I’ve been having some real transportation issues lately. Sold my car, bought a dorky scooter, dreaming of a bicycle powered utopian world without traffic or cars while simultaneously shopping for old race cars.
The Michigan car culture I grew up in clashes so hard with my life as a cyclist!
Too emo?
Too obscene?
I have a definite love hate relationship with Las Vegas and Interbike. First of all I pretty much think that Vegas is the worst place on earth, but I also kind of love it. As soon as you begin herding off the plane with all the obese and moo-ing midwestern tourists you know you are in a bad place. Waiting 45 minutes in line to check in at the hotel while people are chain smoking around you, and then buying a bottle of water for $8 is no way to start a visit to a new city. On the other hand though, the people watching is amazing!! Every time I start to get bummed or on some decay of civilization high-horse I see some old lady laughing her ass off at a slot machine, or some newly-wed couple having a lovey-dovey moment waiting for the elevator. I don’t know… suffice to say Vegas is not my place but I understand that people from all over the world save their money to go to sin-city on vacation and have a great time. If they’re happy then screw it… I’ll be happy for them.
Well… blah blah blah… Vegas… its worth the experience.
I also got to see about a million and half friends who I never get to see enough of. That was very good. Spending a little time in the BMX section is like a highschool reunion or something. You can’t turn around without running into someone you haven’t seen in 10 years. Good times even if it can be a little overwhelming and I think at one point my mouth went numb from talking too much.
Got to show the Fairdale road bike prototypes at the Full Factory booth and that was pretty cool (eventually you bike shops will be able to buy the bikes from them). The Fairdale bikes are so new and we are still working things out so it may have been a tad premature. We still don’t know what they will cost or when they will be available (spring?). Working hard on the other models now and hoping to get them in to test soon. The response to the bikes was awesome though. I really appreciate all the great feedback we received.
Every year I promise myself I will walk around Interbike with a camera and find the most outrageous and kooky stuff because I really think some of it is amazingly comical. But, like every year I never get around to it and forgot my camera. Found a few little gems though.
This is a Cinderella shapped shoe that clamps on to your handlebars to hold your barbie doll. Pretty sweet. I’m a huge fan of the grammar though… I find a lot of comedy in bad translations.
You really need to read the description to understand this product, but apparently this is big in the brooklyn BMX scene. I haven’t seen Edwin Delarosa in a while, I have to assume he is riding this around and loving the “bouncing ability”
I’m a big fan of Knog’s lights and also their general weirdness. I don’t know how they can sell stuff to uptight bikes shops with this kind of advertising, but I love that they do.
Of course they are advertising cable locks. By the way, I think maybe we should start a collection to get them off that 1995 freestyle bike and on to something a little more modern.
My little press release about the bikes coming out got spread around a lot with pretty positive response. The one from Ride BMX above really made me laugh though. Somehow Fat Toonie managed to spell my name wrong 4 times (and two different ways) and also to spell Fairdale wrong. I’ve only been writing and contributing to Ride BMX for 18 years! Ha ha… considering though that Phat Toni put up a post about road bikes on a BMX website I am nothing but grateful.
The first Fairdale bike samples have arrived! I’m so happy and excited to see this project starting to come into reality.
After a while of working at Odyssey’s design office here in Austin, TX, I have been given the opportunity to turn Fairdale into an actual brand.
It’s something I’ve wanted to do for years and years and I think even my hardcore BMX-only friends will be able to relate to some of the motivation behind it.
Fairdale is the brand for all my friends who ask me what kind of bike they should get just for riding around town. In the past, I always struggled to find a good answer for them. So many bikes are too focused on racing, extremeness, trends, are dorky looking or just bogged down with too much flakey technology. On the other hand, BMX, with its simple functionality, has taught me that the technology of a bike rarely increases the fun of riding it.
It has been my experience that the simplicity of a bicycle is actually the magic of it. Who wants a bicycle that is too complicated to maintain without the help of a mechanic, or too “raced” out to be comfortable for a leisurely after dinner cruise? And how many people really need a carbon fiber space ship bike just to have a fun day pedaling or to get to school on? Fairdale is my opportunity to design bikes based on my 30+ years of experience and my love for simple and reliable bikes. As a bonus, I also get to work with the Odyssey design and engineering team, whose capabilities have been proven for a long time now.
