Bond Theme

Have you ever ever heard of an “extremophile?” No, it’s not your buddy who solely listens to identical-sounding black metallic bands with identical-looking scratchy letter logos. An extremophile is an organism that may survive just about something, like these little wormy issues they thaw out of the Siberian permafrost:

And sure, I do know your extremophile buddy has each single identical-sounding Siberian Permafrost album on vinyl, good for him.

Effectively, the bicycle world has its personal extremophiles, and whereas most individuals affiliate sturdiness and longevity with metal, one of many hardiest of all extremophiles is the venerable Trek 1200, which is in fact made out of glued-together aluminum:

It’s a scientific reality that you simply can not stroll greater than half a block in New York with out encountering no less than one Trek 1200. Moreover, 85% of them nonetheless have intact Biopace stickers on the chainrings, and totally 98% of them boast authentic pie plates:

The world actually by no means wanted one other bike from Trek after the 1200, which may by why they’re in such bother.

In the meantime, I suppose the entire Sea Otter factor is occurring, and it’s clear from the protection that the business has made its choice and the transfer to 32-inch wheels is formally a Achieved Deal, as evidenced by this Ari Fleisher:

Thus far it feels like the brand new wheel dimension is good for driving brief distances by means of crowds:

Past that, each of the Ari 32″ prototypes I noticed had unique-looking prototype negative-rise Race Face stems to compensate for the bigger entrance wheel. Fox’s bike additionally had a set of Race Face branded wheels with its personal Vault hubs, so these are additionally clearly journey prepared prototypes as effectively. The brilliant purple Raicam Racing brakes aren’t a standard sight, both. I had an opportunity to journey Fox’s bike up and down a crowded pathway between the cubicles, which was my first time on 32″ wheels. It was paved and there have been plenty of individuals round, so I can’t say that I took a lot away from the expertise, aside from that the fork was undoubtedly practical.

OK, so in case you’ve misplaced observe, right here’s a quick abstract of the previous six years in bicycle retail:

In 2020 governments wouldn’t let individuals go to work and as a substitute despatched them checks to do nothing

Bored out of their minds, all of them determined to purchase bikes

The large bike corporations went hog wild, overproduced, and acquired up a bunch of motorcycle retailers, as a result of if historical past has taught us something it’s that bike booms by no means finish

Folks went again to work and the bike increase ended instantly

So now they’re engineering a wholesale shift to a brand new wheel dimension that may make all these bikes they will’t promote immediately out of date.

Is sensible to me.

However hey, what do I do know? The world has a method of confounding your expectations. For instance, once I was youthful there was this concept that Australians had been rugged individualists:

Or no less than lovable eccentrics:

However then I bought older and realized that Crocodile Dundee was mainly Hitler:

[Maybe the most Guardian article that ever Guardianed.]

And much from being a land of rugged individualism, Australia is a spot the place you may’t even journey a bicycle with out carrying a helmet. Actually, doing just about something on a bicycle in Australia will land you a fantastic, even when you’re “South Australia’s prime site visitors cop:”

Right here’s what occurred:

Supt Johnson, head of SA Police’s Visitors Providers Department, was fined after taking a selfie whereas biking on a residential road and posting it to his Strava account.

Mr Johnson mentioned he had been “winding down” after a 200km journey with pals final 12 months, and he was lower than 100 metres from his residence when he took the picture.

And right here’s the picture:

Wow. So far as I’m involved, he’s responsible of nothing, other than being an enormous Fred. Even right here in New York it’s not unlawful to make use of a telephone whereas driving a bicycle. Definitely utilizing a telephone whereas driving a automobile is harmful, however utilizing one when you’re driving–to take an image of your self no much less–isn’t any totally different from any of the opposite stuff you routinely do on the bike, equivalent to consuming, consuming, sticking your gloves in your jersey pocket, or “going downstairs and rearranging the furnishings,” when you get my which means.

I say anybody in favor of fines only for taking a photograph whereas driving a motorcycle has nothing to rearrange.