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<< Previous 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 Next >>flatland frame length posted on 2006-04-18 11:10:30
I'm 5'10", and while I rode an EP for about 3 years, I won't ever go back to a TT length less than 19 again. Too short! I'm on a 2002 Pony right now, 19" TT. Feels pretty ideal for me. I had a 19.25 Bowls once and that felt too big for me for back wheel stuff. Front wheel stuff felt great, though. My next bike will probably be
Leif's FBM frame.
edited ... . . . . . . . posted on 2006-04-17 07:19:46
I could see message boards like this being both a great asset and a great liability to companies making parts. Word of mouth travels VERY fast on these things, and reputation is SO important in BMX. If Pedal had been around back in the early 90's, Bully wouldn't have been able to move nearly as many frames....
Falling out. posted on 2006-04-11 11:30:04
If you are thinking in terms of popular tricks, trends, bike setups, parts etc...don't worry about being "in the loop". In the past year or so a handful of guys landed a few new hard tricks, there was only one major US contest, bikes keep getting lighter and more expensive, and all the new integrated headtubes and bottom bracket configurations have hit flatland bikes (mid, spanish, etc.). But all of that doesn't really make any difference.
Just go out and have fun riding your bike if that's what you like to do. Believe me, whatever has happened in the past year, (or even the past 6 or so years) or so won't have much impact on your riding, or anyone else's for that matter. I've been "out of the loop" since probably 2001 or so, and I have as much fun riding now as ever. Some of the best riders ever, are, in fact, totally out of the loop as I write this.
flatland games posted on 2006-03-29 12:46:00
curb ride contest.....
pick any curb....try to hop up onto it and roll for as long as possible without going off either side. A lot harder than you think it would be.
Old School Vs. New School posted on 2006-03-29 08:51:55
when does "old school" start? I would say its entirely subjective, depending on the age of the person and how long they've been riding. A lot of kids here might think 1998 is old school, they might've been 7 years old that year. I was 21 and rode all the time, didn't seem too old school to me.
I agree with Brett, there should just be good vs. sucks, not old school v. new school. I wish some younger riders here could see footage of DMC, K. Jones, Gerry Smith, or Perry Mervar riding c. 1989. They'd be really suprised, a lot of the stuff those guys were doing is still considered hard today.
Getting into wheelchair!? posted on 2006-03-29 06:29:44
Or you could fire hyrant to step over the frame, then switch hands and go into a wheelchair that way.
Or make up your own way in.
Re: has this happened to you? posted on 2006-03-28 11:03:04
[quote="Frenchy"]you're going through your regular day and somehow you meet a new rider you didn't know.
First time this happened to me i was riding in this parking lot by my house, and this guy stops, and tells me that he rode flat too. Brian King, he's more of an old school rider, but he definatly has some insane looking combos.
And tonight i show up to my microcomputers class, and i hear this guy talking about a flatland bike right next to me. he just started riding but it's for sure he's really stoked on it.
Has anyone else ever met new riders while riding, or while doing something else?[/quote]
Brian King! There's a name I haven't heard in a long time. He used to come over to Athens and ride with us sometimes, and later on we rode flat at the AMC lot up in Kennesaw when I moved to Atlanta. He was getting pretty good at riding when he got really involved with school and kinda faded out for a while. Good to hear he's back on the bike.
Cracked KGB posted on 2006-03-27 08:46:53
Will KGB be the Bully of this generation? Lots of hype, cool colors, great team, but parts that aren't nearly as good as they should be? Almost everyone I know has had problems with their KGB frames...it's too bad.
Hitchikers...part 2 posted on 2006-03-27 07:20:48
I learned hitchhikers back in 1993. There are a few steps you can take to make learning them a bit easier.
How are you rolling into them? Have you done the necessary prep work leading up to learning them? You NEED to have forward karl kruisers, forward elbow glides , or steamrollers DIALED before you start trying hikers. Otherwise you'll just be slamming you bike into the ground over and over again.
This is how I learned them.....Get some good steel bar ends to protect your bars....they WILL hit the ground a lot learning this trick. I learned this trick bars backwards first so the barends would hit and not my levers, but you can try it either way.
