Thursday, July 31, 2008

Sugar?

Not just a girls magazine.

This is their bar:

"I wanted to do a different bar… so I designed the HABILIS with a thinner and a bit lower cross tube (132MM) with more marked curves, it reminds me of my first bmx bar when I was 14 years old. Although those were not good and these are. The HABILIS is 700mm / 27″ inch width, but you can cut up to 3cm more than 1″ inch on each side before the lever gets to the bar curve if you don’t like so width"
Not really sure why they'd think that lowering the cross-bar just to get a look would be a good idea, but hey, there we are. According to the thread on Bikeguide, "ask to David inĂªs!". Hmm.




Their forks:

"As the name says this fork has the minimum of material without losing strength

Machined tube were the fork arms are welded

Arm tubes reduce diameter as they reach dropout

Smaller dropouts with a large laser cutted triangle, even smaller it allow the use of pegs the same way

Steer tube has three diferent thicknesses, thinner on the top thicker on the bottom

CR-MO 4130 heat treated"


Probably trying to win "Nicest top-cap" award, even though the fact that that allen key broach is offset means my mindset is swapped to 'kill' after the trauma of dealing with Odyssey's infernal topcap on their Classic forks.

They've also got a frame coming out, but with no pics, just generic dimensions (74.5HA, 71SA, 20.5; 20.75; 21; 21.2TT, 13.75CS), there's not really much point going into too much detail. They have an estimate weight of "4.92lbs" which, for a frame drawing on a piece of paper, is pretty heavy...

Aversion vid

Rinsed straight from the 'Phire, this vid rules!


sean and dave from aversean on Vimeo.

This post was made wearing the last Avetris shirt to be sold, haha.

Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Jersey's Back...

After a lengthy off-the-bike stay due to an ACL death, Jersey is properly, properly back on it:


mike taylor bmx from michael taylor on Vimeo.

Champion. His old interview in Dig is awesome.

PijinBlog Comp and a Levis Video

First things first, new Levis vid. You can probably turn it off after you get to 00:35, that 3 is nuts.



But yeah, the comp (Of sorts).

This is my bike:



At the moment, I've got a new Tierra frame in flat raw. Currently, it's a little plain for my liking, so I want to spray it a new colour. I can't decide what to do, so whoever suggests the best colour-scheme for my bike (Only frame and rims, unless you come up with a pretty amazing combo that makes me actually want to spray my forks and bars too) will not only get to see their idea become a reality, but will also get a copy of Us And Them. Just leave a comment in the comments bit with the frame/rim colours you're recommending, but make sure you use a legit e-mail address so I can e-mail you if you win...

Tuesday, July 29, 2008

I <3 Wales

No really, it's awesome.

In non-Wales based news:

Chris Doyle has a new web-vid up from Duo that I saw on Defgrip (Speaking of Defgrip - they have a pretty awesome comp on. If someone pays my fuel costs, I'll happily do the photo for them ;-)) that you're now seeing here because John saw the need for a Blog. Detailed enough?



Embed codes have just not been working well recently, here's hoping Youtube will buck the trend.

I am currently hungry.

Monday, July 28, 2008

This is all kinds of awesome.


Coventry Confrontation from matt parker on Vimeo.

I find it hard to express in words just how awesome Project5 and Mute really are. You need to be at this jam.

Vans "Off The Wall" trailer



The more observant of you will have noticed a vid I posted here a week ago of the Vans team riding London - well, this is the teaser for the free DVD coming on Ride 120. RideToGlory DVD next month, Vans DVD the month after? Why aye!

Found out Streetphire.

Mike Mastroni outtakes.


WebVid5 Outtakes Montage from Mike Mastroni on Vimeo.

I think calling these 'out-takes' with the quality of some of the lines in there is selling him a bit short, but hey, his call...

Carlos.



As seen here.

Photo: H-Man (Who I introduced to Dan's girlfriend as "H-Man". Awkward moment)

GT's newest rider

Bob...


