Saturday, May 30, 2009

Buffalo Creek-Nowhere '09

Read that like Paris-Nice and you'll start to figure out what happened.

Got signed up for the Burn offroad timetrial, got psyched up, drove down with Sarah and Fuentes, and got to the start house pumped up to ride a fast time.

Then fate, in the form of a missing marshal, intervened. At the very first turn, a y-junction in the road circling the lake, the course marshal was MIA. There was a cone placed strategically in the exact middle of the intersection, signifying nothing that I could comprehend, so I continued straight.

Big mistake. But fortunately, I wasn't alone - starting up the first big climb of the day (wait, the course was supposed to start out with a *descent*....) I spotted 2 riders a ways ahead. I felt great, and almost caught them, lost them on a mile-long fire road descent (spinning out like crazy), and then finally made the catch on the next climbing section. Best of all - one of them was Colby, who is a very strong climber. I was having a great day, making up time on my rivals! Er, or not...

As a side note, "Forgot about Dre" is a great song to have stuck in your head when you're anaerobic and chasing someone up a huge climb to nowhere.

Given that we could see at least 5 minutes up the road, and nobody was in sight, we quickly established that we were, in fact, nowhere near the course. In fact, if anything, we were making a beeline for Colorado Springs. Doh.

Flipped it, headed back, and cheered on the racers. The Team Evergreen boys were kind enough to refund Sarah's entry fee to make up for the snafu.

Fuentes, for those who are interested, won by over 4 minutes. Yeah, he killed 'em. Sarah was third in women's open, not bad at all! She won a cowbell, too!

I'll post a picture of Fuentes' prize when he emails it to me. It's pretty sweet.

Friday, May 29, 2009

Another racing post


I swear I'll post something more interesting than race reports next week. Really. Tomorrow you get another one, though, because I managed to win a free entry to the "Burn" mountain bike time trial at Buffalo Creek. I will get absolutely stomped on (the course is nice and flattish - Fuentes averaged 15mph last year!) So expect another whiny "it wasn't my course!" type of thing. You've been warned.

Wednesday night short track went pretty poorly for the team, I'd say. Ben did well in the Men's B race (5th!) and might have to upgrade soon, but otherwise:
-Sarah got stuck behind some girls who couldn't handle their bikes and had trouble getting around them (they both crashed on the final lap, so she did get them then), though I think she ended up 7th or something out of 18 racers.
-Fuentes crashed and spun his saddle sideways on the final lap, and ended up third.
-I had my worst start (and that's saying something!) ever and literally started dead last. Managed to pass a bunch of people, but still did crappy.

Redcoat had a good race, I think - went out fast and blew up a bit, but finished strong.

Perhaps I'll try to make tomorrow's race report more interesting. Or maybe I'll post a recipe (equally popular!) instead.

EDIT: Taryn got *3rd* (which I'm pretty sure is her best result ever!) in the women's B race - now we'll see how her new crazy-forward position works out next week. Nice job T!

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Jon's Lefty-9er


There is a hilarious (but too long for the blog) story about how I mis-measured the head tube on this bike after building it and panicked. Suffice to say that plastic calipers and hot metal can lead to... problems. Or to sum up even more succinctly: I'm an idiot.

Regardless, the head tube is actually fine. Jon built her up and is enjoying the Lefty fork with the big wheels. Check it out!

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Eszter wins the Growler!


Double X chromosome category, overall. Nice work, E!

Chris, um, bailed after a torn sidewall and a lot of mud. Here he is looking satisfied with his 30 miles of suffering. Note how spiffy that new bike looks now...

Sunday, May 24, 2009

You would be surprised...


...how well this extremely stupid idea works. Grinch badly needed the brake levers on my townie, so I gamely sold them to him for the low, low price of $10. Which I spent on beer.

Some of you may point out that it would probably be better to have this death-trap braking system installed on the rear wheel. I agree, but until I can find an old shifter cable long enough, the point is moot.

Maybe I'll make BSNYC with this setup. The hanging tatters of duct tape (used to "install" a light "system" at one point) should give it some extra curb appeal, not to mention the rusty imitation H-bars or the long-defunt steering damper mount integrated into the toptube.

Friday, May 22, 2009

How not to treat your bicycle and a belated race report


So Redcoat called me last week. "Got bad news, buddy. I broke my frame."

