The Radavist

Today we’re pleased to showcase framebuilder operation Quirk Cycles and its new model, the SUPERCHUB. Let’s take a look at this new bike, guided by Robert Quirk’s words and photographer’s Nikoo Hamzavi documentation of this stunning machine.

These days, it’s hard to set your bike brand apart from others within a specific niche but if there’s one thing Cjell has achieved with his brand, Monē Bikes, it’s just that. Monē frames are instantly recognizable with their large, bountiful brass beds of fillet brazing, unique tubing bends, intricate and ingenious singlespeed-friendly dropout designs, and yeah, rat rod aesthetics. Cjell and I have met before, albeit briefly, but at last weekend’s Dangerbird event, we got to spend a lot of time on the bike with each other, which helped me gain an even deeper appreciation for the brand, the bikes, and the man who designs and even builds some of them.

This one is gonna be a simple write-up. Ally had a really amazing looking custom bike from a builder, Hoefer Cycles, I had never come across before.  I asked Ally about the story behind the bike and she just responded, “I told him I wanted a sweet bikepacking rig that I could ride anywhere.” I reached out to Donald, the man behind Hoefer Cycles, and he corroborated the story and adding that “It’s really fun when someone comes to me with a request as open-ended as hers was and trusts me to deliver.” While handcrafting a detailed and intentional build such as this is nothing simple, the joy it produces is.  Just look at that smile, Donald still remembered seeing Ally’s huge smile as she came back from the first test ride.  After Ally had trouble finding something that truly fit, it seemed Donald had hit the bullseye.

Circling back to our Shop Visit at Baphomet Bicycles from earlier this year, we’re finally featuring Jenn’s hardtail. Jenn runs Wild Coast Photo and specializes in photographing elopements all over the world. With singletrack out their front door, a good, versatile hardtail is perfect for the trails around Taos, New Mexico, where Baphomet is based. Let’s look at this beaut below in detail…

When one thinks of Esker Cycles, the Hayduke 27.5+ hardtail (reviewed here by Locke Hassett) quickly comes to mind – and in many ways, the Hayduke served as the launchpad for the design of Esker’s latest model, the Japhy.

While the Japhy looks like considerably “less bike” than the 140mm Hayduke with its 120mm fork and 29″ wheels, don’t count it out yet: the Japhy is scrappy and is willing to claw its way through just about anything!

Over the past few months I’ve been riding the Japhy all over our local trails here in Santa Fe and while at first I was hesitant about taking it out on some of the more technical terrain, I found it to be an exceptional climber and a surprisingly fun descender.

So, let’s get into it!

With the pandemic causing severe delays and stock shortages, building up a new bike in 2020 and into 2021 is proving to be quite the ordeal. Erik is a local here in Santa Fe and a customer at Sincere Cycles. I first rode with him a few years back when we shuttled Winsor while I was visiting. At the time, he had a Santa Cruz Chameleon, which proved to be a capable ally in our mountains. Jump forward a few years and Erik was looking for a new bike. The aforementioned delays due to the pandemic had him looking at other options outside of the brands offering titanium frame models. He had his sights set on a custom titanium hardtail from Waltly in China…

A bike can be a liberating tool for a youngster. I got the first bike that I could travel distances on when I was 14. Granted it was a beach cruiser but hey, we lived at the beach. I’d carry my skateboard and even a surfboard to spots after school and on the weekends. It was a vessel of adolescent liberation.

For Jonah, a local of Santa Fe, and an employee at Mellow Velo, the bicycle has helped develop his independence as well as a vehicle to meander around his homeland. His family is one of the deeply embedded heritage households and have been in the area for hundreds of years. Just north of Santa Fe is the town of Chimayo where his family has been weaving for generations under the brand Ortega.

Over the past few years, I’ve noticed a lot of negative internet chatter when bike brands release hardtail trail bikes that are not overly slack, steep, or otherwise geometrically boundary-pushing in some way. My suspicion is that many of these comments come from riders that prefer lifts over pedaling uphill but nonetheless cast a shadow on mid-travel hardtails that are intended for folks that aren’t spending their days in terrain parks.