Look what my new bike can do
#1
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Look what my new bike can do
Long story, but last week I finally picked up the rebuilt Bandit, the one-hand adapted bike that Trek made for me, on the latest version Domane SLR frame. In a word, the new Bandit is awesome - incredibly fast, smooth and go just about anywhere versatile. After 100 miles of road stuff on Tuesday and Wednesday, I shifted over to a different wheel set and 40mm knobby tires.
I’m calling it Beast Mode.
Grand Dad's Bluff, La Crosse, Wisconsin
I’m calling it Beast Mode.
Grand Dad's Bluff, La Crosse, Wisconsin
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#2
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Nice.
I've seen splitters for one-handed brake cables, but not hoses - how does that work?
I've seen splitters for one-handed brake cables, but not hoses - how does that work?
#4
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For an off the shelf solution on a flat bar bike, or a drop bar where you are not trying to hide it, the Outbrake system - splitter and abs type modulation - looks great. I have one, and if I ever build up a flat bar bike, I plan to use it.
#5
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Admirable, for sure.
I knew a guy that I would chat with at the brewpub. He was a cabinetmaker, and liked to talk up his accomplishments.
He had gotten flesh-eating bacteria infection from a rusty nail scratch on his butt cheek, and spent months in the hospital, narrowly surviving and losing most of that side of his butt.
Had not seen him for some time, and he told (perched awkwardly on the bar stool) about his latest projects and name-drops, saying "I'm not one to rest on my laurels".
I said "Yeah Bob, and now you have only one laurel to rest on." (apologies if this isn't funny)
#7
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Awesome. Both the bike and your ability.
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Awesome! And great to see you riding.
Every time I start to think that I'm not doing as well on my rides, I see guys like you and others on hand and adaptive cycles and get inspired again. Thank you!
Every time I start to think that I'm not doing as well on my rides, I see guys like you and others on hand and adaptive cycles and get inspired again. Thank you!
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Ride Safe ... Ride Hard ... Ride Daily
2017 Colnago C-RS
2012 Colnago Ace
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HCFR Cycling Team
Ride Safe ... Ride Hard ... Ride Daily
2017 Colnago C-RS
2012 Colnago Ace
2010 Giant Cypress
#11
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nice !
Ride On!
good hair
Ride On!
good hair
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Vintage, modern, e-road. It is a big cycling universe.
Vintage, modern, e-road. It is a big cycling universe.
#13
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I wonder how many idiots like me had the thought breeze through their heads "Wow! It's a literal one-armed Bandit!" I really like that color of green. I'm not a fan of the weird flat pastel colors that most bikes seem to come in anymore.
Enjoy getting your ride on with that Beast!
Enjoy getting your ride on with that Beast!
#14
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Don't be embarrassed by drawing the connection. I loaned the bike the nickname my brothers had given me years ago. There's a longer story on the bike and its color, design and name that I posted a couple years back. I'll look for the thread.
#15
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A Canvas Big Enough
This is a story about a bicycle, but it is not about a bicycle at all. It is a story about remembering and healing. It is a story of taking up a broken brush and using it to repaint the canvas of my life with splashes of color and moments of joy.
A bit over a year ago, my friends at Trek Bicycle Corporation and I embarked on the reimagining of the Bandit, a bicycle adapted to a one-handed rider. I am that one-handed rider. My left arm went missing at the shoulder many years ago, victim of a run in between the sailboat I was on and a high power line. I am also, at least to my brothers, the Bandit, taken from the nickname given to slot machines, and a reflection of my brothers’ belief that any money I win from them on the golf course is an act of larceny. When Trek produced the original version of this bike five years ago, we passed the Bandit name along to it. It stuck.
Between the first Bandit and the start of Bandit 2.0, there were some changes in Trek's Project One, custom bike program. Now, in addition to choosing color schemes within a set group of designs (which was already pretty cool), riders can start with a clean slate and, working with Trek's artists and painters, they can create a bike that is uniquely theirs.
