I’ve been a roadie. Yup. A self avowed spandex wearing road weenie.

I started as a Cat 5 and slowly moved my way up to Cat 2 over the years. Dirt? Who needs dirt when you can have fun cruising on asphalt.

Well- that was my view. Note the past tense. A couple years ago I got my first taste of dirt through cyclocross. The first time I had heard about it, I was like what’s up with this “cyclocross” thing? Running? Dirt? Ewww… Nonetheless, I decided to give it a try. My first race was at the season opener at the Cross Crusade in ’06 and I raced as a beginner. A Cat 3 road racer racing beginners. Hey- it WAS my first race. I distinctly remember riding along when one of the officials, Lisa to be exact, exclaiming at the top of her lungs, “SANDBAGGER.” That word was forever burned into my memory. In the end I did take 3rd place. How things have changed since that first taste of dirt.

This year I burned out. Too many hours suffering in cold and rain. I couldn’t muster the motivation to get on the road bike, I looked at my bike and didn’t want to get on it. During the King’s Valley road race I was feeling really good. I went up to the front of the pack at one point and was chatting with Carl Decker, Team Giant. Jake Rathe, Jelly Belly led an attack up the left hand side and the pack surged in response. Having no motivation, I shrugged my shoulders and said have a great race to Carl. After the pack had passed, I turned around and rode back to the start. I was so done with the road.

So, after many years of friendly jibing by Mike Ripley and others, I finally picked up a mountain bike in April. I jumped in with both feet and picked up a carbon Blue dual suspension bike. At the races the bike always attracts attention. People are amazed at the weight of the bike and I’m riding some heavy, indestructible wheels. The bike is awesome. The pilot needs some work.

My first race on the mountain bike was the Mudslinger. Oh boy oh boy did I pick a doozy of a race for my first experience racing a mountain bike. Lisa’s words were still echoing in my head so I chose to race Cat 2 and in the end it was the right choice. I’ve never pretended to be a hill climber and I never pretended to be really good in the mud. The Mudslinger provided these in buckets. I felt like the gods of suffering were out to smite me. Bombing down hills with water bars with my front wheel wandering all over the place I did my best to suppress my roadie instincts. Granny gears? I had thought those were only for weenies. Mudslinger proved me wrong. Those were some epic grades there.

Even through the pain, even through the “what the hell am I doing moments”, I knew I had found the joy of mountain biking and was hooked.

I’ve been having lots of fun riding and racing my mountain bike. I’ve been crashing a lot, but every time I pick myself back up and get back on with the grin. See (http://gallery.me.com/sugahara#100025) I’m also back on the road bike and have found that riding both is a great way to stave off the burnout. Short track has been a hoot and is good practice for the upcoming cross season where I’ll be riding as a Masters A. And I’ll also be sporting a brand new Blue Norcross cyclocross bike too.

100 Acre Wood
By Carl Decker

I think the worst part of the weekend was right after I asked “Do you think we need to take all 10 gallons?” at the last fueling depot. Sometimes it’s embarrassing being a weight weenie. And this was one of those times. Normally, I’m proud of how light my car is. I’ve spent a lot of hours trying to get the power/weight ratio of the Wheels of Teal as good as possible, without adding power. This is because, generally, power costs money. Throwing stuff away, however, is free. So I have no sound deadening, no air conditioning, and no stereo. I have a plastic rear widow with no defroster. I have no console, so nowhere to keep my cellphone, and no sand inside the bases of my little safety triangle thingys. I put WRC mirrors on my car because they looked cool, but more importantly they saved 4 lbs. You cannot see anything using these mirrors.

So in a rally race, as with a bicycle race, I like to run light. And that’s how I almost ruined everything at the Rally America National event in Salem, Missouri.

I knew we were in trouble when the fuel light came on as we were rolling up to the start of a special stage (the timed race stages at a rally). The stage was 10 miles, followed by a 3 mile transit. Followed by a 4 mile special stage. Followed by a 20 or so mile transit to a service. I told Mike that the light was on. He did a good job of hiding how unimpressed he was.

