Remember these? The smaller sizes sold out in 2 days and the numbers for the big sizes dropped fast too, but tapered off. So there are still a few 18s, 20s, & 22" available. They won't hang around forever. Remember: pink is fast, regardless of whatever your homophobic racer geek friend tells you.

There's this guy...Sean Grady...who decided to stop what he was doing and take life by the handlebars. He's been riding a bike...a Surly 1x1 to be exact with a steel GT fork to accomodate his front rack.... from "new jersey to new york city via mexico : watch as i become a deranged homeless man on a bike, right before your very eyes!" He found us in vegas and wrote me not too long ago from mexico. All his exploits can be found here. The site hosting his journal is a good resource for bicycle travellers, with lots of tips for packing and preparing, as well as many journals from other bicycle travelers which can themselves be useful for gleaning bits of first hand experience as you prepare for your own journey. Suitable for firing you up or scaring you off. Does both to me.

The usual commute for this time of year in Minnesota entails bundling up from head to toe and slogging through the residual snow piles from the long season. Not so last night. It's been melting for 4 weeks now and we had our first real signs of spring with a thunder and rain storm. By the time I left work, the rain had subsided and left a warm, humid and foggy atmsophere that left me thinking it was May. A mile into the ride, I realized I was way overdressed. Down to knickers and longsleeve woolies, I rode lightless through the park. The fog was so dense that lights just made it harder to see. The park is usually void of people at night, but loaded with night creatures. The deer, rabbits and ground varmints will scare the crap out of you. Above me, the sliverred moon and stars were out. It was absolutely stunning.

There were almost no cars on the streets at this time, which made for some long no-handed sessions and lots of rolling through stop signs in the middle of the street. Was I going home like I'd planned? No way, it was too nice and my legs felt good. I took some routes I hadn't taken since before the snow first fell in November. The houses were lit up and you could see what peoples' living rooms looked like. I'm no peeper, but it's fun to see how people decorate.

Through the puddles and fog I rolled down to Lake Harriet. Still frozen and foggy, I dipped down by the lake and immediately the temperature dropped 10 degrees. A reminder that it was winter not too long ago. The only remaining snow left was in the parking lots where they plow it into 20 foot high piles. Sometimes these piles last through June. Not this year.

Through Uptown and down some steeps hills, I went into urban mode and blasted into Downtown Minneapolis. Again, no cars and few people. Another sign of spring is the lack of clothing seen on people hanging outside the downtown nightclubs. I love spring!

There were no signs of a bike pile outside Grumpy's bar, so I went home to have a homebrew and some dinner. Perhaps the best rides you'll do are the ones that end up being longer than expected with an unplanned route. Just turning when you feel like it and going home when you feel like it. There is no pressure to compete with cars or suffer from the cold temperatures. The wheels of my Pacer made it feel like I had a tailwind the whole time. Especially after pushing a fendered, knobby tired, crap carrying winter bike for the last 5 months. Happy.

Hells bells, I think i have SARS. Got back a couple of days ago from kansas city, MO with lungs that feel like they've been injected with motor oil. Caught some funk, but then I guess I deserve it. I had more than my share of fun at the IMBA Midwest Mountain Biking Summit, held on the incredible singletrack trails at Landahl Reserve (outside of Blue Springs, a suburb of KC), put together by Earthriders, the local trails access and maintenance organization. If you are traveling and have the bikes on the car and want to ride some killer trails, this is worth a detour. Twisty, rooty, rocky, sometimes long climbs, sometimes long downhills, always varied, and miles and miles of this. Weather was a bit cold but bee-yutiful. Went on 2 spectacular night rides, plus lots of daytime rides. Met lots of cool folks too. Dang. That was just fun.

