - i still have no real idea what a heptathlon is . . . . . except to note that whateverthehell it might be, it leaves 20 y/o participants of it in crazy-good shape !! ill-fitting and dorked out trek aside, that girl was hammering. and, once we got her hooked onto the whole wheelsucking thing, she was smiling that smile that comes from experiencing the cool dynamic of a sweet road ride, on sweet roads, with everybody lookin out for each other for the very first time. she and MK are goin out for more this week ( the old man's job is done ).

ironically, after that we entertained the original founder of stadium bike for the eve - and reminiced about the days when that shop ( nowadays it is a store, not a shop ) was the most happenin around by far. how things change . . . . .

retire, or reinvent

so, the question arises - do i keep this blog goin, or just let it fade away? obvious choice is the latter. but, a couple things have popped up to make me reconsider.

ya know, there is an old joke/sterotype amongst guys who finally realize that they not athletes, but instead old-guy-hobbyist racers. seems like after you reach a certain age, every year there is some guy who is newly divorced, and he's a freaking holy terror. leaned down, eating like a caveman, working out like he is on garmin slipstream, new bikes from the money he stashed from the wife, and pissed off to no end about all the rest of his money the ex got in the settlement. we've all seen him. guys like me - more or cruising along, very happily married, other stuff on our minds . . . . how we gonna compete with newly-divorced-guy ?

then, i have my awful year of riding to look back on. work issues kept me off the bike all spring, and into summer. big trouble getting back on the bike once outta the routine, complete loss of any remotest sense of shape i might have had, and at age 50 the very very real possibilty that once gone - it ain't coming back, period. don't laugh - at my age, it happens.

and now, my beloved strong frame and blacksheep fork might well be toast after being rear-ended on the back of the van.

i think that last thing is the final motherf*cking straw. i'm pissed. that bike is gonna be either fixed by the best tig-welding framebuilder on earth, or i will replace the thing. till then i'll ride on whatever rolls, but i gonna ride. i am gonna look back at this past BS season like recently-divorced-guy does the shafting he took in court. i am gonna saddle up, kimosabe, and ride. when winter comes i will XC ski till i collapse ( my refurbished rollerskiis are on the way . . . ), and i will march-hero next spring like it is 1999.

and i am gonna write about it. give it another year. yeah blogs ar so 2002, but i am lightyears more irrelevant that that on my best day, so who cares? will it be entertaining ?? dunno. but, i have been bouncing around a few cycling topics that seem to resonate ( read, annoy ) some people, and a few that some people actually agree with me on. i'll throw those in too. recently-divorced-guy best get on it, cuz this past season was worse for me, than him - and i was probably a lot worse person than he was to begin with - so next season we can have it out. i imagine i will tick some people off, already have, in fact. don't care.

it's a shame it took some a-hole wrecking one of the coolest bikes around to get my ass moving, but i can get another one, and it'll be just as cool, believe me. and in the meantime, my ass is moving again.

requiem

my strong 29er SS frame is now a wall decoration. probably the blacksheep ti fork, too.

hiding in plain site

when is the last time you saw a sugino cycloid chainting, in aluminum, in mint shape ?? trick question - unless you have invaded my secret basement vault where i have them stashed in the lab - you very likely have not. here we see the pristine and enigmatic ring monted up, ready for MK to jump back into racing after foolishly frittering away her 18th year doing schoolwork during her freshman year of college. ha !! here comes the pain.

noneof which gets to the heart of the matter - that being . . . .why on earth use a sugino cycloid chainring for ANYTHING, let alone a race-going bicycle ?? well, i have my reasons, and indeed like most of my reasons they are neither shared, understood, nor agreed upon by anybody. i used to tell the child the ring was a secret weapon, but long about age 12 she asked " dad, if our secret weapon was laughed off the face of the earth by everybody 20 years ago . . . . . is it really a secret weapon ??? "

funny kid. gotta admit, kinda smart, too. more like her mother every day.

well, THAT was cool.