So we drove 10 miles as fast as I could, but without braking as much, or accelerating as much. And the car coughed a couple times. And then we transited very carefully, so as to not waste fuel. And then we began running out of gas in the first corner of the 4 mile special stage. 3.9 sweaty, on/off/on/off/on miles later, we finished the stage on fumes. We then spent oh, 12 miles or so being towed to the next service by the Hanson Rally Team (thanks guys!). And then Mike and I pushed the car into the time control. And then we pushed it into the service area. And I told our service crew that I was retarded (but my Dad already knew that). And when we finally pushed and coughed and sputtered the car into the fuel depot before our last couple night stages, that’s when I said “Do you think we need to take all 10 gallons?”

After an uncomfortable silence, we used all 10 gallons

“Fueling issues” notwithstanding, the race went pretty smoothly. Since AC was laid up with a bad knee, we had to call in a pinch-co-driver. Mike Rossey came highly recommended by another co-driver we know, and for good reason. With 9 years experience, a couple National Championship titles, and some trips to the X-Games under his belt, Mike is a wealth of knowledge and co-driving skill. He’s also a stand-up guy that has done a bit of mountain bike racing and knows his STI from his XTR. So Mike would fly out of Washington D.C., our one man crew, Mike Decker and I would fly out of Redmond, and our trailer-mates, Byron and Sky would fly into Chicago and trailer the WoT into Salem. Eventually, anyway.

Turns out Byron’s old Dodge would take a full day of TLC to get running again after a month in Illinois storage. So Dad and I, in no particular rush to get to Salem, MO without a car to worry over, took a drive into St Louis. We toured the “Gateway to the West” arch and explored the surrounding urban decay on the Mississippi. And we luxuriated in doing anything other than working in the cold on that jalopy of a truck.

A day later, everybody was accounted for, and while the service crew took care of the WoT, Mike and I got down to business at recce. The roads were fast and grippy, with the occasional water splash through a creek. It was at one of the earlier g-out water splashes that I started noticing what looked like a trail of oil down the road in front of us. Less than a mile later, we came across the victim: ACP of the NOS Energy Drink Team had just torn the oilpan off of his co-driver’s Audi TT. We helped him get the car out of the road, and he and his co-driver hopped into our rental Accord for the rest of recce. This turned out to be great for Mike and I, as ACP is one of the fastest and most experienced rally drivers in America. We learned a lot and had a great time listening to he and his co-drivers stories. After a full day of recce, we had improved our note taking considerably, and were ready to try them out on stage.

When friday morning arrived, we took part in the “practice stage” to shakedown the car. We made two good passes, but stopped near the end of the second to tow ACP’s Evo (and it’s freshly grenaded engine) the 5 miles back to their service crew (not ACP’s dad). We just can’t seem to get enough of each other, it seems, but this would be the last time we saw ACP in action for the weekend.

In the afternoon, the stages started, and they were kickass! The improved notes were great and Mike was spot-on with the calls. We began building some momentum and pushing harder as the day progressed and confidence improved. By day’s end we had driven into 8th place overall, so would start in the mix with the faster cars on Saturday.

Saturday, however, would prove challenging. One early surprise was when we launched into a river crossing (this was no creek) and water sprayed me in the face from a hole in the floor somewhere. It also got Mike pretty wet, in addition to a lot of wires by his feet that apparently go to something important, as the car did not run well for a while. Time to ease up on the water crossings then, we decided.

The next stage, we lost the brakes at about 100mph when a brake line rubbed a wheel and failed, coming into a 50mph corner. We used a lot of the road, and a good bit of bushes too, on that corner. But we made it through the rest of the stage with the handbrake and lots of downshifting. Upon returning to service, we noticed that we had fractured a brake rotor as well. So we replaced a bunch of stuff and raced on crappy brakes until we had enough time to bleed them in a transit section.

And then there was the whole running out of gas thing. Yeah. But with every frustrating setback came the excitement of limiting our losses and not losing much time. Sure, Seamus Burke’s son got by us by a few seconds to take our 6th place overall on the last stage, but he’s obviously better at gas math than I am, so I guess he kinda deserved it.