Bob's GT Edit from cleon on Vimeo.

This...

...made me laugh.

Empire of Dirt vid and OdenBikes

This vid is sweet:



Ben Hennon, you crayzee.

In not-as-cool-as-that-video news, OdenBikes have some new product out. Here's the frame:



They've also got a sprocket, a stem, and something else that I can't remember over on the Dig site.

James Smith

The boy from Kingston's been mixing it up a bit with this street/flat day edit:


JAMES SMITH 1 DAY CARHARTT EDIT 26/07/08 from S43 on Vimeo.

Sunday, July 27, 2008

Empire Of Dirt

So. Bohan got first, Young got second. Contromaversial.

Check out their runs here and here, and click these links to see 3rd place rider Dane Searls and 4th place rider Kye Forte ride.

Saturday, July 26, 2008

New Fit-Ed LT frames.

Fit just put up a pic of their new Fit-Ed frame, which is of course Edwin's sig frame.



Blisteringly high quality.

Anyway, seems it's now lower and sleeker than it used to be, although it still looks like it's got Edwin's prefered longer back end. You'd hope so, judging from how he used to go on about 14" (Or something like that) being the perfect brakeless manual length...

Live Empire of Dirt feed

If you happen to read this post within a few hours of me posting it, go here to watch a Live Feed from Empire Of Dirt.

Ali Whitton just had an awesome run...

Procrastination.

Ride US have a pretty cool interview with Josh Suhre.

Feel free to read that while you wait for this sweet vid of some of the 'proper' riding from Friday's Empire of Dirt session. Well worth a watch. Does Gary Young really do an uprail to Griz?

1:37 = "Pffffffffff"

And maybe a little "Jeeeeeeeeez"...

Freecaster's Embed code sucks so badly.

Friday, July 25, 2008

Other stuff I saw in Cologne.

This is like name-dropping, but with parts? Anyway, yeah, saw this on a computer screen in Germany, and now they've 'gone live' seeing as S&M (Not even linking to their site 'cos I hate it that much) did a similar adapter - Eclat have this Pivotal-to-railed adapter coming out:





The figure the WTP/Eclat dudes were throwing around as an RRP was really reasonable too (Sweet alliteration ;-)), so yeah, definitely worth looking out for if you want a lighter/cleaner setup, or want to revert from your Pivotal setup back to railed.

What's in the box?



No prizes for guessing. Click here for the details.

666!

At least according to the main Blogger page anyway. Evil!

Saw these in Cologne, so it's cool to see the finished product - Max "1,000ft tall" Gaertig now has a frightening big (8.7") bar out from WTP, and here it is, the Mad Max bar:



Click Here for more info. IT's also Max's turn for Videorama glory next (Check out Will Jackson's further down the page), can't wait for that - the guy's dialled. (Side note: I don't usually like to get involved with stuff like this, but here goes - before people start having a go at WTP for doing an 8.7" rise bar, at least they're doing it for a rider who might feasibly need it, unlike certain other companies making 8.5" rise bars for their seemingly exclusively sub 6ft tall team?)

Federal have put up a trailer for their Ride to Glory vid on their site, and here it is in all it's embedded glory:

Actually, it's not, 'cos I'm in a school and they've blocked Vimeo, so yeah, click here to see it.

James showed me the possible WTP edit for RTG - Bangers. That's all I'm saying.

Fit have a video up on their site of the making of the latest Chase Hawk/Vans ad, again I can't embed it so click here. Can watch it, but can't embed it. Hmm. Either way, burly.

Videorama 'n' stuff

Will Jackson is the latest Videorama candidate from WTP. Sound dude.

Mutiny have a cool feature up by Hanson Little, with a bunch of photos from their NW Trip. In related news, watched Stoked On Being Pumped again today for the first time pretty much since it came out, and it's officially good.

