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Speedvagen’s Ready Made program looks to get you on top of one of their bikes, minus the lengthy wait, and premium price, associated with a fully custom frame. These bikes come in completes only, built with a carefully selected component selection, and in two models. The Ready Made CX starts at $5995 for a complete and the Workshop Team SSCX starts at $6695 complete. Check out all the details below, including more photos of these hawt bikes.
After the Workshop Build Off, Speedvagen counted all the votes on this website, social media, and other forms of chatter to determine the winner. Without a doubt, the GTFO landed the public’s love and a place in the Ready-Made program. But alas, if the GTFO isn’t your speed and you’d like to see a Ready-Made road bike, the team at Speedvagen worked with Chris King on special pricing for an entire King package, resulting in the CKOG road bike. Check out the details for both of these bikes below and see more at Speedvagen.
It’s always fun to see projects like this unfold. A few years back, Josh from Avery County Cycles built this 650b light tourer up for a customer, who returned it shortly after due to it not fitting the size tire they wanted to ride. It’s a bummer for a builder to deliver a product that doesn’t please their client, but it happens. For a while, Josh just kept the frame as it hung in his shop. Eventually, Josh decided to close Avery County, and posted the frame up on his Instagram with a note saying it’s for sale.
Ryan is a customer at Golden Saddle and a regular. You’ll often find him ripping around on his Ritchey or hanging out at the shop on a Saturday afternoon. When he expressed an interest in building up a light tourer, Kyle showed him the Avery and they made it happen. Ryan built this bike with a mindful component selection, ranging from the rare Paul Component Van Halen Mini-Motos, to a Pass and Stow rack, Sinewave Beacon light, running from a SON hub and various other tried and true components. He wants to take this bike on a tour this summer, once he can get some time off work, but for now, he takes it all over the dirt roads surrounding this bustlin’ city.
Builds like this are really special, especially with the backstory on this frame.
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If you want a custom build like this and live in Los Angeles, hit up Golden Saddle Cyclery.
Tonight’s premiere of El Silencio: Cycling the Peruvian Andes at Golden Saddle was excellent. The visuals, story, and cast of characters are as memorable as the scenery. Seeing these vignettes in video is an exceptional experience, especially after seeing so much of Ryan Wilson’s photography work from the area over the years…
Instagram. It opens the door to people’s lives. Their existence, their motivations, their day-to-day routines, and their ambitious undertakings. With some, this transparency and subsequent stoked, is not only exciting to follow along, but highly motivating. Pepper is one of those people on Instagram. The ones you see on their bike, in beautiful places every post, and sharing a positive mental attitude all while promoting cycling. I had never met Pepper before yesterday, yet I’m sure the feeling is mutual when we acknowledged seeing each other’s lives unfold online. One of the bigger undertakings of her cycling life was an ambitious bikepacking route with the Tumbleweed Bikes team. The end product of their trip is a beautiful film by Jay Ritchey, which premiered here in Los Angeles last night, coinciding with an opportunity for me to meet Pepper and document the very bike that she pedaled, pushed, and crashed on the Peru Divide.
We’ve looked at Dan’s Tumbleweed before on the site, and while the frame details are the same, the build differs, particularly with Pepper’s use of a basket for touring – not pictured here, a Fabio’s Chest by Swift Industries and Ultra Romance has replaced it – for that, head to her Instagram to check it out, and be sure to catch the film El Silencio: Cycling the Peruvian Andres if it comes to your city!
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Cannondale Track, ORNOT
Photos by Nich Barresi and words by Byron Anson
After breaking my fork, putting some deep scratches into the head tube paint, and getting a replacement fork from Cannondale that wasn’t going to match, I decided to get my Evo repainted. Choosing color is an agonizing process, but this idea fell into place really easily: early 90’s Cannondale Track’s are on of my all-time favorite bikes, Cannondale Track bike vinyl decals can be sourced from Britain, and the simple lines of the frame would really lend itself to this idea. Besides, ‘classics are classics for a reason.’
The painter, Eric of Burnt Bicycles, is a super rad dude who does work fairly close-by. I'd sent him a couple other frames for carbon repair+repaint and knew he'd kill this. Sure enough, had this frame and a paint matched stem back to me within 2 weeks, recreating the color from scratch.
Polished silver quill stems really go hand-in-hand with the Cannondale track bikes and knowing that Ritchey makes a sick polished cockpit with their Classic series, I couldn't not try it out. It looks so good, simple, and clean up front that I refuse to clutter up the front end with a mount and computer. Carbon seat post because ain't nobody got time for beat-up-booties.
See more at Ornot's blog!
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Follow Nich on Instagram, Ornot on Instagram, Burnt Bicycles on Instagram, and Byron on Instagram.
Sawyer’s Dirt Drop Miyata Sportrunner
Photos and words by Morgan Taylor
Bicycles need not be complicated. They need not be expensive. Yet it sure is nice when they have character. Sawyer’s Miyata is a simple reminder that a Craigslist find and a few easy mods can revive the joy of having a rad bike on a shoestring.
Built and bred with either ‘cross racing or dirt road riding in mind, the new DSS3 from the UK’s Donhou Bicycles pushes new geometry design, with versatility in mind. Built from a mix of Columbus and Reynolds tubing, with customized paint, geometry and build kit options. Check out all the details and more photos below and see more at Donhou Bicycles.