In the end, we finished 7th overall again. Trailer-mates Byron and Sky went off late on saturday and couldn’t finish. Ken Block won and Travis Pastrana broke his car on a totally smooth looking corner and DNF’d. Which puts the Wheels of Teal 3 for 5 against Pastrana. He might not be counting. But I am. I gotta work on those math skills, ya know.

AC’s excited to rejoin me for the next event, the Olympus Pro Rally in Washington state, April 24th. And I’m excited to share the tricks I gleaned from Mike Rossey and ACP with him when he does. We’ll do the next couple National races in an effort to make the X-Games selection this year, and it looks like we might actually stand a pretty good chance of making it, if we can keep the shiny side up.

As for now, I’ve got some bicycle racing to do. I’ll be in California chasing podiums with my shiny new carbon Anthem X right until Olympus. Which sounds pretty damn good to me. Don’t you just love spring?

Thanks for coming along,
Carl Decker
Giant Professional MTB Team

bonus! here are video highlights (including some Offs) from Byron: http://vholdr.com/node/73365

here are a bunch of photos of me totally blowing a R2 spectator area, etc… http://photos.digitalspeed.org/v/100aw2010/693/

Not representative of final product.

One shoulder:

53×11/24×7

Other shoulder

Dirt

Front:

(bicycle pic)
Bike
Race
Ahead

Back:

OBRA logo
Race it like you stole it.

Yeah yeah. I know.

Oh so busy, so little time. I tell ya- membership is up year to date 10% on top of 12% growth last year? I am sooo glad that the big O-Dog aka Omer Kem is now working for us. Mindy Murray is also doing results for us. We had a meeting with Dan Houghton this afternoon and he’s very interested in running the neutral wheel program. Possibly looking at a timing chip system- looks like one company may be stomping out the bugs that we weren’t stoked about. We’ll see.

Lots of new stuff this year to make racing better here:

1 new truck (service area of Salem to Medford)
1 new trailer (service area of Bend)
Gobs of new signs and some new timing clocks will be ordered too.

Oh and here’s some notes for this weekend:

Wear both numbers or you may be relegated 1-5 places. No brainer.

If you win, use your head before saluting. We’d rather you not.

Don’t go over the centerline and attack.

Made the OBRA calendar into a google calendar.

HTML

http://www.google.com/calendar/embed?src=kenji73sugahara%40gmail.com&ctz=America/Los_Angeles

iCal

http://www.google.com/calendar/ical/kenji73sugahara%40gmail.com/public/basic.ics

XML

http://www.google.com/calendar/feeds/kenji73sugahara%40gmail.com/public/basic

With Cyclocross season winding down, I wanted to take a moment to talk about a misunderstood group of people: singlespeeders.

When I first decided to give Cross a try, I wanted to do singlespeed (or as I call it, one-gear). Galen Mittermann (Midtown Direct) asked, “Sal, why would you choose the hardest category?” At the time, I didn’t have a good answer. Now, I do.

‘Cause it’s awesome . . .

It takes a while to come to that conclusion, however. When you first start riding one-gear, you try to use it as an excuse or a handicap. You find yourself always in the wrong gear for every situation. You start thinking things like, “Oh, well, yeah, I could have ridden that run-up too, if I had gears.” You learn to hate B’s that come flying by you on straight-aways in their big rings. But, eventually the tide turns and you realize you are handi-capable.

This happened early for me. At my first Thrilla in Bend, Ryan Trebon lapped me halfway into the race. As he passed he said, “Come on Buddy!”

As I was about to yell back my excuse, I looked down at his freewheel, and I’ll be damned if he wasn’t a singlespeeder. Well shoot. By the time I figured out what to say, he was gone. He didn’t need any excuses, and didn’t have time to hear any from me.

As they say in British car racing, “Push on regardless.”

You learn to spin, you learn to mash, you learn to run and you learn to love the natural feel of it all. In talking to fellow one-gear riders, the one word that keeps getting repeated is, “simplicity”.

