Frostbike Schwag Bag

Hooray for free stuff! Positive behavior, like giving me things, should be rewarded and encouraged. So here's the rundown of Frostbike schwag, please note and patronize the maker of each of these doubtlessly fine items.

First item was from Surly, a ridiculously long toe strap, suitable for restraining prisoners or lashing things to a rack. They had a sign imploring grabby showgoers to not take one unless it would actually be used, so below is me using my Surly toe strap to haul the 10 pounds of vendor literature to the recycling station. Thanks, Surly!
Next, a nicely machined bottle opener from Thomson. My girlfriend gave away my Park bottle opener (a freebie from some other shindig), so I can now ween myself off of twisties. Thanks, Thomson!
Oddly, I got no t-shirts. But they did have arm warmers. Maybe they cut the sleeves off a long-sleeve shirt, gave them away, and the shirt remainders will follow at Interbike. Who knows. Thanks, Frostbike/Michelin!
Wool socks from DeFeet. I did not notice these in the bag until I unpacked at home, these might have come in handy that night at the Pugsley races. Thanks, DeFeet!
And here's some brake pads from Jagwire. I don't actually own a bike with road cartridge pads, so these will be regifted, but thanks, Jagwire!
Our Chevy Chase store manager, Nick, is quite the Europhile. Now, I may never approach his level of sofisticazione, but I can try, one comically-small sip of caffè at a time. Thanks, DT Swiss!
Finally, my favorite. A painter's cap from Belgian helmet maker Lazer. It doesn't even fit my stupid-large head. But look closely at the label -- "Lazer -- Since 1919". Before we examine this, let's see the pic:
So anyway, the 'Since 1919' assertion didn't quite ring true. The first laser was demonstrated 41 years later. It wasn't until the 1980's that marketers seized on the term as product-worthy, with such items as the Chrysler Laser:
...and American Gladiator "Laser":
Turns out, they really did start in 1919, as “Etablissement Lacroix”, maker of, "all fine leather goods for motorcyclists." OK. Thanks, Etablissement Lacroix!

Frostbike Day 2 -- Civia

Blazing a new frontier, Civia is a purpose-built line of serious commuters. The difference between Civia and Breezer, besides price, is that Civia bikes are a bit more speedy, aggressive, with the target customer being an enthusiast cyclist who decides to commute, and wants the best tool for the job.

Here's the Shimano Alfine rig, in blue. $2K or so, and a derailleur version is available too.
And the Rohloff version, $3K or so:
Both bikes have disc brakes, premium internal shifting, dynamo hub and light, Thomson stem and seatpost, color matched fenders, rear rack, channels for brake lines, sliding rear dropouts, and a super tough matte finish. They'll also offer the frame, fork, fenders, and rack (with entirely-too-large diameter tubes) a la carte.

So, the question of the day is, will hardcore cyclists plunk down $2-3K for a fully-outfitted, super nice, purpose-built commuter? Ideally, bicycle manufacturers would provide some of these answers to dealers, by doing things like market research, and sharing it with prospective dealers. It would make it a lot easier to plunk down the cash to buy into a product that is no doubt pretty cool, and we all want to live in a world where the commuter bike is lavished with such great spec and engineering. But come on, bike brands, at least TRY to do some research into your market theories before developing your products.

That's a long way of saying, I have no idea if City Bikes will buy any of these bikes. They are cool, but it's an entirely new market that may exist, or may exist only in Civia's imagination.

Frostbike Day 2 -- Ya down wit BMC?

No, not really. Eric was a bit interested in their Fourstroke mountain bike, but every time he went by, and displayed the classic retail mating ritual (squeezing brake levers, compressing suspension, inspecting pivot points), he was met with maddening Swiss neutrality. No greeting, no pitch, nothing.

Anyway, 15 minutes gone, but here's a pic of the Fourstroke 01 (note the hole in the rear of the saddle of the lower bike, Eric guesses it's for crotchular airflow, I say "speed holes").
Here's a really bad pic of me holding a gin-yoo-wine Yoo-nited States quarter up to the comically-large chainstay of their roadbike:
The equally girthy downtube/bottom bracket intersection from the same bike:
Here's the BMC time trial rig, a design which has carried all of it's most prominent riders to doping positives:
I wonder what Tyler, Floyd, and Alexandre saw when they looked at themselves in this mirror finish?

