Seven Cycles for the Long Haul

This from our friends at Seven Cycles, "We had an email from a photographer friend, based in Europe. It said, "Have been out shooting PBP (Paris-Brest-Paris) and was amazed at the number of Sevens I saw." Then we were researching recent posts about the New England Randonneurs' summer brevet series, looking at results and times, and it struck what a high percentage of the riders were on our bikes.   It seems everywhere we look at the longest, hardest rides the sport offers, our bikes are disproportionately represented. We hope it's because we can offer serious riders the exact blend of performance and comfort they're looking for, and that few, if any, production bikes provide the sorts of features and options that make big adventures so much easier. Whatever the case (like Seven riders are just a little crazier than the general cycling populace), it feels good that the harder the ride, the more likely the rider is to choose Seven."

Because Seven does a lot of custom bikes, and you don't tend to see them sitting on the sales floor, it might be easy to forget that they're some of the best bikes out there. Big adventure riders, we're here for ya.

This here...is quite a bike.

Yesterday (8/23/15) we had a very successful Giant Bike Demo at Camel's Back Park, with many riders getting out on multiple bikes. Thanks to "Giant Demo Driver" Brad Pastir and everyone who showed. 

The surprising revelation of the day: Most people who thought they wanted a 5.5" travel Trance Advanced, and then rode a Trance and a 6.3"-travel Reign in secession, came away saying, "Well, the Reign pedals just as well with more travel...it's overkill for here [in the Boise foothills], but that's the bike I want." And guess what? No one was missing 29" wheels. All day. 

To each their own, 29-inch wheels make a ton of sense to a lot of people and on a lot of terrain, but if you have yet to try out 27.5, we think you owe it to yourself. Luckily, both models will be part of our in-store demo fleet very soon.  

Absolutely DO NOT try to insult the
Justice League right now, Drunk Aquaman

As for the "Stories" part of this Stories-post, I don't have a picture of the guy, because when he arrived the queue was substantial and we were busy getting people out on bikes, but let me paint a picture for ya. Imagine it's about 8:30am on a smoky Sunday and the Giant truck is posted up at the end of 9th street; the backside of Camel's Back. As we're unloading bikes, a man stumbles out of the woods with a duffel bag. He's quite fashionable with some designer jeans, a button down shirt, and suit-style vest. Problem is, he's not fit, neither the shirt nor the vest are buttoned, and he's having trouble negotiating how to get over one of the least formidable wooden fences I've ever seen. 

It takes him a handful of minutes but eventually he makes it over to the demo area to start chattin us up about bikes. At least, I think that's what he though he was doing. We fielded a barrage of questions relating to what we were doing setting up shop near his hallowed pond in the first place....until a green cab pulled up. Don't know if this was pre-arranged or what because dude didn't have a cell phone. He throws his bag in the trunk, slaps his face to dust off his beard, asks us for a light [that we didn't have] and away he goes. Weirdest thing I've seen in a while, but "too weird to live, too rare to die," I guess.

The Liv bike demo is next week, Monday the 31st. Hope to get all the ladies out for that one. Call us at 208/336-3854 to reserve your bike ASAP. 

Mountain Bike World Cup DH - The last race of the year (almost) streams Saturday Morning

For those of you who like and follow World Cup DH mountain bike racing, Val di Sol will be streaming on Red Bull TV Saturday morning at 6:30 Mountain Time. This is the final stop on the World Cup circuit, the only other being the World Championships in Andorra in 2 weeks (World Champs is not technically a World Cup... so there's that).

There are tons of compelling stories playing out this year, as Josh Bryceland (AKA "Ratboy," "The Rat," or "Miami Bryce") came back to form to win a few weeks back, but maybe isn't exactly 100% after his crushing ankle injury at last year's Worlds. Luckily, the kid hasn't lost his accent (the best in the biz).

Meanwhile Greg Minnaar is perennially at the top despite the whole pesky "aging" thing (the man is a professor), both the Athertons have won here before (understatement of the century), devout-American Aaron Gwin is capable of winning on any weekend (pray for him), and then there's the new crop of youngsters hanging out at the bottom of the podium every week just waiting to punch through (these include Troy Brosnan who qualified first, and my favorite up-and-coming-Frenchie Remi Thirion, who does already have a World Cup win, so maybe he's not so up-and-coming anymore, but it doesn't really matter because he's out with injury).

Watch the course preview to get you pumped, and tune in tomorrow. Top women should be at about 7:15 and I'd say the top men go off at about 8:00.

It's not that early.

Two separate events coming up. Giant on Aug. 23rd and LIV on the 31st.

What goes around comes back around.

Maybe I'm just getting old, but I remember this. 

Be honest: it was a terrible bike. 

And now we have this. 

These are not at all the same bike. There is so much tech in the new Session 8 that didn't even exist in 1992, but you have to admit, there are similarities in terms of the look. Can you tell me is this faaaaiiir?

BC

Can't light a fire on the ground in the Sawtooths? Use this.

The Grilliput Duo seen above is here. Photos courtesy of John Sabala. 

Have a great weekend, every weekend. 

- BC

Reading Pete Zimowsky

Thanks again to all of those who showed up to the Roots Rated Pint Night last Saturday. As I noted in

our facebook post, the RR guys (Jake, Ry, and Brian) remarked that they had never run out of cups before 7:00. This was at about 6:40, and not only were the cups out, but it was time to make a run to the Co-Op for more Sockeye.

Anyway, a raging success, as you can see, so... well done, Boise.

In that same vein, check out Pete Zimowski's latest Roots Rated article on paddling the Priest Lake Thorofare here.

These guys are doing good things.