SSWC2006 Stockholm Rather Lengthy Recap

Day 1 in Stockholm- Hurl and I slap together our bikes and go for a cruise around town to get rid of the airplane butt. On this warm and sunny autumn day, we meet some guys we knew from the US. Rolling through old Stockholm on narrow cobbled streets that are older than the United States of America is humbling. These people have been here doing their Scandinavian thing for so long, it's hard to not respect their way of life. They even have ramps down the stairways for baby strollers, which we found to be excellent riding. In the evening, that "one last beer" phenomeonon happened at the bar next to our hotel.







Day 2- The sun is beaming into our hotel room telling us to get up and ride off the beer fumes. The locals have organized a long trail ride right from town. After the standard hard boiled egg, ham sammich and coffee for breakfast, we roll across town to meet everyone. The ride goes through town, hops a 5 minute ferry across one of the abundant waterways in town and eventually hits some trails. If you read my previous blog about SSWC2006, you'll know there were tons of roots and rocks on the course. Each time our ride leaders said "it is about to get more rooty and more rocky up ahead" I thought there was no way it could. But it did, and you found a way through it all. Then you heard them say it again, and again, and again. 4 1/2 hours later we were off the trails and almost at the train station to take us back into town. The original 20 riders had been reduced to 12, we hopped the train and talked about how good the beer was going to taste. Jonas and Johan took us to the cheap bar in town for happy hour. Sub-$3 beers is almost unheard of in Stockholm, so we took advantage.




Day 3- Wow, what happened last night? My head hurt and the only cure was to go for another ride. We meet up with a few folks, mostly Americans this time, and try to not get lost. Nobody in the group knew the trails, but there is so much parkspace around town all you have to do is wander around to find it. There were some folks from Finland also, one of them on a Karate Monkey fixed gear. Only his fixed gear did not hand a left-hand lockring, so he was riding "suicide" fixed gear without hand brakes for the whole week. Nuts! The ride was a short 2 hours so we didn't cook our legs for tomorrows race.

Day 4- Race Day- Only two people in the entire world knew the race course, so it was going to be a surprise for us all. It was announced that we'd be riding two 14k laps, then we slowly rolled out of town towards the start line. The bike path was filled with locals walking and biking and I couldn't believe there was not a head-on collision with our mass of 200 riders. Being completely car free made this event really nice and cheap. If you want to read more on the race report, see my previous blog.







Post race party was really good, tons of prizes, we gave away a frameset to the best volunteer of the event who marked all 14k of the course the night before. There was a DJ pumping music and at one point they played Prince and Violent Femmes. Hearing two local Midwest US bands play in Sweden was odd but good. Locals mixed with bikers and eventually a chunk of the party moved down to a dock along the lake. Swimming, beer, fire, 30 people from about 8 countries and a sunrise pretty much sums up this part of the evening/morning. This marked the 3rd day in a row that I stayed up to watch the sunrise.

Day 5- Post race day was quite slow. Eventually everybody wandered down to see what damage was done to eachother and see the race winners' tattoos. The big event to choose where SSWC2007 was going to be held was supposed to be a sailing boat race. What does sailing boats have to do with biking? Who cares. But there was no wind that day and the event turned into a speed drinking contest with teams of 4 from each country. UK, USA, New Zealand, and (I think) Netherlands competed. Each person eventually drank two beers each and UK crushed everybody. Their secret weapon was a sweet innocent little girl named Mel. So if you haven't heard by now, Scotland will be hosting SSWC next year. Exactly where and when are TBD, but I can assure you these folks show up every year and are often the last people standing. Top notch people, so I imagine it will be ace.







Later in the day, Hurl and I caught a movie in the park and then wandered back to the bar. After 4 days of riding and partying, people were amazingly still in the mood to rally. It was Jessica Stein's (Spot Brand) birthday at midnight and people were starting to get rowdy by derbying and sprinting. Just about the time Hurl and I were thinking of getting into the mix, SSWC2005 winner Buck and perennial goofball Deejay wrastled eachother into the bar window. I mean in through the bar window. That put a little damper on us being at the bar, so everybody split up. Nobody got seriously hurt, nobody went to jail and we all helped the bar pay for a new window, which was repaired before the next morning. There was no derby, but I saw the sun come up again for the 4th day in a row.







Day 6- Mellow and rainy, coffee shops, walking around town, absorbing all we could during our last day there. None of us wanted to leave Stockholm, to the point where I thought about selling half my belongings to move there. Have you ever wanted all your friends from around the world to live in the same city as you? Or have you ever been to summer camp and didn't want to go home at the end of the week? That's what SSWC feels like every year for me. Anybody who thinks SSWC is dead, 200+ people just proved you wrong.




A massive thank you to all you Swedes who made it happen, especially Tobias for being the main man, Jonas and Johan for showing us the trails and the cheap beer, Dane and Phil for organizing everything, Magnus for the beer stop and for my new friends who taught me what it's like to be a viking.

