It’s been a few days since the first US Pro Cycling Challenge concluded and I’m still in awe. I always thought attending my first professional bike race would be chasing that yellow jersey across France, but I should now feel lucky that it happened in my home state. I’m a Colorado girl after all…
One of the most interesting aspects to the stage, and for professional road racing, was the accessibility of the team vehicles, the riders, and their bicycles. This doesn’t happen in most of the professional sports we’re used to watching in the US. Many of the spectators were forgoing their primo viewing spots for a chance to get autographs and covet the most expensive bikes you’ve ever seen. The user-friendliness of the event also very much encouraging stalking. You can bet Chris and I joined right in. It was all about finding (stalking?) Jens Voigt.
The Mountain Film Festival in Telluride, CO starts this week and we’re psyched because there are a few bicycle movies in the line-up. One in particular, With My Own Two Wheels, has a personal connection from our travels on the Trail Care Crew. We were fortunate to meet the producer/co-director of the film, Jacob Seigel-Boettner, during our visit to Santa Barbara, CA in March.
I didn’t fully understand the impact that the bicycle could have for those without access to motorized transportation until college when I spent a semester in Rwanda working for Project Rwanda, an organization that developed and distributed specially-designed cargo bikes to coffee farmers. Just seeing the sheer number of ways that people used their bikes in Rwanda was an eye opener. I saw bikes loaded down with dozens of chickens, huge stacks of jerry cans, piles of firewood, entire families. It definitely made me realize how much I had taken the bike for granted, and the potential that two wheels could have around the world.
I have to say the most surprising part of the trip however was the across-the-board openness that all of the people we filmed had towards us. We were very worried that given our short timeframe for shooting in each country (only 5 days in Zambia), we wouldn’t be able to make enough of a connection with our subjects and thus wouldn’t get the sort of intimate day-in-the-life footage that we were looking for. Wow. Couldn’t have been more wrong. I don’t know if it was just luck, but all five characters completely opened up their lives to us…
I’ve had Salvagetti Bicycle Workshop and the Happy Coffee Co on my radar for awhile and it was finally time to head downtown and check it out. There’s nothing like the wonderful smell of coffee intermingling with bike lube…
Frankenbike is a word that you won’t find in the Merriam-Webster online dictionary. But, if you look beyond the norm and venture into popular culture, you might just find this definition; “Frankenbike – a bicycle assembled from various parts one has lying around or parts received from friends, the more mismatched the better.”
Category Archive: The Bicycle