Maybe that’s why, as a group, we are thought of as “earthy”, riding unpainted frames with flat bars.

We may have some tattoos, and drink a little beer, but the truth is we are a bunch of hard-core bike racers that will stack up against anybody. So, the next time you see a singlespeeder racing in another category, give ‘em a shout. And the next time you see a hundred singlespeeders flying down the start straight, back up, cause it will be all knees and elbows. Oh, and the next time you buy a bike, make it a one-gear.

-Sal

All dates are tentative. Also- please be aware that Walla Walla is a WSBA/USAC race- it is in this calendar only for reference.

2010 Calendar

It’s nice to immediately bookend the Mountain Bike Season with something, well, else. What better activity than racing cars around in the prairies of Eastern Washington? Carl and I hastily departed Las Vegas at 6am (not soon enough) on Thursday morning in order to have time to take care of some last minute prep on the Rally Car and maybe, possibly, get a bit of rest before piling into the Dodge with Carl’s Dad for the seven hour drive from Bend to Pomeroy, Washington. We just barely got the car buttoned up at about 1am but were still on the road, Longboard Louie’s breakfast burritos in hand, by 11am on Friday. The plan was coming together…

After we left Tech Inspection and Registration with a (for our roving gong-show) minimal amount of being made to feel like complete novices it appeared that the weekend of racing was starting off without a hitch. Our decision to check out the sticking right rear brake was made quite effectively on the short drive to the Pioneer Motel (a whole ‘nother set of issues) during which the car refused to coast and the brake got quite hot, to say the least… We had the right tools for the job though. Anything you could ever need was right in the back of the Dodge. We had a Leatherman, some scissors, vice grips, a hammer and the impact wrench. And the bucket o’ bolts. An hour later we’d used the hammer and concrete wall out front in all manner of ways and eventually removed the offending seized part. It was honed and buffed with the most rudimentary techniques, greased liberally and reinstalled. Success. Fortunately on our midnight test drive we realized that the Odometer was already calibrated and promptly went to bed, wondering how triple digit speeds through the praries with only a Route Book would work out in the morning…

Our first instruction in the morning with said Route Book (not to be confused with detailed Pace Notes, a Route Book basically tells you where to go and where not to crash into people’s barns) was clearly at the end of what we determined, by listening to the cars in front of us shift through five gears before braking, was a “Pavement Ends/90 Left”. Carl used the slightly uphill braking zone concerningly late (code for perfect) to haul us down from around 90mph and flick the Subaru into a beautiful third gear slide past the first of many homesteads. It was ON! The stage climbed through Geiger Gulch on flowing smooth gravel and eventually crested onto the winter wheat covered plateaus that characterize the majority of eastern Washington. Good sightlines made up for the lack of accurate notes and we posted a solid first stage time as told by the volunteer timekeepers who were getting dusted out by every car. Thanks, timekeepers…

The first few stages rolled along smoothly, getting our bearings and having surprisingly good time hauling ass through gulches and open fields. Initial fears of the speeds and unfamiliar terrain gave way to wide smiles at the end of each stage that Carl clearly drove very, very well. It wasn’t until stage four that we realized just how well Carl was driving though, the timekeepers handed us our card and said kind of excitedly, “nice work”. We inquired casually (not sure of protocol on this) as to just how “nice” our work was. They casually responded that our work was the “nicest” they’d seen as of yet. This meant quite a lot to us as the first car on the road was none other than Carl Jarvedall, a seasoned rally veteran who cut his teeth racing the Swedish Rally Series back in his home country. For those who aren’t familiar with the distribution rallying around the world, Scandinavia is the epicenter. Mr. Jardevall holds a variety of stage records around the northwest and pilots an absolutely immaculately prepared Mitsubishi Evo. When we saw him in Parc Expose in the morning we immediately were excited to see how close we could get to his times but never once considered besting them. Suddenly we had a race on our hands. Carl once again posted a faster time on the next running of Ball Grade Up, which happened to have a solid dose of down as well, allowing the all-out-attack skills of the formerly underpowered Wheels of Teal on downhills to shine through. The last two miles of that stage are the most impressive driving I’ve seen Carl put together to date, linking fifth-gear sweepers together over crests like it was a walk in the park. Stoked, and with smoking brakes, every time…