2017 Philly Bike Expo: Mars Cycles JRA Approved Track Bike
Words and photos by Jarrod Bunk
David from the Bay Area contacted Casey Sussman over at Mars Cycles (Featured here during NAHBS) for this rad track bike! Built for everyday commuting, from Columbus Zona double OS tubing, and featuring a wrap-around seat stay cluster that morphs into the ISP with a Ritchey topper, this bike is far from ordinary.
The Deluxe 840mm Ti bar stem combo along with 45mm deep carbon Deluxe wheels should make for some fun rips through traffic on this JRA approved track bike. Other details include an ENVE fork and a Columbus tapered headtube with raw, un-filed fillet construction throughout. I’m so stoked on the stance of this bike.
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Follow Jarrod on Instagram, and Mars Cycles on Instagram
Nate from Monkey Wrench Cycles’ Hunter Commando Tourer
Photos by Kyle Kelley, words by John Watson
Nate and the entire Monkey Wrench Cycles gang have done a lot for US framebuilders over the years, as evident in their in-house museum where you can find vintage Moots MTBs, alongside Steve Potts’ creations, while a modern Hunter Cycles might be hanging out as well. The thing I can appreciate about what I’ve seen coming from MWC is all their bikes have the same modus operandi: fat tires, practicality and a stance that commands trail time. I mean, honestly, a vintage MTB is still an ideal touring bike and in a lot of ways, the bikes the MWC team are always building up are just “modern” vintage MTBs. Take for instance this Hunter Cycles from 2013 NAHBS in Denver.
Dustin from Cadence took his Ritchey P-29 MTB up to Mt. Hood, Portland’s Holy Mountain.
The Custom Bikes of Grinduro Scotland
Photos by Kyle Kelley, words compiled from each builder by Andrew Denham
Each year at Grinduro California, the event reaches out to a handful of builders to showcase their handy work. With this year’s first event in Scotland, Grinduro decided to do the same, pinging a handful of UK builders to design the ultimate Grinduro bike, display and race their creations. The project was supported by Columbus, Lauf, SRAM, Clement and Fabric. The featured bikes were the subject of a public vote to establish the ‘best in show’ with the winner getting an awesome prize of Flights and entry to Grinduro California! Adeline O’Moreau won the vote with her awesome ‘Good Vibes’ MTB which she rode to victory in the under 30’s women category, so we’ll begin with her creation first.
Knowledge is best passed, like a torch, through experience. There are many institutions which educate hopeful framebuilders in the art of design, construction, and finishing of a bicycle frame. They each take their own approach to this process and many of our favorite builders have learned in this hands-on, classroom environment.
Nestled in an industrial building, within the town of Frome in Somerset, the Bicycle Academy threw their towel into the framebuilding education ring a few years back and in that time, have grown their curriculum into an impressive institution. All this could not have been possible if it were not for the successful crowdfunding operation and the 183 people who donated money and 23 individuals who donated their skills to jumpstart the Bicycle Academy.
Speaking of bicycle evolution and mountain bikes, check this video out. There’s nothing much to say other than if you chose to not watch this, you’re missing the point of riding bikes. These are the early days of mountain biking. When Fisher and others were riding hacked-up beach cruisers down fire trails in California.
Here’s some information from the internets:
Crested Butte to Aspen Klunker Classic, 1980. Part 1 of 2. See Charley Kelly, Gary Fisher, “Murdoch”, the guy who did the belch for Jaba the Hutt, and other mountain biking notables, along with bikes by Ritchey, Breezer, and Arnold Schwinn & Co. A fine look at the state of the art in mountain bikes 30 years ago. Drpaddle is the guy in the Skid-Lid on the desert camouflage Lowell-Knight Procruiser . This was one fine time of high-altitude partying and pedaling with a bunch of creative, fun, and free people. Dana Atchley of Crested Butte created this two-part video series. Be sure to view Part 2!
Part 2 is below, it’s well worth the watch!
Dustin Klein from Cadence talks about the Cannabis Caps and makes a video bike check of his Ritchey P-29 in his latest video.
Speedvagen has some news for anyone looking to buy one of their Ready Made road framesets. The OG-1 now comes with mechanical or electronic shifting options, new colors and a lower pricepoint. See more details from Speedvagen below!
Dustin Klein is no stranger to frame embellishment and for this year’s track crit season, he put it to work. Cadence teamed up with Jan Kole’s framebuilding company Colossi. A former Dutch professional cyclist himself, Jan raced in Europe in the 70s and 80s before moving to China to establish Colossi with his son, Sander.
Together, Colossi and Cadence will have a presence at the US and European track crit circuit in the form of these Cadence Colossi 2017 team frames. Read the full press-release and see more photos below.
The work of Chris Igleheart is some of my favorite and every year at NAHBS, I try to seek out one of his bikes to document it. This year, my quest took me to the Gevenalle and Hifi booth, where this beaut was waiting for me.
Built custom for the owner of Gevenalle, this bike features the Ritchey Breakaway system and one of those prototype White Industry headsets, as well as Hifi Wheels, Gevenalle shifters and a Burd rear mech.