Deluxe have jumped on the "Online interview blog" bandwagon type affair, and launched a new Photographer Q&A type deal, this time featuring Mr. Kyle Carlson. Click here to read the thoughts of one of the few people to spend a night on the floor in my tiny room in Halls. Random. Also, kudos to Deluxe for being the only online site I've seen to make the "hay bale jump" joke after seeing the pics of the Empire course.

You can, speaking of EoD, check out live coverage via Freecaster Here.

Thursday, July 24, 2008

First ever quad whip in competition!

First ever quadruple whip pulled in competition by Mike Spinner at the Dew Tour.

Cameron White bars to flip whip?

I studied Physics at college. My teacher obviously lied to me about gravity. Damn.


EoD/Dig/Defgrip



Empire of Dirt looks pretty nuts.

Over on Dig, there's a cool Ricky Feather bikecheck feature, and a link to a write-up of all the legendary BMX magazines from the past. Just realised as well that they have some of the first Empire of Dirt photos up too. Nice one, Dig!

Non BMX related but still pretty cool (And spotted on Defgrip), Days With My Father. It's a photography-related thing, so if your attention span works only with 30-second Vimeo files, and not words and pictures, I wouldn't bother clicking on it...

Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Black Fly kits




Never mind copper, olive, fluoro yellow, red, blue - black is the colourway that everyone can deal with. If you're in the Mid Wales area and hear a weird ticking noise, it'll be me with the satin black spray cans...

Old news...

But still good news.


Carhartt & Red Bull BMX Team in Cologne from woozybmx.com on Vimeo.

Fly Italy trip - now downloadable!

Their Italy Trip video has been out on DVD for a while now (I think it came with Props?), but it's now available to download from their site. Bonus available from them too, ideal. Get downloadinginging.

Cory Beal


204 Jumpoff from Repset on Vimeo.

Spotted as a direct result of lurking Bikeguide. Good things come to those who wait.

Tate Roskelley Q&A

Did I spell his name right? I think so... Either way, Tate... um... R has an Q&A up on Defgrip that was pretty cool. His part in That's It really was awesome, and in case you're too cheap to go and buy what has been described as "The best video of the year so far" by esteemed BMX video critics such as myself, and, well, myself, here's a link to his Fit webvid slash 50:50 rip...

New Mutiny frames

After WTP showed off some new frames, it's now time for Mutiny to put their Sep '08 frames out for the public view. Up here is the new Burlish, Matt Roe's signature frame, the Cosmotron and Randy Taylor's signature frame, the Loosefer.







Go to their site for more updates...

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

I know what you're thinking... (#23)

Just how much better than me is Lloyd Wright? Answer: Lots.


Lloyd Wright & Mark Westlake chilled session 15/07/08 from S43 on Vimeo.

Style43.com

Trowbo Terrorism vid


Trowbridge Terrorisum from matt parker on Vimeo.

Hell yes!

New Nankai freecoasters.



Long the Bikeguide coaster of choice (I'll stick to the Geisha/Geisha Lite, thanks...), Nankai have now released pics of their updated hub.

535g, alloy shell, 10mm or 14mm, 9t, RHD, 32H (With 36H following soon).

More on Dig.

Last Orchid Vandever 2...



Black, gum, and yellow. Radness. Moar.

Oh my word...

Red Bull Empire of Dirt course pics.

Jesus H. Christ.

Joy!

Rinsed from TCU:



When I heard a Broken Social Scene song at the start of this 'Chase Dehart clips from videos' video, I thought "Wow, someone edited together this video with a BSS song, sweet!" It was only when the music changed to the Summer of Fit music I realised that no, an actual BMX video has used that BSS song. Bad Timing, you are heroes for the day.

WTP/Vans/Hawthorne

WTP have a couple of new frames coming out from two of their team, Ashley Charles and Chester Blacksmith.



Chester Blacksmith's sig frame, the Sleepless



Ashley Charles' sig frame, the A-B





Click here for all the details, geometry, and special features of each frame. They're pretty sweet.

Lastly, here's some footage of the Vans team riding Southbank and Stockwell - I think you need to ride Stockwell to realise how big that gap that Chase 360's really is...


