Oury Grips- Made in the USA

There are plenty of other handlebar grips out there, and many of those might be superior to Oury grips, but I’ve had an affinity for them since I was a kid, when every  motocross biker worth a shit had Oury grips on his dirt bike.

Yeah, they get kinda gooey in the heat, and they don’t always like to stay in place on the bar, but their thick, soft rubber absorbs road shock better than anything else, they have a much larger diameter so they fit large hands like mine (ha) , their multitude of colors will match any bike you got, and they’re cheap at 8 to 12 bucks a pair.

The best thing about ‘em? They’re made in the good ‘ol United States. Pretty rare.

As with any color other than black, they get pretty dirty. The clear ones I bought when I built my road bike looked great with the blue bars showing through. But as you can see, they got nasty fast. I park my bike in my office, and visitors take a wide birth trying not to catch a disease from them. My kid asked me what color they were originally, and was flabbergasted when I said “clear” (he also corrected me by saying that clear isn’t a color). I popped them in the dishwasher just to see if they clean up at all, but I’m not going to expect much. I figured a better bet for a replacement would be blue.

Here’s a photo of them when they were new.

I’ll leave you with a trick for getting tight old grips off a bar, short of cutting them off. If you have an air compressor with a blower attachment, stick the tip under the grip as far as you can and squeeze the trigger. The air pressure eventually lifts the entire grip off the bar allowing you to rotate it off.

Oury Grips are located in Arkansas of all places… but for the life of me I can’t find out how long they’ve been around.

Yes, the bike race was ON

Big Al

Dweedles

Nice Masi

Rich the Wrench

Roland

New Ride 3

Unfortunately it’s not mine but a coworker’s who just moved to the area.

This will be his commuter bike; he hasn’t owned a car in a decade. He should be OK in the Philly area considering he was also carless in Austin and Salt Lake City as well as Germany.

It was built and purchased and built Fairmount Bicycles right in my ‘hood.

The beautiful hammered steel fenders are Velo Orange. He said they’re pretty noisy tho

Made right here

These caps are made not just in the USA, but right here in Philly. Dave wears a cycling cap day in, day out, 24/7, and they rarely last more than a year… until he found Rothera. Coincidentally, Gary Rothera’s mother works on our campus, so ours were both hand-delivered.

You might not be as lucky as us, but you can find them in most shops in the area and you can also order online. They don’t even cost any more than the cheapies with the cardboard brim.

Do it.

Rothera Cycling

Color

2012 was a good year for leaf peeping… that is, until Sandy arrived. All of the leaves you see above are just… gone.

This chap from London Funky DL has a plethora of funky free DLs.

Phila Pedal Coop

I’ve seen these guys for years all over West Philly, rain or shine, hauling large bins on trailers. Now they’re expanding into other neighborhoods in the city.

From the Philadelphia Weekly:

On any given weekday, one or two riders from its four-member staff are on the streets collecting recycling from Center City, Fairmount and West Philly businesses—which can reach 8,000 gallons a month on average—or compost from West Philly residents. All recycling is transported to South Philly’s Blue Mountain Recycling Center, while compost is brought to community gardens and private landowners.
As for cost, the rate for recycling is 21 cents a gallon, which some businesses say is more cost-effective for them. Composting services cost $10 a month for weekly or bi-weekly pickups.

Read more

The Pedal Cooperative

Bad Luck

I’m sure you’ve driven on roads just after workers have scraped a layer of asphalt from before they repave. You’ve probably noticed how rough and gravely it is, and wondered how much it would suck to fall on it I’m sure.

So I’m missing a layer of skin on my right side, but I was wearing a helmet and my arm probably isn’t broken, even though I still can’t move it much after 3 days.

This was the first accident on my beloved Guerciotti and I bent the forks pretty bad. (the wheel is fine, the forks not. Weird) Also tore up the leather Selle saddle.

Contrary to what most people think, I really don’t crash all that much for how many miles I commute; this one happened on the last 3 miles of around 120 miles ridden last week. Coincidentally, my last crash was over 3 years ago, and it ALSO happened on this same rough asphalt surface. Just my luck. I’d seriously rather fall on a pile of broken glass.

Vittoria

Since I’m the king of flats I have to buy kevlar-belted tires so I only ride Vittoria. I have to replace them about once every year-and-a-half which isn’t that often since I switch between 2 bikes. I don’t have to replace because they’re threadbare but because they get slashes and gashes from glass, which leads to blowouts.

This time I went for Vittoria Zaffiro in the usual 23c width in WHITE because they were on sale at bike nashbar.

Figured I’d take a picture of them before they hit the pavement, because they’ll be black in about 3 miles.

Speaking of miles, I was able to commute year-round because of the mild winter. I mark a calendar of the days I ride (as opposed to the days I wimp out and take the train) so I added up the miles I’ve commuted to work via bicycle since the new year, roughly 4 months, not counting weekend rides or errands.

The grand total is 975 miles. Not bad for an old dude I guess.

Drool Worthy: Detroit Bicycle Company

No, I’m not lusting after these because they’re from my former down-and-out haunt. I’m drooling because these works of art are all made with Columbus SL tubing and chrome Nova lugs. Plus the beautiful copper-plating, the Campagnolo and Cinelli parts, the wooden track rims, Brooks leather saddle, and to top it all off, “pre-war Schwinn Paramount” hubs (??)

There are 4 frames and 5 complete bikes to choose from.

Is it too late ask Santa for one of these?

Perils

This teaches at my kids’ school. She biked to work every day and I locked my bike next to hers when I dropped the kids off. Then one day I noticed that she wasn’t there, and hadn’t been for a while. I found out she was hit by a trash truck at 5th and Washington on the way to school one morning.

She’s back at school a year later but she lost a leg above the knee. Check out her story and be careful out there dammit!