Seven – Page 111 – Seven Cycles

Peloton Magazine Celebrates the Bike Studio Concept

Issue 10 of peloton magazine is on newstands now, and in it you will find an article about the bicycle studio movement, a new wave of smaller, more fit and service focussed shops. Bicycle studios tend to have less clutter, less commodity and things you can get just anywhere. Instead they feature custom brands and high end accessories for riders who live their whole lives by bike. Think of the classic “pro” shop, then pare it down to an elegant austerity, and you have the modern bicycle studio.

The forebear of this new breed of shops was City Cycle of San Francisco under the stewardship of bike industry legend Clay Mankin. Mankin proved that you could build great bikes and make good money out of a very small space, if only you sold the right products. That shop, which continues on after Mankin’s early passing, began selling Seven when we were just a start up in 1997. Mankin’s loyalty to the brands he carried was off the charts. Though no longer, strictly speaking, a studio, City Cycle’s new owner Cory Farrer has kept Seven on the floor, even as other bike brands have come and gone.

In fact, here at Seven we were deeply gratified to see that, of the ten studios mentioned, seven of them are Seven dealers (ooooh, symmetry). In addition to City Cycle, those include Cascade Bicycle Studio in Seattle, owned by former Seveneer Zac Daab; Velosmith Bicycle Studio just outside Chicago, owned by another Seven alum, Tony Bustamante; Paul Levine’s Signature Cyles of Manhattan, Greenwich, CT and Central Valley, NY; Bespoke Cycles of San Francisco, Bike Effect in Los Angeles and the Ride Studio Cafe in Lexington, MA.

In our experience, the studios are our most demanding customers. They’re the ones pushing us toward perfection. When you take the kind of time with each customer that they take, every detail has to be correct. Cascade Bicycle Studio and Velosmith in particular, because they’re run by former Seven employees, can be counted on for unfiltered, candid feedback on every bike we build for them.

Obviously, we are deeply committed to all the shops that sell our bikes. The studio concept, which has only proven viable in large urban markets up to this point, simply represents a new approach to bicycle retailing, the cutting edge of high end bike sales. To be represented by so many of these forward-thinking shops is a great validation of the work we do and an inspiration for us to keep pushing forward.

Close Encounters of the 622 Kind

Bryan saw something in my expression and invited me over.

“Check it out!”

Clamped in his final machining stand was a yet to be finished, and very raw 622 SLX. He popped it out and handed it over. Until this morning I had not seen a 622 in the flesh, let alone held one.I basked in its aura for a bit, maybe a little too long.

“Well?” he asked.

Still stunned by the frame’s lithe beauty, I had forgotten to pay a compliment to one of its craftsman and could only muster a fleeting thought. Had I not been in a trance, I would have told him just what I was thinking,

Everything is different than I expected. The lugs are miniscule and oh-so-shapely. The matte finish looks appropriately industrial, but in the right light, the filament-wound fibers twinkle.

My word! They twinkle!

Deceptively lightweight yet surprisingly beefy. Elegance and power rolled into one. Mamacita.

But in the heat of the moment, all I could say was, “it’s awesome.”

Sorry Bryan, I was awestruck.

-Karl B.

Tales from the Seven Shop Ride: The Value of Vanilla

Weâ€™ve heard professional chefs usually have simple breakfasts: oatmeal, yogurt, that sort of thing.The idea is, if you aregoing to be critical and discerningwithyour food all day, you might not feel like engaging that kind of intellect first thing in the morning. Start simple. Begin at the beginning.

Wethinkwe understand.Whenwe reflect on our typical morning ride at Seven,itâ€™s an uneventful out-and-back on the Minuteman Bikeway with a stop in Lexington Center for coffee. No traffic, no crowds, no climbs, no egos, no going fast. Just a lethargic double paceline and base conversation peppered with bad jokes and proclamations of needing to drop five pounds or racing ‘cross next season.Some might ask, “why bother?” Rides should be exciting, epic, adrenaline-filled multi-hour slugfests, right?Those types of rides are fun, but not every day.

Asa crewwhoare critical of bicycles and cycling all day and every day,we likea plain-as-vanilla morning ride.

–Neil D.

Lumens

You can never have too many.

Snow Ride

When the snow flies and the temperature yo-yos, you have to change your game plan. At Seven, we try to stay on the bike, outside, as much as we possibly can. There’s no shame in retreating to the rollers or a trainer, but “stationary bike” is a contradiction in terms, right?

Trail riding is an even bigger challenge. On top of the snow/ice/snow mix, the sun sets early, so you need a good light. The upside to snow riding after dark is that the white ground cover amplifies your light. And you need all that light, because traction becomes a random event. Choosing the right line can mean the difference between staying on the bike and sliding down the trail on your butt.

Best also to bring a sense of humor.

To be really successfulon the snow ride, you have to change your basic expectations. That feeling of flow you get from riding dirt in summertime is not available. You have to replace it with the simple joy of being there, of being out in the woods when no one else is there, when the trees rock gently in the wind and the squirrels stay home to feast on winter stores.

It’s so nice to slip and slide and grind your way into the winter woods at night, and then stop there, turn off your lights and let the darkness close in on you. If it happens to be snowinglightly at the time, the sound of the flakes flitting against the already fallen snow is absolute magic.

Back on the bike, staying upright is the biggest challenge, that and keeping your feet dry. The reward is in the adventure, in going someplace that’s hard to get to, and in staying on your bike and moving forward when most “sensible” folks are at home, on the couch.

We’re really lucky that people are riding our bikes all year-round in all sorts of weather on every continent – except Antarctica…as far as we know. We don’t, strictly speaking, have to be out on the trail in the middle of winter, but in addition to loving the outdoors and the challenge of riding through the winter, we feel we owe it to our riders to experience what they experience. It helps us build better bikes, and of course, it makes a hot cup of coffee taste that much better.