Frostbike Day 2 -- A few other interesting bits

The first item I'll mention is a sock. Not so much for it's socky merits, but for the sales pitch. The very friendly saleswoman at the DeFeet booth was showing Eric and I her wares, and I suppose we were showing all the enthusiasm we could muster while hung over and discussing socks. She came to the women's model seen below, and noted that it is obvious to Jane Sockshopper that it's a women's model, because, "See, the rider has boobs." Fair enough.
Next, Cane Creek showed a wooden (either maple or ash) headset, noting that it's lighter than their carbon model.
Is it a carbon fibre garden tool? Is it a bottle opener for a 5-gallon Heineken? It's actually a saddle with an integrated bottle holder, suitable for aero-fetishists, and maybe for my '74 Motobecane with no bottlecage mounts.
Knog showed a new pannier system. The knob in the center twists, the whole pannier mount comes off, and you can then twist on backpack straps. Pretty neat.
The bags themselves looked a notch below Ortlieb in stoutness and water resistance, but as an around-town bag for 99% of commuters, these looked pretty good. Though, those 'Nightmare Before Christmas' graphics are pretty out there.
Wheels Manufacturing showed this chain tool with an emergency derailleur hanger. Several weeks ago, I botched a Shimano chain installation on my Moots, the chain failed 8 miles from my hotel in a strange town, it jammed in the derailleur, and sheared the derailleur hanger off. This would have come in handy. I suggested to them that adding a holder for a Powerlink would make this a great option for the 24-hour racing crowd, and they seemed pretty excited about that prospect.

Frostbike Day 2 -- Surly Hangover

Not much new from the folks at Surly:
Here's a logo variant that's on the Pacer, their road steel bike:
And here's the Long Haul Trucker in a new color:
And it's hardly new, but their Xtracycle frame, the Big Dummy, is finally shipping:

Frostbike overload

I'm beginning to burn out on Minnesota in winter, grainy pictures of bicycles, energy bars, riding in vans, skinny white guys with facial hair resembling Hetchins lugwork, and Frostbike in general. So for variety's sake, here's a pic of our CFO Erik and his enormous dog, both reflecting on the wonderful absurdity of things.

Frostbike Eve 1 -- Pugsley Race!

Surly makes a fun bike called the Pugsley, which is designed to lurch it's way through soft terrain, like the Minnesota snow. And every year at Frostbike, they put on the Pugsley races, or as one straight-arrow QBP wag titled it, "The Surly Pugsley Race Powered By Bud Light."

I don't have a very compelling narrative to offer, as I (a) was extremely intoxicated, (b) was very cold, and (c) was extremely intoxicated. Here's Eric grimacing from the cold:
I didn't race, as I left my gloves and extra layers back in the hotel room. I considered lying, and saying this guy was me, but I'd like to think I'm outgrowing such shenanigans:
The rest of us huddled around the bonfire on the frozen pond, and listened to that guy in the foreground mutter insults about the racers into a megaphone.
And finally, here's Eric crying about the cold, but hiding his tears from the camera. There's yet another topless guy. At least half the folks coming to start/finish on the pond wiped out on the ice, adding another layer of absurdity to the toplessness.
One of the topless racers later popped up in our hotel bar, but sadly, I was without camera, and he was dragged off by a very spry waitress.

Frostbike Day 1 -- Salsa Completa

Salsa has made some interesting bikes and bits for quite a few years, but has really failed to establish much brand consistency. Scandium TT bikes mixed with steel hardtails. Some models were funky, some models were racy, and none were marketed in any meaningful way.

Then, at Interbike '06, Salsa showed a frame called a Casseroll. Designed around the beautiful dropout I showed at the bottom of this post, it became the #1 unit seller in framesets this past year. We liked it, but weren't keen on taking it on just as a frameset. Now, they're offering it in two complete bike variants. A single speed version, check out the chainguard:

And here's the road bike, with mostly 105 stuff:Note the color matched stems on both:
Finally, the La Cruz, a disk-only steel cross bike with vert dropouts:
We'll definitely be discussing these in some depth in the coming weeks...

Frostbike Day 1 -- Mountain Spew

I'm out of my comfort zone, but here's what I've been able to pick up about mountain bikes here in Bloomington.

650B -- Not just for the wool knicker crowd anymore, 650B is clawing its way up to Ross Perot status in the hearts of MTB product folks who are sick of the 26 v. 29 partisan warfare. Maybe it is the plain-talkin alternative to those kevlar beltway insiders, or maybe it's just a well-financed crackpot idea. Regardless, four manufacturers are tooling up 650B mountain tires, so if tire choice is holding you back, stay tuned.