Some things about Sweden that really kick ass:

- You are charged money to drive cars into the central city

- There are more bike and pedestrian lanes throughout the entire city than anywhere else in the world I've been

- Cyclists and pedestrians have the right of way over motorized vehicles. Although it got busy during rush hour, nobody ever came close to having an accident

- We witnessed only two events of road rage the whole week, one of them by a cab we were in

- Blondes

- The abundant parkspaces are for use by all, except golfers and motorized vehicles

- Everybody has access to healthcare

- Zero obesity

- Blondes

- People wearing business suits on bikes

- Low pollution

- Really nice people

- Dense housing

- No bumper to bumper highways

- Blondes

Our Steamroller frameset and fork supply is having a temporary hiccup, but we should have them all in stock by the end of today.

I found this article about the drunkest city in America kind of interesting.

Thanks Dave for posting the super-icky pictures of your ankle chicken. I can almost smell it from here.

Did you actually think ANYONE wanted to see these?

Pass the barbeque sauce please...

I got to see my surgery incisions for the first time yesterday. While the bandages were off, I took the opportunity to get some pics of my new skin art. The white stuff is gauze fuzz, not mold…I hope.

The bandages left a chicken skin texture on my ankle. Unfortunately, my flexibility isn’t quite up to par, so I can’t confirm that it tastes like chicken. Until I locate a qualified ankle-licking fetishist to identify the flavor, we’ll just assume that it does, indeed, taste like chicken. I’ll keep you posted.

Kyoto Chie Matsuri Alley Cat Report

I recently made about 50 new friends in a single day. I shit you not.

Last Sunday I arrived in Kyoto by Shinkansen for the Chie Matsuri Alley Cat. The event was held for the first time this year, in place of the much larger Kyoto Loco event held the past two years. The main reason they had to stop doing Kyoto Loco was that it got too large by its second year and the city planners were not keen on having a third one. In order to keep it a bit smaller it was deliberately held on August 13th, the first day of the Japanese Obon holiday. During Obon many people leave Kyoto to travel, so the attendance would theoretically not be as high as if it were held at another time.


My first stop was Ginrin Bike shop, which is about 5 minutes walk from Kyoto Station. Muga Amemori is the master of this shop, and is one of the first dealers in Japan to carry Surly. But more than that, he really understands the Surly brand, and has worked very hard to spread the good word all through Japan. Needless to say, we owe him our gratitude, and no trip to Kyoto can begin anywhere but his shop.



I spent about an hour chatting with Muga about various things, then another great friend, Takuya Kodama, stopped by the shop to meet me and take me to Fortuna House where I would spend the night. We finished assembling my Karate Monkey and then headed out for about a 10 minute ride before arriving. Upon entering I was introduced to several messengers who were lying around on the tatami mat floor trying to cool off on this hot summer day.



Only three people live in this house, but numerous friends are always there and on the weekends a lot of them will stay there. The first person I met was Reiko, who is one of the tenants. She graciously allowed me to stay in her room for the night, and she stayed at her parents' house nearby.



After hanging out and chatting with the Fortuna House folks, Takuya asked me if I wanted to see a cool temple about three minutes walk from the house. I said sure, and so did Reiko, so we headed out. The name of this temple was Sanjusangen-Do. I had no expectations going in but when we got there I was pretty amazed. This temple is very old, built in the 12th century, and its most impressive characteristic is that it contains 1001 full-size statues of Buddha. I personally am not interested in all the history of Buddhism, but the cultural significance of these temples in Kyoto is really moving. Kyoto is the cultural center of Japan, so if you ever go there you will likely be spending a lot of time in temples and shrines.

After visiting the temple we headed back to the house for a bit to gather our stuff and then we rode over to the Kyoto City Hall, where the meeting spot for Chie Matsuri was. There were quite a few folks already there when we arrived, most of them signing up for the races. I guess I shouldn't really call them races, because although there were many riders who took them very seriously, the winner of the races in no way determined who got the prizes. Chie Matsuri had the slogan, "Neko wa daremo korosanai," which means "An alley cat never kills anyone." Chie Noguchi, the event organizer (hence the name Chie Matsuri), wanted to emphasize the participation of women, so she deliberately made the prize structure such that anyone could win. Indeed, they asked me to make the decisions about who would win the two Surly frames we donated for prizes (a 46cm Crosscheck and a 54cm Pacer). I really liked the anti-competition theme of this event. Chie's goal was to try and introduce women who were not hard-core messenger types to the fun of riding a bicyle for sport. It seemed to work in that several women showed up for the event on bicycles unsuitable for racing.



The first race/event was a team alley cat. Each team had six members on it, and were given a manifest with a variety of quiz questions that would need to be answered along the way. There was also a lot of room left to be creative, so the teams were encouraged to get jiggy widdit. The first race took a little over one hour to complete, and in the end I had no idea who won (as I metioned before, winning the race was no relevant anyway). It was clear, however, that everyone was having fun.



The second race was the individual alley cat, mixed between men and women. While the riders were out completing their manifests I was struggling to come up with a way to decide who would win the frames. I didn't want it to be completely arbitrary, so deciding was very difficult. In the end, I decided on one woman and one man to give them to. It was much easier to choose the woman than the man, since the theme of the event was aimed at bringing in new female riders, and setting one of these ladies up with a new rig would really help her get started. So, my choice for the lady winner was Akane Edo. She showed up on an aging city hybrid and managed to come in third in the individual alley cat race. I was really impressed by this, but this is not why I chose her. The reasons I picked her were: 1) She badly needed a new bike; 2) She has an irresistible pureness to her that made it really hard for me not to pick her; 3) She was very interested in the Surly brand and asked many questions to me before the race; 4) She bought me a beer (this should be #1 I suppose). Anyway, congratulations Akane san! We are looking forward to seeing pictures of your new Crosscheck after it's built up.