Which got me to thinking how much fun SSWC in Berlin is going to be this summer. Those wacky germans are already done organising the event, so now they're sitting around drinking beers, wondering what they forgot to do (correct if I'm wrong, phat c.). But it sounds like everything is lined up to be stellar. The usual suspects from this rock, plus the UK, plus the Whiz-ards of Aus, plus the Canucks, Belgians, Italians, the list keeps going...come on, who else?
You got a single speed and like to git dowwwwwn and want to visit someplace new? Baby, bring it! This is gonna be a big one. Staying in Berlin, riding in The Black Forest.....do I really need to keep telling you? No. Here's all the hot-diggity you need: www.sswc2004.com. It would be a really good idea to book your room now. And if you don't have a passport, start that process now too or you'll be sorry.

We only sell one complete bike...the Cross-check. But, you can get a complete bike built for you by your local shop or by the BikeBuilder program at QBP, our US distributor.

BikeBuilder is very flexible. It allows you to get a bike built as you want it, as long as the parts are offered by QBP. Luckily QBP has the best parts selection of any distributor in the world. If you don't know what you want, we might be able to help. Andy, Nick and I put together some build options to help your local bike shop get a bike built for you. In some cases, we've put together a couple of build options at different price points. You can change 1 item , or all items, of our build spec. It's totally up to you.

The build options and prices are given in the QBP wholesale catalog. So, your bike shop should be able to give you an accurate quote for a complete bike that we've spec'd. If you want something partially or totally custom, your shop can call the QBP customer service folks and ask for a quote for your parts specification.

Why don't we offer all of our framesets as complete bikes? Because it's a pain in the ass. When you offer a complete bike, you are at the mercy of every component manufacturer who has a part on the bike. That introduces a lot of variables into the project. If one part is late, the bike is late. Sometimes, we are out of Cross-check complete bikes. Usually, it's because something got delayed in the component pipeline. Luckily, the Cross-check uses commonly-available parts that aren't really affected by industry trends. So, those parts are available year after year. What? You think our Cross-check complete bike spec. sucks? That's fine. Order one with your own parts spec, and have it built by your shop or by the BikeBuilder wrenches.

Soon, we should be able to publish the BikeBuilder pages, of the QBP catalog, on the Surly site. You won't get pricing info, but you'll be able to see what we offer as suggestions.

Truckers love babies.

My wife started a new job on Monday. Her schedule doesn't give her time to drop off our son, Noah, at daycare in the morning. So, I'm Noah's new morning daycare drop-off shuttle captain. The shuttle is a Burley D'Lite. The tractor is my Long Haul Trucker. And, the route adds another 6 miles to my daily commute total.

It snowed last night...only about an inch or so. It's the kind of frosty, wet snow that you see in postcards...beautiful, but potentially sketchy. The temp was 31 degrees F, when I left the house this morning, so the roads were a bit slick....somewhere between freezing and thawing. The Trucker tracked like a champ. It was the perfect vehicle for the tuggin' task. Maxxis Wormdrive 700c x 42mm tires provided the traction.

The Trucker is proving to be a great all-round commuter, tourer, trailer-puller and grocery-getter. I find that it handles single-track just fine, too. The stays are longer than you'd typically spec on an off-road bike. But, when it's loaded, there's traction to spare.

The LHT order was placed a month ago. So, we should see them in roughly 60 days, unless something goes terribly awry in production.

Tip of the Day:

Check your hub bearings for proper adjustment. We've noticed with single speed drivetrains that more torque goes into the rear wheel and can cause things to loosen or tighten while just riding along. One common problem we see on rear hubs is the driveside outer locknut loosening in combination with the cone tightening. This puts excessive loads on your bearings, slows the rotation of the wheel and usually results in premature bearing failure. Our hubs use adjustable cartridge bearings, which means you should adjust them. Resist the temptation to ride your bike without wrenching on it periodically and make sure you check this outer locknut frequently on your singlespeed drivetrains. Your bike will thank you for it.

A while ago, Andy and/or Nick mentioned that we got a weird shipment of rear 135mm-spaced 36-hole fixed/freewheel hubs in silver (Part #HU0225). We still have 20-25 of them, if anybody is interested. They are priced at 75% of our other non-disc rear hubs, because they aren't in a catalog...so they are harder to sell.

