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The legacy of the Messenger Mansion goes back over a decade. It used to be filled with SF graffiti heads and then over time, local couriers moved in. Now it’s more or less the TCB Courier HQ and I’m crashing here while I’m in town. Bike houses always make great subjects for photography and these photos were taken yesterday afternoon in the waining San Francisco sunlight.
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Kenny always has the nicest work bikes. His Raleigh, Guerciotti and now this Cannondale track bike have been featured on the site but this one takes the cake. Chris Lee bought this frame a few months back and realized it was too big for him, seeing an opportunity, Kenny snatched it up. Since the original fork was nowhere to be found, he picked up a similar track fork and threw a Cetma on it. Now the fork and the rack have a nice patina to them and Kenny is already riding it into the ground. As evidence by the bird shit all over it, he’s more into the ride, than keeping a museum-quality icon of the 90’s track racing scene.
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Look, I’m not going to sit here and say that the 44RN is the best track chainring ever but I will say that they look damn nice. Someone should convince Aaron to make more of these 144bcd 47t rings. I love mine and Chas has been riding his since he won it at Stupor Bowl. It looks damn fine on his Cinelli Mash low pro.
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NYC has a flavor unmatched by any other city in the world and this interview by Lab8 with Kurt Boone captures some of those vibes.
Remember this bike? Well, this is what it looks like after almost two years of street thrashing. Tone’s taken this baby everywhere and it’s accumulated a lot of character in the process. There’s nothing like riding Italian steel all day as your work bike.
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Touchdown! Well, maybe you weren’t gunning for that just yet.
“DrEd, a British website that bills itself as “the online medical practice for everyone,” is launching an emergency contraception bike delivery service that promises to discreetly deliver the morning after pill to any London location within two hours for £20 — as the website points out, that’s “about £5 less than it would cost to walk into a pharmacy and order the morning after pill over the counter.””
Wow. See more at Jezebel.
Hugo has been a cohort of mine in NYC for a few years now. He started Snap! Delivery and is always hanging around Affinity. I caught up with him while I was in NYC and got these two photos. Austin may be my home now but the Brooklyn community is still my family.
The 2012 Velo City dates are locked in! Make it out to this if you can and check out more at Cyclehawk.
Snap! Delivery in Brooklyn really started a chain reaction in how bicycle-powered food delivery companies can work. When Alex moved to SF, he spawned TCB Courier and now, in Milwaukee, Kevin and Peter from COG Magazine have started Flavor Cycle. We all know this is far from easy to achieve and I wish these guys the best of luck. If you’re in Milwaukee and work in their delivery zone, make sure you help these guys out! Thanks for the heads Earl!
The Brooklyn Machine Works Gangsta Track is hands down my favorite street fixed bike of all time. These rugged machines were all the rage a few years back, when FGFS was still in its infancy. Everyone from Tom LaMarche to Austin Horse and even myself rode these noble steeds all over NYC. But these bikes could still be found worldwide, as far as Japan. Ian’s a bike messenger, or courier, in NYC and this is his work bike. Taking in cues from BMX bikes, his Gangsta’ is a mix of fixed and BMX components, all holding together a well-used street machine. This was my favorite bike I shot while I was in NYC a few weeks back. See for yourself below.
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Photo by Takuya Sakamoto
Tak’s been real good to the Mishka family over the years and while I don’t usually like studio shots, this LOOP Magazine photo set that’s up on the Mishka Bloglin is awesome. Check them out!
Kevin from COG emailed this over. Back in May of 2010, he made some buttons with the above copy, inspired by Tracko’s STTB campaign. Now, there are tee’s for sale at Ink to the People. Swoop one here for $15.
This was my favorite bike from my recent trip to NYC. Ian’s BMW Gangsta Track had so much soul. So much life and a patina that only a thrashed street bike has. Ride this into the ground man! More to come…
Kurt Boone wrote a poem and reads it over a series of photos he took during the 2012 Red Hook Crit as an homage to the NYC bike messengers.
The whole week I was in NYC, I couldn’t get over how rad the SF to NYC connection was working out for people. Chas and Steve came over to race Monster Track this year and stayed for the Red Hook Crit. They work for TCB Courier in SF and decided to work in the city with various independent messenger companies while they were in town. These two got thrown in the fire and had to learn the ways of the streets almost immediately. But they’re resilient and took every lesson in stride. After he settled in a bit, I met up with Steve on 15th street to see how he was adjusting to the NYC hustle. He’s working for Clementine Courier and has been on his hustle. As I said, dude’s resilient and you’ve gotta be when you’re #FixieFamous.
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Squid was one of the first “OG messengers” in NYC who reached out to me. Still to this day, I have the utmost respect for the man. He embodies the hardworking NYC hustle but is never to busy to stop and chat for a minute. He’s split off from his old courier crew, now named Street Kings NYC and continues to push advocacy through Cyclehawk, Velo City and is the rep from Chrome in NYC. I caught up with Kevin last week in NYC and shot some photos of his work bike, a custom Squarebuilt track bike.
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Australia’s a wonderful place, filled with amazing people. This Recent Roll is compiled from various left-overs accumulated while I was Down Under. It’s mostly city shots and photos of vintage cars. Click the photo above to launch the Gallery, or click here to open in a new tab.
280 miles in 3 days? Sounds like a blast to me. The Beast of the East messenger challenge is coming up on May 18th.
“Welcome to the official website for the pre-event to the 2012 NACCC. The Beast of the East will be a weekend long event celebrating the bike courier culture. Expect a wide verity of all the favorite alley cats, lots of partying, all the weirdest side events we can think of. There will be 7 races during the weekend, each race will earn participants points. The rider with the most points at the end will be crowned the Beast Of the East. And after all that is done we will hop on our bikes and take a 3 day 280 mile trip down route 1 to Richmond, VA for the 2012 NACCC.
This event is put on by current and ex messengers of Philadelphia. To ensure a great weekend we ask that you please pre-register so we know how many party hats and cake to buy for everyone. Those who pre-register will get early access to couch and floor space.”
Pre-register for the event here.