i have been racing mtn bikes more or less consistantly ( this year less . . . ) in WI for over 25 years straight. lookin back - not gonna lie - that year lemond won the TdF and then lined up a month later with us hacks to race the cheq40 in the mud was a pretty good weekend for WI mtn biking. B-U-T this past weekend at mt morris is without question a close runner up.

i think the best part was the story that the ever-classy Mrs Peters was telling. she watched the pro race with a racer outta texas' dad. this race-dad and kid have been hitting the natl race scene. and, the dad was stunned by the turnout of crazy cheeseheads. in particular, he noted that not only were the crowds the biggest and by FAR the loudest of any mtn bike in the country - he had never ever seen the ear-splitting roar that came for every local pro, as they looped around the course. he was dumfounded, and had to ask Mrs Peters " what IS that ?? "

WI is the best state in the usa in which to XC race a mtn bike. always has been, and still is. huge thanx and shout-out to don E, for letting a few more people than us know it. man, i hope he brings it back.

the other funny thing that happened was the look on MK's face, after being duly impressed by the pro racing scene and style when we reminded her of where she comes from. a little over 20 years ago, in the heyday of the sport, her MOTHER - then riding as a regional expert for suntour-ibis - could pretty much hang in the lead pro bunch . . . . . well OK lets say for 2/3rds of the race or so. those were the days !! when the girl asks . . . ." what happened ? ", we get to say - she stopped racing like that to have you. it was cool to see her comprehend what that meant.

little help from her friends

since losing her road bike in a pink-slip street race in south bend, the girl has been riding on my most righteous back-up bike. a killer ride, to be sure, but a wee bit too big for her. so with her home for a few weeks we endeavored to remedy the situation. bein' a struggling college student and all, resources were limited. enter the amazingly cool world of cyclist buddies !! with a series of riding friends each piling on to help, this h'yar ride took shape. wahat's more amazing still is that my bike-snobism has rubbed off on the child, and so she has a certain bar that has to be met. luckily, said cycling buddies are pretty much as big a snobs as either of us, so no problem there !!

so, with help from russell, rick, marty out at prairie peddaler, singular cycles, dallas fowler at trikes2bikes, of course MOM, and a few more the girl is back ripping in style. those hoosierswill not know what hit em when she gets back to south bend. her vinatage ibis she rocks on the trails made them weep over their lame ass rides, and this bitchin steed will do the same. killer bare-knuckle no-nonsense wheels, rival parts doing the work, solid remaining bits to just last and work with blue-collar aplomb, and to tie it all together a frame older than the child, triple butted lugged steel made in nippon like a samurai sword and quite probably the best frame specialized ever made - every bit as good as all but the most boutique level frames made today.

thanx to all !!

half way to the wrong side of the grass

i turned 50 this week. i looked up a few things that were going on the year i was born.

1. the flintstones premiered
2. ben hur was a hot movie
3. the aluminum can was invented
4. cassius clay ( not yet muhammed ali ) won his first pro fight
5. gas was a quarter a gallon, and a brand new mustang was 2300 bux.
6. the foolish pic above passed for olympic-level winter sport

pardon me, while i go heat up a bowl of stewed prunes and ovaltine.

week at camp calls for -

lake owen drive every morning. i can't get away to ride camba singletrack, but this is pretty sweet.

if you ain't cheatin', you ain't tryin' !!

i have been enjoying the big story about cancellara and his supposed electric motor, boosting him to victory. personally - i would love for the story to be true. take bike racin's cheating and get it out of the classless and tacky PED arena, and move it up alongside motorsports; the source of the title quote for this entry ( famed tuner and notorious cheater smokey yunick is source ). i mean, let's see some more creativity in our cheating !! make it something to be proud of - for example, f-landis' famous testoterone-patch-on-the-XXX has got to be the ultimate low-rent cheat in history. not because he cheated, but because of the horridly embarrassing way he did it.