The day ended with back-to-back runnings of the Maxwell Hill stage around dusk. With Jardevall fifty seconds up we knew outright victory was unlikely but hoped to post another fast stage time or two. The cagey veteran had our number though, despite being within one m.p.h. of his speed approaching the spectator area there were some other places on the seven-mile stage that we were clearly slower, finishing ten seconds down on run #1. The second running demonstrated the value of early road position clearly as the Evo sped off into the sunset with no dust ahead and dying winds. We took off ten minutes later with fading light and hanging dust from the cars in front, losing a further twenty seconds to Jardevall in just one stage. Oh well, at least we had a little battle going for a few stages there. It was and exciting day and we were even more excited to eat a provided chilidog dinner and not work on the car with the wrong tools into the night.

Just to make sure we were still respecting our day job, Carl and I started Sunday out with a jog through town to check out our tracks from the day before. They were rad. And someone crashed. A quick brake bleed (they get hot with triple digit speeds) and we rolled the car into our new Parc Expo position, second on the road behind Jardevall. We were stoked to get to see his tracks and feel like we were really in the hunt for the win. Turns out Carl drives a bit, well, looser than the other Carl, we were consistently entering and exiting further outside, taking more liberties with the wide roads and adjusting the line on the fly. Decker was in his groove right off the bat, driving what we thought was a solid opening stage. Jardevall laid down some track that we’ll just call generous into a downhill junction, showing us just where not to go off the road, but somehow still beat us by ten seconds. Keeping us honest we supposed… The next stage was more of the same but we kept it much closer, only seven seconds over twice the distance. It wasn’t until stage two that we got the now-familiar look of approval from the timekeepers. The Breakdown stage is a great place for just that, the smooth flowing county roads were traded for a decommissioned, overgrown route through a narrow wash, which was crossed numerous times via car-breaking rocky ditches. No matter though, Carl just kept ‘er loose and took some even greater liberties with the line (and weeds) to post a time a solid ten seconds faster than the “too shiny” Evo of our competitors. Solid.

A nice mid-day service break, lunch, some weed removal and we were on our way out of town for the final three-stage loop of the weekend. First stage was a dead heat at 4:40, then Jardevall punched it again on New York Road to eke out another few seconds, leaving the gap at 23 seconds coming into the last running of Breakdown. We’d taken down some notes as to the roughness of the ditches and corners to be cut and reckoned a faster time was definitely possible, kind of like a busted in half car was possible. The spot-on Wild West Rally crew not only kept things on time all weekend, but actually let us start a couple minutes early on the final stage. We were more than ready. Carl continued earning his black-belt rally driver status, following my commands perfectly and taking a further 10 seconds off our first run of the stage. We allowed ourselves to consider the unlikely prospect of Jardevall having gotten slower somehow on the second running on the 18 mile transit back to service and the virtual finish line. Not surprisingly, the Swede got faster as well, but only matched our first time, we took the gap down to 16 seconds on the day. Not too shabby for a couple of bike racers learning the ropes in a conservatively (cheaply) prepped car. Jardevall, usually a quiet guy, was more and more stoked throughout the day to have someone challenging him and opened up to provide some valuable advice. His Co-Driver, Jason Grahn, did the same, in between talking shit about how we couldn’t hope to beat them… it’s this kind of camaraderie that makes racing cars in the dirt equally enjoyable to racing bikes in the same medium. Must be something about pavement that makes people take things too seriously. Or maybe it’s money…

In any case, it was a weekend of racing that exceeded even our loftiest expectations and got us fired up to learn more and get better at this intriguing new sport. Carl’s dad was even more stoked than usual, having gotten to go out to a few spectator areas to see just how well his son was driving that little white car with AC/CD on the hood.