My first thought was that there is only so much that can be drawn upon the scant surface area and oddly shaped tubes of a road bike, that the canvas offered by a bicycle was too small to do much. In my limited imagination, every conceivable design and combination had already been tried. So, with no set image in mind, I accepted Trek's invitation to simply send along something to inspire the design-a name, a story, perhaps a picture or two.
The Bandit name was a given. I don't think the wonderful people at Trek, especially ..., the lead designer from the start, who have invested their creativity and passion in this project over the past six years, would have permitted anything different. On the occasions I brought the Bandit back for rides, the Trek workforce treated it like a lost child recently found. The bad things we have done may haunt us, but it is the good things that sustain us. To my friends at Trek, the Bandit was a good thing, a reminder of how their work makes a difference.
As further confirmation for the name, on a bicycling tour in Ireland I had listened to stories about the roving bands of Irish torai, bandits if you will, living in the forest and taking back from the English the possessions those foreign invaders had stolen from members of the clan. Like so many other things misappropriated by the English (the ability to cook a decent meal sadly not among them), the legend of Robin Hood certainly was one. This new Bandit, I decided, would need more than just a touch of green. Riding it would make me feel like a man of danger, a rebel forever connected to his Irish roots, a Fenian crusader on the path to independence.
Name decided, I turned to the story I wanted this bike to tell, or more appropriately, the stories I wanted to tell when I rode it. The first Bandit was a conversation starter that had helped strangers become friends over hours of rides up and down Colorado mountains, and from Iowa clear over to Lake Michigan in the Ride Across Wisconsin. I wanted this Bandit to be no different.
As this is a story about remembering and healing, beware that the next part starts in the darkest of places. The night I learned that our son, Jeff, had passed away in a backcountry skiing accident in New Zealand, I found myself on the Bandit, on the trainer, tears streaming down my face and sobs catching my throat. Two hours later, the bike was still planted on the trainer, not an inch away from where I started, a taunting metaphor to the crushing reality that I could not pedal away from this tragedy.
Over the course of the next few weeks, as we planned to remember and say goodbye to Jeff, friends and neighbors came along side for long, mostly silent rides. Incredibly brave young men and women, friends of our son, showed up at our doorstep, not knowing what kind of mess they might find. Many of them came with their bikes, or borrowed one of ours. It was during a ride that I remembered one of my favorite days with my son, and realized that he had on that day given us the tools we needed to survive this.
At his memorial service, I retold the story:
Standing still is not an option that would sit well with Jeff, I started. A few years ago, he and I set out to ride our bikes in an event called the Triple Bypass, so named because of the three, high mountain passes it climbs. Forty-five miles into the ride, with only one pass behind me, I fell and shattered my femur.
Five months later, I had a business meeting near Jackson Hole, a place that we had always wanted to ski, so I invited Jeff to drive down from school in Montana and join me. On the way to the mountain, Jeff announced his plan for the day: “When we get there Dad, we’re going to take the tram 4000 feet up to the top, find the steepest run that’s open, strap in and go.”
When I raised my eyebrows at this, he elaborated: “You’re going to know in five turns if this is going to work. Otherwise, we’re going to spend the day *****footing around while you whine and test things out.”
“What happens if it’s not working?” I asked.
Jeff told me that we would cross that bridge when we came to it, but grinned in a way that said I’ll pick you up and we’ll try five more. Either way, there was no plan B.
Likewise, when it comes to healing, there is no Plan B. We are going to make our five turns, no matter how awkward or painful, and then five more after that. If someone falls, we’re going to pick them up and start with five more turns. At some point, we’re going to realize that the wound is healing and the rhythm of our lives has, to some extent, been restored.