Disc Powertap -- For mountain guys who wanted to quantify their lack of training, see below. The everpresent Saris randomly raffled off a few of these, and one of the lucky winners was a nice guy named Michael. Michael works for a shop called the Old Spokes Home, asked if this Powertap thing powered a dynamo light, requested a three-speed internal version, and professed a willingness to trade for boxfuls of Sturmey-Archer spares. Here's their homepage pic, for contextual purposes:
Reba 29er -- Apparently new, and somehow novel, I'm told. I nodded politely. The graphics are slated for revision, for those who care.That's all I can muster. With that out of the way, I'll post up some stuff I can actually talk about intelligently pretty soon.

Frostbike Day 1 -- The Majestic Sperm Wheel

Posted as bait for BikesnobNYC, here's the latest in powdercoating cheekiness from the fertile imaginations at Velocity. Picture those buggers swimming upstream on your brakeless Pista. Hmm.

Frostbike Day 0.5

Oh howdy from Frostbike, Quality Bicycle Product's annual tradeshow here in the most picturesque industrial park in Bloomington, Minnesota. For those unfamiliar, QBP is the biggest, fastest, and at least for us, most reliable parts supplier in the bike industry. They're very efficient like WalMart, but with the soul of Ben & Jerry's. Pass the Kool-Aid, please. Most every shop does at least some business with them, so yeah, good guys can finish first.

Food and coffee is a bit hard to come by in our remote Crowne Plaza lodging, but that Minnesota friendliness is making up for it. I spent Day 0.5 in a borderline psychosis, having endured a caffeine and food free 9 hour adventure on US Air, complete with late departures, wind sprints through terminals, and some snags finding and securing lodging. Next was a blur of seminars designed to excite me about enhancing the profitable paradigms of our new world of outside the box something something. I need coffee....

My traveling companion, our Chevy Chase buyer Eric, led my bedraggled shell to a charter bus, which hauled us to a happy hour (sponsored by Saris) and dinner, featuring more people saying doubtlessly profound things, and me gulping down water like my airline peanuts were meth-roasted. The highlight was the video tour of Saris played on the bus, on the video monitor, located 9 inches from my bloodshot eyes, Clockwork Orange style.

Anyway, gear postings to follow, here's a teaser:

How do you make a million dollars in the bike biz?

Start with the savings account of a guy who won the Tour 7 times, apparently. Linked on bikeportland.org, LanceStrongtm has apparently heard the siren song of bicycle retail. I keep checking that it's Valentine's Day, rather than April Fools, because his new shop, "Mellow Johnny's," will focus on commuters, rather than his moon-eyed legion of man-crush racers.

Says Armstrong BFF Bart Knaggs, "We want to add something to the community that will catalyze interest around riding bikes, about being bike friendly and folding it into life in Austin." And every shop owner who sells more u-locks than Castelli jerseys will declare, "His shop is just like mine! Cool!" But here's why we're actually right:

1. Repurposing of old building -- Fantastic Lance is moving into a building that served over the years as, "a distribution center for Pearl beer, a paint company, a steel manufacturing facility and a resource center for the homeless." City Bikes in DC occupies a space that once housed a gas station and a Ben & Jerry's cafe.

2. Hide where they ride -- Lance and City Bikes both plopped themselves down in locations where people ride their bikes (in Lance's case, next to the synergy-rich Lance Armstrong Bikeway), as opposed to where people go to shop.

3. Bike Sharing -- A few retailers grumble about publicly-funded bike sharing leeching their business. We love bike sharing, and so do they, according to the article.

4. Common workflow efficiency tool -- A dumbwaiter. "Mellow Johnny's" will make use of a dumbwaiter to move bits between floors, as City Bikes did back in the old days (photo evidence to follow).

5. Rumours of performance enhancing drug use -- Lance and our ownership team have both been accused of ingesting substances that enhance performance of a variety of tasks.

Welcome to the industry, Lance. Wanna split a shuttle ride at Frostbike this weekend?

FW: In Other News...

-----Original Message-----
From: Martin
Sent: Monday, February 11, 2008 11:11am

Sorry for all the emails today; I'm hungover and everyone else must suffer along with me. Anyway, not sure if you've ever seen this, but it's good:

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/38324

......... __ o
.........-\<,
......(O) (O)...........

Chito's new IF

Paint modeled after Eddie Van Halen's guitar. Arriving soon from IndyFab, it's going to be doing eye candy duty in the shops while Chito scratches together a build, swing by and ogle.

Sheldon Brown

Bicycle tech guru to the masses Sheldon Brown has passed, and maybe the best tribute to his impact on the bike world is in the diversity of folks posting their thoughts. Velo Orange, Velonews, BR&IN, Gwadzilla, BikesnobNYC, bikeportland.org, and forums galore, plus his home at Harris Cyclery. But I'll never forget the etched flask.