Choosing the winner for the men was much more difficult, as there were no clear standouts. So, I decided that the winner would be decided by derbying for it. Muga organized the derby by asking all men interested in winning the frame to gather around the circle in the arcade area. In all there were about 20 men who entered, and after they were taught the rules they began in heats of three or four members per. There were some great battles, and luckily, no serious carnage, but in the end the winner was Yusuke Mori on his Karate Monkey. He was well deserving of the Pacer frame. He was so happy to win it that he gave me the saddle off his Karate Monkey. This was no ordinary saddle though, it is one that he made out of Manta Ray skin. Mori-san works as a shoe and leather repairman, so as a hobby he uses his skills to make bike related items. The saddle he gave me was a Velo saddle, the same one we spec on our Crosscheck complete bike. He also made some really cool leather bar tape which looks a bit like the tape that Brooks makes. I asked him to make some for me. Mori-san? What do you think??? Congrats on winning the Pacer frame. I know you will ride it well.




This was the first time for most if not all of these guys to try derbying, and by the end of it everyone was talking about how great it was. Shortly after the derby ended the event was officially wrapped up and we all headed down to the riverside to hang out, eat and drink. The Kyoto riverside is beautiful, with lots of grassy flat areas and other places to sit and watch the river. It's really a date spot but it is in the central part of Kyoto so it's always bustling with activity. This night was no different, with the moon shining bright and everyone in a great mood. We had a veritable lovefest hanging out and talking into the wee hours of the morning. Mori san and I started another derby in the grass and pretty soon four or five more riders joined in. We all ended up with some bruises and scratches but the most notable feature on all of us were the big smiles on our faces.



My god what a night we had! I want to personally thank each and every one of the folks who showed up for this event. I can't remember everyone's name but here is a list of some of the new friends I made:
Masatoshi Kato (Good English!)
Naoki Odoro (The Party King)
Kaori Tsuchiya (Maybe next year you can win the frame)
Akane Edo (Kyoto okusan)
Yusuke Mori (stay in touch brother)
Chie Noguchi (this event rocked!!!)
Reiko chan (thanks for letting me crash on your floor, big hugs and kisses)
Brett Peary (Hope to see you again)
Sayaka Matsuse (I read part of the book you wrote - it's really nice!)
Junichi "GON" Murakami
Sachi Nishikawa(You scare me you are so fast!)
Muga Amemori (Friends forever!!!)
Takuya Kodama (My Kyoto bodhisattva)

One thing is for sure, I will be back in Kyoto as soon as I can and I want to see every one of your faces again!

On Monday my train didn't leave until after 5:00 so I had much of the day free to ride around and explore. Akane chan met me at Fortuna house in the morning and took me around to see some cool places. The day was really hot, and not having eaten any breakfast I was starting to bonk by mid-day. We stopped for a nice Italian meal for lunch and then decided to take it easy the rest of the day because of the heat. We headed back to Ginrin Shop to hang out with Muga and Takuya, and basically just try to stay cool. Many friends came by to say goodbye to me, a detail that was really nice. Honestly, everyone was so kind to me on my trip to Kyoto. This city truly remains my favorite city on earth!

I'm still steaming and have the adrenalin buzz from riding perhaps the most technical bike race course I've ever done. More technical than SSWC2005 in State College, Pennsylvania? I think so. But the kind of technical that you simply don't get sick of. As I said in my previous post, there are so many roots and rocks here, so we renamed it Rockholm.

The ride started with a 20 minute rollout through town to a ski hill. Then the lemans start up the ski hill was dumb as usual but completely necessary to string out the couple hundred riders before they got into the technical stuff. 10 minutes into the woods I punctured a tire. No big deal, I wasn't racing. Once fixed, I started rolling again and tried to get into a groove. Then a small deer ran full speed in front of me, cool. Rock garden after rock garden and infinite tree roots made me happy I was rolling 29" wheels on my Karate Monkey. The lack of any suspension didn't even matter, since it was easier to pull the front wheel up over everything with hard fork.

We did two 14k laps, which does not sound like a long course, but as you may imagine, they were slow laps. As promised by the promoters, there was a mandatory beer stop out in the woods. We overlooked a lillypadded lake and sat on the rocks drinking refreshing beer. As each rider rode into the beer stop, they were cheered and handed a coldie. If they refused, the got it poured on them. I was so far off the back after puncturing, the beer stop on the 2nd lap was really the first time I'd seen my American and British friends since the start.

Knowing what laid ahead of me, I knew I needed to roll on without too much beer messing with my vision. It honestly felt like you were operating a jackhammer at times, only going high speed through the woods and having the time of your life. Every time somebody took a picture, I think I had the dorkiest wide grin under my sweaty and dirty face. Smiling was so easy.