I was just waiting for the just riding along story, but instead, he said, "I threw it off a cliff, basically".

Amazingly, RC survived pretty much unscathed, but the bike landed HARD on a sharp rock, directly on the left seatstay (observe the carnage). He had to remove his rear brake caliper just to roll home, because it was shoved into the spokes.

So I spent Thursday doing emergency surgery and replacing the stay, the bridges, and the disc tab, because he's racing Angel Fire this weekend. Next time, drop the bastard on the *right* side, dude! Amazingly, the frame was still in perfect alignment (once I cut out the bent stay) and the repair went nice and smoothly. RC will be out $120, but that's chump change compared to being out a whole frame. Gotta love trustworthy, repairable steel!

In other news, the first Boulder short track rack of the year went off on Wednesday. I thought perhaps my best-ever hillclimbing fitness would transfer over in some way to this flat/sprinting race, but I was sadly mistaken. At the start, as usual, I managed to get boxed in and be about 25th (there were 40 or so dudes in the A/pro race) to the first corner. Whereupon somebody went OTB right in front of me. Lovely.

After managing to A) stay on my bike and B) not give the guy a chainring tattoo on his face, I started the chasing. The endless chasing. The lap was well under 2:30 (yes, that's 2 minutes, 30 seconds) and we were going 35 minutes or something, so I knew it would be a struggle not to get lapped by Colin Cares, Brian Fuentes, Colby Pierce, or one of the other really fast pro dudes in attendance.

Long story short, I picked off 15 or so people, didn't get lapped, and managed to finish just behind local fast short track guy Ward Baker. I was pretty pleased with that. Fuentes rode a great race and lost a sprint with Colin by half a wheel, and Miguel and Nick played around on totally inappropriate bikes (a 5" travel FS rig and a singlespeed with 'cross tires!) but did just fine.

In the ladies race, the field was HUGE - probably 20 gals. Good to see! Sarah was our lone representative and managed to basically miss the start, but recovered to beat 7 or 8 people, in her first race of the year. She also avoided being lapped by the super fast pro chicks, which was her goal. Nice work! I'm not sure how Taryn's race in the women's B category went (she took all the pictures, btw) but a good time was had by all.

Random Friday Complete Bike Photos


Chris' 5" travel 29er semi-freeride bike. Sweet thru-axle Reba fork!


And at the other end of the spectrum, Ryan's sparkly blue 'cross bike, with zero inches of travel.

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Big in Japan: Epic Finale Post

Well, ok, if by "epic" you mean, "regarding the installation of the seatstays and some small braces".

Seatstays. Argh. Every framebuilder's least favorite part - they require bending, multiple funny-angled miters (one of which is 90 degrees out of phase with the other), and they're structurally just about the least important part of the bike. I mean, you need them there, but they can be asymmetrical, mismatched, made from cheap carbon fiber, bolted on with chainring bolts, etc, and nobody would ever be able to tell while riding.

But everyone can see them. People who wouldn't bat an eye at a horribly mangled set of chainstays, or massive dents in your downtube, or missing paint, will make their opinion regarding the shape of your seatstays known every time. Many folks seem to think they're the end-all and be-all of creativity when it comes to frame design, and some people even think putting funny bends in them will make for a smoother ride (let out 5 pounds of tire pressure if you want that, folks).

So needless to say, on some days, seatstays are the bane of my existence. Today was one of them. I bent and mitered up a set of the super-burly 20mm (and .9mm thick!) seatstays I got from Burly when they stopped making bikes a few years ago. These stays are strong enough to probably use as *chainstays* for a relatively small person on a road or 'cross bike (I might even build one for some tiny person with them someday) and they're also great for 220+ pound folks. Yes, I could make custom stays from 3/4" 4130 or something, but for the price (I believe they were about $1 each, Burly was never going to use them again) these are a great way to do things. They also have a taper and built-in "bullet" at the dropout end, which is totally kickass.