The first samples to arrive are a couple sizes for what will be our single-speed road bike. It’s a classic steel frame design that incorporates room for a tires that are wider than what you would find on the average road bike. It also has mounts for both fenders and front/ rear cargo racks. It works well with drop bars and riser bars and although production is still a ways off, we are thinking that we may offer the bike with both configurations. Made from reliable, trustworthy and affordable double butted chromoly steel, the frame and fork are light and durable. The components are spec’d with what we would ride if we built them ourselves (because we did) and every effort has been made to keep the bikes affordable and easy to maintain. Simple things like flat protected tires and common sized, proven parts can make such a difference in how much time you can actually spend riding your bike instead of fixing it.
We also have a few other models planned:
-A mixed-style 700c cruiser with a more relaxed riding position, fenders, and rack standard.
-A simple 26 inch wheeled single speed all around ultra affordable-adaptable bike.
-My personal bike; a 29 inch BMX cruiser, perfect for a chilling ride around town or on a trail with the occasional curb hop thrown in.
-Whatever else we feel like doing. Austin is such a bicycle city that we have endless inspiration.
Also, for my skateboarding friends, I just completed the prototyping of a cool pannier rack that will hold a skateboard for easy transportation. I realize the irony that my BMX friends will see in me making a big-wheeled bike with a skateboard on it! Ha ha. I love it!
We’ll keep you updated on these things… won’t be available for a good while yet, but we are working on them!
Oh yeah, we’ll have some new soft goods out very soon. Mostly keeping with the silly graphics on our online zine here, but some will be more clean and classic like the bike’s graphics too.
Note: We’ll spec our single speed road bikes with freewheels and brakes to make them easy to ride and good for getting places, but you can flop the hub and run it fixed if you like.
Journal dump…
Ah yes… the bird dancing with the elephant.
And these guys…
And a little deep contemplation of the dichotomy of city and country life interrupted by a gigantic zombie dog attack.
And a statement of the obvious.
I never really much understood labor day or any of the other kind of lesser holidays. Those ones where the bank and a lot of business’s are closed but no one really celebrates them outside of getting a day off work. That is until now when I have (for the first time) a 5 day a week “real” job.
I had a few jobs back in Michigan but never anything too serious. I rented canoes and cross country skis when I was a kid, worked as a dishwasher at a diner, worked a K-mart. I even worked at Albe’s for a bit as a gorilla of a mechanic (wrestling and smashing early 90’s BMX bikes into shape). I moved out to Standard in Davenport Iowa for a bit and worked as a short order cook in a strip club and then finally made the move to Austin. In Austin I got a job in a health food store making smoothies. That was a pretty fun job.
Not long after the smoothie job got going I quit to take a open position riding in Sprocket Jockey shows for Hoffman. Poor Dave Mirra was in the hospital with a ruptured spleen and they needed a fill in. Someone could write a book on doing BMX shows at state and country fairs… what a wild ex-convict haven of interesting and sketchy people. I also got to learn to ride vert some. Can’t tell you how horrified I was rolling up late for my first show and being told to do an abubaca for the first time ever on a vert ramp in a show! ha ha…
After doing all the shows I could take I luckily started making enough money off bikes to not have to work. I had some golden years where all I did was get by, travel and ride bikes. Not bad at all. After a while I got kind of bored of being such a slacker and helped start T1. All of a sudden I had a job I couldn’t ever get out of my mind. Drove me a little crazy… I guess thats the danger of taking a business so personally… kind of get pretty wrapped up in it. In the end I walked away from the company because it was so mired in personal issues.
Now I’m working at Odyssey and Fairdale and its super fun. After being hurt and off BMX for so long I am really grateful to have such a good job and to be doing such fun things for work.
Even so, I appreciate (for the first time) a good long holiday weekend! Hope you had a good one too!
Today I am 12. Monty and I are celebrating! Its Taj’s birthday too, but he’s off at work at Odyssey having a pizza party lunch.
Dave Parrick Photos