I was lucky enough to meet him about a year or so ago. Looking back, I probably should have better expressed my appreciation for his website, which gave this normally cautious canadian cat the stones to hack apart and reassemble -- in increasingly crackpot configurations -- multiple bikes. I converted a vert dropout road bike to fixed, in spite of common wisdom and good sense, because Sheldon said it was possible, and he demonstrated the joy found in trying. I reworked a 70's Motobecane (yes, a true French bike, rife with non-conformist Gallic threads and metric-rich) into a fixed city bike (small case intended). I even dabbled with a left-side drivetrain. These monstrous rolling bastardizations of good engineering practice never would have soiled the streets without Sheldon's passion for sharing his life's work with random idiots like me who found him on the Internet.

There's a whole subset of folks who got into this industry because they saw a bit of that Sheldon Brown eccentricity in themselves, and I proudly count myself among them. I still haven't tried a BioPace chainring, though.

p.s. -- next time you're in the Boston area, go to Harris Cyclery in Newton, which is a really cool shop.

Coming soon....

...some actual new content in this blog. In the meantime, sign up for our monthly newsletter, if you're really anxious to hear from us.

Bike Sharing bikes in DC

Sorry for the bad photos, but from the warehouse, here's a few pics of the new SmartBike rental bicycles that are getting stationed around the city. We nabbed a contract a few months back to build up the bikes.

Here's the WashCycle rundown on bike sharing. Our own sometime-manager Jeff Peel was just named as their first program manager, he'll do a great job in leading the Clear Channel charge to win (back) the hearts of bicyclists.

The bikes themselves are remarkably nice to ride. To be blunt, they don't really look like much, but everybody who's ridden one was impressed. Three speed internal hub, all mechanical bits shrouded in mystery and plastic, big racks, big slick tires, and more stable handling than the Breezer folding bike I normally pinch from the warehouse to run errands.

Bicycles in Ireland, pt 1

With things around the shop settling into an offseason swoon, the timing was right for a long-planned and often-delayed trip to Ireland with my dad to tour the sheep farms and village pubs of his misspent youth in County Cork. Regrettably, we did most of our tour either by foot or by Nissan, but I did take a few pics of bike relatedness, and wished I had hauled the Moots along with me.

We began in Dublin, where nearly everybody bikes. No wonder, they really make it painless (at least in comparison to DC). Every road, everything from one-way lanes to the highway into town, has a bike lane. And nice ones, too. Every road in Ireland is paved with this terribly coarse chip-seal asphalt, it's basically just stones mixing in with some tar. It percussed my lumbars in the car, and I'm guessing it would turn any bicycle into a circa 1987 Cannondale crit racer. However, they've put a nice colored surface seal on the road that not only provides a smooth (but not rainslick) ride, but provides a nice visual distinction.

The gent to the right is fairly representative of the commuters I saw. No fancy gear, riding an older MTB or hybrid, wearing his work clothes. Atypically, he's wearing a helmet, one of the few I saw in Ireland.

When he got to work, he likely locked his beater to one of the many bike parking islands throughout the city. The first pic is the quite barren racks outside of (you guessed it) the department of motor vehicles. The next one was far more typical, filled nearly to capacity during the workday.

Miscellany -- The Guv'ment is trying to keep Gaelic alive, no doubt having observed the Babelicious harmony that prevails in such other such polylingual nations as Belgium, Spain, and my home and native land. So they have entire towns whose citizens are subsidized to be all-or-nothing Gaelic, Gaelic state radio and TV stations ("South Park" and "Pimp my Ride" dubbed into Gaelic), and of course, bilingual street signs that taught me that the Gaelic word for bike is either "Raon" or "Rothar".

More later, perhaps.

Repair Classes Begin November 1st!

Ever wanted to learn the basics of maintaining and working on your bike? Already know some basics and want to build on them with more specific knowledge? A little rusty and want to brush up? We're here to help.

We;re very pleased to announce that beginning November 1st, Ben, one of the mechanics at our Adams Morgan location, will be leading repair classes. Ben worked for us years back and we were very happy to have him rejoin us moths ago. He has a lot of experience leading repair classes and is an excellent, patient teacher. The schedule for the first round of classes is as follows:

Thursday, November 1st, 6:30pm: Basic Maintenance

Thursday, November 8th, 6:30pm: Derailleur Adjustment

Thursday, November 15th, 6:30pm: Wheel Truing

Thursday, November 29th, 6:30pm: Brake Adjustment

We will continue to offer our Flat Tire Repair Class every Thursday at 6:30pm.

