The Shop Talk Blog is the repository for any content we think you might enjoy reading about, not just our random rants. We do a lot of interesting things in our shop and we want to be able to showcase some of these thing. Not only will you see blog posts on interesting bike builds, but we will also discuss how to perform projects around the house along with informative posts on the usages of certain products.
District Hardware - The Bike Shop jerseys are now available in two styles - our team jersey sporting all our brands and our retro grey jersey. We're placing our order this Friday and in 7 weeks we'll have them in the shop! We're offering a special pre-purchase price so anyone who commits before we place the order on Friday, February 24th will receive them at our discounted price of $60+tax - get as many as you like. Email info@thebikeshopdc.com with your phone number, size, style (retro or team), and quantity and we will contact you for payment.
We are very excited to announce that Chris Tremonte is now an acting contributor to the shop. Chris will be sharing his experiences, proving commentary and insight into training, racing, nutrition, and possibly a few side projects. Hit the jump for more about Chris.
Chris Tremonte is an elite triathlete, software guy and personal trainer based in Seattle, WA, where he races with the Recycled Cycles / Raleigh USCF club. Chris has raced in 7 countries on 3 continents, has won at least 15 triathlons and has placed in-the-money in half a dozen pro races. He has also ridden his touring bike from Seattle to San Francisco! Chris grew up in Northern Virginia and graduated from Thomas Jefferson HS. Chris rides a Raleigh Team bike for road racing and draft-legal triathlon, a Jamis Xenith T2 for non-drafting triathlon, and a K2 Enemy for cyclocross and touring.
If you love bike, old and new, and you have an iPad then Cyclepedia is an essential app. From itunes: "fully interactive collection of 100 bicycles that changed cycling history – and not always for the better! From the suitcase-sized Skoot to the Olympic Gold medal-winning Lotus Sport 110, every bicycle is displayed in stunning clarity and technical detail. 360º spins and 20 times magnification of each component allows you to compare and appreciate all the elements of this rich celebration of cycling culture, innovation and design."
And no bike book would be complete without a couple of old Raleigh Tourists, complete with rod brakes!!
This app is awesome and I was using it for a good while last night. You can find it here http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/cyclepedia-iconic-bicycle/id487250899?mt=8
The pictures are beautiful and being on a touch screen device like the iPad makes image manipulation such a winner in my opinion (sorry for the Apple suck-up). The app was developed from a hardback book, so all is not lost if you're not drinkin' the Apple kool-aid. The book can be bought here http://www.thamesandhudson.com/9780500515587.html or probably on Amazon.
I really liked how the app has a really good glossary of terms with corresponding pictures so if you're new to bikes you can get a functional lesson along with a history lesson. My favorite two bikes are the BSA Paratrooper, which was an early folding bike used during WWII, and the Bianchi C-4, which is beautifully aerodynamic and has no seat tube, which I think put this bike about 6 years ahead of Kestrel before they became known for doing the same (although Kestrel was the first major producer of carbon bikes). The Bianchi looks fast just sitting there.
Check it out, there are worse things you can spend $10 on.
I took my car in for service the other day, the standard 25k checkup, and the dealer suggested I replace two air filters and a brake pad. For an additional $500. I suggested they pound sand and did it myself. Bicycling has given me the confidence to do so.
Cars can be intimidating to work on. Ten-thousand parts, computers, and potentially lots of money if you mess something up. To the mechanically unfamiliar, even menial tasks can seem daunting due to the overall complexity of a car. Bicycles, on the other hand, are relatively simple machines. You can see nearly all the parts, you understand how the major components work and their purpose, and its comparatively easy to adjust with $10 worth of tools that fit neatly under your saddle.
For cyclist, learning the basics isn’t something that requires a trade school or apprenticeship, but is a necessity. Cyclist, for the most part, are willing to get their hands a little dirty, which in my opinion is the first hurdle to overcome when doing anything mechanical. Few would refrain from adjusting a seat post simply because there was the risk of a bit of grease.