my all-time favorite cheat, tho, was the kid ( OK, his dad . . . ) in the soapbox derby car back in '73. he had a wicked strong electromagnet in the nosepiece of his car, and a switch hidden in the roll-bar. he would switch it on, and when the metal plate holding the car at the start line would fall away, the car would get a little pull from the magnet ( !!! ). awesome !!! so, so wrong, on so many levels - you just have to love it. they only caught him because as the battery wore down, his times and starts became noticably slower.

so, please cancellara - let this business of you having an electric motor hidden on your bike be true. if people are racing, somebody's gonna be cheating - cycling NEEDS a good cheatin' story like the soapbox kid, or one of smokey yunicks legendary yarns. for god's sake, no more embarrassing stories about placing sticky medicinal patches on one's XXXX.

redemption via russell

after a decent start to her college career at ND, the girl has been undergoing a fall from grace. first, they kept her over after class for some reason - to the tune of over a month and a half !! dunno how she got that far behind on her classwork, but there it is. then, while out running the mean streets of south bend all nite long like she routinely does, she ran into a bad crowd - and ended up street racing for pinks with them - in the process losing her road bike on a bad bet. as she wallowed in the shame of losing a pink-slip bike race to somebody from freaking INDIANA, russell swept in like the veritible Angel of Wheeled Redemption that he is - with this:



yeah, we had to update a couple things. the wayward kid could not get on with the righteous crit-bend ultra-narrow bar, nor the 36 hole front wheel. i give her a pass on needing the bar-con rear shifter, tho - like russell, bar-cons are always in Style. she is back at school finishing up her detention till the end of june, but had better not lose anymore street races !! that bike has some nice stuff on it - if she loses this stuff we will move while she is away, and not leave a forwarding address:

just beacuse . . . .

frank zappa once sang:

"Just because the sun
Want a place in the sky
No reason to assume
I wouldn't give her a try"

with that kinda spirit in mind, we decided recently to go with the rage and jam a 29er wheel into the fork on gretchen's 26er on-one . . . . . just because.

well, not exactly. i originally designed my strong as a 69er, but that was on purpose. i need to know - what does doing it ghetto-style like pictured here, and how you see guys doing today actually do ??

for a given fork offset, and/or a given fork what it does is this: adds around 8.1 mm to the trail figure of the bike's front end. this is not a small change. it is about the difference in trail between a standard road bike and a touring bike ( 1.5 degrees of head angle, say, if you were to leave everything else the same ). speaking of which, it also relaxes the bike's head angle by a half degree actual. it does a few other things as well, regarding bb height, position, and weight distribution but those are minor or easily correctable to insignificant for a dirt-going bike, i think. some of them might even be improvements, depending on yer preferences. we need to correct the position from the photo, and get the rider contact points back where they belong. . . . bars back down, saddle back where it needs to be, etc.

anywayz - two ways of looking at the numbers game with regard to bike as converted - 1. a more stable platform on which to hammer and rail . . . or 2. a formerly nimble bike now handling like a dog.

personanly, i believe stability is VASTLY underrated. a stable bike is a fast bike. all bikes handle quick, or quick enuf - how can they not?? they weigh 20 pounds and are only a few feet long. just as with sporting motorcycles, very few people can actually use all the parking lot quickness in handling that most modern bikes possess. i've had that converstion with many a veteran builder. they Know, but usually build what the market tells people they want, instead.

so - i think we'll keep it like this. it rails.

redemption on the wheel(s) within a wheel

seeking wheeled redemtion requires certain obligations. one of those obligations is this:

"" when skateable full-pipes are in town, drop what you are doing and go skate 'em !! "

i am fortunate to have a kid who is hip to this. not only that, but he knows what size full pipe is skateable, and what is not. in this modern world you gotta be sure to teach kids the right stuff, ya know (in case yer wondering - it is 8 ft diameter) ?? and so, when nicky spiied these with his keen eye and called to say some steel 8 foot full-pipes were in town, we grabbed the board and headed over to assess. never know what yer gonna find - maybe the pipes are full of concrete, maybe they have stuff welded in 'em, or maybe the construction guys on the job-site are gonna be jerks, or whathaveyou.