Embracing rather than avoiding the things that cause me to remember my son, that is the story this bike will tell and the story I will tell about this bike. I kept this in mind as I dug through the images Jeff had captured on his final journey. One of those pictures was from a forest in New Zealand. It was a place of tranquility. It appeared to be a perfect sanctuary for the noble bandits of Irish folklore. If you look closely, you can almost see them hiding in the trees. I sent the image off to ..., explaining that my son had taken the picture shortly before he died. It became the color palette for the Bandit 2.0.
The final image I sent to Trek was this one, which I described as follows:
Okay-so it’s not specific to the Bandit theme, but is important to me. This teardrop pendant (“roimata” in Maori) comes from a region in New Zealand very close to where the picture I sent you was taken by my son Jeff, shortly before he died. It was hand carved by a friend of his and then blessed by the priest, or Tohunga, in the village where he was staying. It provides strength and reassurance. I wear it on most rides.
Trek took those inspirations and captured and combined them brilliantly. From the colors, to the pattern that evokes the thought of arrows flying through the mist, to the whispered image of the roimata on the front forks, this bike is the Bandit. My friends at Trek also knew, without my saying, exactly what the Bandit and my riding represents. It is about recovering from injury and unimaginable loss. It is about rejoining a world that still holds so much promise-a world my son saw every morning when he woke up in a meadow, surrounded by snow-capped mountains waiting to be climbed and skied-a world he captured in pictures and dreamed about on the days he was confined to more mundane tasks.
The Bandit is about the journey forward.
Don’t let the awkward collection of interconnected tubes throw you off. A bicycle offers us a canvas that is more than big enough. The paint on that bike does not need to be custom, it can be chipped/peeling, yet from the seat of a bike, we can find joyful stories filled with vibrant color, strangers waiting to become friends, quiet moments amidst vast beauty, and the parts of our surroundings that need our attention. A bicycle ride does not hide the world-it brings it into sharper focus, the good and the bad. The windows are always rolled down, opening us up to the sights and sounds and smells that surround us.
And, on those rare and special days, our bicycles might even take us to what the Irish call thin places, where the separation between the world we can see and world we can’t is so slight that magic fills our senses.
Paint on and journey forward. That is what the Bandit and I are going to do.
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#16
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Yeah, quite a story.
My brother and his friends did the Triple Bypass on a bucket-list kind of adventure a few years ago... he still speaks fondly of it.
So, regarding the bike - is the left lever just for looks and a dummy in case someone else borrows your bike? Or does it have some function? What were the considerations?
#17
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The left side is empty - just there for aesthetics. In a way, it's worse for those who borrow the bike than the original with no left lever. They expect something to happen.
#19
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Wow, what a story and what a special bike. Thanks for sharing both with us.
and you are a badass!
and you are a badass!
#21
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No pictures. You will have to trust me on this one.
After a morning ride with my wife and daughter, I went back out to explore the mountain bike and walking - running trails that border the MUP and roads I've ridden countless times. The journey took me through loose stone (scary at times), hard packed dirt with patches of gravel, sand that was almost too soft, and some sections that were under water two weeks ago but were firm enough to ride today without jumping off and filling my road cleats with mud.
Twenty out of 31 miles were on terrain I never would have seen on thin tires absent a gross error in planning.
Not once did I consider how this was going to look on Strava.
I'm having fun!
After a morning ride with my wife and daughter, I went back out to explore the mountain bike and walking - running trails that border the MUP and roads I've ridden countless times. The journey took me through loose stone (scary at times), hard packed dirt with patches of gravel, sand that was almost too soft, and some sections that were under water two weeks ago but were firm enough to ride today without jumping off and filling my road cleats with mud.
Twenty out of 31 miles were on terrain I never would have seen on thin tires absent a gross error in planning.
Not once did I consider how this was going to look on Strava.
I'm having fun!
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Sounds like you had a blast.
#24
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Super bike, super color and super story! I wonder if Trek 'borrowed' that green color from Honda motorcycles. As a child, I once had a 1971 CT70H the exact same green. Perfect!
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