Sometimes fate intervenes and a cyclist is left with no other choice but to flip the bike on to its saddle and change a flat tire. And while I hear walking 20 miles back to your car, bike in tow, burns a lot of calories, many folks have taken a class, learned from a friend, or out of plain old resilience stumbled through changing an innertube. But that in itself is an incredibly large hurdle to overcome - the confidence to repair something. People do amazing things when the need is there. Flat repair is fairly minor on that scale, but anytime someone is required to do something out of their comfort zone, its an accomplishment.
I’ve been working on bikes a long time. And I’ve change a whole lot of flat tires in that time. I’ve also worked on a lot of more complex items over that time too, but bicycles were my introduction to mechanics. Bikes made me comfortable with a wrench and a screwdriver because they’re a simple machine and allowed me a easy progression to more difficult projects. Better yet, the associated costs to learn was relatively small.
If you ride, learn how to work on your own bike, at the very least the basic stuff that can prevent you from being stranded. Read a book, check out a youtube video, or go to a clinic like we occasionally host (our next one is Saturday at the Fairfax Life Time Fitness http://clubs.lifetimefitness.com/Fairfax/11287/, so if you’re a member, come on out). You’ll not only be able to get yourself out of trouble but it may save you a few bucks in other areas too.
My car problem? $30 in parts and 10 minutes to install everything. One of the parts didn’t even need tools to swap out. $500 saved. Money for a new toy :)
The Neilpryde Alize made Road.cc's top 10 bikes of 2011 list. Number six on the list, not bad for a newcomer. Check out the Alize and the rest of the list here http://road.cc/content/news/49650-roadcc-bikes-year-top-10
We’ve been really excited about the Neilpryde bike line, they ride and look great, and the company has a lot of experience with being big time competitors in their other industries. Although there has been a lot of action overseas, especially in Hong Kong with Team Cyclone, we’ve been largely forgotten here in the states since Neilpryde Bike’s launch in late 2010.
But earlier today Neilpryde made a big announcement that they will be the bike supplier for the UnitedHealthcare (UHC) Pro Cycling Team, and that’s a very big deal because they’re unseating Boardman Bikes. Yes, the Boardman that the 2012 Olympic favorite Alistair Brownlee races. Additionally they’ve yanked a few riders from the BMC and RadioShack teams. Their season will start with the Tour de San Luis in Argentina at the end of January.
What Does This Mean for Neilpryde?
Could a Tour de France team be far behind? Probably in the not to distant future, especially if UHC performs well. It’s certainly going to be an interesting year for Neilpryde. We’ll have to wait and see what other surprises they’ve got up their sleeves for 2012.
The full article can be found here
http://www.dailypeloton.com/displayarticle.asp?pk=19639
And an additional article, which I can only assume is the official press release, along with a snapshot of the team bike can be found on the UHC website
A fun build, but color coordinating a bike build can be a real pain in the ass! The Macaframa frameset was a limited production track frame from Raleigh designed by, well, Macaframa - group out of San Francisco that does a lot of cool stunts of fix-geared bikes (check out some vids here - http://vimeo.com/611977).
Because a lot of track bikes had been done in the past I really wanted to make something unique. The frame is very flash and you can tell it was designed by a group out SF so trying to build something that balanced multiple components of the bike was very important not just in color but in functionality. I wanted to make something as unique as the paint scheme so from the get go I had planned on using a Sturmey Archer 3-speed hub. Yeah, I know, gears on a track bike, but that's the point of doing something different. That's why I dubbed this "The Functional Fixie".
The hard part: look at that frame!!! How the heck do you not make it the center of focus without using garish colors? Also, the paint is not a normal cherry red and the only other colors on there are black (boring), cream (impossible to match) and baby blue (nearly as impossible to match as cream). After many mock-ups and rollers put together, every color combination of wheel, and battling back and forth between dropped bars or bullhorns I finally decided on my layout. I'm not going to bore you with the rationale of why I chose what I did but take a look at the pictures and our parts list. Maybe there's someone who has done what we've done. Personally I hope not. Regardless, this is a fun bike to ride that has stellar looks with both modern features and influences as well as some classic aspects. Certainly turned a lot of heads at the DC Tweed Ride.