More BMX Videos >>


Lastly, spotted over on Dig, this interview with David Hawthorne, a name that should be familiar to you if you've ever read Ride/Dig, or even Document (I think?).

Monday, July 21, 2008

You know you're right when...

...SPRFLS agrees with you. This isn't just so I can get people to look of that pic of me dying again...

If you're a ComeUp afficianado, feel free to disregard this post as Adam has made his stance on the TCU vs SPRFLS debate, and you're duty bound to agree with him. I wonder if my Wales IP Address is banned from making comments on the ComeUp like my London IP Address was? Hmm...

Anthony Kiedis makes a good point.



Since I moved to London back in September 2006, I haven't owned a TV. As a result, I haven't had to be home at a certain time to watch a certain show, nor have I wasted away for hours just watching Eastenders Omnibuseseseses (What's the plural of omnibus?). As a side point, the only legitimate TV shows you can watch are Top Gear, which you can check out on the surprisingly good BBC iPlayer, Family Guy and Attention Scum which the BBC appear destined to never show again. But anyway, yeah, I just chilled out whilst eating some awesome home-made risotto - one of the few plus points of being home - and seriously, everything on the TV was turd, until I slipped the 50:50 That's It DVD in. If you haven't bought it yet, do so - Mike Aitken's ending section is amazing, exactly 423% better than his Electronical part; Cam Wood does some mental gaps; Dave Thompson rules anyway; Tate Roskelley had a part so good Fit hooked him up; Beringer is Beringer - the list goes on. It's well worth getting though either way, and I'm supremely glad I found my copy. Somehow, it was hidden under the furthest back part of my bed. Moving has it's plus points.

Anyway, yeah, turn off the TV, turn off your computer and go and ride. The weather's decent, we're way past the longest day of the year now, so we're getting closer to the long dark nights and short rainy days. Make the most of it now.

Oh, industry point I wanted to make last post but forgot - I know what you're thinking - why did Alex Dropsy appear to put on a box-fresh set of shoes before riding? Well, answer is is that Vans, one of Alex's sponsors, won't accept videos or photographs of their proper team riding in anything other than box-fresh shoes. Pretty nuts, but there we are. Perhaps they need to take a leaf out of Fallen's advertising book.

Brakeless trails: MOAR.

Being someone who's brakes have fallen off (Honestly, officer), when people decide to tell me my choice of going brakeless was wrong because it means I can't possibly ride trails, this dude was always the first response I'd give. Alex Dropsy was way ahead of Chaiz Ork and Mike Bacon with riding manly trails without womanly brakes, so it's a treat to see more stuff from him.

On his old team page there was a beasting video of him riding Peynier brakeless with a guy training through with him with a helmet cam on - Dropsy flipping the last, massive set so slowly when you're in the air right behind him was probably one of the best things I've seen commited to film (Well, you get the idea) ever.

So yeah, without much further ado, a sweet new Alex Dropsy vid.

In unrelated news, everyone's stopped riding here. May have mentioned this yesterday, but yeah, it sucks massively. Not into it. Fortunately, there'll be a 5 man Wales Roadtrip on the go soon, and assuming I can still wield my camera after a week or two of pure boredom, the results shooooould be going in Ride. Speaking of - the new layouts are pretty sweet, if a little busy, and it's definitely a refreshing change. If you're one of those dudes who just wait to inherit magazines from people who get bored of them, it's probably worth buying a copy yourself...

EDIT: Just for Harold Shipman's notice (See the 'Traffic Jam' comments), I've added in the code to make this stuff open in a new window, but apparently some versions of Internet Explorer mean it doesn't work. If you've got a mouse with a middle button, you can click links with that to get them to open in a new window, or you can always do Ctrl + click. Sorry for the hassle...

Sunday, July 20, 2008

Getting shirty.



Aversion have a new T out, the first of their summer range. It looks sweet, so yeah, head over to their site, check out the Outlet and get purchasin'. On it.