Anyway, I bent them, and I mitered them, and then I mitered (slotted) the dropout end and went way overboard. The slots were WAY too long and the stays sat like an inch below where I wanted them on the seat tube. Just a brainfart, really, but super frustrating. Luckily I still had the seatstay fixture set up, so I tossed the stays into the "Misc stays" box (yes, it's got a LOT of random stuff in it!) and re-did the whole process. Bummer. One of the lessons I've started to learn (but still struggle with) is knowing when to give up on a part, toss it in the recycle (or re-use) bin and start over fresh. Sometimes it helps to go for a ride or take the dogs for a run before re-starting, too. Or smash my head into the wall a few times. In this case, it was too early for either, and I was still in a pretty good mood, so I just redid it.

And they came out just fine the second time around. As you can see, there's actually not that much clearance for a disc caliper (remember, this is a 21.5" frame, so the seatstay isn't as close to the caliper as it would be on a more "normal" sized frame). The BB7 is one of the biggest calipers on the market, so I figured that was a good one to test it out with. For smaller frames, I'll have to do a second seatstay bend at the dropout end to keep the stay up and out of the way. That's assuming, of course, that more folks want to use these dropouts. So far, I'm a fan.


I also have run out of low-fuming bronze (the stuff you use for fillet brazing, and which I usually use for braces and bridges because it's less work than using the TIG welder) so I had to TIG the seatstay bridge. Here's a quick shot of that.


Final frame brazeons (I need to decide how to route the rear brake line!) will be done tomorrow, but here's a shot of the 95% finished frame. She's a beast - about 6.5 pounds (and I haven't added the cable stops and rack mounts yet). But given that my own frame is something like 4 pounds, and I weigh 150, I think Derek is actually doing pretty well there.

Monday, May 18, 2009

Big in Japan: Part 2

For those of you who missed the first part of the story, scroll down a bit and find the first part to get caught up.

I got the chainstays and dropouts on this frame today (and yes, that's not much, but I also packed and shipped 3 frames, 4 forks, and a bunch of weld rod, so I only was able to work on the frame for an hour or so).

For a 300 pound rider, I wanted appropriately beefy chainstays. For most bikes, I'd use tandem stays (which I have a pile of, beacause True Temper discontinued them and sold them to me for like 75 cents - if you read back a ways, so far the only thing I've made with them is a fork). But with those (straight) stays, I could probably only get 45c or so worth of tire clearance. Derek wants to use Big Apples (about 60mm width), so mountain bike stays are the way to go.

I finally decided on some Nova "Mad Max" chainstays. 1.5"x.75" oval, 9mm, super burly. Also pretty shoddily made (one is 19mm width, one was 20mm). A little asymmetry won't kill anyone, though (and in fact you can't really even see it).

The chainstays are so huge (along with the huge seat tube) that they have to be compound mitered (by hand) to the seat tube, as well as the BB shell. Here's a shot of about halfway through the process...


He also wants a chainstay mounted disc brake, so I ordered some fancy schmancy Paragon low disc mount dropouts. Pretty spiffy!

Before anyone asks: Using these is about 30-40g heavier than breezers with a separate disc mount (that's taking into account the *much* shorter chainstays needed with these suckers, as well as the disc mount and brace needed with a conventional setup). Really not much of a weight penalty at all. I anticipate doing a decent number of bikes with these - I really like them and they save some work on my part (no need to miter or weld on a disc tab or seatstay/chainstay brace).

I'm guessing that there will be problems making the caliper fit in there on some smaller frames (and I'll do some experimenting to see). Worst case scenario, I'd have to put a second bend in the seatstay to arch it up over the disc caliper. For those who are curious, no, there won't be any upcharge for these.

Only quibble: I wish they were post-mount.

So there you have it. Tomorrow I should be able to finish up the rear end and I'll do a third post to talk a bit about the seatstays and such.

Coppi vs. Bartali!

Check it out - great NYT article on the great Giro rivalry.

Big in Japan pt. 2 coming soon...

Friday, May 15, 2009

Big in Japan: Part 1


This is the #2 interesting frame this week (though it's hard to beat Eric's bizarre FR-29er). Derek is looking for a 29er for (mostly) commuting when he moves to Japan.

No problem! Buy a bike when you get there!

Er, no. Derek is almost 300 pounds and 6'8" tall. They don't sell Godzilla size frames much in Japan.

When building bikes for really big folks (to me, this is >250 pounds) you really have to start throwing conventional tube choices out the window, if you want the bike to survive rough treatment from a really big person (and in this case, the bike will also be carrying loaded bags a lot of the time).