Parts list:
This bike is not for sale, however there may be a limited number of Macaframa frames still available. If you're interested in The Bike Shop building out a bike this, please shoot us an email. info@thebikeshopdc.com.
More pictures available at facebook and gplus
If you're looking for something athletic to do over Halloween weekend check out the Star Rock Cross race. Not too expensive and a good opportunity if you've ever contemplated Cyclo-cross. Or you can go cheer on friend of the shop Josh as he competes for another win.
Follow the link for all the event info www.bikereg.com/events/register.asp?eventid=14322
Are you competitive? Do you have a group of buddies who you ride with and participate in events together? Have you thought about forming an organized team? If so, District Hardware/the Bike Shop is looking to work with local competitors to sponsor a team.
This will be our first foray into sponsorship and we’re looking to build organically together with the team. That means the sponsorship program will grow with the input and involvement of the team to determine the best possible level of shop support. We’re going to start with a minimum of 6 but a max of 15 team members and will need a team captain to work with the shop on the specifics of the program. We’re looking to start small so we make this a great program and focus on the enjoyment of being competitors.
At this point there will be no age, weight or gender restrictions, just have the passion to race! The base annual obligation will be a minimum of 5 DC area events (triathlons, cyclocross, crits, etc) with each team member required to compete in at least 1 major event (Nation’s Triathlon, DC Triathlon, Air Force Classic). Our first year annual dues will be $65, which will include your team jersey and access to the sponsorship program benefits.
Our promise to you is to work to make this a fun team with event support, a personalized program, and to work to bring in additional sponsors (how great would it be to have a bar or restaurant as a co-sponsor?!?). If you are interested in this opportunity please shoot us an email at jc@thebikeshopdc.com
Check out our Facebook page for pictures and videos from the TrueValue market, going on in Philly this weekend. We'll be posting pictures of all the cool new products we'll be bringing into the store.
A beautiful, hard to find classic Raleigh that is in great shape. This 1975 Raleigh Sport would fit a woman between 4'11" and 5'5". The bike is mechanically perfect with a lugged steel frame and a Sturmey Archer 3-speed hub, still nice and shiney with no pitting on the chrome.
In fact, there is no pitting on the wheels and all the metal is in great shape. Only under heavy inspection will you find any paint imperfections, and even that is minor. It is not sun faded and has very few blemishes. Almost unheard of in a bike this old. The vinyl Brooks saddle has no rips, tears, or fading, and should last quite a while. An original British made Raleigh, this is a very handsome bike and would make an excellent ride throughout the city.
We are offering this bike for sale. All of our used bikes come with a 30 day guarantee on the mechanical parts. If you're interested please contact us either by phone or email info@thebikeshopdc.com
There is something to be said about the competitive spirit and how addictive it can be. Last year I started my foray into triathlons and I can easily say that I am now hooked. This year I had 5 scheduled, and with 3 now under my belt I think I can effectively call myself a true triathlete and share my opinion.
Maybe it was approaching 30, maybe it was the poor health my last job left me in, but in 2010 I signed up for every event I could. Call it my reason for getting motivated and back into the gym. Inevitably, these compulsions lead to entering into my first triathlon. I eased into it at first, preparing via adventure runs like the Muddy Buddy and Warrior Dash, with a culmination of relaying the 2010 Nation’s Tri. As a normally fit individual and former college “athlete” (Div 1 cheerleader, but let’s not debate the validity of cheerleading as a sport), I decided to do both the bike and run portions. Seeing how I’m a heavier guy whose idea of “swimming” involves a raft and a beer, I left that part up to a buddy. The sense of accomplishment of completing even two-thirds of an Olympic distance tri was extremely gratifying, but it was my competitive nature and being able to continually pass people on the bike that really got me hooked. Swimming and running are a singular motion, one body part in front of another, for me that means a fairly consistent pace. But biking is a multi-dimensional sport, where strength, endurance, strategy, and an understanding of the mechanical nature of cycling all play equal parts. A person with great leg strength and endurance can easily be beaten by a weaker individual who knows how and when to shift effectively.
