The Radavist

The 2014 Red Bull Mini Drome NYC
Words and photos by Chris Lee

This year’s Red Bull Mini Drome took place at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple on June 28th. Unlike last year’s frigid race, this year took place in the middle of summer and brought a much higher (and more leveled) caliber of racing to the event. Racers definitely took note from the year previous and brought fixed gear freestyle bikes, fixed gear DJ bikes and a lighter gear ratio. This made for some really impressive bike handling and transition pumping skills to be shown off while each racer gained more speed with every lap.

This year’s Mini Drome featured a new “fastest team” category which Brooklyn Machine Works took home. And of course the individual fastest racer which went to Brooklyn local, David Rodebough.

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The Messenger’s Guide To New York City: The West Village and Midtown
Standby with Hiromi/Ghost stories and local comfort with Stoned Tone
Words and photos by Chris Lee

In the second installment of The Messenger’s Guide To New York City, I got a chance to have the man behind Boda Boda, Hiromi Bruni show me around. Hiromi was born and raised in the West Village and knows the neighborhood like the back of his hand. We payed respects to the remains of Gray’s Papaya, a hot dog joint that was a fixture in the neighborhood and got some desert at Rocco’s. We went by Dave’s Work Wear, the local’s only one stop shop for work wear. And finally chilled at his favorite midtown standby spots.

What I’ve realized over time is that I end up with a lot of bike portraits of riders in my film rolls. This sparked an idea: a “ride along” interview series. We’ll start this off with Chris Lee, in NYC, where he interviews Brean Shea, a bike messenger and track cyclist.

Monster Track. The world’s most infamous, dangerous and in my opinion, most significant alleycat. In the 15 years it’s been thrown in New York City, it never ceases to surprise its contenders. There are only a few rules, the most important being two words: NO BRAKES.

Typically, there’s a weeding down process, at the hands of multiple manifests. Everyone starts with one, but only a select few make it to true completion by filling up to three. This year, mother nature smiled on the event, delivering somewhat favorable conditions (when compared to previous years being riddled with rain and snow). At the end of the event, the winners of Monster Track XV were Cooper Ray and Hannah Todd.

On the scene at the event and working the Williamsburg Bridge checkpoint was Chris Lee, who provided a few photos from the event. Check them out in the Gallery!