Making New Friends at NAHBS
NAHBS Charlotte Photo Studio Crew
©Weldon Weaver
23 March 2014, Charlotte, NC – NAHBS is certainly the place to experience the most stunning custom and handmade bicycle innovations you’re not likely to see at your local bike shop. And it’s a great place to meet some of the giants of the industry like Tom Ritchey and Chris King who manned their booths during the recent show in Charlotte.
Photo Studio NAHBS Charlotte
©OneOffTwoWheels.com
But the handmade bicycle business is about more than just the bikes. The annual NAHBS show recently ended its tenth edition gathering custom bike aficionados from across the globe for three days of bicycle bling. As much as each of the builders at the show is an artist with a unique and different perspective on bicycle building aesthetic they are also very much alike. If you took a moment to pause on the show floor this past week you would have hear the unmistakable clamor of community.
Calfee Anodized Cassette
©OneOffTwoWheels.com
Although the bikes are the main focus of the show something more important happens in this tight knit community of artisans; new friendships are made and old friendships are rekindled both on the show floor and at the parties after day’s end.
Shamrock Cycles Disc Cross Bike
©OneOffTwoWheels.com
NAHBS sponsors team up to put on some of the best parties in town during the show weekend. This year’s NAHBS fell on Saint Patrick’s day weekend, a fitting backdrop to Shamrock Cycles green clover-draped cross disc show bike, in Charlotte where the worlds largest pub crawl highlights the Luck o’ the Irish festivities.
Shamrock Cycles Disc Cross Bike
©OneOffTwoWheels.com
And not far from the uptown Charlotte St. Patty’s crowds NAHBS attendees put on a hoedown of their own sponsored by Oskar Blues Brewery and a local fiddle band.
NAHBS Charlotte Hoedown
©OneOffTwoWheels.com
This year Greg ran the photo studio where a show bike was set up and photographed every six minutes. This is a daunting task for the best photographers but with the help of an army of dedicated volunteers the bikes were photographed and sent back to their booths unscathed in record time. Seasoned bicycle race Photographer Weldon Weaver worked closely with his volunteer crew to create the official photoset of award entries.
Weldon Weaver at Work
©OneOffTwoWheels.com
If you love bicycles and are even remotely interested having a chance to be around some of the best custom bicycle handwork in the world we encourage you to head Louisville in 2015. If you go, remember to take a moment to meet the builders as well as ogle their bikes. You’ll quickly learn this is a gathering of artists and a community of people who’ve come together for ten straight years to share their visions. In the end NAHBS is as much about the people and having fun as it is about bicycle innovation.
NAHBS Charlotte Photo Studio Crew
©Weldon Weaver
Its a place where friendship and community come together to share bicycle dreams.
A Small World
18 March 2014, Salt Lake City, UT – Home for two days and recovering from NAHBS. We enjoyed living a different life for a week and we are grateful to our NAHBS family for their hospitality but it’s nice to be home.
A crazy week of bikes and people. Said hello to Mike DeSalvo though I didn’t photograph his latest bikes. I have one and can tell you the guy knows how to work metal.
We took a ton of images that we’ll post once we get back into the groove. Until then the picture here is the tear down and load out of NAHBS Charlotte.
And finally to illustrate how small the world is we made a surreal connection when we stopped at the local supermarket on the way home to restock the fridge. Looking like two feral cats, she asked us how our day was going. We told her we just landed from Charlotte and were exhausted after the world’s biggest pub crawl. She said the next time we go we should stop into Connolly’s Bar because her grandfather was the proprietor years ago…
Saint Patty’s Day Charlotte.
St. Patty’s Day Celebration
The World’s Largest Pub Crawl – Charlotte
©2014 OneOffTwoWheels.com
15 March 2014, Charlotte, NC – NAHBS Charlotte is partying it up at the worlds largest pub crawl tonight for a bit of Irish fun as day two of the North American Handmade Bicycle Show moved from the the convention center floor to the pubs for a welcome bit of Irish cheer.