Perhaps the best thing about Singlespeed World Championships aside from the riding is the comraderie. I know this sounds cheesy, but you never know who you'll be having an excellent conversation with or what country they'll be from each time you stop in the woods. You just can't wait to share you stories with them and find out what their world is like.

The prize ceremony and "other" events are tonight. Hopefully we'll see a nice sized turnout in a derby. Either way, it should be fun and everybody should be excited to rock out in this fine host of a city. Sweden rules!

T-minus 7 hours and 40 minutes until rollout of SSWC2006. Yes that's right, reporting to you from lovely Stockholm, Sweden, in just a short amount of time a mass of singlespeeders from around the world will leave the local bar throughout the town of 800,000 to the trails that await our carcasses. The trails are much more technical than I'd expected. If tree roots were a sellable commodity, I think Sweden would be the most wealthy country in the world. If any of you though State College, Pennsylvania offered a difficult course last yéar with rock garden after rock garden, imagine almost as many rocks with twice the amount of roots. It's enough to make a seasoned singletrack slut feel out of place.

Quote of the night came from one Jacquie Phelan, "I think it's illegal to be ugly in this town". It's late right now and I'll just leave it at that. More reports from blondeville later. Hey Do.

Yesterday, my ortho surgeon put my ankle back together with 8 screws and a metal plate. Everything went well, and I hope to be back on a bike in a 8-10 weeks. My struggle will be waiting an appropriate amount of time before I start pushing myself again. I don't want to go out of the gate too fast and have this injury nag me for the rest of my life.

Dave mentioned in his last blog post about the possibility of me going to SSWC in his place after he broke his foot skateboarding at 4:30 in the morning. Well, I did not go to Stockholm. This is largely due to a very painful condition from which I suffer called Midwestern Responsibility. Oh, I thought about going --thought real hard, mind you-- and was almost there. Dr. Nick had everything set to transfer the ticket if I gave the word, I warned the lovely and talented Ms. Bloggins of my impending departure (baby, you're the greatest!), and I begged my way out of a ride I was supposed to help with this coming weekend (that being the Freeride Croozer, hosted by the Reverend Zito Jackson of The Church of Two Wheels, and which is on Saturday and starts at 4pm at Cars-R-Coffees Cykel Garage here in the MPLS. But I digress...).
But then I remembered what happens when there is nobody in the office for a protracted period of time. Perhaps you've read about those people who live cloistered existences, literally walled into their meager hovels by stacks of debris accumulated over a lifetime, until one day a pile gives way and traps them for days until they finally die, but then, since they lived a cloistered existence, no one realizes they're gone, sometimes for weeks, and only then discovered because of the horrible smell eminating from their meager hovel.
So with that in mind, let me paint for you this picture: Snack is in Nippon not to return until next week, Dr. Nick's bracing himself for a week of rain in Sweden, Dave's gimping about sullenly at home, and Sov's setting up camp on the still-smoldering ruins of the border territory's Back Water Canoe Area. Meanwhile there are two tradeshows looming and the usual daily stuff piling up so fast you need wings to stay above it. Yes kids, the walls are closing in and threatening to topple if not buttressed. My brain-squirrel saw the chain of events I would be setting in motion by leaving and made me realize the long term consequences of Shirking Responsibility (note: midwesterners even have a special name for this sin!).
The younger, slackerer version of me would have jumped at a last minute chance to go to Sweden with my bike, damn the torpedoes and this soul sucking, 9 to 5, day in, day out boojz-wah capitalist B.S., especially if it was on the company dime and especially if my buddy who was supposed to go was laid up with a cast on his flipper! Instead I have chosen to stay and work because, well, it's the right thing to do. Ug. I feel sick. In fact, come to think of it, even if the walls did cave in there wouldn't be anybody here to bury! Dammit, where were you on that one, brain-squirrel?!

And yet, there are two things that give me hope:
1) People like Dave breaking their legs skateboarding in the middle of the night when they are 37 years old.
2) And this. Oh, hell yeah!

p/s// the lovely and talented ms. bloggins has read this and tells me that in reality I am still a slacker because i did not yet remove the weeds from beside the garage, something for which the city apparently has, without precedent, cited us. for my part i am raging against the machine by not removing the weeds until tomorrow, or maybe the next day.

p/p/s// there is another bright spot: former Surly All American varsity squad player and glowing ball of superheated charisma Hurl Everstone will be traveling to Röckholm (wordcred: Hurl) with Dr. Nick! Brace yourselves. These two are ready to be eurotrashed.

Friday morning, about 4:00am, was perfect for a run to the 24-hour grocery store on the longboard; the temp was about 21C and the moon was almost full. So I set off on one of my usual routes. There was a slight headwind, but I knew I’d appreciate it on the return trip.

I got to the store, and the crew was cleaning the floor in the area I wanted to shop. So I left. No big deal. The trip was mostly about playing on my board…less about shopping. I bombed down the hill on Ford Parkway on the way back. It’s not huge. But it’s big enough for me to scare myself, and it isn’t perfectly flat. The road surface has some dips and bumps that can cause a bit of speed wobble if one isn’t careful or relaxed. I rode the hill faster and smoother than I’d done previously, so I was feeling pretty good.