Roll forward with both hands on the bars, with left foot on the left front peg and right foot on the back left peg. In one smooth motion, push the back wheel into the air and grab the seat with your right hand, and take your right foot off the peg and have it trailing behind you. Learn to coast this position first, this is a forward karl krusier (or a dave duster). To get out of it, just let the back wheel drop and let your right foot find the back left peg again.
Once you get that balance point learned and can ride into and out of this trick easily, take it to the next level. Roll into the karl like normal, but this time put your right foot back on the right peg, let go of the bars with your left hand, and let the bike drop out in front of you. As the bars fall forward, let go of the seat with your right hand and grab the tire (either peg works well, too.)
Now you are in the hitch hiker position. You'll probably do one of two things the first few hundred times you try this. Either you'll push too far forward and the bars will hit the ground and you'll stop, or you'll not push too far and the bike will slip out from underneath you. At first it will probably be the first choice. Don't worry, this is where the magic touch comes in. You don't really push the bike down when it drops into a hiker, if you do it right gravity will take the bars most of the way down. If you try to slam them down they'll go too far. Use some finesse, you don't have to get violent with this trick for it to work.
If you bars start to scrape, it is possible to lean back a bit and just have them tap the ground repeatedly for balance and keep rolling. Lots of people learned them this way at first, although as you get better you'll stop doing them this way.
So you'll spend quite a while getting the roll down on this trick, but it will be fun and challenging. Pretty soon you'll be able to roll them as long as you want. To ride out, what you want to do is just reverse what you did to get in. You can ride out on either side but I learned on the left first. With your left hand reach for the left side grip while pulling the back tire beside you and behind you. The bike should start to fall. Don't lean forward too far to grab the grip, the key is to let the bike fall back towards you. As the back end falls, grab the left side grip with your left hand, release the tire with your right and grab the seat. Your right foot should come off the right front peg and land on the back left peg, right as the back wheel touches the ground. All this should be happening at the same time. Riding out is by far the hardest part of this trick so give it some time....you'll kickstand out of it a million times before you get it right and even people who have this trick dialed do occasionally.
This trick is just an extension of the karl krusier or the elbow glide, so don't get intimidated. Prepar e for your neighbors to freak out when you get this one dialed, though.
Good luck and let us know how it goes.
suitable 2pc street bars for flatland? posted on 2006-03-27 06:38:46
I just put Ody Skim Milks on my flat bike. They used to be pwh4130's. They work great.
kevin is the man!wait till you see this posted on 2006-03-25 08:58:58
I tried riding that bike at the last York jam and couldn't seem to get the hang of it. Its a LOT harder than it looks to even do a mccircle on.
Front hubs posted on 2006-03-24 12:42:59
I've had a Hoffman Girthy 48 on my front wheel since 1999. It's the best hub I've ever owned. Before that I rode Suzues like everyone else in the 90's but I found that I broke axles a lot more with those hubs (to be fair, I did ride a lot more back then, too.) The HB hub is a bit heavier than newer hubs, but it's just so smooth you don't care. I have a NOS 36 HB hub that I'm going to build up one of these days. If you can find a Girthy Hub, I recommend it if you can handle the extra 4 ounces or so. Otherwise I'd go with a Vandero, they look really good.
About fightining posted on 2006-03-24 07:49:07
Which martial art is the one where you can throw ice and freeze someone? Or harpoon them and pull them to "get over here!" Or how about learning how to Shoryuken!
and dragon punch 12 feet into the air?
Best way to bring a bike on a plane? posted on 2006-03-24 07:14:27
1.) Get a duffel bag with wheels. A hockey goalie bag works very well, but without wheels it will be kinda hard to carry very far at all, even with a light bike. DONT get a bag that says _____ Bikes on it. Hard to convice someone there's not a bike inside.
2.) Take off your bars and wheels. Everything else can stay on. Zip tie the wheels and bars to the frame really well, so the whole bike is one piece. Get some towels and other stuff for padding (pads actually work really well) to keep the bike from being destroyed during transport. Remember the smaller you break down the bike, the less likely they are to suspect there is a bike in there, and the less likely they are to charge you.