Fried Catfish, Black-eye Peas and Collard Greens @ Merts.
©2014 OneOffTwoWheels.com
First stop was Mert’s Heart and Soul food on College Street for a plate of deep fried catfish, collard greens and black-eye peas. Sufficiently satiated and hydrated we moved the party to Connolly’s Irish Pub where nobody seemed to care what our names were; this isn’t Boston after all. And the bartender didn’t bother with our ID’s because we really do look older than most of the crowd.
St. Patty’s Day Celebration at Connolly’s Irish Pub Charlotte
©2014 OneOffTwoWheels.com
The streets and the pubs were overflowing with people of all ages celebrating Patrick’s special day. But since we have another day of bike show to attend to our evening ended earlier than most partiers’ will. And we’ll most likely not wake up with a hangover which will be a welcome treat after this morning’s head pounding start. St. Patty’s day is a perfect backdrop for the special bond the builders and attendees of NAHBS have forged over ten years of handmade bicycle show history and there’s no where we’d rather be than Charlotte.
St. Patty’s Day Celebration at Connolly’s Irish Pub Charlotte
©2014 OneOffTwoWheels.com
Mavic – The French Chefs of Bicycle Components
Mountain bike wheel: Crossmax Enduro
NABS Charlotte
©OneOffTwoWheels.com
16 March 2014, Charlotte, NC – Just as a Michelin three-star French chef would never allow an imperfect plate to leave his kitchen, Mavic, the storied French bicycle component manufacturer, releases no new product lines before perfection is achieved. According to the Mavic representatives at NAHBS Charlotte the company is not interested in being first to market when new product trends appear, rather they want to bring the product to market when their version is perfected. This is the company’s mantra today although Mavic has many firsts in its long history including the1999 debut of the first wireless electronic shifting group. Mavic’s recent work focused on improving the braking track of their elite level carbon road wheels to improve braking and temperature modulation.
Road & triathlon wheel: Cosmic Carbone Ultimate
NABS Charlotte
©OneOffTwoWheels.com
We asked about the trend toward road disc brakes, a technology that seemed to step back here at NAHBS after SRAM’s recent hydraulic brake recall, an early stumble that we’ve predicted will move the technology of hydraulic bicycle braking systems forward in the long run. Mavic told us they were waiting for the market to settle but disc brake wheels from France are soon to be a reality. And like dining guests at a Michelin-starred French restaurant we are waiting patiently for perfection to be served.
Road & triathlon wheel: Cosmic Carbone Ultimate
NABS Charlotte
©OneOffTwoWheels.com
NAHBS Load-in
ALLONEWORD Fine Cycling Caps
©2014 OneOffTwoWheels.com
“Charlotte, NC, 13 March 2014 – NAHBS Charlotte load in has begun. Exhibitors are arriving, checking in and setting up their booth displays. This should be one awesome gathering of bike builders, component manufacturers and apparel companies including our new friends at AllOneWord Fine Cycling Caps.
NAHBS Charlotte Load-in
©2014 OneOffTwoWheels.com
Landed Charlotte NAHBS
11 February 2014, Charlotte, NC – Landed. On to the Westin for NAHBS prep. We’re going to help make a hill out of a mountain. Oh wait, I don’t see any mountains.
NAHBS Charlotte – Here we Come
11 March 2014, Salt Lake International Airport – Checked in, through security and waiting to board the flight to CTL for NAHBS. We packed our bike shoes on the oft chance we have an opportunity to get on a bike one morning during the show, but We’ll be mostly working with the show directors helping with all of the behind the scenes work that goes into the show. Can’t wait to get out of SL,UT for a week.
