The Radavist

I’m here in Portland, Oregon attending the Bike and Beer festival at HopWorks Urban Brewery. While I’ll be documenting many of the frames, I’ll also be capturing the general vibes. For now, let’s just check out some bikes!

For Breadwinner Cycles, it may appear their bikes are designed for racing and ripping. That’s not the case for their Arbor Lodge porteur bike. These do-it-all city commuters are designed to pack versatility in a nimble steel frame while still holding true to that Breadwinner aesthetic. My personal favorite detail is the custom porteur rack and the use of the White Industries VBC cranks.

“John, let’s just ride bikes, don’t bring your camera.”

I’ve heard it countless times and history has proven that no matter what, if I don’t bring my camera, I end up wishing I had. Especially when it comes to new trails. Extra especially when it comes to new trails in the Pacific Northwest.

On my last day in Portland, Ira and Tony from Breadwinner Cycles invited me on a Sunday afternoon trail ride, about an hour outside of Portland in the Brown’s Camp trail network. Up until that point, all I had ridden in the PDX area was Sandy Ridge and a few trails in Forest Park. Not exactly a sampling of the land.

The JB Racer may be Breadwinner’s flagship MTB but it’s far from anything new for Ira Ryan and Tony Pereira. When the two framebuilders decided to join forces to create the Breadwinner label, Ira Brought his knowledge of road and cross bikes to the table, while Tony weighed in on the MTB game.

Truthfully, the JB Racer is a continuation of the way Tony Pereira has been building cross-country mountain bikes for years. Named after Jeff Bates, one of Tony’s best friends who died from skin cancer, the JB Racer is a true to form XC race machine. Racing mountain bikes is where Pereira Cycles first made an appearance and Jeff Bates was one of the first to race under the brand.

When Breadwinner formed, Tony used his singlespeed MTB as inspiration for the JB Racer and here we are today. This and the Bad Otis offer two sides to the MTB coin. After we shredded Brown’s Camp last week, I shot some photos of Ira Ryan’s personal JB Racer. While there’s more to come from that day, I really wanted to showcase this bike on its own.

If you’re interested in one of these machines, the JB Racer starts at $1795 for a frame.

Check out more in the Gallery!

Breadwinner Cycles was one of the brands that took up the torch, or tig welder rather, for the Rouge Roubaix Builder Challenge. Ira Ryan came out to St. Francisville with a stacked team, including Bicycling Magazine’s head editor Bill Strickland and a loyal customer Jake Rosenbloum from Asheville. Their selection was pretty much a shoe-in. When Ira began sifting through the applicants, he selected Hurl Everstone from Minneapolis.

With the Rouge Roubaix’s 40-ish miles of gravel and horrible road conditions, Ira and Hurl began discussing which bike would make the most sense for the race. Truthfully, both the Lolo and the B-Road would be ideal steeds for such an undertaking with their bigger tire clearances and geometries dialed in for all-road terrain.

Hurl selected a disc B-Road with Shimano Ultegra, Mavic Ksyrium Pro disc wheels, Pasela 28mm tires and Thomson bits.

… and as demonstrated, the bike shreds just fine.

The guys had an exceptional placement in the 3/4s, with Jake finishing 6th on his Lolo and Ira Ryan coming in 20th on his Lolo.

Team Breadwinner would like to thank Castelli, Mavic, Bikeflights, Hifi Wheels and Challenge Tires.

At this point, Tony Pereira of Breadwinner has won three “best MTB” awards at NAHBS over the years. So when this Bad Otis was getting built up on Thursday night before the show, I was interested to see what he had up his sleeves… Boy, was I surprised and impressed. Both Ira and Tony had killer personal bikes at the show.

Tony’s Bad Otis sports a Rockshox 160mm Pike front fork and it’s a hard tail. While that might be an issue on a 29’r, this 27.5 bike will destroy about anything Tony throws at it (or anything he hucks it off, rather). The Reverb Stealth dropper adds another level of adaptability for trail conditions.

With a head angle of 66 degrees and some nice, plump tires, this bike wants to go down things, fast. I just wish I could be there to see him shred on its maiden voyage.

See more in the Gallery!

Don’t adjust your handheld or desktop computers, those are indeed indexed downtube shifters… This bike is a throwback to Ira Ryan’s personal history as a bicycle racer and frame builder. Ira is no stranger to gravel, or dirt road riding and racing. Years back, in the early years of the Rapha Continental, Ira was on 23c tires tackling some of the US’ most picturesque roads. Maybe that’s what inspired this ride? That and classic road frames, with an edge. Think of this B Road as an homage to the bikes of yesteryear, with modern upgrades.

Breadwinner‘s bikes this year absolutely slayed and this tangerine B Road “gravel” bike had so much zest. The project began with Ira and Tony modifying Dura Ace downtube shifters to fit 11-speed bar end internals (yes, it shifts like butter). From there, a tapered head tube with an ENVE CX fork and 32c Pasela tires provide more than adequate clearances for true all-road riding and racing. Then, Breadwinner added a third bottle cage and fender eyelets to the ENVE fork!

TRP’s Hylex hydro disc brakes (with custom drillium levers!) will provide the stopping power and modulation. The internal cable routing ensures the lines of the frame stay clean. I don’t know why I love this machine so much, maybe it’s a combination of it truly being unique or the color? For whatever the reason, I enjoyed photographing this in the morning light at this year’s NAHBS.

See more of this mind-boggling machine in the Gallery!