I keep on finding fun bike stuff on the internet, and then never do anything with it. So I present you with tabs 2 through 12 in my browser at the moment. These are things that I've left open for revisiting, but can now close.
Another awesome cyclist convo "PDX Chat before CX Natz":
Gnar tandem track crash:
Trailer for the upcoming film documenting the bike ride from London to Paris by a group of cyclists from around the globe - also known as Cutters:
Wait.. cyclists from around the globe are also known as cutters? ..and they rode 500km in cotton and ball hats?!
In the spirit of cotton and ball caps, Cody is putting on a bad party race and screening of this movie!
Vancouver screening premiere of "London to Paris"- Friday January 15th RACE: Register at 5:30pm, race at 6:00pm - BRING 2 TALL CANS TO ENTER FILM STARTS @ 7:30pm - FREE race start, finish, and film screening all at Super Champion (245 Main St.) More info on FixedVan
..and not really bike related, but still awesome:
Wow. Feels pretty good to get all those tabs closed. Its like spring cleaning my cache.
This is pretty dope. I heard about it last year, and this year I read about it the night before it happened. I was pretty tempted to hop on a Chinatown Bus and get out there, but decided against it at the last minute since I didn't think I would be welcome on a bus on the trip back, covered in toxic sludge. Looks like I missed out.
So as I'm gearing up to go over to Leanne's and eat all of her food, Morgan "Drift King" Tsaylor rings me, and he's all hepped up on some n+1 business because he bought a new BMX, and I think he's trying to offer up his old tank as some kind of compensation for getting scooped on the GT. He sounds like he's been into the tall cans:
"Dude, do you realize that there are people who actually just get on these bikes and do jumps and shit? Like, they're not breaking any parts or hurting themselves or anything - they just ride the fucking things?"
Damn, son. If I even look at a bike with 3-piece cranks these days, my body involuntarily shuts down and I wake up rocking back and forth in a corner muttering to myself about bottom bracket shell standards. So yeah, the ol' wrist ain't doing so well. It's been a rough couple of weeks, and having a veiled offer of an indestructible 20" hackmobile (with pegs!) waved under your nose after losing out on a $300 track bike isn't making it any easier.
It's a rugged life, son. It's war out here in these streets. Burrard St at full chat dropping down northbound past triple-seis last week. Nitwit pedestrian steps out into the bike lane between two parked trucks. Car in the lane to my left, nothing but door on the right. Of course, when you ride with a bunch of random hoons, one learns to watch for the quick leg-twitch and react accordingly: quick metal-on-metal bark up front to scare the shit out of him and set up the weight transfer for a full lock on the rear. Hip-drift onto the grease strip, breaking traction for just the sweetest, neatest little Scandinavian Flick six inches into the left-hand lane and another flick back to the inside because if the juice is flowing, I am coming down that hill like a wolf on the fold. Like fucking plague. Captain Trips, son. M-O-O-N spells "Get money."
Sunday, though, we were all Tom Boonen. And B-O-O-N-E-N spells "owned." Sure, maybe you didn't get to bring home the Queen of les Classiques, but it was mos def one hell of a dance, and everybody got to come home bloody, dirty, and drunk. And on Sunday, Mr. Boonen rocked quietly back and forth on the Grandview Park polo grounds, and tried to piece together just how it all went down. Something about taking a moment to compliment Mr. Luciano (the hardest-working man in show business) re: a fine last-minute wheelbuild from Rob, and then borking it not five minutes later via a kamikaze derby run at Kelly. And making her cry. Work bike vs. polo bike. Comedy wins. Mavic Open Sport and short-term memory lose.
Except that out sur la pave, Tommy Boy is getting the first ever custom-molded bicycle frame to accommodate 13mm worth of back discomfort, and out on these streets, kids can't even get a muthafuckin' dental plan. Shit, some of the hardest female riders in this city are wrecking themselves because they can't even get a frame that fits.
How can you be bitter, though, when guys like The Artist Formerly Known as Nagasawa Mike are screaming "PACK-A-GESSSSS" at you in the elevator; or when Bun Guy appears out of nowhere just as the bonk is coming down; or when you get stopped out of the blue to show off your Midnight Mass emo-button for a Momentum Magazine photo shoot; or when Skylar gets screamed "EYYY! FUCK-A YOU, AH!" on him within seven minutes of leaving the house for a breakfast hoon run out to the Drive?