3.) Get ready for your bike to get at least a little dinged up. As my friend Graham said once, it will look well traveled.
4.) Check it in with the skycaps. Tip them about $5 for the bag. Better to tip them out and get the bike on and save $75, than cheap out and get charged at the counter.
5.) Don't wear bike clothes at the airport. If anyone asks what's inside, you can say "exercise equipment" this is not lying, technically. DONT lie to security if you have to bring the bike over to get x-rayed after you get your baggage tag, remember only the airline employees are interested in charging you for bringing a bike on the plane, not security.
6.) Be very careful about weight. Make SURE that you bike bag does not go over the usual 50 pound weight limit. Give yourself a 5-7 pound leeway if you can.
You can sometimes avoid the scale by going to the skycaps outside, but some smaller airports might not have them. I got charged for the first time ever flying home from Savannah on Airtran (no skycaps there) not for having a bike in the bag, but for going over weight and going over dimensions (the bag stretched out was bigger than the max allowable baggage size.
Some dickhead manager came over the desk and stretched out the bag to max capacity. My bag is a huge hockey bag that could probably fit 2 1/2 bikes inside comfortably. He charged me for overages even though the bike took up MUCH less space than that and the extra space in the bag could be pressed down to probably less than half of what he was measuring and charging me for.
I should add that all I had in the bag was my bike, a few small tools, kneepads, a towel for padding, and a pump. The bike is an '02 Pony, Ody forks, Profile cranks, 48's....probably weighs around 30-32 pounds. I have NO IDEA how the bike bag got quoted for being over 50 pounds, but it's hard to argue when you're looking at the digital scale and it reads 54 pounds. It wouldn't suprise me if the scale was off but there's not a lot you can do about it when you're already at the airport. So weigh in before you leave.
7.) Avoid Airtran. I've never had problems on Delta or United, though.
8.) Just to make my own life easier, I am going to try to put my wheels in one bag, and the bike in another next time. Easier to carry and avoids the weight issue.
BTW, there is a great article on the G-sport site about bikes and planes, and G's own great idea for traveling with his bike bag. Check it out.
Already?! posted on 2006-03-24 06:27:46
Its been a couple of weeks, how's the recovery coming along?
Simon O'Brien sig frame ''happy place'' by st martin posted on 2006-03-23 06:08:11
Nice frame. Is it just me, or are almost all flatland sames sporting nearly the exact same geometry these days? I'd love to upgrade from my Pony, but I'm just not into bikes with these -13" chainstays. Someone needs to make another "balanced" flatland bike. Leif's bike definitely fits the bill but some more would be good, too.
Happy Birthday Trevor Meyer posted on 2006-03-22 09:10:51
Happy B-day to probably the winningest rider in flatland. He was absolutely unstoppable from around 1993-99, and still is unbelieveably good today.
FM7 - The lost tapes posted on 2006-03-22 07:50:47
If Nev ever finds my lost footage and interview from FM 5 Ath Fam interview, I'd be even more stoked.... I rode pretty good at the tennis courts down by the river in ATL, and we did my entire interview down there, but the footage got lost. No bueno. Oh well, I was stoked that years later, when I was in York, the Pergentiles recognized me anyway from my riding that Nev taped from the next day in Athens...That was a fun
weekend....flatland needs more Nevs.
19" frames for street posted on 2006-03-21 11:08:23
A 19" frame should be fine for street. For box or dirt jumping it might be a bit loopy, esp. if it has a very short back end. But for regular bunnyhop/grind/manual/wallride type street riding it should work great. Back end length seems to have a bigger effect on how a bike rides than front end length to me. A longer front end might be a bit more comfortable, but it's all just personal preference. Osicka is a great street rider and he rode Standard Taos for most of his career.
Back out of whack again posted on 2006-03-21 10:04:51
Yeah, I remember when you were out for while after recovering from surgery. Was that already 6 years ago?
Did you do physical therapy? I've got an appointment with one scheduled, hopefully I'll be able to get back on track soon. Don't worry, I'm not riding until I get this resolved, though.