a number of years back, a barge full of beautiful 18 foot pipes docked in town. my buddy could not make the scene, so i hit them up myself, was chased away by the po-po and a hyperventilating tugboat captain muttering something about wrecking his million dollar cargo ( a skinny bald goof on a 34 inch piece of 8 ply maple and urethane is gonna hurt 1" thick steel ?? ) - and before my buddy could make it up they actually fired the tugboat back up and towed them across the bay and docked them behind a fence next to a navy minesweeper with its security detail. my man was still gonna try to session them . . . . but i noted that the navy guys carry 45 cal sidearms, and we had to sadly watch them sail away the next AM instead. i hope somebody else sessioned 'em at their next port-o-call . . . .

anyway, here we see nicky - a new-skool skater - throwing down hard over-vert in a vicious old-skool fashion. that is my boy !! over-vert realities with no flat-bottom - very very nice. lightning fast transition management/direction changes, and razor's-edge precision are called for in quarters that tite - and woefully few new-skoolers are up to the task.he's a punk, as russell or my man rick W will tell you anytime - but he does have his moments.

as the wise russel would say . . . .

. . . it was a good day:

this as nice a urban in-town trail system as i have ever seen, rum village in south bend IN. very sweet banked over&under section pictured here -



2. chillin in as nice a place as can be -



3. new steel confers with old steel. both agree, steel is where it is at -

the perfect metaphor is sometimes hard to find . . .

. . if you are not bob dylan. the picture above comes quite close to describing my current cycling form, tho. and this classic lyric from the great ray davies hits my recent state of mind ( not literally, but figuratively ):

Cheap is small and not too steep
But best of all cheap is cheap
Circumstance has forced my hand
To be a cut price person in a low budget land
Times are hard but we'll all survive
I just got to learn to economize

I'm on a low budget
I'm on a low budget
I'm not cheap, you understand
I'm just a cut price person in a low budget land

as ray notes, circumstance can force a fellow's hand sometimes. in my case it has not been $$, but rather time, energy, resources/energy. they forced that hand into doing something and becoming something i have not been for many a year . . . . . . . . a guy-who-used-to-ride-bikes.

being a guy-who-used-to-ride-bikes is a suck-ass thing to be. something i never wish to be again. after umpteen years of riding and ( mostly badly ) racing bikes, i have known and do know plenty of this breed. i never wanted to count myself in their number, but it is easier than i thought to do so. the worst part of being a guy-who-used-to-ride-bikes is that you are no longer kin with the coolest people around anyplace - that being guys-who-do-ride-fooking-bikes. fortunately, in my case it was a planned short-term kinda thing, and it's over now !!

so, redemption on the wheel is reborn. it is sorely needed, too - the redemption part. my bikes never looked so good - every one of things reflects me in some way, and i cannot wait to rediscover them.

kinda fallen off the back a bit, gonna try and catch up. LBL. what a fun time it was. rain, driving wind, cowshit, riders from far and near, and a hunk of head cheese for the grand prize after the World's greatest Townline sprint. thanx to all.


one very very bright side during the hiatus has been nicky's official first self built bike - behold. not an easy build, either - it came as a bare frame which has both BMX and standard mtn/road specs scattered throughout, and he did everything from selecting the parts, to the wrenching itself. it is a fab bike to look at, and he styled it out just perfect with a little help from his friends. super-stylee, show me a cooler looking DJ bike and i'll buy you a smoothie at the cup.

despite that, here in these grease spots we see a beautiful representation and metaphor of my cycling efforts and current status thus far for 2010. in the words of vincent vega " i'm a fooking grease-spot !! "

so, redemption-wise, i see one last hope - fortunately it is a good one. this Lady will not let my sorry ass down:

we've all been there . . .

the day the new frame arrives. such a sweetness it is !!



with ray's MKE only a short 7 months away, nicky is on it. plus, there are skateparks, and a newly constructed dirt jump at camp montee to shred in the meantime.

still in need of a few key parts, a new temporary sculpture takes over the living room, like an early michelangelo sketch.

cleared for flight operations

this is the perch for my multi-time busted, crushed, double plated, screw-and-glued, cadaver-bone wedged mangled excuse for a right wrist - most recently pulverized between the hardware on 12/29/09. rode today - good to go. 2.5 hrs on bumpy semi-frozen dirt. i mean, i kinda hurt but i had other things hurting worse, so that is a go.

