Monthly Archives: October 2008

Awesome work by American tattoo artist Mike Giant (his official site here).

The Paino is almost ready. Another new white tyre is on it’s way for the rear. White brake cable outers and white handlebar tape and I’m set!

I finally got around to registering for the 90km Sydney to the Gong MS bike ride today. I’ve done it twice before but I was 16/17 then! Even though I haven’t had any sort of distance training regime over the past few months I’m pretty sure I’ve got the mental ability to make it. I’m pretty sure my ass is going to hurt by the end of it though!

If you would like to make a small donation to support my ride and help people suffering from Multiple Sclerosis, please do so here.

The soundtrack is amazing, especially when the drums kick in, but then it turns to crap when the shitty wap wap keyboards take over. Nice clip though, looks like the Fixie trend is well and truly about to crap itself and die (not?).

Some say you should never sell bikes as they’re always good for parts, or for when mates come over or for memories sake but my Scott Scale sold on eBay for $3k and she’s packed and ready to be sent off to Melbourne. I’m not that sad to see it go, she’s truly an amazing bike, but a super rigid XC hardtail doing the kind of stuff I like to do and riding on the kind of stuff I like to ride just doesn’t go hand in hand. I’m sure the new owner will be ecstatic.

Had a hit of Golf with Mum today at The Lakes golf course, she’s been competing for over 5 years now. My sister Jamie and hubby Richie played too and we were playing so shit that Mum got a little frustrated and played well below par herself.

JDM yo! Their golf buggies are actually fast! lol.

Richie and Jamie.

One of a few which I later lost in the lake.

Haha.

Richie teeing it up.

Mum smacking it.

Bird?

Fish!

I’d wear that. Love the logotype.

The Lakes is as elitist as it gets. This was in the carpark. I suppose he can fit a set of clubs in there somehow.

New X6 is MASSIVE.

On another note. I spent last night polishing bits on the Paino whilst watching the F1 (yawn). A massive lot of rust has come off which is a good thing.

Brake pads: left – before, right – after.

I got these Gran Comp tyres in white, really not sure about them though, they were originally for the purple rims I was going to get (which I’m no longer getting).

I’ve been invited to judge another Cut&Paste event, this time it’s the 55DSL Logo Remix. The Logo Remix challenges graphic designers, illustrators, and typographers, as well as all-around creative types, to take the iconic 55DSL Shield logo and spin it into a remix that reflects 55DSL’s culture and spirit, its origins and its future. The Grand Prize winner of the 55DSL Logo Remix will receive 1,055€ in addition to seeing his/her logo design produced by 55DSL. More details here.

Had a great ride today at Loftus with Richie and Andy and 3 new guys: Grant, who wears clip-ins and has a lovely old Cannondale hardtail and is more into road bikes, Shaun who commutes on road 5 minutes to and from work on his Giant Yukon hardtail and has never ridden on a trail before (yeah we’re pushing everyone to ride with us!) and Johnno who had an old Specialized hardtail.

Bright and early at Richie’s place.

Left to right: Johnno, Richie, Shaun and Grant.

Left to right: Richie, Grant and Andy.

Group shot.

My fitness levels are definitely getting better and I’m also learning how to lean into corners much harder and modulate the rear brake whilst leaning in, as opposed to locking up the rear for a slide which does nothing much but slow me down and rip up the trail.

In other news the heat is on so Suga and I went to fetch some fresh salt water at the boat ramp for the fish tank. I put a little love into the tank, cleaned up the glass and did a 20litre water change. I’ll hopefully keep it up, weekly, over the summer.

So I had planned to drop a load of dosh on the great 80’s Paino road bike I picked up off eBay last weekend. I spent the week concepting and building up a wishlist of great parts. The first part on order was a set of Velocity Deep V wheels in purple (gold spoke nipples of-course lol). I really wanted to offset the old skool frame with some super crazy in your face bling wheels, thing is, Velocity are out of purple rims and that disrupted the whole plan as it gave me time to think some more.

