Point A to Point B

Last night was the first of Ryan and Toby’s Wednesday night sprints so the other Nick and I rolled over to Matt’s to meet up and go check it out. On the way Nick put the nail in the Sovos coffin, but Matt saved the day with some J-B Weld, with no intention of backpedaling we were off.

Click on Nick for more pictures from the night.

Blucka bluck bluck blucka

There are a couple things that should be on your agenda this Friday, this is one of them.

a long winter a gwan come.

It’s getting cold, I love Autumn and all but the last couple days are just a reminder that I’ll be spending a lot of time indoors very soon. Matt and I rolled around looking for bike parts and whatnot to try and resurrect Lazer Quest from it’s unfortunate run in (over) by someone’s bad (vindictive) driving. While on our adventure we saw a couple of things.

First and formost we saw the Google Street View car, here all the way from California. Matt was able to take out his camera quickfast and snap some pics of it, we chatted with the driver for a second and told him we were gonna put him on GSV.

After picking up a frame, a wheel and a number of other parts we swung by Cavern Cycles. Keith is moving on from the cycling shop thing and has some great deals right now, he’s a rad guy to talk to in general but now you don’t have a good reason not to go in.

Case in point.

After sherpa-ing bike stuffs around all day we made one last stop at MEC and then Pizzaiolo for a much needed slice. Pics of Jordan’s completed bike coming soon.

P.S. Good luck to Sam and Nick at the Barista Nationals today and tomorrow, you guys are going to kill it.

Ryde For Charlie

I’m one of the many that didn’t know Charlie personally, but knew of him through message boards and word of mouth. The rumours-turned-reality that he was biking across Canada—twice—shocked me, but also made me a bit envious, I think anyone who rides a bike wishes they could pick up, leave and just test one’s limits over miles and miles of countryside, so I’m sure that I’m in good company. Charlie was dealt what can only be referred to as a raw fucking deal when he was struck and killed by a drunk driver while on his way back from the West Coast. Tonight there was a memorial ride for Charlie and it was great to see so many people out, obviously his reputation as a dude of dudes was spot on. It was a critical-mass type ride and while I generally veer away from these things, it was great to see the odd person reading the pamphlets that some of the crowd were giving out explaining Charlie’s story and ‘getting it’.

(right click/apple click to view full size shots)

jet fuel was hosting the gathering

crowd forming

ryan showed up

David Suzuki showed up and helped us out a bit (people, LISTEN TO HIM)

that crowd goes back for a long time

end of the line, great to meet some new people and all of that

Ride safe kids.

- b.

Form like Voltron

Everyone’s got busy schedules these days, so it’s pretty awesome when we can get a nice group together for a solid ride. Matt sent me a txt in the afternoon saying ‘meet at the thimble and 8:30 if you want to go for a ride’ – I guess he gets free txtings on his cellphone plan because for all the people that showed up it would have run me $2 to send those out.

I’m glad he did though, met a few new people which is always nice and of course it’s good to see the usual peeps out.

it’s impossible for Toby to have normal spokes… ever.

bike warz, Canice was actually rolling her eyes in that picture, I’m just slow with the shutter.

Erin is a dude of high caliber, he’s got a similar shot of me on his camera now.

Erin quickly realizes how photogenic I am.

bike gang at the petrol station.

Toby breakdancing on a pole. pole dancing, Chris threw a nickle in his eye – no lap dance!

obligatory urban skyline shot for Matt.

All in all a great ride, the Don Trail is fucking intense at night without proper lights, thanks to Ace for talking us into that one and thanks to the people in the car who drove down the hill with their high beams on so we could see. Buenos noches!

P.S. This Saturday afternoon is the Shop Till You Drop Alleycat race which is being organized by Goodfoot, Ransom, Crumpler and Toby. Registration is at 1:30pm, the race starts at 2:30 and it will obviously be radical, so come out.

Night Crawlers

Brandy and I had visitors the other night.

At one point 8-10 baby raccoons took over our back yard and chased us around.

weez in yr tra$h eatin yr trashez

Then, the smallest one of the bunch got ballsy, we ran inside:

Last night a few of us went out for a ride and Matt suggested the Leslie Split, which is a great little stretch with virtually no cars, though it does have locust-like swarms of bugs which I’m still coughing up.

Matt checking out the view.

What Matt was looking at.

Then we started home and bumped into some other peeps, so we dorked around in a hockey rink for a while. Matt probably has pictures of that part of the night. He does!

Ryde for Heart

So late Saturday we found out that we were registered for the 50k ride for heart, I was rushing around at 6pm to find a water bottle and some sort of mounting bracket that would work on my bike. I ended up getting to the only bike shop open past 6pm just in time. Actually I was about 30 minutes late, but they let me in, so Set Me Free on Roncesvalles deserves a shout out for coming through in the clinch.

We met up with Jas and Jay to get our passes and got in queue, I’m not sure how many people rode in this thing, but the hairiest moments were definitely while walking our bikes to the start line. About 10 seconds into the thing a lady in front of us ate shit, that was the only bad accident we encountered the rest of the day.

We had fun egging on old roadies and burning them on the uphills. Had some good chats with a few people, and earned a pair of grips, All for a good cause. Afterwards we got some Thai food in Parkdale, it’s been a long time since I’ve polished off three plates of food and 3 drinks in a restaurant.

Twist away the gates of steel…

Nick explaining the whole “no brakes” thing.

The Ride for Heart is not necessarily good for your lungs.

Nick pulling away from the pack.

Myspace photo.

Water is for the weak.

Jas & Jay, holding in the pain.

Check out the view from the Freedom Hater’s cockpit.

Cat Attack

Went for a late ride last night and ended up biking in the PATH, which is smooth as hell, it’s funny that if you even think of skateboarding in it the budget-cops are lurking in droves, but biking through seems to be alright. I’ll post some pics later today, we’ll have to work this into our weekly group rides though. 180 skids are hard as shit though, no matter how smooth the ground is, fyi.

As promised, here are the pics:

Nick Peddling -

Nick Skidding the Light Fantastic – (or, I Can’t Take Pictures Properly)

2 feet before I fell over -

On our way back we met up with Brandoo and Paulo who’s in town visiting and meeting with bigwigs at publishers plying his trade. And Brandy had a chance to make fun of our hats, which you can do too when I post the pics.

But this post is really all about a cat named Jeff, who pwns small-game backyard hunting.

Look out for this one too:

Inauguration Day

So after three days of rain, and three days of subsequent broken plans we finally got a small group together for a ride. Matt brought his freedom hater crew out for a ride and we set out to the east end, on what turned out to be a pretty leisurely ride along the lakeshore trail. We ended up at Mercury in Leslieville and Alex set us up with espresso beverages. If you’re reading this and you live in Leslieville, chances are you already know the people at Mercury, but on the off chance that you’re still getting coffee across the street, smarten up. Sorry there’s no riding shots, maybe next time.

!More Pictures!