Ti (rigid) fork & drop bars, my friends. good for what ails ya, say i.


P.S. with all the very nice shots of everybody's new rides for the season floating around with various hot nouveau-bling parts and stuff. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . lemme just say, for those of a non-nouveau persuation - italy is where you get bling from.

the Ventoux of the western hemisphere

here we see gretchen laughing in the face of the mighty brussels hill, in prep for L-B-L. why - if i am not mistaken - in the background there, you can nearly see the atlantic ocean. how many will die of exertion upon its fearsome slopes on apr 3rd ?? only one way to find out.

can't find a pic for this one. triied google-image searching lazy, arrogant, pompous, and geo-centric but got nuthin.

i received my special feature velo-snooze " Ride and Race" guide this week. 65 of the best cycling events in the USA !! wow !!

funnily enuf, fully 1/3 of them are in CA or CO. so, according to the lazy and utterly clueless v-snooze staff, fully 33% of the greatest cycling scenes/events take place in 4% of these great 50 states. i guess a guy knows where to start at least !!

leaving the remaining lame-ass 96% percent of the 50 states with a paltry 66% of these must-do events. uhhhhhh . . . . . . . yeah.

velonews is fast closing on bicycling for putting out an inferior product/publication with every single issue.

the depressing part of going techno

i shoulda known. last time i used a HRM was in 2002, when gretchen and i did the ironman. as most people know, there is a great portion of your brain that immediately turns off when you enter a triathlon, good taste in things bici being one them.

anyway, i am older now, and gretchen is back looking to see where she is at after a long layoff, and i once knew enuf - quite a bit in fact - about em in the pre-power meter era - and nashbar had nice simple ones for 30 buxon sale , so . . . . . . . presto.

here is the thing, tho. at my age, and vital stats, and an accurate max HR - when a person ciphers out the various zones and ranges and all that malarky like in the chart up there the answer from the equations comes back in a flashing display on the device as:

" DON'T BOTHER, YOU IDIOT. OR, IF YOU MUST, CALL YOUR LIFE INSURANCE GUY IMMEDIATELY " - and then of course the battery wore out. i hate those fooking things.

holding to the klingon family code of Honour . . . .

as russell has sagely noted, the Burden of Shame on the House monT is great, with my riding around, fat, slow, and now wearing those shoes pictured below. an atlas-scale burden for young nicky to bear, indeed. fortuitously, here we see he is more than up to task. rolling to the local skatespots on a custom painted arai-adamo helmet themed hawk GT. for those of a non-motorsickle persuation . . . . this bike, 15 years ahead of it's time when it came out, is the second coolest motorcycle to ever come out of nippon ( the RC30 beeing cooler, naturally ). but, note how the lad still is able to rock that mofo like amadeaus.

with nicky holding up his end of deal like that, i could wear pink bunny slippers when i ride and he would STILL make up for it.

"my mtn biking shoes are older than you are"

racing singlespeeds with old dudes, and young - this has been one of my most fave lines ever. but, even with the feeble efforts applied to them, my shoes do actually wear out over enuf years. adding to the gettin'-ready-fer-spring stuff, then, was a new pair of shoes.

the price on sidi's has gone nuts - those are out.

for inspiration, i recalled back to my most fave ridin' shoes of all time, my andy hampsten replica lakes - i loved those rascals:



so, after a bit of a seach, i came up with the closest modern equivalent i could find - voila !!



going back to the billy "white shoes" johnson look for 2010. nice !!

don't just watch the hardmen . . .