After crossing the Ford Bridge over the Mississippi, I thought I’d hop off the 8" curb onto the relatively smooth road. There was no traffic, and I'd made this transition from sidewalk to road before. I must have hit a crack or rock or something on the landing because the board basically stopped as the front wheels hit the road surface. The board flexed and rebounded back at me, twisting my right ankle back and up. My board shot to the other side of the road, and I landed on my ass in the road with my right foot pointing too far to the right. The intense pain and immediate swelling told me something was very wrong.

I hopped to other side of the road and got my board. Then, I tried to figure out how to make the 2.4km trek home with a wounded ankle. I usually carry my cell phone in a Pelican case when I go riding. But, of course, I left it at home, this time. I tried using the board as a crutch, but that proved to be slow and painful. So I sat down on the board, placed my feet on the front, and pushed myself towards home on the sidewalk and road using my hands. Every bump and crack in the road caused pain to shoot up my leg.

I happened upon a pay phone halfway home. Having no change in my pocket, I tried to call me wife’s cell phone collect. Collect calling is not an option with her cell phone. There was a soda vending machine nearby, so I hobbled to it and bought a soda to get some change. My change was 40 cents. After making the painful journey back to the phone, I realized that I was 10 cents short; the pay phone requires 50 cents to make a local call. Son Of A Bitch!!! I made another painful trip to the soda machine for more change and another Coke that I didn’t want or need. I called my wife, but she didn’t answer…maybe, because it was 5:00am and she didn’t recognize the pay phone number. As soon as her voice mail kicked in I hung up, hoping my coins would be returned, so I could call again. That’s how it used to work. No dice. The phone kept my money. I was destined to make the trip home sitting on my ass and pushing with my hands.

I piled myself back on the board and rolled home down the street. The street was much smoother than the sidewalk, so I stayed on it. It’s amazing how few people you see when you really need help. I was hoping somebody would be walking a dog and have a cell phone for me to use. I thought, at least, I’d see somebody delivering newspapers at that early hour. Nobody came to my aid.

I arrived home and floundered around to get off the board and into the house using my board as a crutch. My cell phone was downstairs, so I called my wife upstairs. This time, she answered….because she recognized the number. I explained my condition, and she came downstairs to help me into the car. Then she woke up our 3-year-old son Noah, strapped him into the car, and drove to the hospital. I was not on her favorite person list, at this point. Waking somebody up at 5:00am…then again at 5:30am, to tell them you’ve hurt yourself badly on a skateboard, doesn’t go over very well when you are 37 years old and should “know better”. Luckily, Lynn understands that I have a condition that hasn’t allowed me to fully mature, and she puts up with my cuts, scrapes, bruises, and broken bones.

The X-rays proved what I had suspected…broken bones. I fractured my tibia and fibula at my ankle. I’m wearing a cast until I go under the knife for corrective surgery next week. To add insult to injury, I was booked to fly to Stockholm, Sweden on Tuesday to “race” at the Single-speed World Championship event. Great timing. Swervy will have to step up his game and represent for both of us, unless Kenny Bloggins decides to go in my place.

One concern, resulting from my not-so-graceful dismount, is getting to and from the office...51km round trip. I’ve ridden a bike or unicycle every day for more than 8 years. I know I can take the bus, but it’s going to suck compared to riding a bike. I can probably find a carpool partner, but it still means sitting in a metal box in traffic for 1 to 2 hours each workday. I can already feel my soul being sucked out of me.

I’ve ridden with one leg, but I’m worried about crashing with a cast on. That’s probably not an option. Maybe, I’ll get a scooter. It’s not as eco-friendly as a bike, but it’s less polluting and more fun than riding in a bus or car. I’ve been thinking about building an electric-assist bike for years. It might be time to build one that can go the distance from home to work and back with minimal or no pedal-assist. Maybe, I’ll have to utilize the train for part of the commute to guarantee I have enough battery power for each leg of the trip.

It sucks being a spaz on a skateboard. But, at least, I broke myself while having some fun. I’d probably feel worse if I’d hurt myself by slipping in the shower or tripping on my sassy feather boa and falling down the stairs. So I’ve got that going for me.

Rumors suck, and there are a couple of them floating around the internet bike forums about new Surly product coming out for next year. So far, every forum I've read with supposed "insider contacts" has been bogus and untrue. For the record, we are coming out with some brand new products and also tweaking a couple old products this year, like we do every year. We always release this information at tradeshow time, which is early-September during the Eurobike tradeshow in Germany and early-October for the Interbike tradeshow in Las Vegas.

The two main reasons we don't like our dirty little secrets revealed early are:

1) The information is heresay and subject to false interpretation. So what you would read on a forum isn't truthful or accurate.

2) You probably can't get your hands on any of the new goods until the following spring/summer, so why make you wait even longer by releasing the info too early?

So until tradeshow time when people can actually take pictures of the prototype buns we've had in the oven, you will have to wait. As always, thanks for being patient.

Typhoon Days In Tokyo

I think I might just have found the most bad-ass bottle opener ever.





I found it at a souvenir shop near Asasuksa Temple in Tokyo. No one will ever mess with my bottle opener again!