I got two, for myself, just to have 'em for a couple of badass off-road fixie wheels. The Karate Monkey hasn't had a fixed wheel in it yet. I think the time is near.

We still have some reduced-price 03' 20" orange Instigators, and some reduced-price '03 Steamrollers with 1" steerers. There's also a new 18" scratched orange Instigator (Part # FM3031A) for a great price. Bug your local bike shop to order one for you. Orange Instigators are on sale, because Yellow is the new flavor. 04' Steamroller steerers were changed to 1-1/8", because we added a 62cm size. We felt that a 62cm frame should be accompanied by the larger steerer to accomodate a larger, heavier rider. There's nothing wrong with 1-1/8", so we changed the rest of the sizes to match. It's less confusing this way. And, now, all of our framesets are compatible with 1-1/8" steerers.

Don't worry... we'll continue to sell 1" Steamroller and Cross-check forks. There's still a large enough market for them.

There's good news on the Surly stainless steel chainring front. Rings have been ordered for a while, and the day of their birth is near, I feel. Production has been delayed due to rapidly rising and fluctuating steel prices. Availibility has been sketchy, too. Finally, our manufacturer was able to locate the desired material in Canada, so we have one less border paperwork hoop to jump through. And, the supply should be dependable.

Nick's making final changes on the rear Nice Rack. Realistically, it's going to be another 3-4 months before we see them. The front rack should be here in 6-9 months. It could be sooner, but almost everything takes longer than we anticipate. We have a rear rack sample that is pretty close to the final product. It's sturdy. I'm confident that the production Nice Racks are going to be tough.

Large Marge. Josh and I are still nitpicking and arguing over the best cut-out design for the XC version...arguing with our manufacturer, not with each other. We're close. I have the purchase order ready, but we need to finalize everything before metal starts flying.

That's all for now.

My ride to work today was painful, in many regards.

Heading west, on my way to work, I coasted toward the red traffic light at 42nd and Cedar. A tall conversion van was in the right turn lane; a sedan was in the left lane; I was in the 6-to-8-foot-wide space between them (the right side of the left lane...where I'm supposed to be), waiting for the light to turn green, so I could proceed through. A rent-a-cop on a moto-trike (lights flashing) was blocking the intersection as a funeral procession was moving through, just in case our light turned green before the procession had passed. That rent-a-cop took off, and my light turned green. Assuming the procession was over, with the conversion van blocking my view to the right, I proceeded halfway through the intersection, before I T-boned a red Acura 2-door that blew his red light (from my right) just before the next rent-a-cop escort got to the intersection. The red Acura (who was supposedly part of the procession) didn't have any orange flags, denoting a funeral procession car, and he should have stayed behind the trike, or, at least, stopped at the red light. Right?

I went down pretty hard on my ass and back. So, I'm sore, and my back feels a bit tweaked. Nothing's broken, as far as I can tell, but I'm going to hurt worse tomorrow.

The worst part, of this whole ordeal, is the fact that the cop in an unmarked squad, who showed up almost instantly, told me that I was in the wrong. "A green light means you should proceed with caution", said Hennipen County Deputy Curt Raymond. "You should have waited for the van to turn", he said. I wasn't in the turn lane!! What the F$#k!?? I went through on green, at 10mph max, with no funeral escort blocking the intersection, while some dude ran his red light and almost added another funeral...mine... to the global list. And, I'm in the wrong? Luckily, I wasn't going faster. And, luckily, I wasn't in an automobile. If I had been, I might have seriously hurt somebody, including myself.

I know that most, if not all, funeral escorts are off-duty cops, so I called him on his bias...because I think the escort was partially in the wrong, too. Deputy Raymond just gave me the runaround, while giving the funeral escort the proverbial friendly reacharound. He wouldn't even consider my side of the story. And, the dude, who blew the red light, got nothing, ticketwise. I asked for a report. He said that I won't be getting a report. What!!?? I'll inquire with the courthouse tomorrow. It's public record. I'm curious to see the report.

