Wanna pick up a zine and limited edition mystery hat? Now you can. Click here! That’ll take you to the Odyssey store where you can place an order. Need anything else from Odyssey’s store? You can add that stuff too.
Not a whole lot left of these limited editions. Odyssey BMX Online Store.
I always hoped Fairdale would be a bit of an art blog that had more things on it then just what I can come up with. Luckily I got a contribution last night from Leif Valin. Following up on the T-shirt/ stencil from yesterday’s post he sent over one of his own designs.
“i love stencils fast, cheap and easy
unlike my women
well educated,expensive and prude.
heres an owl made from bicycle chain and a couple cogs as the stencil”
-Leif
Fairdale prides itself on being one of those companies that always seems to have its finger on the pulse of the newest and greatest things in cycling. But how do we do it? The truth is there is no big secret. We carefully monitor and catalog all available data so that we can analyze and quantify the upcoming styles and trends.
Here’s and example. We are all aware of the startling growth in handlebar size, but what has caused it? Fairdale has discovered a directly inverse correlation between the size of a riders pants and the size of his handlebars.
If we look at the early to mid 90s (known as the JNCO era) we can see that along with outrageously large pant size there was also a huge drop in handlebar size. Bars cut down so narrow that brake levers couldn’t fit between the grip and the crossbar were not unusual.
As time progressed and the disturbing excessively tight pants fashion entered BMX in the late 2000’s we can see that handlebar size has grown immensely.
At the beginning of 2010 we can see that two things have happened. Most riders pants have literally become so tight that the lower portion of the pant’s legs have literally exploded from the pant body leaving nothing but the shredded remains hanging from the rider’s waist. Secondly huge handlebars that are actually banned in international BMX race competitions due to overly large size are springing up everywhere. Manufacturer’s keen to cash into this market are quickly producing the biggest bars they can. But what could possibly come next?
Thanks to Fairdale’s ability to accurately trend-map we can give you a glimpse into the future. Here is 2012’s style. Specially made BMX banana hammocks and fantastically large handle bars leading to even more nose wheelies tricks and less candybars.
The future is limitless, but with the proper data and analytical ability it is not unexpected. Fairdale is here for you.
And, hopefully unrelated to the above… got this in the mail today. Photo of me from 1995 on the cover of a zine from 1999. Dreadlocked and Hoffman superforked.
With today’s street riding reaching never before seen bike demolishing levels Fairdale is here to help. Hub guards are an old stand by for protecting hubs against street riding abuse, be what about spoke nipples? Just like human nipples spoke nipples can be very fragile.
Introducing the Fairdale Nipple Bra.
Using a light weight combination of soft cotton and lycra this protective bra can keep your spoke nipples in perfect condition through even the roughest riding conditions.
Small elastic straps hook around the rim and underneath the tire making the bra very difficult to break free.
Still only in the prototyping phase is the valve stem athletic supporter. Once the design is finalized we promise to deliver a fail safe means of protecting your valve stem.
I’m sorry to say that whenever anyone talks about their meat stick sponsor I start giggling. Maybe its too many years as a vegetarian and I’m just not comfortable with those words, or maybe its the sense of humor of a 14 year old, but “meat stick” is funny.
On Transworld BMX’s site today they posted two different meat stick related articles. First a Ball Park Frank bike check and then a press release about the Matador™ by Jack’s Link’s™ Bold Bull Ride™ at the Wendy’s™ Invitational Dew™ Tour. That’s a mouthful of sausages right there! I can only imagine that BMX riders are going to be bouncing around on a gigantic bucking hotdog trying to keep their energy drink sponsor in camera frame. Its a funny time in BMX (for those of me who find meat stick sponsorships so entertaining).
Now granted this event is for charity and its always a good laugh to watch your friends falling off a electric bull. I’m not knocking the fun that will be had. In fact I find it that much more amusing that meat sticks are involved. I don’t think you could say anything relating to the subject at hand without me smirking… “you’re best friend choked to death on a meat stick.”
I was thinking about some other events they might have for charity, like the above hot dog bobbing contest. That would be pretty cool for BMXers as long as they are going to be dry humping a mechanical bull for wads of processed meat money anyway. I heard about this one game called “hide the sausage” too, but I’m not exactly sure how to play that one.
I was also thinking that some our soon to be patented Fairdale real-live sausage grips might be a good way to really connect with the sponsors and get it out on to the competition course (and most importantly in front of the TV cameras).
And of course its only a matter of time before these hot dog sponsored guys get paid enough to ride in their company’s mascot uniform. Any publicity is good publicity right?
It would be amazing really… front flips look so much like an attempt to bite a weenie anyway… why not add some flair to it and do it dressed in a wiener costume?
There are many awesome things about this blanket set. First of all the guys foot is blowing off the pedal either in an effort to save a fall, or some blanket maker sewed up this still image a little early and should have waited till he was full tweaked. Second I know this is someone, some magazine photo or some internet photo of some rider… you could make someones day by letting them know they are on a blanket. First clue is pegs on the left side. The recommendation to dry clean is a nice touch for a BMX blanket too.