So tube choice is critical all around. Here's what went into the front triangle (pictured) and a few words about why I chose what I did.

The head tube is 1.2mm wall OX platinum. I often use 1.0mm wall head tubes, but for anyone over about 180 pounds, I always use these 1.2mm jobbies. Yes, that's still thinner than a lot of head tubes (it's not uncommon for builders to use 1.3mm or thicker wall 4130 head tubes) but it's also OX Platinum, which is a darn sight stronger than your garden-variety 4130 head tube.

As a side note, these head tubes are unpopular with custom builders because if you make them distort even a little, it's VERY hard to ream/face them for headset installation. I use heat sinks, backpurge the welds with argon, and weld carefully to keep them pretty close to round, so it's not a problem for me.

Paragon machine works makes a thicker BB shell than the one I used here, but honestly, even their lightweight shell is more than beefy enough for anyone. I've never had anyone encounter a problem with a BB shell (except that one I put in backwards 5 years ago, right Brad?) so this is the one part of the front end that is pretty much bone stock.

Seat tubes are usually 28.6mm (1 1/8") diameter, externally butted to fit a 27.2 post. Derek bends 27.2 posts like Uri Geller, so something beefier was called for here. His seat tube is a 9/6/9 double butted 31.8mm diameter top/downtube (no joke, this would be a moderately beefy road bike downtube for a normal person) which will accept a 30.0mm Thomson post. Of course, I've lugged/sleeved the seat tube to beef it up, and if he does manage to break the 30.0 post (or just doesn't like it) it can easily be shimmed down to 27.2.

The top tube is also pretty odd. In this case, it's a Nova 35mm 9/6/9 29er DOWNTUBE (I usually avoid Nova tubing, as it's cheap 4130 and the butting isn't to my liking, but it was the best choice here). Yes, this is a downtube that a lot of builders would use for a pretty big dude on a 29er. Thanks to Nova's weirdly long butts (80mm at one end, a ridiculous 220mm at the other) it can also be used as a toptube in this case (to be fair, Derek's frame has a 65cm toptube, so it's pretty long). Beefy!

Finally, the downtube. I really wish there was a better way to do this, but the only tube strong enough (IMO) is a 44.5mm OD 1/.7/1 Supertherm BMX downtube, and in this case, it's not nearly long enough (TT, make some longer versions!). So I was forced to use straightgauge .049 x 1 5/8" 4130. It's plenty strong, though quite heavy, and there's loads of room for 2 sets of bottle cage bosses. It's a bit of a shame not to be able to use a butted tube here, but I like to err on the side of caution when building bikes for really big folks - and Derek is aiming to ride around Japan, not win world cup races.

All in all, a tremendously overbuilt front end for a tremendously big dude (note that Derek is not even CLOSE to the biggest guy I've built a frame for, though - that honor goes to a fellow who is 7' tall and 400 pounds!)

Next time (probably Monday, since Paragon didn't ship me the dropouts I needed) some words about the rear triangle. There's unusual/interesting stuff going on there too.

Thursday, May 14, 2009

Quick for-sale

I blew it and ordered a post-mount front XTR disc brake for Redcoat's bike. He needed ISO. So now I've got a front XTR M975 post-mount (160mm) brake sitting here. $150 takes it, shipping included in the good old US of A. No rotor, just caliper/hose/lever. Pre-bled, really spiffy, blah blah blah. Email me!

More interesting stuff tomorrow, I promise.

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

Fat tire 29er


A few shots of Eric's frame (which I'm building while I wait for parts for Derek and some feedback on design from Blake).

Why is it interesting? Well, mainly because it has 425mm chainstays, 29" wheels, and clearance for up to 2.6" tires, while still using a front derailleur and gears. Pretty spiffy. Then add in the fact that it's built for a 135mm fork and has <30" standover, and you've got a pretty unique ride.

To get that to happen, I offset the seat tube forward a bit, used an 83mm shell, and did some dimpling/bending to maximize clearance. Not sure this would work any other way, simply because the front derailleur would cause too many problems.

I also did some goofy stuff (with Eric's approval) with the seat tube that I'll try to take some better pictures of when she's back from powdercoat.