Today a typhoon is blowing through the Tokyo area. There are no high winds in this area but it's dumping a ton of rain. My Karate Monkey has been sitting outside in the rain for about 24 hours. This makes me happy and I can't really say why. I guess it's because in the past I have always been so anal about my bikes: never leaving them outside in the rain; washing the mud off after every ride; cleaning the gunk off the chain on a regular basis. These are not bad habits or anything. I mean, most people don't have as many bikes as most of the people I work with, so taking good care of your bike is very important. I just think personally I don't want to fuss too closely about such things.

Anyway, about five minutes ago I stopped writing this to go outside and move my bike into the garage. I feel a little better now.

When it comes to speaking in public around here, I usually leave it to the professionals like Sov or Kenny Bloggins, mainly because they are good at it and are quite hilarious. But when both were out of town last week, I reluctantly got suckered into an interview with Tim Grahl of Blue Collar MTB. Which is an excellent web source of all things you enjoy about cycling without all the work of having to go for a ride.

Honestly, it's the first podcast I'd ever listened to and it's about 15 minutes long, here is the link:

Crooked Cog podcast

Saturday was a good day to ride a bike. Fortunately, there were almost 100 people that wanted to ride with me and fortunately there were three breweries that were waiting for us to show up. Riders of all abilities and from as far as Seattle, Boulder and Arizona joined us for the Beermuda Triangle Fat Tire Brewery Tour, which took us 30 miles around north Minneapolis.

Check this video!

Starting at Town Hall brewpub in the heart of the city for morning beers and brunch, we traveled up the Mississippi river and straight through the not-so-pretty part of town. The goal was to ride slow and either recruit other riders to join or to heckle them. We quickly picked up two guys that were just out for what they called a long slow day. One guy was wearing a Sierra Nevada beer jersey, so he had no excuses not to join.



After a quick park stop for a beer break, we were onto Surly Brewing Company (no affiliation with us other than we like beer, they like bikes and we're both in the same town). At Surly, Omar the owner poured us samples for 45 minutes until he then gave us a tour of the 30 barrel per batch brewhouse. Holy crap, they had a cold-pressed coffee version of their brown ale on tap especially for us that was to die for.



After this we traveled to a secret picnic spot atop a hill, where we'd stashed 150 sandwiches, chips and 7 gallons of beer. The goods lasted about 1 hour, then it was onto the next stop, Barleyjohn's brewpub. Colin, their brewer, was with us on the ride and had brewed a special Belgian beer to quench our thirst. Tasty! They had a nice patio for us to invade that was covered in hops. After a couple more pints, the natives were getting wrestle-less and started riding in circles, meaning it was time to derby and move on.



We rode through some dirt jumps and back to the heart of the city to finish the triangle at Town Hall Brewpub. Two miles from the finish, we were stopped by a cop that said we were trespassing and ordered us to turn around and go back the way we came. After about a minute of listening to this thickheaded rule enforcer, I decided to ride past him. Afterall, was he going to stop all of us? The best part was when the people in the back of the group waved at him and thanked him for letting us go. I'm quite sure he finally felt like a jerk after that.

We arrived at Town Hall with Black Sabbath blasting from my bike just in time to interrupt some couples' wedding photo session. I felt kind of bad until one of their kids ran over to me to start rocking out. Special thanks to Matt at Town Hall for opening your doors early for us, to Omar at Surly Brewing for pouring such fine liquids into our bellies, to Colin at Barleyjohn's for making the beer flow and letting us put a dent in your supply, to all the motorists that stopped and used their hands for waving instead of honking (or other), to Kenny Bloggins and Brauer Power for being the caboose all day and fixing something like 10 flat tires, to Nate for shooting bottle rockets at the people who tried to ride fast and for all your help, and to everybody who joined up and made it one of the best days on a bike ever.

Friends of Surly Japan - Taiji Korenaga



I met Taiji Korenaga last night for dinner and drinks in Chiba. In case you don't know, we have been producing our catalog translated into Japanese for the past two years. Korenaga san is our translator. He has also done translation for the Salsa Japanese catalog.

I have known him since I lived here, so I guess it must be around 15 years ago that I first met him. He is a complete bike geek, and has a vast amount of knowledge about the bike scene in Japan.

The first time I met him was at a mountain bike race in Chiba. He was riding a Yeti Ultimate with a complete selection of purple anodized parts from Ringle, Grafton and Chis King. His rims were even purple ano. Remeber the Sun ME-14A rims? They were basically a road rim, since they weighed around 360 grams each. Remember stupid light? Those were the days, huh? Anyway, he was rounding the course and came upon a very steep downhill section that was in full view of the spectators. This section was famous for crashes, as it was hard packed, rutted, and just plain scary steep.