I try to give cops the benefit of the doubt. Really. Cops have tough jobs, and some of them are cool to cyclists. Some cops ride Surlys. But, Deputy Raymond has soured me with his bias and ignorance.

If you've ever wondered how good the singletrack riding and bike culture is in Kansas City, you must check out the Midwest Mountain Biking Advocacy Summit happening March 19-21st. Rides, races and nightly events will be sure to have you in and out of trouble all weekend. Check out the official info site: www.earthriders.org for more details. All I can say is Andy, myself and a few other Minnesota screwballs will be there ready to rumble. Hope you can make it.

Don't say I didn't warn you that you'd want one.

We have been sitting on this for a while now. Every once in a while we'll do small runs of colors that we don't regularly offer. This time around it's PINK 1X1s! These are a limited run! We are not taking orders for these, they are first come, first served. So get down to your local shop right now and have them try to get you one. Writing to us with plea bargains and whatnot will not do you any good because we don't sell direct! Your shop has to order them. Call them right now!! There are less than 100 of these but they are available in the full size run (14"-22"). Next time...maybe Crosschecks. I dunno yet. no promises.

A short ride from my house, part of the route I take to get downtown and beyond, is a wooden walking bridge over a river inlet, followed by a tree-canopied trail of crushed gravel and curving slope. It's a great riding trail, but I stop here sometimes coming home late, lay the bike by the side of the trail, walk around, maybe sit on the leaves or snowbank. Chill out.
There's another spot not too far away. I have spent a good deal of time paused on the railroad bridge, usually coming home from a show, ears ringing, reeking of smoke, the skyline reflected in the river. Sometimes the moonlight mixed with the rush of the ride takes over and I smooch with my lady.
There are some places I only ever go on my bike. Places I associate only with beauty, happiness, reflection.

As you may know by now, we Surly chumps are motivated by beer. Considering I can only brew 200 gallons of beer at my house in one year by law (thank you Jimmy Carter), when I was offered a chance to brew 310 gallons in one day I gladly said YES. O'Hara's Brewpub in St.Cloud, MN has a 10 barrel micro brewery that offers 4 tasty beers year-round and a few seasonal offerings. Chris Laumb, the head brewer and fellow bike geek, has been brewing there since 1996. He is very knowledgable of beer and bicycles, plus he rides his fancy Rivendell to work everyday.

My role was the "helper monkey" for Chris and to learn the ins and outs of small scale commercial brewing. If you think homebrewing on your stovetop is intimidating, try being at the control switch of 310 gallons of boiling malt, hops and water. If you let this mixture boil over too much, it will flow out of the kettle and encase everything in a sticky ugly mess. Being overly careful, I safely avoided the dreaded boil over and got a nice steam facial treatment in the process.

Another highlight was climbing INSIDE the mash kettle where the malted grains were cooked to scrub it down by hand. Chris proceeded to tell me stories (from outside the kettle, you sicko) he's heard of sexual encounters in the kettles at other breweries, but assured me nothing like this has happened at O'Hara's. After scrubbing and spraying the kettle, I was soaked and had dripped water into my rubber boots.

Once all the cooking was done, we were ready to cool it down and add yeast to initiate fermentation. A mind boggling maze of flow lines and valves were opened and closed as the boiling mixture was almost instantly cooled to 68 degrees F and pumped into the basement fermenter. We walked downstairs and added the yeast. A sense of pride came over me for helping produce what will soon be a wonderful Pale Ale. The pride was quickly erased as I realized there was another hours-worth of cleaning to do.

If you think brewing is glamorous, it's not. But like any labor intensive job, it can be rewarding, especially if you're into whatever it is you're working on. Be it slinging java at the coffee shop or drawing bike parts on the computer for a kickass bike company, having a job you love is the most important step to making your 8 hours a day a happy experience.

Chris has successfully made his homebrewing hobby into a career without ruining his passion for making beer. Or perhaps it's just the perks of mandatory product testing that keep him happy. We ended this excellent brew day with some product testing of our own. Yum.