We’ll be rocking around in the Mt Hood National Forest next weekend trying to get the same kind of cheers that people love to give a car that, upon first glance, appears to be a rolling tribute to who many consider the greatest rock band of all time…

Here’s a little video we found on the internet, after this quote from our friend Byron Garth we decided not to turn on the in-car camera… “If I had the camera running I would’ve stuffed it miles before I did…” (He rolled his freshly prepped new WRX on the same corner that claimed rally vet Paul Ecklund and fellow Impreza pilot Mike Goodwin)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vGq7GmsEpg

Team Rubicon-ORBEA
Norrene Godfrey
3014 L Street
Vancouver WA 98663
Tel: 503-806-2215

For Release: Immediate Release

TEAM RUBICON IN SEARCH FOR TITLE SPONSOR FOR UCI CONTINENTAL TEAM

Portland, Oregon –Team Rubicon-ORBEA, presently known as Land Rover-ORBEA; Benefiting the
Lance Armstrong Foundation, a first year UCI continental team, is in search of a title sponsor. Rubicon’s two-year partnership with Land Rover will end December 31st, 2009.

“For 2010 the team’s goals are to grow the young development team’s roster to 13 road riders and add three development track riders with a focus on the 2012 Olympics in London,” says Godfrey, the team’s co-owner and co-founder. “We are looking to grow the team slightly to help a few more young riders reach their dreams. While leading five-to-six charity rides throughout the US in 2010 and send even more cancer survivors to the LIVESTRONG Challenge events in Seattle, California, Philadelphia and Austin.”

In order to continue on with the team goals for 2010, Team Rubicon- ORBEA needs to come up with a title sponsor by November 5th.

“Securing a title sponsor by the UCI November 5th deadline will be tough, but not completely impossible, to meet,” said Godfrey. “If there is anything we have learned from working with the Lance Armstrong Foundation over the last nine years, it is that you never tell a cancer survivor they can’t. You build your support network and you ask for help when you need it. We are asking the global cycling community for help.”

“We have all been affected by the down turn in the economy, but we can never lose sight of the people in need and whatever we can do to help support Team Rubicon-ORBEA further in their pursuit, we simply must” –Celeste Moser, Schwalbe North America.

Team Rubicon-ORBEA was born when Godfrey, a competitive cyclist, lost her mother to cancer in the fall of 2001, after being diagnosed with lung cancer and given only 6 months to live. Although her Mother gave up on life after hearing the “c” word, Norrene was determined to not give up on her Mother. Norrene contacted a friend at Nike, who reached out to Lance Armstrong directly. Lance sent Norrene’s mother one of his race jerseys with the inscription, “Fight Mom -Lance Armstrong.”

That simple gesture of kindness encouraged Norrene’s mother to wage her own personal war on cancer; giving her the strength to fight and push through countless hours of chemotherapy treatments. Even though Norrene’s mother lost her battle, she lived longer than anyone ever expected; allowing her the chance to enjoy one last summer and watch Norrene get married. In order to repay Lance for his kindness and “pay it forward,” Godfrey dreamed of a cycling team that would ride in support of the Lance Armstrong Foundation and its fight against cancer.

In 2008, Team Rubicon-ORBEA partnered with carmaker Land Rover to create Land Rover-Orbea; Benefiting the Lance Armstrong Foundation. The team is built up of primary young development riders between the ages of 19–to-25 year olds from the US, New Zealand and Canada. When traveling to NRC races through-out the US, the young professional riders spend countless hours visiting children’s hospitals handing out LIVESTRONG wristbands and helping some extremely sick children have a moment of fun during long regiments of chemotherapy and other daily treatments.

However, the teams goodwill does not stop with hospital visits. The Land Rover- ORBEA team raises funds and awareness for the Lance Armstrong Foundation through leading charity rides in Philadelphia, Utah, Portland, and more, sending seven cancer survivors to the Seattle, Philadelphia and Austin LIVESTRONG Challenges and raising over $71,000 in donations for the Lance Armstrong Foundation.