In retrospect, the idea of tackling an entire triathlon completely green is a very daunting task, and I wouldn’t be as into these events had I gone about things differently. For those contemplating a tri, I would HIGHLY recommend relaying your first one.
After Nation’s I was convinced that a full tri was in my future, and I was going to dive head first (no pun intended) into training. As luck would have it this was facilitated by a new job and a new coworker who was also big into triathlons, who was willing to get me in the water and teach me how to swim. Not only has training with a partner helped my performance overall, but it has pushed me to commit fully to triathlons. My goal being to complete the Nation’s in under 3 hours, which was the time my buddy and I completed last year’s event.
So here we are in 2011. I’ve got three triathlons down (Lifetime Indoor Tri, Kinetic@ Lake Anna, and DC), with BRAT and Nation’s to go. By far DC was my most nerve wracking event to date. Poor sleep, racing alone, fear of no wetsuit (it was wetsuit legal, barely, at 77.2 degrees), blah blah blah. So what did I learn? Here we go:
First, try to sleep more than an hour. Rephrased another way: if you have a wedding on the far side of Baltimore the night before, don’t sign up for a triathlon that occurs the next morning. Getting home at 1:30, not being able to sleep because of jitters, and then waking up a 4:30 isn’t fun. Thankfully GU makes caffeinated gels and blocks. 6 cups of coffee equivalence in less than 2 hours will perk most folks up.
Second, if you’re going in the Potomac, have a few doses of Cipro waiting for you at home.
Third, don’t trying breaking in new bike shoes the same day as an event. Furthermore, don’t forget your old shoes at the gym after spin class, allowing them to be stolen in the first place.
Fourth, and most interesting, the Potomac taste better than Lake Anna. Not sure I’m happy to know that.
Finally, if Fatty McGhee here (that’s me) can finish a triathlon in less than 2 hours under these conditions, anything is possible. Don’t be afraid, commit, and try something new and challenging. You might just find you like it.
See you on the road.
This Raleigh Space Rider, essentially a mini version of a Raleigh Superbe, was a cool little find at a vintage store out past Leesburg. The bike was in pretty good shape and was a definite must have.
Built in the original Raleigh factory in Nottingham, England, the Space Rider has 24 inch wheels, painted fenders, a 3-speed Sturmey hub, and a head lamp.
We'll be restoring this over the summer to make it a cool little bike. We're going to have to bang our a few dents in the fenders, ensure the lamp's wiring is sound, and touch up the paint and decal. The saddle on it is the original and beat to hell, so we'll need to replace that with a newer Brooks sprung saddle, which might not be "to spec" but will keep the dapper look to this old Raleigh. Might just have to add the matching leather grips to go with it.
This would be a great bike for an appreciative young adult, or a slightly shorter adult who can't fit on a full-sized vintage Raleigh. If interested, email jc@thebikeshopdc.com
Somewhere under all that mud is a yellow shirt with our sprocket logo
Look for us in Richmond! (Store will remain open)
The Soma, which gets a lot of looks, was a birthday present for Raleigh Racer's fiance. The conversation went something like this:
RR: Sweety, I'm going to build you a bike for your birthday. What would you like?
Fiance: I want a pretty bike.
RR: Can you elaborate more?
Fiance: It has to be white. And with pink or red. Maybe some other color too.
RR: Anything else?
Fiance: It can't be too girly.
Needless to say we had our work cut out for us.
Getting a bike straight out of the catalog wasn't going to work here so framesets were definitely the way forward. After searching through many of our resources we settled on the Soma because, well, it was white, classic looking but not too girly, had some classic graphics and "other" color. It helps that the frame and fork, all Tange Prestige steel, weighs only 5.5 pounds too.