. . . . and the classics on versus. BE one, and DO one:

the route is not for the weak of spirit:




but the payoff includes the Ultimate townline sprint:




Luxemburg - Brussels - Luxemburg. Apr 3. stay tuned for harrowing details as they emerge.

friendly tip pt II

keeping to the theme of cool new bike parts - here is another.

bar-tape. everybody uses it, everybody needs it, and some people even have a fave. but, few know there IS a best-in-show in the world of bar-tape. this is it. why ??

lemme answer with a question: is your bar tape as tough and comfy as your sidi shoes ?? lemme guess, that would be a hell to the no, it is not.

this stuff IS, because it made of the same material as your sidi's. san marco lorica is the bestest bar tape on the earth. you cannot wear it out ( unless you wear it on your feet instead of your sidi's, and even then it takes years, and will withstand untold mud, rocks, scrapes, and abuse until then). washable. NEVER moves/shifts around. yeah, it costs a bit more. so, eat mac&chees one nite this week instead of going out, and it's paid for - pretty cheap price-o-admission for perfection !! and, you will not have to replace it eveytime your bike lays on the ground. git some.

friendly tip

always go for the good skins ( if yer bike's aluminum . . . don't bother . . . . . . ). 290 tpi goodness for the the bestest day-o-the year so far ride.

not XX more like 00 new bike stuff for me

with the season fast approaching, i see everybody getting their junkie-like fix of new stuff on the bike, or new bikes.

me too - what is better than new bike stuff ?? i am hard at work on few new rides. but, i find myself off-target from the marketing machines of the modern industry just a tad. take this item - i will bet no sane person on this earth will be jonesing for it:

and indeed why would they ?? i may know that drop bars are the proper bar for ANY bicycle, be it on road or off - i never did understand why XC mtn bikers think they need more control from their handlebars than the guys riding paris-roubaix - but this is a Knowledge shared by very very ( very) few. this stem will make it happen. some might say a Knowledge that is held to belief by a very very ( very ) few is in fact not a Knowledge, but rather a Disturbance - and i would not argue.

similarly, you can keep you swanky new XX derailleurs. gimme this beauty every time for my new 2X7 69er:
the bestest mtn derailleur ever made? well, yes it is but i dunno - don't they all work the same ?? make no mistake, tho - it is bad-ass, flush with cold-forged goodness and dripping with they-don't-make-em-like-they-used-to nipponese Quality. plus, i have a brand new one sitting here in my lab . . . . . how much for that XX one again ?? ??

ah well - beauty is in the eye of the beholder. even if that beholder is a group population of 1. new bike stuff rules !!

nahmbs

i am missing being at the NAHMBS. here is my fave guy from last year ( not surprisingly, he is nipponese ). he flat out rules:



he is not the most skilled builder, from a boutique-craftmanship level of lookin at things. maybe not the hippest guy - he looked earnestly bewildered and wanting desparately to be polite to everybody there. but his bikes were magic. steel bikes, filled with wonder and imagination and freshness. so so cool. so so utterly lacking in pretension ( hello seven and vanilla ), just love and vision and passion. dude's little booth was everything that is right with a handmade bike.

http://www.cs-cherubim.com/

i made this secret tape of russell . . . . .

. . . . . down in the double-secret chamber of the rusty toolshed, when he thought nobody was around:





i gave him a chance to pay me off, but he refused. now his darkest secret is revealed - INDOOR ROLLERSKIING !! ??? !!

some are matheticians, some are carpenter's wives . . . . . .

so, we made our first-ever f2f contact with an old friend that facebook put us in touch with. in this case, a female friend from a crew i used to run with maybe 30+ years ago. facebook seems to be a lot of whacky things, and according to one buddy maybe even a secretly dangerous thing. but in case of meeting for coffee with an old friend long lost to time and circumstance - it was cool. very fun.