“Norrene and David Godfrey [owner and co-founder] are the two most “neverdie” people Orbea has met,” said Justin Slarks, Director of Marketing ORBEA-USA. “The two of them are the glue that has held this team together since its creation and are the two who have put all of their personal time and energies into one of the best vehicles for stewardship out there. “Team Rubicon – Orbea is the one constant in our sponsorship program and hope that we can continue as the teams bicycle sponsor for years to come.

The team earned great acclaim in 2009 for its criterium stage win at Tour of Gila by Roman van Uden. Mike Northey followed that win up with winning the U23 New Zealand Criterium Championships and Dean Tracy won the US National Team Sprint Championships in Carson, California. The young Land Rover-ORBEA team also won the best young rider jersey at Nature Valley Grand Prix, the climber’s jersey along with the team overall GC at Tour of Delta. “For a first year professional development team, the results were great,” said Norrene, “What’s truly amazing about this team is what they do off the bike, when not racing, that has them winning the hearts of so many.”

“It was a pleasure to have Land Rover-ORBEA at our events this year”, said Nature Valley Grand Prix director David LaPorte. “Our goal is to grow the fan base of cycling fans and they did a great job of interacting with the people in our host communities and at our events. They are excellent ambassadors for the sport and for their sponsors. This is a great opportunity for any company who’s interested in engagement marketing.”

More information can be found on the team at www.landrover-ORBEA.com including a short video, complete team resume and more. Contact us direct at landrover-orbea@comcast.net or by phone at 503-806-2215 or 503-806-5305.

The Constructor’s Design Challenge FRIDAY OCTOBER 2ND
A well-designed modern transportation bike is flexible, durable, able to portage reasonable loads with ease, and ready to accommodate the many small and large challenges of everyday riding. Transportation bikes should be sturdy and durable, yet nimble enough to provide all-around utility during a short trip or a longer haul.

Custom bike builders are problem-solvers. They’re able to craft integrated, highly individualized, and functional design solutions that larger production bikes can seldom accommodate. Hand built bikes are able to express beauty, utility, and individuality in equal measure.

The Design Challenge seeks to inspire builders to develop considered, integrated, and spectacular solutions for the everyday rider, as well as to educate the public about the quality, engineering ingenuity, and functionality of handbuilt bikes.

SPECIFICATIONS
• Judged by legitimately qualified judges familiar with bike fabrication and handling
• Points are awarded in 10 Design Consideration categories, weighted into 3 points groups
• Top 12 winners (and the 3 race winners) will display in the OM Bike Union for 5 weeks
• All entries will be on public display for 2 days during the Design Challenge and Race weekend
• Top winners will travel on in a display at the OBCA show and Cross Nationals in Bend, Oregon
• All participants will be featured in a coffee table book being produced around the event

DESIGN CHALLENGE CONSIDERATIONS
1.Truly sensational solution
A genuinely unique and innovative solution for transportation use. Amaze us.
2. Handling
The bike must handle equally well with and without load. Both options will be tested against turning and straight pedaling.
3. Integration
Design solutions should be integrated into a complete and harmonious whole, rather than a checklist of details.
4. Presentation and Execution
Fabrication refinement and final presentation are important indicators of skill and thoughtfulness. Extraordinary craftsmanship can be displayed equally well in the simplest brazing or the fanciest lug. Individual design solutions should build to a single visual and functional whole.
5. Overall response to the course and challenges
Entry bikes must take into consider all elements of the race course, the 10 design considerations and the overall challenges they present.
6. Load carrying
Bikes must accomodate and securely carry the rider’s award ceremony party attire, a provided 6-pack of beverage (in glass bottles), and a provided small container of party snacks.
7. Security
Bikes must be protected from theft while unattended. A smart, easy solution for securing the bike under different conditions is expected.
8. Portage
Bikes must accommodate being carried by its rider over a section of the course.
9. Utility
Bikes should accomodate the expected need for changing weather, lighting conditions, and visibility. We know that you know what this means.
10. Quality and Rattles
If elements are loose, rattling, or otherwise inoperable at the race finish, points will be deducted for each failure.