Frame in hand we could start the coordination of colors, which really drove the rest of the build. A big requirement from the Fiance was to have as much metal to be a matching anodized color. This meant the crank, headset, brakes, and seat post had to be red. We already had a red Origin-8 crankset sitting in the shop, so now we had to get the rest in. A few days later we had our parts, but we weren't happy with what we saw. The seat post, while labeled "red", was really more of an pinkish-purple and we knew right away that it wouldn't fit the theme, so we scrapped it for shinny silver. If we couldn't have color, we could at least have clean. There was also a similar case with the brakes, where the red was more of a powder coat, not an anodized, and really clashed with the look of crank and headset. Instead we went with a nice pair of black Tektro dual pivots. Two pieces of Jagwire brake housing rounded out the red, with other pieces, like the stem, bars, and spacers in silver and black. To add a little bit of contrast to draw out the crank we used a white powder coated chain from Origin-8 as well.
Since we went with a track crank we had to come up with a way to integrate gearing because the width of the chain used on a track crank is larger than cassette and derailleur can use. Easily remedied by using Shimano's Nexus 8 internally geared hub, which ensured we could keep Origin-8 crank. Although a little heavy, this is an incredibly smooth shifting device that requires little to no regular maintenance. The Nexus uses a "grip shift" style shifter which in order to fit on the arced handlebars we had to find narrow-width grips. And since we couldn't find short grips that we liked we decided to make our own using Portland Design Works leather grips, a hacksaw, a bench grinder, and some contact cement.
This is a classic looking bike, so we needed to add some more classic accents. The PDW leather grips matched the frames graphics, but we needed more, and you can't have leather without having something from Brooks. An incredibly comfy Brooks Flyer S gave us the look and feel we needed for the build. We tossed in a set of MKS lightweight pedals and MKS leather trimmed toe clips to complete the look.
The Fiance likes wine. We like beer. We tried to get her to put a front-mounted basket that was perfect for carrying a case of PBR, but that was ill-received suggestion. Instead she went with the wood-planked Axiom Phoenix rack (a very sharp looking piece, btw) and a Lezyne trunk caddy. Which, if you're wondering, holds two to three bottles of wine and is easily removed for use at outdoor events like "Jazz in the Garden".
We started building this bike for the 2010 race season with the intention of building a light weight racer that could be used for road racing and triathlons. The requirements for this bike were lightweight yet durable enough to handle a 200 pound rider. As luck would have it Raleigh had a few of their 2009 Team framesets in stock and carbon would provide the weight and durability we needed for a great platform.
Now that we got our frame, we have to build out the bike. Right off the bat we decided for a full Ultegra groupo using an adapter for the BB30 bottom bracket. Many bikes with a BB30 bottom bracket run a SRAM setup, but we happen to like the shifting and drive train of the Shimano setup a bit better. Just a personal preference. Because this was to be a dual-purpose bike we stayed away from carbon wheels and went with the Mavic Open Pros. These are sturdy wheels that stay true through bumps while training, but are fairly light weight and offer the good balance of performance we needed. Attached to the wheels were Continental's Gran Prix Tri tires, which were light weight, super sticky, and offered incredible traction in the rain.
Looks were also an important part of this build and we wanted to make sure the lines of the frame were complemented by the other components. So we added more carbon with an FSA headset, Truvativ Noir seatpost, and Ritchey drop bars. We also added an FSA stem and Serfas Arc saddle in white to conform to the color scheme. Fully built, this racer tops out just a hair over 18 pounds.
For the upcoming race season we've made a few changes to the bike. We found that even though the Lezyne alloy bottle cages look great, and weigh less than the FSA K-Force carbon cages, having water bottles on the seat and down tubes were too cumbersome while racing and ultimately lowered our average speed (averaged 19.5 mph during the Nation's Tri). To combat our speed and hydration problem we've added a set of Profile Design T1+Viper aerobars and the dual-chambered aerobottle, which should keep us in aero position for the entirety of the race.
More updates to come as race season starts up.
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