Articles – Page 20 – Seven Cycles

Off Road with Mike Bybee

Like most of our favorite riders, Mike Bybee brings an enthusiasm to cycling that makes other people want to ride bikes, too. So beyond the fact that he’s an accomplished bike packer, travel photographer and all around outdoors dude, he was a pleasure to collaborate with, and we think the bike we built him came out all the better for it.

Although he plans to ride his Seven on all Seven continents (yes, including Antarctica), we checked in with him for an early review only a few weeks after he had taken delivery.

Seven: Why this bike?

Mike: The Seven Sola SL is a great compromise between ultra-butted and straight tube frames. The craftsmanship is absolutely top-notch, and I knew that working with the designers and builders personally would insure that the bike would be tailored to me, not simply cobbled together to reduce discomfort.

With a goal of singletrack bike based travel and setting wheels on all seven continents, compromises have to be made. Seven Cycles did a great job at making sure the bike was as light and nimble as any dedicated dedicated all-mountain bike while still giving me the comfort, durability and carrying capacity to spend weeks on the bike without resupply.

Seven: How does it measure up to your expectations?

Mike: Seven Cycles has blown me away entirely. The bike weighs barely more than the standard spec, despite being built for exceptional ruggedness. The innovative design of the rear rack means that I’m able to carry a full load without it interfering with the brakes or relying on a convoluted series of adapters. The welds and craftsmanship are top notch, and the bike is the most agile 29er I’ve ever used – far better than the competition. It handles better than any bike I’ve ridden in its price-range, and with a fit and form that blow them all away.

Seven: Where are you going to take it?

Mike: Immediate term, it’s making its way across Arizona. Early 2015 it’ll be in Utah and New Mexico, and preparations are underway for a tour of Norway’s remote bike trails as well. Travel is being arranged for Iceland, Europe, and Australia in the coming years, with a trip to a research base in Antarctica already in the works.

Giving Thanks.

On a warm July day in 2004, in the conference room at Seven Cycles, I sweated through my first real job interview. I met with Jenna in sales, Zac in design, and Rob the owner, for a total of about two hours. They sifted through my babbling, disregarded my nervousness, and offered me a gig as a Customer Service Representative. I started in August.

The learning curve at Seven is pretty steep. There is a lot to know. My primary responsibility, out of the gates, was to help answer phone calls which is a good way to learn things quickly. Each question and each caller were as unique as the bikes we make. I tried to learn as much as I could so I could be prepared to answer every question that anyone had and so I could finally stop pestering my colleagues with pleas of “Can we do this?” and, “Can we do that?” All my pestering revealed a pattern, the answers for all but the most outlandish requests were, “yup,” or “of course,” or “why not?” Once I understood our philosophy, phone calls became fun, and equally important, I understood what made Seven great, for the first time I knew our tagline, “One bike. Yours.” wasn’t a marketing ploy, it was simply how the business ran, from the top, down.

Ten years later, that motto hasn’t changed, and I will bring that singular focus with me throughout each of the adventurous endeavors that lie ahead. This Friday, October 10th is my last day at Seven Cycles. The decision was my own and though I will miss my colleagues and their fun-loving spirit immensely, I am excited for my next steps. I am also excited for Seven and know that the best has yet to come, a sentiment that everyone here has relayed to me as well. Seven is a special place, full of incredible and talented people, and I am proud to have been a part of the fun. Thanks is also due to the wonderful people that make up our retailer network, and to the many thousands of cyclists who have called, emailed, or stopped by for a factory tour.

Looking forward to seeing you all down the line.

Karl

Hulking Chain Stays.

You may have noticed in a recent post about Craig Gaulzetti’s new Axiom SL, that he wanted a race bike. Craig raced as a youngster while growing up in Belgium, and has never gotten over the thrill of a stiff, speed first, comfort second-if-at-all race bike. He wanted to recreate the same excitement with his very first Seven, and we were excited to take on the challenge.

Walking around our production floor, the most memorable site is the towering wall of titanium tubing located in the machining area.

titanium tubing rack — A section of the titanium tubing wall.

Hundreds of twenty foot tall tubes tower over everything in sight. Organized by diameter, these tubes will determine how a bike will feel on the road. To over simplify, a narrow tube will bend and flex over bumps and potholes resulting in a plush ride, but all that flex means the bike won’t explode forward when you stomp on the pedals. A large tube responds oppositely, bouncing over bumps like a poorly performing suspension, but will take off like a rocket when you mash your pedals. Most people want bikes that fall somewhere between those two extremes. No matter how you want your bike to feel on the road, choosing the appropriate tube set is our specialty.

