So, this Emma Way girl tweeted that she hit a cyclist, what actually happened we’ll probably never know, I find it hard to believe that she clipped him and he didn’t fall off, he’s saying he did fall off, she said she didn’t stop, then she said she did then she started crying and the whole thing is a great big fuck-up on her part.

I’ve posted before about the war on Britain’s roads, ‘bad’ cycling is one thing but bad driving is so much worse, a car is a very deadly piece of machinery to be pissing about with. Emma Way is clearly as thick as shit, she cannot form even the simplest sentence when she is being interviewed, she’s dropping completely the wrong words left, write and centre, the best place 4 her is on Twitter.

It truly is amazing that people as fucking stupid as this dozy bint can be left in charge of a car. She will definitely be far more careful around cyclists for the rest of her life and she got her own song so it’s not all doom and gloom…

When I started riding fixed gear bikes about five years ago it was still pretty underground, hardly anyone knew what they were and the only people that spoke to us about them were old men who remembered them from decades ago.

Now though, practically all ‘serious’ cyclists think they know what they are yet they refer to them as fixies and are under the impression that everyone that rides them wears skinny jeans, has a moustache and uses super narrow bars. To those people I’d like to say FUCK OFF. Stop reading this blog, unlike the Facebook page and just crawl back under your embrocation creamed rock.

Stop arguing with me about wearing a helmet, running red lights, not having brakes and other boring bullshit. A fixed gear bike is not like your road bike and you cyclists that look at us as some kind of lesser sub-species are fucking ignorant, bourgeois, square pricks.

I don’t care about the law, rules, The Rules, safety, infrastructure or any of that other stuff you need to feel safe in your life; this blog is not about that stuff and it is not for you.

Okay okay, I know I’m not exactly riding my bike across the world and living from a couple of pannier bags BUT today I carried my shopping home from Sainsbury’s by filling up my Mission Workshop Rambler (review) and attaching it to my Fairdale Weekender with a couple of bungee cords from the 99p shop.

Groundbreaking, no; life changing, maybe; awesome, definitely!

This is such a versatile bike, there is no doubt in my mind that I will be taking it camping this summer, whoop!

If there is one thing in the world that I don’t understand it is the idolisation of sportspeople. I have nothing against Chris Hoy, but he has just retired so I’m gonna use him as an example, live with it.

Sportsmen are essentially the modern version of the hunter-gatherer of the past, over the last few thousand years the need to go out and kill an animal for food has all but vanished, now people that are exceptionally fast or strong go into sport and when they win ‘we’ treat them as though they have brought home a sabre toothed cat for our dinner, it’s lame.

What was an essential part of life has now been transformed into one of the most selfish forms of employment on Earth: sport. I’m really not a competitive person which is why I have no desire to race my bike, I’m much faster than some and much slower than others, I already know this and don’t need to prove it to myself or anybody else. Sportspeople should not be idolised, nurses and carers and inventors and artists should be idolised.

Jobs and pastimes that use our brains should be on a pedestal above sport and it’s a fucking crime that they aren’t. People who take great pleasure from the sporting achievements of others could really benefit from a trip to a psychologist or a walk around an art gallery or some quality time reading Edgar Allen Poe’s explorations into the darker corners of the human condition.

Chris Hoy’s gold medals and trophies and sponsorship deals mean absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things, his work with the Scottish Association for Mental Health is far more important but who is going to remember that? Nobody, that’s who.

Open your eyes and smell the Deep Heat, don’t train tonight, cycle to a gig instead, you’ll be better off in the long run.

I’ve not watched a single road race this season yet because I simply couldn’t care less. I’ll probably watch the mountain stages of the tours in the summer but that’s it.

Professional road cyclists are boring fuckers, they are as bad as any other sportsmen/women: completely without personality. There are exceptions to the rule of course and Peter Sagan is the man at the mo, the fuss over him pinching that girls arse was truly sad and she needs to get a life as does anybody who thought what he did was disgusting.

As with all Europeans his dress sense is appalling but this t-shirt is simply brilliant, I hope and pray that he doesn’t become the puppet of his sponsors and tone it down any time soon but he will, shame.