Grant at Mc Cyclery thought it would have been a shame to remove the vintage Campagnolo gear from the bike (I had removed the quick releases and was contemplating a new Sugino crankset). Same goes for the Campagnolo hubs, which he says are worth a pretty penny. After talking to Matt, who says I’m a lucky fucker to score such a lovely bike with great Australian history I re-thought all of the modifications that I was going to do and I’ve decided to just leave her be.

I put the drop bars back on as the risers, apart from being very “trendy” and fixie inspired, brought the bars too close to me in any case. I dropped in to Mc Cyclery again today today and bought some brand new cabling for both brakes and shifters. It’s so nice to not have to tune up the gears, friction shifting rocks out! Grant was out of toe clips so I ducked into Europa Cycles in Kingsford hoping to find some vintage gear.

Europa: I always dreamed of owning a Colnago.

Europa and John have been around forever. I bought my road bike from them when I was a kid, it was a Europa steel frame with friction shifting, lovely bike which I later destroyed (I ran over a cat!). They used to have a huge store on Anzac Parade, close to the big roundabout, they also had a store in Clovelly and on Clarence St. in the city across from Clarence Street Cyclery. I haunted the staff a lot, and even did hours at the Clovelly store in exchange for parts for a mountain bike build.

It’s just so awesome he’s still there, the now tiny “new” shop is a time warp, nothing has changed and John is in the store running it with his wife and his son. He’s an old man now, his hands are a bit shakey but he got a little excited when I said I had an old Paino bike I wanted some parts for. Specifically some white handlebar tape that refects the era, some chrome toe clips and white leather straps. John ducked into the store room out the back, and after what felt like an eternity, he came back out with some goodies for me.

Check out the goodies I bought: French AFA toe clips, Europa/Campagnolo white leather toe straps and vintage handlebar tape. Even the recipt John wrote for me is old skool cool!

– Edit: Love the toe clips and straps, they feel great. The bars I still have to get used to. On a bad note, the handlebar tape was nowhere near long enough for the whole drop bar (it could only do the ends to the brakes) That’s a massive shame. Looks like I’ll have to settle for something else.

A few months ago I decided to take off the ariel on the Honda Jazz in an effort to ban radio. Nova 96.9 in particular. The shit was killing me, the repetitive top 10 pop, the crap humour and the advertisements.

What an awesome move!

I’ve got a stack of CD’s in the car that I find myself screaming along to (good times). Fave CD’s over the past few months have been:

– Faith No More – the real thing
My first ever CD. Their cover of Sabbath’s War Pigs still gets me every time.

– Jeff Buckley – Grace
So real.

– Stone Temple Pilots – 12 Gracious Melodies
It’s one of those albums that you happily play start to end.

Well it was bound to happen. 2 guys who run their own businesses = mid week bike rides. Zi and I hit Manly Dam AGAIN today!!!

This time I had to try a few things. One was the harder line up the 3 techy steps and 2 was the gnarly drop that I’ve seen someone do but have always gone around the easier way myself.

Zi going up Step 2.

So getting up step 2 is now as easy as piss for me, but step 3 is a little trickier as I lose all momentum before it. Last ride I saw an old dude go straight up the hardest part of step 3 and this time I had to give it a go, took me quite a few goes but I finally got there. I’m determinded to take this harder line every time from now on.

Here’s a small vert drop to steep roll (picture taken from the top) that I saw someone else do once. Zi’s bike in the picture is where the cliff drops off (he’s placed his bike there for a reason!). I’ve always gone around this part but this time I was all padded up and I had to try it.

Picture from the bottom looking up.

Funny thing is I did it once, Zi missed the shot. He was giggling and told me to do it again. He missed the shot the 2nd time too, and I missed the last rock and almost went over the bars. After missing the shot for the 2nd time Zi was now laughing out loud. He told me to do it again and we finally got the shot.

Saaaap! Building on the way back to work. Speaking of back to work, fuck I’ve got a lot of work to do, WTF am I blogging for?!