I was talking to a friend in the pits when I heard what sounded like a gunshot and then a helmet hitting dirt. When I looked over I saw someone had crashed hard on the hill, so I went over to check it out. It was Korenaga san. His front wheel had blown out on the descent and turned into a very tasty looking potato chip (the ones with purple ridges, you know?). He was shaken up but not hurt. In fact I recall he was laughing pretty hard about it. I had my camera so I took some pix of his bike (I still have the pix somewhere, sorry not to have them for this blog). After that I struck up a conversation about his bike and all the cool parts hanging from it. This began our friendship, one that I value greatly. He has helped both me and Surly a ton in Japan. Every time I come here he arranges for me to have a cell phone, meets me whenever I need help with some Japanese, or just to discuss bikes. His translation work has been of great value to Surly and Salsa in Japan. As you can imagine translation is not easy, so finding someone who can do it well is really important. Taiji does it really well. Oh, and did I mention that he doesn't speak English? It's true. But he reads and understands it very well, and his attention to every detail and nuance of meaning has helped maintain the flavor of the Surly brand in the Japanese market. Japan is our biggest market outside the U.S., so we're really happy to have a guy like Taiji working for us. Thanks Taiji. Your work is greatly appreciated. The bad news is that it has only just begun. Our 2007 catalog is almost ready so you can expect some more headaches very soon.

Homey Fall Festival

Minneapolis

Saturday October 21

Get here. Plan it. Stay tuned for details.

One of my bikes, a white Schwinn Crosscut, was stolen from my yard in the Longfellow neighborhood of south Minneapolis, yesterday.

I lent it to a family member for a couple of weeks. While I was out riding the Beermuda Triangle, my father-in-law returned it. He left it in the back yard, next to the house, and covered it with a tarp. Somebody must have been watching him while he hid it, because my wife returned home 30 minutes after he had left, and it was gone.

Here's the description of the bike:

20" white lugged cro-moly Schwinn Crosscut 'cross frame
Chrome Tange 'cross fork
Silver 700c rims with silver hubs
SRAM 7.0 ESP Halfpipe shifters, ESP 7.0 rear derailleur, 7.0 linear pull brakes
Black aluminum Salsa riser stem, black Salsa flat bar, black seatpost
Silver Sugino 58/94 BCD cranks with silver chainrings
Red Oury grips
Charcoal Selle San Marco Integra railless saddle
700 x 37 Panaracer Pasella or T-Serve rear tire, 700 x 38 Kenda front tire

In the last 8 years, I put thousands of miles on my Crosscut...usually pulling a trailer. It was my tractor. I'm bummed that it's gone.

If you see this bike, please let me know. I'm looking forward to delivering appropriate justice to the scum that stole it.

I was about 10.5km into my 25.5km Friday commute home from the office when the drive-side Ritchey 'cross crank on my Pacer fixie snapped into two pieces as I started from a stop at a 4-way intersection. It had never been crashed, and it wasn't scarred in any way that would set up a stress riser in that area of the crank. There was no warning...no creaking or popping preceding the failure. I've broken cranks before from fatique, and they've always given me some audible warning before letting go. Not so with the Ritcheys.

No blood was drawn, and there was no fantastic crash for the car-entombed spectators at the intersection. After it snapped, I had enough momentum to roll through the intersection to the other side. I turned around and pedaled awkwardly back to retrieve my crank and attached pedal. A nice women actually drove into the intersection in her car, stopped...blocking traffic in the intersection by doing so, opened her door, and picked it up for me. That was cool. I thanked her, grabbed my crank...my bicycle crank, and moved to the side of the road to put it in my Carradice bag.

Hmmm...what to do? Pedal home with one crank or call my wife and have her pick me up? It was a nice day, and I knew I could pedal at least part way home with one leg. So, I set off with one foot on the pedal and one foot on top of the downtube near the headtube. I found that I could move along at a pretty good clip once I got started...even just wearing my Keens and pushing on a single Odyssey Triple Trap pedal. I couldn't pull up much on the pedal, but the fixed nature of the drivetrain kept the crank moving. Had I been on a freewheeling bike, I would have been in more of a predicament. There would have been no way to keep that crank moving around except for the rotational momentum of the crank and pedal, and I don't think I could have pedaled smoothly enough to keep that going for very long. Last year, on my morning commute into the office, I broke a drive-side Ultegra arm on my other Pacer...a 1x9 derailleured set-up, but I was using Time clipless pedals. So I could pull up and push down on the pedal to ride the remaining 16km into work without too much trouble.

I was fortunate to have a front brake on my fixie when this happened. Riding home sans brake and only one not-clipped-in-or-strapped-in foot/leg to slow down would have been a bit sketchy. Doable, but sketchy.

In the end, it took me an extra 20 minutes to get home. Not too bad.

Media attention doesn't usually get you too far, but kicking ass does. Take the case of one Jack White, who now tours with the flavor du jour band Raconteurs. Say what you will about them, but I just saw them live and I had goosebumps from shoulder to ankle more than once. There is just something about a band that blows you away live that cristens them into the heirarchy of kickassedness. So I eat this late night burger to flush down the boozey sludge in honor of 4 dudes that shred, the Raconteurs.

Snackey's Spanklicious Summer Vacation In Japan



So my family and I decided to take a trip to Japan this summer. My wife is Japanese so it's kind of a requirement to get back here about once per year to visit the in-laws and chill. Well, maybe not chill, exactly. The summer here is hot, to say the least, and muggy. But it is also the best time of the year to be here, as there are lots of festivals, fireworks shows, and other cool stuff to do. So, I'm here for three weeks while the rest of the Surlies suffer back at the Mpls HQ.