Primo aNeyerlator stem.

Tee hee hee.







S&M also have some stuff on their site - go to News, then click the "New parts" post or whatver it's called. I hate Flash sites that don't need to be in Flash. Anyway, yeah, dropouts that none of you will want, and a Pivotal-to-railed adaptor that isn't as good as the one I saw recently that'll be coming out soon that I can't really say any more about.

Traffic jam.

So yeah. I've been writing this blog for quite a while now (Like a year?), and it's a strange business. I look around the place and try and find stuff I think's cool (Or Tim recommends stuff, cheers dude) then put it up here to inform the reader/you. However, in doing this, I have literally no idea who actually reads this. Apart from ocassional e-mails from Sam saying thanks for any trails vids (;-) See you around dude, and good luck in Devon), Tim telling me I put a cool vid up, or Gaz from Mutiny correcting me for putting up wrong info (again...), I don't really know who watches this. Anyway, the long story is: I don't really know much about blogging, but I do know that if you want to increase the traffic on your site, you should probably put the Complete Works of Steven Hamilton Esq. up. The Day Is Over... Damn.

As a side thing - if you've got any suggestions for stuff you'd like to see more/less of on here, use the comments and I'll do my best, eh.

Saturday, July 19, 2008

Rad webvids = good times.

So yeah, even when drunk the Mutiny team can nose manual and twist better than me. Downer. Not for you xEDGEx kids...

If you scoot yourselves over here, not only can you check out Odyssey's new site, but you can also see a ridiiiiiiiiculous new Aaron Ross edit. It's too good, go watch it now. Comping out Brad Simms on the last rail: Gaunlet's thrown down.

Rob Harrison from WTP is one of the nicest dudes I've ever met, and he has a cool interview up on BMXUnion where he also has some photos of his riding up, which is pretty sweet. The People's Store is so nice, and all the new WTP/Eclat stuff looked sweet when I was over there, so it's cool to know he can help run one of the best companies in BMX, but also blast around the place.

Lastly: damn son.

I'm now living in Wales for the next two months. Hmmph.

Thursday, July 17, 2008

You're doing it wrong.



Unintentional half-cab bump to elbow grind to narrow miss from my back wheel. My bike actually defied gravity purely to not impregnate my skull with my cranks/rear axle. Champ.

Speaking of 'my bike', the seatclamp on my bike is both really, really good and now available for purchase:



They're made of steel so they clamp really nicely (You need less force to 'bend' it to crimp your frame compared to alu), they don't strip as easily, and it's got a 6mm allen key bolt so it means one less size allen key to bring with you.

While I'm plugging products, yeah DK, purely for the DKGolf logo...

Good stuff.


WebVideo5 from Mike Mastroni on Vimeo.

I'd forgotten how good one of Mike Mastroni's old videos were, so with the arrival of this new cool vid, I also got to check out the older ones on his Vimeo account. Ideal.

Ride 118



As some of you may know, Chris Noble has left the Ride fold, and has been replaced by a fellow Chris, Chris Gordon. 118 marks his first issue as designer for Ride, and it appears to be a banger...

Spreads available over on Streetphire!

Brad Simms is too damn good.

Noooooow.

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Whooooooooa, hold on a sec there


I know of a couple of people who run the Fly pegs currently available, and they seem alright (Not for you street-heads though, I guess...), but yeah, these new ones are... well... different.

Fly usually have a pretty unorthodox way of solving 'problems' (If you could call them that), but this is again a step in a totally different direction. Similar enough in concept to the One-Way Pegs, Fashionably Light pegs, and so on, but yeah, externally machined? Interesting...

More pics here.

...



...oh, and expect a P5 write-up on Style43 in a few days, complete with MSPaint pics/representations as a direct result of me not taking my camera with me. Slacker than my freecoaster.

Insert witty title here.