in other news, nicky is taking the news of a Ray's Bike park a short drive away with massive stoke. even tho he regularly shreds various concrete parks already - he has responded to this most righteous news by selling off one frame, a bunch of parts, and is working resources and the interwebs most diligently in order to build up a kickass park-bike. he knows the bar is high - ain't no stink-bug bike comin out of the studio. he is looking at a stylee start . . . .

it is simple enuf to see that sean white is haed&shoulders better than anybody in the half-pipe. it is not so well know that this is a newer situation. . . . he is pulling away from them, even after all these years. there was talk about the sick foam-pit private snowpipe and all, but here is the reason why:



over the last couple years, white has quietly become one of few legit world-class vert skaters in existance. this is extremely rare - most of them are old grizzled and time-tested guys. but white hucked himself like a madman into their midst over the past 4 years. vert skating is waaaaaaaayyyyy focking harder than snowboarding. it takes everything snowboarding does, but DEMANDS precision and CONTROL. there is no slopping nothing, at no time. the board is not tied to your feet. the ground is solid.

when you watch white, it is the fact that he rides like a skater that sets him apart. he lands with precision and pumps BOTH sides of the transition speed - nobody else does that - because they can't. he has board/body presence in the air like nobody else does, because he can do it with the board NOT tied to his feet.

so long as he keeps skating, and they don't, they will never catch him.

it's been a while since we had the fun of getting somebody skate-skiin' for the first time. when we started, you had to chop down your own skiis to size, re-epoxy them together, and then go find a snowmobile trail or frozen lake to try and figure out to do it from some still photo's you might have seen someplace. things have moved on.

check out liz here, on her 2nd day. lots of good stuff goin on. more importantly, a whole lot of bad stuff NOT goin on !! note the lack of duck-walking, stinkbug-style, floundering, and generalized unpleasantness. she was wise to heed our counsel of forgeting about the poles, and forgetting about how fast she was going, and forgetting about the 'workout'.

dig the nice flat ski she is running on. that means she is balancing on it and it alone - not easy to do. dig also the rotation of the upper body in anticipation of the new ski goin' down, but the hips still running the old ski, kinda winding up for a powerful new drive, but not wasting any energy with excessive floundering or counter-rotationv - just a tight driven weight transfer about to happen. check out that upraised boot, close and tight to the body perfectly positioned to pivot outward and accept her center of gravity smoothly and with no energy loss as she glides out onto it - REALLY not easy to do !! nice forward position, too. most of all, dig how she looks like she doesn't really need those poles at all - the sure sign yer getting it right.

gotta be honest - i cain't take too much credit. when gretchen skiis no-poles she looks like ginger rogers. all liz had to do was watch that, and keep tryin.

sometimes i dig the modern way-o-doin things.

who, me ??

thru what can only be described as an administrative oversight, i find my name on the covetted roster for the cheq 100. 3 months out, in the worst shape-o-my-life. on the other hand, i've never done a hundie mile mtn bike race, and always wanted to. plus, the entry fee is right up my alley. worst case, i die and my bones get picked clean by some possums in the cheq forest, which is fine by me.

i am reading something about GPS foolishness for the course, tho. i just got a cell phone a few months ago for god's sake - i leave GPS to NASA and do not want that manner of geegaw anywhere near my bikes. bikes were a form of ANTI-people knowing where you are at all times in my day, and i intend to keep it that way.

so i hope they will also have some paper plates with arrows stapled to the trees or somthin'.

little known fact

the best snow for XC skate skiing in the USA falls not in colorado, nor utah, nor the san juans. it falls in the midwest.

for XC skatin', ya don't want pow. ya want some moisture. ya want some silkiness. and ya even want a little transitoned icy stuff tilled in there once in while. makes for a firmer, faster, perfect skate deck.

not only that, but the terrain is better, too. rolling, winding, rollicking - as opposed to crab-ass sideways on the side of gigantic goddam mountain.