Ted has been working on a hand made BMX frame which looks totally badass. If I was ever to take up BMX then the frame would have to looks as raw and dangerous as this puppy!

“I first thought about building a BMX when i was around 18 when i had no means or know how, i have now finally build the first of many, i started building 3 at the same time, two are now complete.”

Hopefully he’ll have one of these with him at Bespoked Bristol on the weekend. Check out his Flickr for loads more photos and Like his Facebook page to be kept up to date with the goings on.

And here is a bonus shot of Ted after the recent Boiler Room Sessions…

(The top two photos and the portrait are from the Fixedgearlondon blog, hit it up you bastards!)

I’m really not one to gush over bicycle components but when I got my hands on this Victoire splined cog a couple of days ago I just couldn’t take my eyes off the damned thing.

Obviously I’d seen countless photos of all the hubs and cogs that Victoire make and they always look awesome but the experience of touching this was something I’ve never got before from a bike part of any kind.

The finish is absolutely mind blowing, it really is like a little work of art, everything about it was perfect, no rough edges, nothing was sharp where it should have been smooth and nothing was smooth where it should have been sharp.

Then there’s the weight, it was hard to believe it was in my hand. It’s made from 7075-T6 aluminium which I’m sure many people would argue is not as tough a material as a critical part like this should be made out of but still, wow!

For more info check out the Victoire Cycles website and a range of their products are available in the UK from Urban Cyclery.

Duuuuuudes, this is my new bike. It’s a Fairdale Weekender and it is absolutely amazing!

I’m not going to say much at the mo because I’ve only had it a couple of days and there’ll be a lot more on it soon but I can say that is is solidly built and a helluva lot of fun to ride, this is definitely my go to bike now.

Stay tuned for more news very soon…

You may remember a couple of months ago my friend’s bike was stolen, well since then I have been checking findthatbike.co.uk every day and keeping my eyes on all the bike racks around town in the hope that I’d find it. Today I got lucky, VERY VERY lucky…

I was walking up the street on my way to buy myself a nice ice cold can of pop when I spotted a couple of chav scumbags propping their bikes up outside a shop, one of them was almost certainly hers. I waited for them to go into the shop then went over and quickly checked it over. Different front wheel, check; Bontrager bottle cage, check; scratched derailleur, check…

I hopped on and rode off like a rocket!!! Well, not exactly a rocket because chavs like to ride in the most ridiculous gear so I spun off like a bottle rocket and nearly crashed into a wall because the front brake doesn’t work with the wheel he had put on it, ha.

And that is the story of a real life hero. I could have called the guy out of the shop and confronted him and I would have if he was a respectable looking fella who might have bought it without knowing it was stolen but the guy who had it was a lowlife and it definitely would have ended up in a punch up. Even if this guy wasn’t the one who stole it and had bought it off a crackhead or whatever it’s just too fucking bad for him, innit.

HIGH FIVES ALL ROUND!

Today I went into the Swansea branch of H&M to have a look at the Brick Lane Bikes collection, it came as no surprise when I found that it wasn’t even being stocked in Swansea. I was mortified by this and left.

Rather than give my opinion on the range without seeing it like I did with the Levi’s jeans which made people all over the world cry like big babies and call for my immediate death I have come up with a plan…

I want you to tell me what you think about it, if you haven’t been to see it yet then go and have a look, get hands on with each piece, maybe even try some on and then send a mini review to me and a week from today (18th Match 2013) I will post them all right here on the blog. Here’s a little checklist for you…

1. Go to H&M, find the Brick Lane Bikes range
2. Have a good look at it all
3. Try some of it on if you want
4. Take photos of yourself in the changing room or get a friend to on the shop floor, think Blue Steel
5. Write a mini review of 100 words or so about what you think, good or bad

When you have done this either post a photo to the Facebook wall with your review, post a photo to Instagram with your review and #TFDHMBLB or e-mail me a photo and your review.

Pretty please get your friends involved too, I’m genuinely interested in what everyone thinks about this collaboration. Cheers everyone!