Well, after Russ from SPRFLS made mention of Dan's UKBikeCo frame in a post on his blog, I thought it'd be fitting to post this as a follow-up:



Hmm. Personally, I don't really care what anyone else rides as long as I can still buy the bits I want, so I don't really mind if this dude happens to want to run a custom frame so low that you can't actually slam your seat, but no doubt some people will be almost as appalled as the Islamic dudes were when the Danish newspapers posted that Allah comic... Burning effigys in the street? Who knows.

Related News: Eddie Cleveland has a 'Top 5's' thing up on Defgrip...

AAAAAAAnyway, moving on:

This is the video of the Nike6.0 Meet The Peoples Street Jam that took place in Cologne. I happened to be around at the time, and me doing a 180-to-half-cab-to-air-punch-to-20-euros features in this video, although they've given me someone else's name? Unless they're just cussing me out in German...

This is ridiculously late now, but I've been super busy - awesome Dakota Roche video (And an 'interview') up on Fit's Site.

Corey Martinez is now on Duo.

Chris Doyle appeared at Cantelowes two days ago - the Anthem 2 boys are in town. Netley - train tickets to London aren't too expensive with a Young Person's Railcard ;-)

Colony web video. Diverse...

That's about it for now. I'll hopefully be firing out some more regular updates soon - heading back to Wales to cat-sit for a month, so yeah, it's not like I'm gonna be busy, is it...

Monday, July 14, 2008

3 is the magic number

Fit have a new v-necked t-shirt, that you know every kid on Bikeguide's going be wearing in no time at all.


Fly have some info up on their site about their new rims.


Finally, there is a new Big Daddy video my computer won't let me watch. I can only assume it's awesome.

Terror in Trowbridge.

Just a photo from yesterday's jam in Trowbo. Some crazy stuff was layed out, and everyone made the most of the spots we visited. Good times. Not much action from Joel though due to several bike problems. Bad times.

Friday, July 11, 2008

Damn.




Steven Hamilton, wherefore art thou?

Scotty D...

"I just want to make sure everyone knows that i’m not into bmx politics i’m into riding bmx so if people out there think I did this to kick off loads of shit between two distro’s there wrong. I did this so I can ride my bike everyday, which is a dream come true for me."

Fair enough.

The News at 2.

Top stories...

Edwin Delarosa has a broken leg.

Dan Lacey and Derek Strickland's Federal Remixed split-section is out now:




K-124 aka Try-All aka Koxx aka Money-grabbers aka Trials company aka Some Clueless French Dudes aka Dominique Hermance have hit the nail firmly, 100% on the head by producing just what BMX needs:



Kevin 'Wobbly' Garwood has a bikecheck + interview on Profile's site that I did the photos for.

Also up on the Profile site, a sweeeeeeet Mike Saavedra video.

Crazy Spaniard sighting in Austin, TX.

Luke Towey is a firm fan of pegs:




NonStopVid.com have a NewVid.com:




In business news, Sidewall Distribution are now the US distro for Superstar. No, I don't know why I included that either?

Also in business news, Russ has left Beloe as a result of their skate team getting paid more than their BMX team, but having a fraction of the sales of skate shoes compared to BMX shoes, and the skate division therefore being dropped. In related news, a certain UK distro is in talks to begin bringing Beloe products into the UK, and having seen some of the models in The People's Store, they really, really need to get on that. They're too gooooood.

...and finally, Big Daddy features in this Staff Roadtrip. Get involved...

(P.S. Trowbridge jam, this Sunday, 12pm...)

Wednesday, July 09, 2008

Die uberpost, ja?



(Managed to do this on the way to the train station to meet everyone in London - over the bars 'cos of a hub slip, with 2 heavy bags on my back led to a pretty dramatic 'pinned down on my hands' powerslide for about 10ft. Good times...)