Or when you're three knuckles deep into the smoothest, juiciest run ever, and the Asian chick smoking a blunt in the black AMG is checking you out and bumping this shit as you lock up:
My roof back, my money rides I'm on the pedal, show you what I'm runnin' like
Steady on that grind, son.
More shit from the B-Tionary:
Pick-n-roll:
Timing your turns so as to keep a vehicle or pedestrian as a barrier against oncoming traffic. Shields up, Mr. Sulu!
Pump-n-dump:
BK1 cheque delivery to a junior mining firm of dubious credibility. Cashout-n-dashout. A good 30% of these offices are shuttered by the time I get there, and I can only hope that their officers and directors had the good sense to break out like Stuart O'Grady to a non-extraditable country before the hammer drops. I suspect that in some instances, I've made it mere moments in advance of the process servers.
HOT BIEK RACE ACTION THIS SATURDAY. BRING INTERNET MEEPING AND A TALL CAN TO CRAB PARK AT 4:20PM. For the record, my race strategy is "Don't fucking hang out with Wendell, Skylar, Leanne, Tara, or Kelly the night before, you fucking degenerate, and maybe you won't be dry-heaving at the starting line this time around."
MORE HOT RACE RIOTS SATURDAY SATURDAY SATURDAY APRIL 5TH! BURNABY VELODROME 3-DAY! BEER GARDEN, CHEAP EATS, HOON SHIT, KASEY SPINS ELECTROQUEER MAKEOUT, SOME OTHER DOODS SPIN HIP-HOP AND FUNK!
Stay tuned for more sporadic alcohol-fuelled updates: the long-procrastinated Project-B winter gear review wrap-up; gettin' dirty with MEC, Park Tool and Filzer; the unkindest words we've pretty much ever had to say about a cycling product since fucking BioPace; and the finest in girl-girl makeout action that the internet cycling press has to offer. As always, somebody gonna get-a hurt real bad.
Yesterday I woke up in a strange hotel room overlooking Burrard and Nelson. Things were strewn about as though it had been ransacked. The fountain out front had been filled with soap, and I don't think I slept more than 3 hours.
Yet, the bikes were still there. (The Sheraton people had offered to store them for us earlier, but when we looked at the tag that said 'not responsible for loss' we decided to park them in the room)
At 8am Rhiannon and I hit the streets to check out the start of the Sun Run. We played bikes on a closed off Georgia, and watched people warm up.
Then we hit the course ahead of the wheelchair racers and headed towards Stanley park. At the 2.5km point I was overheatin' something fierce, so I doused myself in a cup of water from one of the water stands. Winning the Sun Run isn't easy.
We then hung out at English Bay to watch the wheelchairs, then the fast runners go by. At this point I should mention that the fast runners were led by a Trio of promotional H2s and H3s driving in reverse delta formation. We told them to get some bikes.
After we got bored with watching runners, we went back to the Sheraton to drink the last of the courtesy alcohol, and gather up our stuff.
We had stayed there because Rhiannon was nominated for two journalism awards, at a dinner/party hosted by CBC personalities Gloria Makarenko and Zack Spencer. In packing up, I started to think it was a mistake to have had flowers sent to the room.
Why a mistake? Well, I hadn't really thought ahead, and didn't think that I would be the one to have to transport the flowers when we checked out. Back through downtown with a loaded bag, and a boquette of Lilies, Roses and Dendrobiums. Who's a posenger now?
Honestly though, that was pretty fun. Signalling lane changes with a large mass of flowers seems to work pretty well, and lots of post Sun Run pedestrians were pointing and smiling. Imagine if I were riding a tallbike!
I'm feeling pretty good about this weekend's events and don't think that they'll be topped too easily. But now it's work time for me.
PS- This week's Projekt-Breakfast had a special semi vegan guest star. I'll let N1ck report on that however.
A journey into the mindset of four multi-disciplinary bike nerds. Riding dirty, breaking shit, fixing it, nerding it out, styling it up, passing it on, and arguing about it on the Internet.