take tonite . . . . a layer of ginzu-ized pulzerized icy speed, mixed together with an inch and a half of new-fallen small-sized flake snow and packed to gentle firmess, with a layer of another 1/2 inch of pure silk on top. too, too sweet. better than the mountains, indeed - we should groove on that.

to the lab, igor !!

it has been a while since i felt right, and had use of my right arm. both are comin' 'round nicely tho, and i reckon it is time to venture out to the laboratory to assess the bike situation. MK may be rocking a two-bike approach to the season . . . . so i thought i would take stock of the available old parts and see if i cain't join her. 4 steel frames, 4 drop bars, maybe three bar-con shifters, various mismatched rim brakes, a thread-on freewheel, the smell of phil grease and a bitch-pile of soul.

where is spring !!

separated at birth pt III

this is one i am particularly proud of. they do not call MKE's own JWM "the elusive one" for nothing. he is indeed rarely seen, even when you are on ride with him and maybe 2 or 3 others. or in a vehicle driving across the state to a dinky little SS race. few photos exist of him in captivity. witness this one, and note his uncanny ability to blend into any background - in this case by impersonating a towering Blue Spruce tree even as he rides his most righteous Singular steed:

BUT, as arlo guthrie once sang - that's not what i came to talk about. for this installment of SaB none other than MK her own bad-ass self was able to capture a pic of . . . not JWM's elusive self - but instead an even MORE rare shot of a JWM impersonator lurking amongst the stately confines of Notre Dame University. no word from MK on how this elusive lookalike responded to being immortalized inside her i-touch . . . but i have not heard from her since.

hunter thompson, quentin tarantino, gauguin . . . . .

and tim gunn are all personal heroes of mine, in the artist category. the painting above is my fave all time- i wonder where former art historian russl B jobs weighs in on the issue ?? anyway, since the good Dr is dead, and quentin is taking another umpteen years off after the stellar " basterds" film, and the Art Institute is several hours away i guess i will have to make do with Project Runway.

nice !!

i gotta say, sometimes i am disturbing, even to myself.

song remains the same

i ran across this story recently. i didn't know whether to laugh or cry.

the various points of story are almost too unbelieveable to be real. a stellar and nationally recognized group of volunteers, doing everything by-the-book. thousands of man-hours. insane levels of hoop-jumping and good faith. every step of the way the model of new-school partnershipping and organization.

all completely thrown under the bus by the Wisconsin DNR at the first sign of a problem. not to be a droning old coot, but this isn't the first time. the Wisconsin DNR has a historic relationship with mtn biking that is overidingly awash in lies, covert and sophisticated back-room dirty deals, and a beyond blatant disregard and viscousness toward the individuals involved as users in the sport. they have done this for over a quarter of a century.

it is always a little surprising to me that the people active in advocacy today seem to prefer to ignore the history involved in this state, but i suppose it is for the best. acknowledging the bad blood that was shed by the bucketful in the early days when the DNR robbed mtn biking of everything would prevent the gains that they have managed to slowly claw back. nobody that took those brutal beatdowns in advocacy then is still in the game today. and even now, the HPT and other modern people are meeting with the DNR this very evening to attempt to continue to get them to throw a bone mtn biking's way, even after they watched the DNR run them down in their headlights and feast on their still breathing carcass. god bless those guys, maybe they will get something, and they are far better men than i am for walking back in there and trying. still, it pains me to see people making the same sucker mistakes we did - hint: never talk with or put in 5 minutes of time toward anything with DNR on a verbal agreement, guys - GET IT IN WRITING. and i don't care if they have a smiling smooth talking "trails coordinator" on the payroll these days - she is NOT ON OUR SIDE, OK ?? you don't need TmonT to tell you that, the "no biking" signs should suffice ( speaking of which - didja ever notice that when a new trail gets built it is always up to the hardworking cash-poor volunteers to procure signage because "there's no money" in the DNR - but when they close a trail the "no biking" signs spring forth like magic ?? ).

so sad, over 25 years later and they still play us like violins.