Fixie culture

I don't get the whole fixie-craze thing. How fun can it be to ride a bike that you can't coast on, that has no brakes, and that has a gear which either makes climbing hills too hard, or makes you have to descend them spinning your cranks at 185rpm? The whole thing seems ridiculous to me. Why also does it seem to be that a prerequisite for joining the fixie-scene requires one to either be color blind, or at least pretend to be?


I often mocked fixie's openly. Claiming that they were the plaything of "Uber-hipsters". Those who no longer would be seen in public with an apple product, because they're far too mainstream now. These people needed a new outlet to express their 'individuality'. Fixies are the i-phone for those who outgrew the i-phone. When you had a walkman, a future fixie rider had a discman, when you were alphabetizing your CD collection on your bookshelf, a future fixie rider was attempting to find some obscure foreign band to download on to his/her i-pod. Because being one of the first to own an i-pod whilst simotaneously being the first in ones group of friends to 'discover' an up and comming band would elevate one to some sort of social demi-god in his or her clique.

But sadly, the time of 'i' was drawing to a close. The mother of someone you once thought was cool for having an i-pod, now has an i-phone. Possibly even his or her grandmother! And a user-group generation span of more than two certainly destroys any cool-factor that any product can have. Enter the urban fixie. Filling the void left in the wake of 'i's demise. The apperance of these bikes allows you to know who is at the forefront of cool. I, for one, shall never be caught dead riding one.

...from the journal of Mitch, april 14'th

Night ride!!!

The weather was not ideal this morning for the commute to work, a bit of rain and wet streets, which made for soggy bottom commute on the Tractor (EX8)...It was not all bad though, at least it was not poring. The weather is supposed to be like this morning for the rest of the day, scattered showers and mild. That's the key word here "MILD." For my commute home last night I did not even wear my jacket and I swear I can smell the spring in the air. Daylight savings time is this Sunday as well so it won't be long until the night rides will actually be in daylight. Compare that to the weather right now where I come from:
So remember to be thankful for the privilege of being able to live here. There are a lot of bad things you can say about Victoria, but the pros definitely outweigh the cons. In 25 min we're out of the city and on the trails, and that's including a stop at the beer store. Try that in any other major city in Canada...Speaking of trails, night riding is tonight and it's looking like it's going to clear up by the evening. I'm going to ride and so is Justin, and perhaps Chevy as well. My wrist is still sore but I'll tape that up and see how I do. I'm sure I'll be a bit apprehensive of some stunts tonight though, as my last RSCT put the FEAR in me.

Odd Underpants, Excitable Vikings and Metalic Mammals...

The Velo Vixens Alley Cat race / Variety show went down last night on the streets of Victoria. The epicenter for all the bedlam was the Camus book store in Quadra st. village. The Race consisted of five checkpoints throughout the city. The checkpoints were spread out all the way from Recyclistas to Clover Point to the Delta hotel. At each checkpoint there was a Vixen or two ready with a fun game or challenge to be completed before you could leave for the next stop. After visiting each checkpoint, in any order you saw fit, we were to return to the bookstore/finishline for the afterparty show.

Our intrepid team of adventurers, consisting of Haldor (viking cat), Justin (steel wolf) and Mitch (magnanimous), left the start line with the rest of the riders at 7:30ish. Imediately there was mass confusion off the line as all the riders took off at full speed through an intersection. And since the checkpoints could be visited in any order, all the riders were going in different directions as fast as they could. I nearly careened in to two or three other riders within the first twelve feet of the race.

<-The Riders team... impressive.

Once we emerged from the initial melee, our trio rode incedent free for at least, oh, say a block, Until Viking Cat got confused and must have thought he was pillaging a small village 300 years ago. He charged into traffic with reckless abandon, hurling Norse insults at any driver who dared venture near him. "Eulalia!!" he kept screaming. "Eulalia!!"... if any one knows what that means, let me know. Steel Wolf and I were so taken back by Viking Cat's agressive style, that we became confused and imediately lost each other down side streets. the race had been on for two and a half minutes now and we had nearly had several collisions and had lost sight of each other completely. I was already delerious with joy. What fun. We rendezvoused at Recycalistas and continued on reunited from there.

Steel 'effin Wolf ->

There is perhaps too much detail for a short "Blog" story, but the rest of the night was filled with bike-joy, laughter, sore legs and Soda pops. Some highlights include; running around Clover point with bags on our heads trying to find Buns to accomodate our weiners, being wary of Haldor as we ride in close proximity down a steep hill because he is spinning his fixie so fast that I'm sure he'll explode at any second and kill all three of us in some horrible fixie death crash, hearing the name "Steel Wolf" spoken aloud, realizing that the 'velo-vixen' underpants I'd purchased for the race are actually 'womens XL', post race pasta and pops, etc. The list could go on.

After returning to the book store in a respectable 10'th place... outof,cougheleven,cough. We took in the atmosphere of the afterparty. In all seriousness, I must say that the energy surrounding bike folk is always excellent. A mix of joy and eccentricity.

I would say that the event was well organized, the Vixens are a great bunch of fun-loving girls and everyone who took part in the race or the post-race show had a great time. This was my first 'alley-cat' style race and i must say that it was sooo much fun. I can't wait for the upcoming 'Viking-Cat' race.

Two large thank-you's are in order: To the owner of Camus Bookstore for letting a bunch of weird bikers use the space. And to Chevy who carted around our, uh... rehydration liquid.

"Eulaila!!!" -Viking Cat

Night Ride!!!

Cleat issues...clack clack, clonk clonk

It was a slushy ride last night, five of us came out, Laurence, Shayne, Ryan, Justin and myself. The problems started early, as Ryan went down somewhere around the TTA on the way to Skull. After creeping up Skull trail inventive, little face, and Crazy horse. The cleat problems were getting bad and Laurence opted to head back to the parking lot as her spd's were getting filled with frozen snow and no amount of banging her shoes against the pedals was getting the snow out from there. The conditions were bad for cleats, and Justin was the only one riding flats, so we would all get a taste of the same problems that Laurence had. Last night would have been primo Crank bros. Egg beater territory but since we're all riding Shimanos we were having major issues. The snow made for really technical riding and some parts of the trail that would usually be pretty tame, were rather sketchy and technical in the snow. We rode up Twister and finished off with Who's your daddy, Night shift, and the short cut into the TTA. Shayne took the Rock star crash trophy (RSCT) with a nice toboggan slide on his right ass cheek down a rockface on the last trail we hit. He got a good speed going on the shortcut, gapped the road and came in way to hot over the snow covered slimy rocks and roots...yeah Yardsale!!!