One thing I have to have while I'm here is a bike. I just leave a bike over here so I don't have to carry it back and forth every time I come. The rig I am on right now is a Karate Monkey built up with a 9x1 drivetrain, Nitto noodle bars, flat pedals and 32mm Slickasaurus tires. It's a pretty sweet ride for here because although I can ride a singlespeed most of the time there are some hilly areas here that wear me out in the 95 degree heat, so I went with a geared set-up.

Riding is fun here, cuz you have to constantly be aware of your surroundings or you'll get clocked by a bus or taxi cab. With that said, drivers are relatively polite, so you don't feel like every time you get on your bike is the beginning of a death ride. Assimilation is the key to riding in the busy city here (I'm in Chiba City which is much smaller than Tokyo but still very busy with traffic). If you can't find the flow of traffic it is not going to work out well for you. I find the flow most of the time but since I've been here I've already had two close calls. I don't wear a helmet when I ride in Japan. The irony of this hasn't escaped me but I just never wear one while I'm here. I could make excuses for it but I won't.

On August 13th there is an alley cat race in Kyoto that I am planning to attend. Surly is partially sponsoring it and besides that it is hard to stay away from Kyoto when something like this is going on. Problem with it being held on this date is that it happens just at the start of the Obon holiday, which is the busiest travel season of the summer. I'll be lucky to get a seat on the train, but even if I have to stand up all the way I won't care. Kyoto has this kind of effect on me. It's my favorite city in Japan and maybe the entire world. Any opportunity to go there and I'm all over it.

By the way, did you know that you can drink on the trains here? You can drink almost anywhere, as a matter of fact. The Japanese might be overly organized and borderline anal in many ways but they are very liberal when it comes to these kinds of things. It's one of the coolest things about this place.

This Saturday we will attend a fireworks festival that features 8,000+ tubes and lasts around 90 minutes. They say each firework tube costs more than $100 so if you do the math you will find that it's pretty expensive to put this kind of event on. Corporate sponsors pay for it, but I still find it pretty amazing that they can make these things work economically. Well, it's summer, and the people of Japan have enough things to cause them stress in their daily lives. Events like this are payback for all their time spent conforming to the rigors of a homogenous culture. I think this is why there are no strict laws about drinking here. You might have heard that there are beer and liquor vending machines on the streets in Japan?

Speaking of beer, I went to see a baseball game last night at Tokyo Dome, which is very similar to the Minneapolis Metrodome (unfortunately). I can't remember who won but the lemon sours (Japanese shouchu alcohol mixed with soda and fresh lemon) I had sure hit the spot. After about six of these drinks you feel pretty festive, believe me. The hangover is even better than the buzz. Not kidding... Oh, and here's the best part. Before we went in the game we stopped at the local 7-Eleven to buy some food and drinks. My friends loaded the basket with 8 tall cans (750ml) of beer, three sandwiches, some chips, a bunch of dried squid and other things you eat here when your drinking, and some other odds and ends for the kids. I ask them if it's cool to bring beer and food into the Dome and they say sure. When we get to the Dome and go inside there is a table to the right where we bring our bags and the beer is taken out. I'm thinking, "Great, we have to dump our beer afterall," but instead of dumping it out, they dump it onto tall paper cups and put lids on them. Then they put the eight cups into one of those multi-cup carriers and send us on our way! My father-inlaw even had a glass bottle of Japanese sake that they did the same with. Meanwhile, inside the Dome they sell beer in the same size cups for 800 yen (about $7.00). I don't have any idea why they allow beer and food from outside but who's complaining?

Signing off now. I'll try to blog some more while I'm here to let you know how the alley cat went.

So yeah, like Nick said: many of the cogs are back in. Conundrum uni frames should be in stock in a day or so. And the long awaited cassette spacer kits too. Good stuff.

In other news, I got an email a few days ago that seems like something you might be interested in, at least if you live around here. It reads:

"Hey -
I've put together a new forum to help connect riders in the twin cities. I'm hoping it will eventually be a good community resource where people can get info on local rides, shops, sell and trade parts, or just shoot the shit. It's still in the formative stages, like 3 days old, but there are already ~70 people signed up, and I'm hoping we can get more.
If you'd take a moment to check it out and maybe let people know about it, I'd totally appreciate it.
www.mplsbikelove.com/forum"

Sho' nuff Jeremy. There you go. Appreciate away. And to the rest of you: I hereby order you to check it out and enjoy the crap out of it and all it has to offer.

Finally today, Surly Music News field reporter Blake "I bent my wookie" Jensen reports that this Thursday, the 3rd of August, Station 4 in downtown Saint Paul will be home for the evening to metal mongers 3 Inches of Blood. Early Man and Bad Wizard open. Good god y'all! Get thy ass in gear and make your ears bleed. A wall of hair and sound awaits you.

The long awaited (by some) Conundrum unicycle frames have arrived and passed our QC inspections. They should be available through our distributor, QBP, by the end of the day. Call your local bike shop or unicycle shop to get your paws on one. The first shipment is small, because airfreight aint cheap...50 frames...10-15 of each model: 24" black, 24" ChamPain, 26" black, 26" ChamPain. More frames are comin' on the slow boat; they should arrive in a month or so.