Anyway, long story short, this should be a really fun "freeride" 29er. I'm not so sure myself about the whole idea of 5+" travel hardtails, but Eric likes 'em, so I think he'll like this too.

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Logan Mill: 17:28

Boo-yah!

Well, ok, so I mostly went faster, I think, because I wasn't carrying a ton of crud in a Camelbak. I actually felt like crud for most of the climb. Still, the fastest I've ever done it. I have a feeling that the 17 minute mark could fall, but I'm not going to be able to get any more gains from leaving stuff at home - I almost froze to death coming back down 4mile canyon because I didn't even bring a jacket. I guess I could leave my tube/pump/multitool at home too, but that's going a little far - I don't want to walk back to Boulder, personal record or no.

I could stash my clothes at the base and ride naked...
Now that you're all thoroughly disgusted, here's something (sort of) neat that I built for my Welsh friend Gumby recently. That's right - it's a lugged crown road fork. Something I really thought I'd never do. But in this case, it fit the bill to do what he needed, and it came out quite well, actually. I did learn that you have to dimple the fork blade on this type of fork to allow a 160mm brake rotor (yes, it's a disc fork) to clear the fork blade. Goofy. I have yet to decide if I'll offer these as an option - honestly, I don't build that many road bikes anyway, and almost everyone who gets one wants a carbon fork. I will probably build a few more for myself/friends and make sure they're working like I want and coming out straight and such, and then think about selling 'em.

Monday, May 11, 2009

Fox 2010

Fox is swapping to 2010 model year today, so you'll notice that prices are up a bit ($475 for the QR-version 29er forks) and that they're finally doing a 15mm axle 29er fork ($500, 100 or 120mm travel). While I'm more of a fan of 20mm, 15mm is a step forward for these long-travel 29er setups, so I'm pretty excited about it.

In any case, I hope to be doing a more interesting post tomorrow. Just thought I'd announce the Fox news here, since I've been getting a lot of questions about when these forks will be available. If you're a Waltworks frame owner/customer, and you're looking for one of these, let me know.

Sunday, May 10, 2009

Weekend recipe: Quiche!

I made this for Sarah's mom for mother's day brunch this morning.

As an aside, why does anyone like Mimosas? It seems like mostly a good way to ruin orange juice, to me...

Anyway:

Spinach-Cheese Oat Crust Quiche

Crust:
1/2c oat bran
1/2c whole oats (the rolled kind, not steel cut)
1 c flour
2 tbsp butter, melted
enough H20 for a dense dough

Mix all of that stuff together, then put the dough ball between two sheets of waxed paper and roll it out a bunch until it will fit properly in a (lightly greased) pie pan. Set the pie pan with the crust in it aside for a moment. The benefits of this crust over a store-bought one?
1. It tastes awesome.
2. It's cheap.
3. It's not made with half a gallon of hydrogenated oils and industrial crud, and it's got probably less than half the calories and fat.

Preheat the oven to 400.

Filling:
1c shredded mozzarella cheese
1c shredded extra sharp (I recommend Cabot!) cheddar cheese
8 eggs
couple of big handfuls of spinach

Take the cheese and eggs and mix up in a bowl. Add the spinach to the crust, then dump the rest of the filling on top. Mix around a bit if needed to make sure everything is evenly covered.

Bake at 400 for 40 minutes, or until the top is nicely browned.

PS Totally unrelated: The Time Traveller's Wife is a wicked good book.

Saturday, May 09, 2009

Weekend race report...

...from professional architect Brian Fuentes:

Morning races-

Ian must have designed some complicated roofs and pissed off a roofing contractor, cause he put a roofing nail through his tire 2.5 hours in, on a 3:34:00 pace, and had to pull the plug.

Taryn made a marginal decision to get some free protein supplements on course, and swallowed a big bug on the second lap and had to stop and dislodge the creature from her larynx. This did not improve her placing, but she did end up a very respectable 7th.

Mid Day -

Cubison was the man of the day, destroying the rest of the single speed field by 10 minutes or so, not riding his waltworks, since he threw it off a cliff last week. He proceeded to the bar to get some beer, and after the giro TTT, is reportedly heading to pearl st. for more imbibement then to the hills with MT for some backcountry two planking.