All classes begin at 6:30pm and will be held at our Adams Morgan location at 2501 Champlain Street NW.

If you have any questions about the repair classes, email Ben directly at copperwire (at) runbox (dot) com.

Cannondale show bike

Check out this wacky Cannondale show bike! It's just a prototype, but looks kinda production-ready. The chain inside the stays is a particularly neat-o touch. No, we haven't heard anything. Scroll alllllllll the way down for pics.

Dang bike thieves

City Bikes made the WaPo in a story about bike theft in DC. They got it wrong on our stolen bikes -- we actually found them on eBay. The police acted real quick on our find, but whatever.

The Pinky Wave!

Been feeling lately like my usual motorist abuse protocol of yelling, cussing, and spitting is just spreading more hate, so thanks to bikeportland.org for this note on Australia's far more clever approach...

Bike Rental Kiosks in DC?

Jim Sebastian and the great folks at the DDOT Bicycling Program want to start a bike-sharing network in DC (funded by, ahem, the bicycle-friendly folks at Clear Channel, who apparently like their revenue streams tinged with small traces of irony).

Anyway, DDOT needs your input, so fill out this super-short survey (and write in Adams Morgan!!).

Hate spandex?

From City Bikes alum Dave, an exhortation to ride this Saturday's World Naked Bike Ride. I pledged to my parents, friends, and all sighted mammals that my days of public nudity ended with my college graduation. Same day as my 10 year reunion. Hmmm.

9AM meet, 10AM ride at MacPherson Square. Bring sunscreen!

Bike Access on the Lexus Lanes?

WABA (dang, still haven't renewed my membership) just sent out a bulletin urging folks to write in to demand bicycle facilities as a part of the planned refurb of many of the bridges over the Beltway. The impetus for the work is the plan to sell the roads to a private company, who will turn it into a volume-based variable toll road. Currently, the WO&D is about the only bike-accessible way to escape outside the Beltway on the west side of Virginia. Anyway, I've copied the full text of WABA's note further down....

....But first, it's time for a rant. People talk of a lack of accountability with government. True enough, but turning a vital piece of public infrastructure over to a company who is only accountable to the bottom line and the strict wording of a contract written by that same unaccountable government hardly seems prudent.

Here's a recent article from Business Week on the privatization of what used to be public facilities, highlighting the tremendous outlays being made to acquire things like bridges and highways. Given the amounts being paid out upfront (lease the PA Turnpike for $30B!), is there a lot of incentive to be responsive to the needs of the taxpayer, or rather, to comply as minimally necessary to keep the overseers happy?

Anyway, therein lies the importance of getting bike facilities into the contract. If it ain't in there, Fluor-Transurban sure won't be answering our emails. Bicycles reduce congestion. Revenues increase with congestion. And every little bit helps when you're laying out $913M.

Get Bikes over the Beltway

The Virginia Department of Transportation is currently negotiating with the private firms Fluor/TransUrban on all aspects of the proposed High Occupancy Toll (HOT) lanes on the Beltway in Virginia. Due to the nature of the public-private partnership under which this proposal is being considered, these negotiations are being conducted in secret. A number of the bridges along and crossing the Beltway will be reconstructed as part of the project. These bridges currently pose major barriers to bicycle travel in Northern Virginia.

Now is the chance to provide bicycle accommodations on all bridge crossings affected by the project. WABA and Fairfax Advocates for Better Bicycling urge Fairfax cyclists to contact VDOT and demand that bicycle accommodations be included in all Beltway HOT lane bridge projects. Write to Dennis Morrison, Northern Virginia District Administrator, at Dennis.Morrison@VDOT.Virginia.gov. Copy fabb@waba.org.

Consider including these points in your message:

The Fairfax County Trails Plan calls for bicycle routes on many of the Beltway crossings. The HOT Lanes project provides a once-in-a-generation opportunity to build these routes.

Providing bicycle and pedestrian access on the crossings is consistent with VDOT policy to "accommodate bicyclists and pedestrians?in the planning, funding, design, construction, operation, and maintenance of Virginia's transportation network."

Crossings on roads such as Little River Turnpike in Annandale, Chain Bridge Road in McLean, Route 7 in Tysons Corner and Gallows Road in Dunn Loring are key bicycling corridors.

Providing bicycle accommodations is critical to making bicycling a more viable transportation option and reducing traffic congestion.

For more information, visit http://www.fabb-bikes.org/.