One Year Old – OneOffTwoWheels
The satisfaction of a job well-done
©2014 OneOffTwoWheels.com
8 March 2014, Salt Lake City, UT – Every project should start with a plan if you expect something of value when the endpoint arrives. Unlike cooking dessert a website does not have an endpoint unless the author stops writing. Each article is merely one more meal for readers to devour while patiently awaiting the next course.
We made these blitzes from scratch for Greg’s birthday last year first making the crepes, then the filling, and finally frying the packets of blueberry and cheese-filled pillows in rich butter. The process is not unlike writing. You take raw words like flour, milk, and eggs to make a batter that has to be caressed in a properly prepared vessel where the ingredients, like sentences, morph into a cohesive palatable product; this step usually takes a good quantity of butter both when writing and cooking to reach a satisfactory end-point.
Step One – Crepes
©2014 OneOffTwoWheels.com
I find making blitzes to be a painful endeavor because there are so many steps to the process. And getting started is always difficult because I tend to look at the many steps involved as roadblocks to the endpoint. But once I’ve taken a moment to realize that the three most important people in my life–my partner and our two kids–will adore me for about an hour after we’re done, the process seems less daunting.
Frying Pillows of Love
©2014 OneOffTwoWheels.com
Similarly, writing OneOffTwoWheels has gotten easier as this year has progressed because I’ve learned to face each post with a passion for delivering a satisfying read. As many other bloggers can attest there’s usually so many topics one wants to cover its difficult to focus and finish one post that will have meaning. I have written many posts that because of the timeliness of the topic, like lumpy crepe batter, never were completed because they did not meet my expectation of perfection in pressing words together. In order to add a more interesting perspective, my goal for the next year is to get Greg to write some pieces for OneOffTwoWheels. His viewpoint about life would be a positive addition to the site.
We started OneOffTwoWheels because we wanted to make a connection between being same-sex oriented and bicycling sport-loving humans; a connection I rarely see in mainstream bicycle websites unless the focus is on the innuendo built into wearing lycra shorts that expose one’s anatomy for all to see. It would be easy to pepper this blog with photos and comments about how men in spandex fill out their Assos S7 Kuku Penthouse bike shorts, but we wanted to have a bit more class in our approach to bicycling. Basically, I’d rather be cooking at the French Laundry than some fast food joint. And hopefully our writing expresses some level of New York Times-style Op Ed. And after years of not using my degree in broadcast communications I can finally tell my kids college does have value.
The Final Draft
©2014 OneOffTwoWheels.com
Hopefully, you’ve enjoyed our work thus far. Next week we’ll be in Charlotte at NAHBS, the North American Handmade Bicycle Show, as assistants to the show directors so we’ll try to give you a behind the scene look at how this show comes together. The people who run NAHBS are dedicated to giving people a glimpse of some of the best custom bicycles your hard earned money can buy. The work that goes into the final product is really incredible.
As a happy birthday gift to all and a thank you for reading, here’s a photo of the mismatched helmets worn by the Polish National Bicycle Team.
Polish Bicycling Team – Their helmets don’t match.
Image From the Internet
Alchemy Bicycle Company Xanthus
NAHBS 2013 Denver – Alchemy Zanthus
Photo @2014 OneOffTwoWheels.com
Denver, CO, 21 February 2013 – This is the Alchemy Xanthus carbon fiber disc brake road bike waiting like a caged tiger for its photo shoot at the 2013 NAHBS in Denver. Greg spent his time at the 2013 NAHBS working with the show photographer so he had an opportunity to handle some amazing custom bicycles all weekend.
NAHBS 2013 Denver – Alchemy Zanthus
Photo @2014 OneOffTwoWheels.com
The carbon fibers reflect the light under a glossy finish of this frame; no photo can do justice to this amazing machine. I remember walking the show floor and being mesmerized by the patterns in the carbon fibers when the bike caught my eye. Visit NAHBS Charlotte and see what Alchemy brews up this year.
NAHBS 2013 Denver – Alchemy Zanthus
Photo @2014 OneOffTwoWheels.com
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