Golden Saddle Cyclery, Los Angeles

I recently visited Los Angeles, and Kyle from Trackosaurus Rex was kind enough to not only loan me his "party on two wheels" bike to ride, but he also showed me around his new shop, Golden Saddle Cyclery in Silverlake.

Kyle runs the shop with Ty Hathaway and recent USA cycling National Champ track rider Woody (sorry I didn't catch his last name, but does he really need one with an awesome name like Woody?).

The shop is super clean and well organized, with a small but solid selection of bikes and obviously excellent customer service. If you follow Tracko you know that Kyle's sense of style is impeccable, and the shop has a really interesting decor of vintage cycling apparel and a 75 Criterium pinball machine. Apparently they just got their first t-shirts, which I'm sorry I missed out on!

If you live in LA or have the chance to stop in to Golden Saddle, tell them I say Hello. (p.s. This is TINA!!)



Awesome signage (these are available as stickers, too).




A recently clean-shaven and apparently unrecognizable Kyle, along with his FBM Sword that he loaned me (THANKS).


Ty


Woody, hard at work


Everything in its place.

See more pics of the shop on my Flickr stream HERE.
(Posted by Tina)

Style Icons

Gram Parsons

Friday Funday

Chacon

damn this kid is good. fixed freestyle has come so far in such a short time.

Hurricane Promotion Video!!!! from Michael Chacon on Vimeo.

spotted on Prolly

Freight Baggage has joined up

as sponsor of this year's ACC's

Thanks a ton

Seagull and Crumpler Prizes Have Arrived

I'd like to give a shout out to Seagull for once more sponsoring the ACC's and sending over this beautiful handmade bag.



And Crumpler for coming back after a year's absence on the sponsor list. As always they kicked down in a big way, with three of their lovely bags.


(Baroo inisted in taking part in the shoot)

Remember to support those companies who support your community! They decided that Minneapolis was worth spending their time, energy, and resources on.

Lately

Sorry for the lack of posts, I was out of town from Saturday to Tuesday, yesterday I was sick, and tomorrow morning I head to MKE for Riverwest 24.

I'll be back on Monday with little to no interuptions till the AC Champs.

Limited Edition All-City Wool Jerseys

Available now, only 50 made. MSRP $120

Dose of Awesome

as usual, via ASL

Cool Story Bro: Viking Funeral

Over the last few days, my beloved black Croc's finally bit the dust.





Now I'm sure some of you believe that Croc's are a hideous blight on humanity, and to anyone who espouses that sentiment I would just like to communicate that you are a total dolt. While Croc's may be the footwear version of sweatpants, signifying that the wearer has completely given up on presentation and now only is concerned with comfort, they are to me a lightweight, waterproof, inexpensive version of a Dansko. (Dansko's if you aren't familiar are the choice of Minneapolis' service industry. Being seen on servers all over the city and other folks who work on their feet all day)

In short, they rule. They are easily the most comfortable shoe I own for standing around in all day.

Due to the blowout, and wearing the soles down so much that I can now feel every pebble, it is time to send these off to the great shoe heaven and buy some replacements. It seems like a travesty to just throw them out, after all the miles and good times.

Because I am awesome, I was contemplating a viking funeral. You know, being put on wooden ship and burned at sea. This concept was short lived though since they are plastic, and that would be a straight dick move to mother nature.

This then made me sad that I myself cannot have a viking funeral, or even a Gram Parson's or Vader style sendoff. For our country's rules just don't allow it. I have an irrational fear of being buried alive, everyone having taken me for dead, and waking up in a coffin with no means of escape. I saw it once on a soap opera as a child and it wounded me (same thing with a Geraldo show about ghosts). Being burned would totally solve that and it is obviously metal as fuck.

Then I realized, that although I cannot have a viking funeral, the closest I may be able to get is giving my dog one. So perhaps one sad day when Baroo has passed, I will honor his life and passing with one of the viking's most dramatic rituals.



That would be totally sweet.

Disc Brake Strider

I'm sure many of you are familiar with the wildly popular Strider kids bike that helps kids learn to ride at an earlier age and is a just plain fun toy.

This past weekend at a tradeshow in Utah, I spotted this modded out Strider. This is some truly sweet bike parent nerd shit.

check it out





the welds are a little gross, but alloy ain't easy to weld either.

This kid looks well on his way to being a stone cold ripper.

Bike Shop Bans Pennies

due to logistical and environmental concerns

BMX Video Monday

OSS "Football" DVD: Jake Seeley from On Some Shit on Vimeo.

Titanium Salsa Selma

I got me a new mountain bike this year, a Ti Selma to replace my well loved steel El Mariachi.


It's essentially the same bike but Ti and dedicated single speed. I've only had it out a few times due to my ongoing back issues, but so far it's been great. It rides pretty much exactly like my El Mariachi, which is a good thing.

I expected to feel some differences in the front end with the supposedly way stiffer oversize steerer on the fork, and with the updated lowers on it. But I'd be lying if I said I could feel much of a difference.



With every ride I get more stoked on this thing, and get closer to selling my El (which is what I promised myself I'd do before buying this).


This bike was made by Lynskey in the U.S.


and features Salsa's proprietary dropout system.


Fixed gears and shit are great and all, but my first love was the dirt. Can't wait to put more miles on my new ride.

Tom's Mixtape

8==D from Daddyvision on Vimeo.

Thanks to Phil Wood

The prizes from Phil were the first to arrive.



Thanks so much.

I'm thinking these will either go to first fixed, or maybe the men's and women's sprint winners can play paper rock scissors to see who gets these.

Contador Punches Fan

Punch might be a little strong but Contador does strike back against an annoying fan on today's stage.

ACC Sponsor Highlight: Trash Bags

Andy from Trash Bags hit me up today to let me know that he's soon to begin work on the prize bag for this year's race, and to needle me for not including his logo in the previous posts regarding this year's sponsors. The reason for his exclusion is that I wanted to do a special call out to Andy, for once more stepping up huge and producing a custom applique bag for the race and for putting his money where his mouth is and continuously supporting the local cycling scene.

Since Trash Bags inception Andy has year after year supported my races and generously donated a custom bag for the All City race. He takes time out of his schedule of making bags that he's getting paid for to make a super expensive and labor intensive bag to just give away.

So thanks a bunch dude, giving away a custom bag is the highlight of the awards and I am beyond stoked to once more be able to hand out an amazing functional trophy.


Andy working on the '09 bag

Classic Cycling

This is easily one of my favorite images of all time. I pulled it from somewhere on the web last year, but I don't know anything about it or who the photographer is.

Anybody else got any info?

More All City Championship Sponsors

Please give thanks to the following people and companies who have generously decided to come on board and sponsor this year's All City Champs.

Seagull Bags


Prolly is not Probably


Phil Wood


Pedal Consumption


Mishka


Milwaukee Bicycle Co


Chuey Brand


huge thanks for supporting the Minneapolis cycling community!

JR in Copper Harbor

our friend JR made this edit of him riding up in Copper Harbor on a trail called "Downtown." Looks like a blast. Got to get up there sometime.

The Wolves Are Coming

soon soon

Salt

This week I finally got around to taking apart and cleaning my winter bike. Both brakes were shot, the nipples on the rear wheel are frozen (but luckily it's super true), and I decided to swap cranksets to something a little more attractive.


Checking out the parts that came off the bike, I couldn't believe how well the salt had worked it's way onto every surface of my bottom bracket spindle and crank arm tapers.


That's a pretty snug fitting interface there, but salt can't be stopped. It's annoying as hell.

(that's the last time I bring it up until winter)

I'll have pics of the new build soonish.