Got a little ESPN interview and photo gallery. Roscoe is happy with it.
http://espn.go.com/action/bmx/blog/_/post/5214017
Seems like this ESPN stuff never works on my computer, but maybe it will work on yours.
All bikes from the previous 150 years were made of crap, looked like crap and were nothing but crap. It wasn’t until the true BMX bike was born that bicycles finally became something worth noticing. Few now know the true story of how BMX was born, but I will tell you.
Most know the story of how our dark lord Sauron was destroyed when the hobbit Frodo brought his ring of power into the cracks of Mt Doom. Although Sauron was destroyed the power of his ring was not completely lost. When the ring was melted into a vast molten sea of iron and steel its power was distributed throughout the liquid metal.
Centuries later, when the metal finally cooled and hardened, a new material was born. A metal that was harder and stronger and more metal then any metal ever before known to man. That metal was Chromoly. Bike builders tried to build bikes from this new indomitable metal but they could not shape the metal into any form of a bike they new. The metal seemed to want to become its own new type of bicycle… and through the hands of great craftsmen eventually it did. Carved from the very bones of the earth, from the ashes of the cold fires of Mt Doom itself BMX was born.
His eyes pierce through your soul with the power only BMX can give.
Any BMX bike fit to carry the name BMX is made from this one deposit of true chromoly. It is true that some other bikes made from inferior materials (like the bastard metal aluminum) try to call themselves BMX bikes, but of course, these are hardly worth noting in the history of bicycling and shall never last. In recent times some bike smiths have discovered ways to even further increase the greatness of Chromoly. For instance, it is rumored that Odyssey’s patented 41 Thermal metal is really just true Chromoly mixed with fingernail clippings from the dead god-man Hercules. Whatever the case, we know that BMX has been and always will be the child of metal’s metal: 4130 Chromoly.
In the beginning, sometime in the late 60’s, BMX was young and misguided. Often imitating the popular motocross bikes of the day. However, it was quickly understood by the new followers of BMX that motocrosses influence was not needed. Suspension systems and shock absorbers made you weaker. Large banana style motocross seats made you lazy and slow. There was no place for them in BMX.
Some examples of true metal. Mongoose and Webco bikes of the mid 70’s.
The late 70’s and early 80’s brought the birth of air.
The mid 80’s brought a lot of this.
And then the BMX warrior arrived from the wastelands. Mat Hoffman. Fully armored and ready to wield the Chromoly.
Mat Hoffman pedaled through snake infested waters to an amazing 65 MPH to achieve this 28 foot air.
As far as I know BMX history ended after that.
At the end of part 1 we had just seen the invention of the bikini. Now things take a much darker turn in the history of bicycling. The bicycles arch enemy the car is born.
As if the entire world simultaneously turned 16 and started driving the exploding bicycle industry abruptly comes to a halt as the world moves to the motorcar. The bicycles clean, quiet and simple transportation for the masses is replaced by the polluting, loud and expensive motorcar. Roads originally built for the bicycle suddenly become too dangerous to ride on and cycling turns from a wildly popular form of transportation into a side show.
Bicycle riders are now captured and forced to ride around on small oval tracks for heckling motorcar enthusiast enjoyment.
The auto industry, bent upon destroying the bicycling industry which it sees as competition, declares all out war on cyclists. Bounties are placed on the heads of cyclists and points are awarded on a nationwide level for running down “road hogging bicycles”. The bicycle industry retaliates by mounting heavy automatic machine guns on to all bikes sold through the 1920’s.
This dangerous trend continues for some 40 years. Even this child’s horse themed bikes from the 1950’s comes standard with a .38 caliber pistol and top tube mounted holster.
Luckily war and bloody death was not the only advancement made in bicycle technology. Thankfully there was also speed! In an attempt to outrun the motorcar new technology in the bicycle world is driven forward. I know this might look like a joke but this is the bike I use for hill climb training.
No seriously, in 1941 some guy rode this crazy bike 108 miles per hour while drafting behind this thing.
Outside of all the drama on the busy roads Captian J.S. Fairdale was still continuing his mission to ride to the north pole. Here he at the summit of Mt Rainier in 1945.
Bikes of the 1950’s start to get really weird and weigh as much as cars.
To keep up with 1955’s growing demand for iPod compatible stereo systems in cars the bicycle industry invents its own iPod docking bicycle.
The volume goes to a whopping 16! Way louder then 11.
A direct result of government sponsored experiments with marijuana and LSD comes this Bowden fiberglass bike from 1964.
This 1970 Chopper is mostly what I ride for my daily 30 mile commute.
The 1972 Lemon Peeler expands on the ideas of the previous chopper but introduces a dangerous spike pointing directly straight up from the top tube instead of a pad or cushion like on modern day trick bicycles.
The beginning of the important part of bicycling history is here. Stay tuned for Part 3 of Fairdale’s the History Bicycling as we tackle BMX. Coming soon…
