I am back home from another week of traveling. I didn’t have enough free time to post last week, but I did see a few things on the web that are worth passing along. Also last week, I uploaded a few more pictures of the Strida to Flickr. I have already shipped the bike back but, as promised, I will write more about my experience with it soon.
If you read BikeSnobNYC at all, you are familiar with the “fixed gear freestyler” description that he uses pretty often. Basically, the term applies to a track bike that has been retrofitted/ modified with something like a top tube pad, chopped riser bars, powdercoated rims, aerospoke front wheel, etc. A while back, I posted a link to a group of bikes on Razor Apple, which take the whole fixed gear freestyler idea to the extreme. Sure bikes that fall into the whole urban fixie category are trendy now, and that makes them pretty easy to make fun of. I am definitely no bike snob, but I have been guilty of questioning the point of some recent fixed gear fads in the past. Well, last week I ran across the Cadence Clothing photostream on Flickr (from which the picture here was taken) and I was pretty impressed. These are some great shots of real fixed gear freestyling in action (check out the air on this one). All I can say is that if you can ride like these guys, I will never make fun of your bike; no matter how silly the top tube pad looks or how many cards are stuck in the spokes (it is worth noting that top tube pads are absent on all the bikes pictured). Anyway, there is no doubt that the guys in these pictures are pretty damn rad. I encourage you all to check out all the shots. While you are at it, take a look at Cadence Clothing’s website as well; they make some pretty good looking stuff.
Knowing that I have posted a few wooden bikes in the past, Fritz of Cyclelicious pointed me toward a design concept from an architect called the “OLC” (for “One Less Car”). The 2 speed (?) “one size fits all” bike is targeted toward the mass market. The designer imagines that a company like IKEA could sell the bike for his target retail price of $35 (US) making it an almost disposable transportation solution. This concept looks like it could be made cheaply, but I am pretty skeptical of that extremely low target cost. Also, as Fritz pointed out in his email, there are no visible provisions for adjustment, so I am not sure about the one size fits all claim. I don’t know that this will be the one, but I would not be surprised to see a bike that folds or packs flat from IKEA one day. Under 50 bucks though? Sounds good, but I kind of doubt it.
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