OMV, aka Old Man Mike Vigers, of the Spot team, who just got his driving learner's permit, was seen ripping the legs off the junior expert field on the 2006 fewgates WW mobile. yes, blown out parts and all, Vigers crushed them on a WW..

Eszter got 3rd, after a spectacular explosion rivaling the big bang. laps were 43 45 45 47 and 54 or something. go big or go home. or go big, blow up, and then go home. it was awesome.

fewgates, aka, I, myself and me, on the new rig was also 3rd, albeit 2 minutes slower than last year after getting dropped by JHK and Colin Cares after half a lap and doing the solo TT mission the rest of the day.

rumor has it megan and jung has graduated as well.

what a week ladies!

heres my crappy iphone pics.

Friday, May 08, 2009

Yo Forks



I do a lot of these - Steve's classic Yo, with new WW fork (it had an AMP before!)

Nothing exciting to write about today, really, other than my imminent Flagstaff-with-a-12-pack record attempt to occur at 1pm...

Wednesday, May 06, 2009

Musings about standover


I get a lot of questions about standover height, and I wanted to try to clear up a couple of confusing issues, or at least give folks my take on them.

First off, there's some confusion about what standover is for. Most people think standover clearance is a safety measure to keep you from hitting your crotch on the toptube. This is actually not true - you will *never* hit your crotch on the toptube in a riding situation, unless your solution to a poor choice of line is to take both feet out of the pedals and lurch slowly forward off the saddle. In reality, a crash in which the bike stops suddenly and you don't go over the bars will invariably result in smashing yourself into the STEM, not the toptube.

I have been riding bikes for a LONG time, and I have crashed them every possible way, and I have never once hit my crotch on the toptube. Not once.

In actuality, the situation (on a mountain bike) where standover is helpful is when you're getting on or off of the bike in a tricky spot (such as an offcamber hill). You want to be able to get your foot down while keeping the other foot clipped in (or keep a foot down while clipping in) and if the toptube is too high, this is very hard to do.

That's a pretty important thing to be able to do, so standover does matter. Just not for the reason most folks think it does.

The second point I want to make is that there isn't a standard way of measuring standover. If you throw a leg over your favorite frame and stand over it, you'll notice that you're standing just in front of the saddle, maybe even with the nose of the saddle touching your back. Your crotch is much closer to the seat tube than the head tube. Back in the day, this wasn't relevant, because toptubes were all pretty much level from the front to the back. But I do a lot of bikes with 20+ degrees of toptube slope - so the standover changes depending on where you measure it.

Unfortunately it's hard to predict *exactly* where you'll stand over the bike, so I measure standover at the midpoint of the toptube between the seat tube and head tube. But many manufacturers measure at other points, or in some cases, simply make up a standover number (at least as far as I can tell). The only way to check standover on a bike, really, is to either do the trigonometry yourself or else measure the bike in person. Standover numbers on websites are wrong at least half the time, in my experience.

How much do you need? That depends on your preferences with regard to tricky mounts and dismounts. Some folks really don't need any standover. Others need 3 or 4 inches to feel comfortable getting on and off. Generally, the more experienced a rider you are, the less you'll need. And on road bikes, you really don't need any at all - there's no such thing as a tricky mounting situation on a road bike, at least if you have any idea at all what you're doing.

Tuesday, May 05, 2009

Crap.

I'm really, really bummed. It looks as if I not only won't break the hillclimb record, I won't even get to *race* it.

No, I didn't hurt myself or get swine flu.

Long story short, Sarah's dad bought us tickets to fly out to Bend for a week for her brother's graduation. He did not consult with us about the dates before buying them, though, so we don't get back until the 13th. The race is in the morning, and we'll be landing at DIA right about when they're handing out the awards. Bummer.

So yeah, I bailed on the record attempt, I guess. I'm pretty pissed, but changing the tickets would cost $400. I'm not *that* pissed.

Sadly, I think I might have had a shot, too. I did Logan Mill in 17:45 to the summit yesterday, which is a good 10-15 seconds or so faster than my old record from back when I was young and fit. And that was my first go at it this year, and I was wearing a freakin' camelbak! Needless to say, I was shocked and pleased. But it looks like that fitness will end up being for nothing.

Then again, they say that it's really about the journey and not the destination, and having the goal really helped me stay focused on getting in good shape this winter. I'm climbing and riding as well as I ever have, which is really a nice feeling.