To ensure Craig’s bike was going to bring him back to his racing heyday, some of our most massive tubes were selected, including the Louisville Slugger-esque 1 3/4″ down tube, a 44mm head tube, and a 1 1/2″ top tube. For most of us, these tubes would yield a bike so harsh, we’d want off. But Craig was looking for that feeling exactly, so when it came time to select his chain stays, we reached past the traditional 7/8″ tubes, and chose our most hulking, 1″ tube stock. An additional eighth of an inch in diameter sounds minor, but in both looks and performance, the difference is obvious. We felt these stays would add the extra boost Craig was after, and his early reports confirm that they have done the trick.

For Craig’s Axiom SL, the 1″ chain stays made sense: the design mission, the size and power output of the rider, and the overall aesthetic were a perfect match. Though they worked wonderfully for Craig, the one inch stays aren’t for everyone. More often than not, they are too stout, too heavy, or too limiting in component choices to use. These large chain stays crowd the bottom bracket junction, leaving only enough room for slick, narrow tires, and are therefore only available on our road bikes. They are so large and stout, that we do not curve them as you’ll see on all of our 7/8″ stays (as I incorrectly pointed out in my response to Brian S. back in September), they get just a small tire clearance crimp but are otherwise perfectly straight.

If you are interested in discussing whether or not our one inch chain stays are right for you, give us a call!

On the Road – Velosmith Bicycle Studio

Partnerships are important. We do our best work with shops we work with a lot. On Saturday we were at Velosmith Bicycle Studio for the launch of a special collaboration, the Moselle. Tony Bustamante, of Velosmith, once worked here at Seven. When he opened his studio, we immediately began working together on gorgeous custom bikes for his customers. It is a partnership in the truest sense of the word where we use our shared experience to do increasingly difficult, but gratifying, work.

And now the culmination of all that effort arrives in the form of the Moselle, a bike Tony designed specifically for Velosmith and only available there. The Moselle is a straight gauge titanium Swiss Army knife of a bike, disc-equipped and set up for wide tires. It can group ride on the road. It can explore double track. It can happily roll down the trail, and it can commute in all weather. The finish is a subtle, bead-blasted river theme that mixes shine with matte to create a signature look.

For the launch, our friends from SRAM came out. The Moselle features their new CX1 drivetrain and Force 22 hydraulic brakes. The first bike was built for Velosmith team racer Eric Drummer, who will mix cyclocross with longer gravel events, like Dirty Kanza, to showcase everything the Moselle can do. At the end of the night we sat with Tony’s father Alberto, a legend of the Chicago bike world, and he shook his head wistfully looking at his son’s creation. “We can do anything now, can’t we?” and he smiled, and that alone made our visit to Chicago worth making.

On the Road – Omnium Bike Shop

The way to the world is down along the river, through the tunnel and out to Logan Airport, where a jet will take you almost anywhere. It had been a little while since we’d visited the Twin Cities, but our friends at Omnium invited us to their annual Sonderkrossen party, an event to mark the switchover from track season to cyclocross, so we booked our passage and packed our bags. We even shipped a bike ahead, so we could see Minneapolis and St. Paul in the manner most befitting a cyclist. We had no idea what was in store.

Omnium sits between a breakfast cafe and a bakery, across from a deli. As places to meet go, it’s a cyclist’s dream. It’s also the kind of shop where everyone who walks through the door is a friend. “Bill!!” They yell from behind the service counter. “Hi, Nancy!” Our East Coast frostiness melted in the honest mid-western warmth. We bought a round of coffees, and helped set up for the party.

The party looked like this. There were a few Seven owners who were kind enough to share their Seven experiences with us, and the crowd was kind enough to listen while we talked about bike building as something of a religion and our factory as a sort of cathedral. This made more sense in context than it does here, or maybe it didn’t, but everyone smiled and clapped politely, and we got down off our soap box (actually a step ladder) quick, before anyone’s beer got warm.

Don’t tell anyone we took the party to the roof as the clock ticked well past closing time. We were definitely not supposed to be on the roof, so as far as you know that didn’t happen.

We got to bed late, and set our alarms for the pre-dawn Fleche ride, that leaves from yet another coffee shop, just across a bridge over the Missisippi, on the Minneapolis side. Aaron, Omnium’s GM, organizes the Fleche, a soft roll around the cities, a chatting ride, a beautiful way to greet a Saturday morning, even when you’re dog tired from not partying on the roof.

One of our fellow Fleche-ers was big Russ H, from Sioux Falls, South Dakota. He got this bike from Aaron at Omnium and came out for the Fleche in part so he could ride with us, which was, naturally, very touching. Russ turned out to be a fantastic riding companion, even if he did turn up on a more attractive bike than even we were able to muster for ourselves. That’s how you know he’s a winner.

The party, the ride, the company, it all made getting out on the road that much more fun. Meeting people, riding bikes, that’s what it’s all about. We are lucky to do what we do. It’s funny that we sometimes have to get on an airplane to be reminded.