Man, that was an awesome trip. Gate-crashing 'secret' Nike street jams (And winning 20euros for the first line I did on the trip ;-)) and BBQs; seeing the new Eclat stuff; seeing the WTP HQ; going to the People's Store; seeing half of Taliban Tom's head get set on fire; getting Jason Phelan's run taken off live TV; seeing amazing riding happening; being in another country (ended up hitting up France, Belgium, Holland (Stayed in Rotterdam for 2 days, there's some aaaaaaawesome street...), Germany and Luxembourg); Noggers; falafel wraps; afterparty rumours; "Schnitzel schnitzel!"; road rage; Chris (Hotwheels TM) riding into someone on a cycle path in Rotterdam, then Jason Phelan riding into someone else immediately afterwards 'cos he was laughing so hard at Chris; exploring new cities - it was all pretty amazing.

Funnily enough though, despite the whole premise of the trip being a roadtrip to the Masters comp, I think that all of us (Apart from Jason) spent at most about 4-5 hours at the Jugend Park. First thing I got to see was Colin Mackay snap some knee ligaments literally right in front of me. Prime. We lurked by the miniramp for the Braun Mini Pro finals and that was pretty much it. I don't think I've ever been less interested in seeing amazing stuff happen right in front of me. The lack of creativity or originality was pretty shocking. I did, however, get to see Taj do a trademark uuuuuuuultra stretched one foot step-thru over the second jump on the pretty fun looking dirt course though, so that sorta made up for it.

Either way, I'm still trying to get myself together after getting back from the trip, so normal service will resume shortly...

Tuesday, July 01, 2008

Dan speaketh the truth...

I get e-mailed news updates infrequently at best, and news updates from my own family even less than that, which is why I thought I'd best post this up! Dan (aka my brother, Myspace Dan, "That guy who hit his head in the bowl yesterday", etc.) e-mailed me this to see if anyone wanted to chip in any money - it's a really, really good cause, so if you think could donate anything at all, do it!

"Hi Everyone,

As I've probably mentioned to a lot of you already, Soph and I, along with some friends of ours, are planning to ride the South Downs way this weekend. The South Downs way is around 100 miles long from Eastbourne to Winchester and we plan to cycle it in two days, in order to raise some money for the charity project of a good friend of ours.

The idea to do this came a couple of months ago after we watched a promotional video produced by our friend, Dave Attwood, for a charity project that he has recently spent a great deal of time setting up. Dave is a doctor working on the Isle of Wight; he spent a few months last year working in a hospital in Malawi and was drawn to Africa and it’s people, whilst being increasingly concerned with it’s plight. As a result he decided that he would like to use his time, skills and enthusiasm to do something to help. After speaking to a colleague of his in the Isle of Wight, who is originally from Africa, a plan was formed to try to help one of the parts of the country that is struggling the most, Sudan. The plan being to establish a training hospital in a town called Juba in Southern Sudan. Dave went about gaining support for the project, including the twinning of the hospital in Juba with the hospital he is currently working in on the Isle of Wight. Dave and some colleagues recently visited the Juba hospital and he plans to return to Juba for around four Months starting this August.

Dave's enthusiasm, generosity and big ideas have always been a source of inspiration to me and in light of the huge amount of time and effort that Dave has dedicated to this project, I thought the least I could do was try not to kill myself riding a very long way off-road in a short period of time on my BMX.

Any money that you are willing to donate would be greatly appreciated. Cheques can be made payable to ‘St Mary’s Hospital – Juba Link’ and more information about the project can be found here.

Thanks very much,

Dan
"

Like I said, it's a really good cause, so why not stick a fiver or a tenner their way?

Sunday/Defgrip

Sunday put a comp up on their site a day or two ago that I totally forgot to put on here - either way, the gist of it was that hidden in the archives on their site was a photo of the 3 signature colourways from Aaron Ross. Well, it looks like the game's up:



According to Aaron, it has shorter stays and a lower BB (So under 13.75" CS and under 11.75" BB). No doubt the head-tube's still at 74.5° though, can't expect them to do it all at once...

Defgrip also have two cool features up on their site - a Q&A with Federal's Product Designer and
a video of Colin McKay and Corey Bohan, filmed exclusively on Super8.