Seven Cycles – Page 52 – U.S. Built Custom Bicycles in Titanium and Titanium-Carbon Mix

Robin’s Elium SL

This is one of those rider emails that makes your whole day. We built Robin’s Elium SL in 2010 with Bob Olsen at Wheel Werks in Crystal Lake, IL. You can’t tell from this photo, but it’s a beautiful bike. Five years later, she writes:

Hi Seven,

I ran across this old email and had to drop you a note. You helped me build my bike 5-years ago and I hope you’ll be happy to learn that it still is the best money I’ve ever spent. My Elium has traveled with me across the country (see it lounging in a hotel room bed below), participated in countless cycling events and logged thousands of miles, yet I never tire of it!

I appreciate the work you and the Seven team does to ensure every mm is spec’d and each detail closely tended to. I can truly say I LOVE my bike!

Continued success,

Robin

Williams Bay, WI

On the Trail – Up to Canada, Down to Mexico with Mike Bybee

Mike B's Sola in the foothills — Mike’s Sola SL

When we built this Sola SL for our friend Mike Bybee, the svengali of Trail Chat, we knew he had some big rides planned. Over the months that followed delivery of his new Seven he rode it through his native Arizona landscape, wrote a review, and worked out the kinks.

Now he’s ready to really rock. We got a note from him the other day announcing his plan to ride north to Canada, then return to Arizona and head into Mexico. Check out the Trail Chat site for live updates here, and watch this site from some select views from his epic journey as well.

The Headbadge

This is our headbadge. It’s one of the very last things to go on a Seven before it leaves our door. Laser-cut and bead-blasted, we think it adds a classy touch to hand-polished titanium, filament-wound carbon fiber and painted steel alike.

It starts flat, like this. Then we clean it up the bead blaster, and we bend it in a hand press depending on the diameter of the bike’s headtube, either 1-1/8″ or 44mm. There is a long and rich tradition of headbadges on handmade frames that goes back more than a century, and it’s one of the small things that we think makes a Seven a Seven.

2015 Dusk to Dawn Ride

June’s Dusk to Dawn Ride was another inaugural event for Overland Base Camp, the more organized incarnation of our own Rob V‘s obsession with dirt and mixed-terrain riding. D2D indulges Rob’s penchant for late night adventures, serving up 85 miles of crazy trail sections linked by pavement. A bonfire at the turnaround gave riders an opportunity to refuel.

This style of riding demands a lot (including a SPOT tracker and enough battery to power lights through most of a night on the trail), not just physically, but also mentally. All your concentration is riveted on a patch of light ahead of your front tire, and staying upright depends on reading the line quickly.

This edition of D2D was plagued by downpours, but all the riders finished safely and happily, if not completely exhausted.

Some photos below:

bRad Across America – FINISHED

Today, we are very proud to say that Brad (bRad) finished the Trans Am Bike Race in 25 days 10 hours 31 minutes. 4406 miles. Astoria Oregon to Yorktown Virginia. Average miles, 176 per day. See previous reports on his progress here, here, here and here.

This is/was the ride of a lifetime, and Brad managed it with zero mechanicals and not one flat. He pushed through all the fatigue, kept his daily mileage up, and crushed it.

We’ll follow up with a full trip report and some insight from Brad into what it takes to race across the continent, but for today we’ll just say that we are so, so proud and happy for him.