Is it too soon to start talking about next year?

We have a weiner!

Erm, I mean winner.

Blake, step up to the podium (well, metaphorically, anyway) - you've won the prestigious design contest!

I'm not going to go into too many details about why I chose the way I did, but briefly, Blake's entry is professional looking but still fun, easy to understand, and the right shape to fit well on a bike frame tube. It plays nicely off of the old WW logo while adding something new. Great work!

I'll do my best to have these in production in the next few weeks and they'll start going on bikes as soon as the guys at Victory Circle graphics can make them (btw, Blake, send me a vector-format version if you could).

I'm also giving an honorable mention/runner up award to Sandy - I thought her entry was the most purely creative and interesting, though it also requires a bit too much explanation. I don't have enough customers (or possibly any?) fluent in American Sign Language, or you would have won, Sandy!

Blake, I'll be discounting your frame (which I'll be building soon!) as your prize. Sandy, you've got a 10% discount available if you want to use it, anytime for the next year.

Thanks to everyone for their excellent entries.

Sunday, May 03, 2009

Return of Weekend Recipe

This one's for you, Eszter. Because you were the only person to complain about the lack of recipes over the last few weeks.

Why? Because it's dirt cheap, but looks and tastes like something you'd get at a fancy restaurant (as an aside, I was once thrown out of the Olive Garden, which was at the time my standard for "fancy" for abusing the breadstick/salad all-you-can-eat policy).

Ahem.

Pasta with Spiced Sweet Potato and Yogurt

First up, this will take 45 minutes, but most of the time, you don't have to do anything. So settle in with a beer or a nice glass of zin.

1# sweet potato, diced into 1cm cubes
2 tbsp olive oil
5 cloves of garlic, crushed

Put these first three items in a bowl and swish them around until the potato chunks are oily and garlicy. Now put them on a baking sheet and bake at 400 degrees for 30 minutes. Take them out halfway through and toss them around to make sure they don't burn or stick.

At the same time, cook half a pound or so of pasta (any kind you like). Set it aside.

Next, put the following in a saucepan and cook until they smell nice (and don't burn them):
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp dried chili flakes (steal from a pizza place if needed)
5 garlic cloves, crushed
1 teaspoon coriander (these are cilantro seeds, did you know that?), crushed (you can do this with the flat of a knife on a cutting board, or in a mortar/pestle if you're a cooking geek)
1 teaspoon ground cumin

Now add the pasta, the sweet potato, and a cup of plain yogurt, mix up, and serve. The other ladies at the potluck will be ashamed of their jello salads and you'll be the toast of the town!

Or something like that.

Saturday, May 02, 2009

Mini-me vs. Me


So when I rode Marcus' 36er, people generally commented that I looked ridiculous. Some of you said some quite hurtful things about my manhood, or lack thereof, as a matter of fact. Bastards.

Well, I'll show you. I'm HUGE now!

This is just about the smallest 700c wheel bike I could imagine building. And yes, the saddle is at the correct height for Casie. Martin and I measured.

Friday, May 01, 2009

Design contest entries

These are in no particular order. No decisions have been made yet about winners, but I will say I was very impressed with all the entries!

If you sent me an entry and it's missing, please let me know. I'm a little absentminded sometimes and I have a nagging feeling that there's a logo that isn't on here. I could just be crazy, though.

From Brad:


From Blake:


From Sandy (see explanation below, and note that these do not scale well as JPEGs, hence the blurriness is my fault, not hers):


Walt,

Here's my entry!

In American Sign Language "to ride a bicycle" or say "bicycle" as an object, the speaker motions as if spinning cranks, peddling with their hands. This is represented by the directional arrows. The two circular objects are ancient astronomical symbols for the Sun and Earth. The Sun (or solar symbol) is the circle with a dot in its middle. The Earth (or sun cross) is the circle with the cross inside.

It's GREEN!

I've attached four variations as Photoshop images.

Enjoy,
Sandy

From David:


From Christopher:

Don't try this at home...


...we are highly trained professional cyclists.

Design contest has ended! Many thanks to everyone who entered. I will post all the entries later today - I will choose winner(s) over the weekend and make an announcement on Monday morning.