The Radavist

Paul Errington is part of the Focal Events crew. They put on some of the best events in the UK, like Dirty Reiver and all of these rides have a reputation of being very difficult. His race course ingenuity has undoubtedly inspired his personal bike. Before we jump into the rest of the Scotland reportage, we’re going to take a look at Paul’s beautiful Shand Stooshie all-road bike.

If you can pull your focus away from the Lauf fork, you’ll see a very simple, yet thought out build happening here. The Stooshie is Shand’s do-it-all drop bar bike. You can race cross on it, ride dirt (obvs) and even do some light touring, thanks to the rack provisions. Paul has his set up as a 1x with the Lauf fork and 45mm tires, perfect for absorbing the rough, rocky and rooty trails found on the Isle of Arran, where Grinduro Scotland is taking place.

Paul’s bike is rolling on Halo Wheels, utilizes probably one of the best adaptations of Di2 with the ability to run a long catch, clutch, XTR rear mech with road shifters. It really comes in handy when the road or trail gets steep. This bike has been in the muck, the mud and the inclement weather associated with riding in the Northern UK. Best of all, it looks like it wants more!

Custom frames, like their owners, are unique. Not to say non-custom bikes or their owners can’t be unique, but there’s a beauty in seeing a bike that’s made for someone’s special physical needs. In Kevin’s case, he’s got a short stature and short legs, making finding a stock bike difficult. Over the years, he’s made his options work, but it wasn’t until reaching out to YiPsan Bicycles that he experienced true bliss on a bicycle.

Robin from Blackburn always brings the best bikes to Ranger Camp. Over the years, I’ve showcased his steeds, most notably the Santa Cruz Highball drop bar tourer. This year, since our route is mostly restricted to roads, rather than singletrack, Robin brought his Caletti touring bike, loaded with Blackburn bags. Although, calling this a touring bike undersells it entirely. As anyone with a tourer will tell you, these bikes become commuters and occasional trail shredders. Robin’s is no different. He commutes on it, sometimes taking dirt roads and bum trails home. This week, his Caletti will serve as his Ranger Camp bike and a city bike as he and I explore the streets of Bilbao after the Ranger festivities are over.

Some of my favorite details include the segmented fork with a sensible amount of braze-ons, the simple paint, and Robin’s clever hacks like that bell mount. There’s one other ingenious hack that I won’t even point out. Perhaps you’ll notice it…

Today we’re all building bikes, preparing for our 7am roll-out from Madrid, en route to our campground high in the Sierra de Guadarrama mountains…

When designing and conceiving my Firefly all road bike a few years ago, I wanted to be able to fit a 43mm tire, while maintaining a road geometry. “It’s not a cyclocross bike, rather a road bike with bigger tires and disc brakes” I’d tell people. Inadvertently, what I found was by allowing clearances for such a large 700c tire, I’d opened the door to even larger 650b tires.

I first used WTB’s “Road Plus” platform shortly after they released the 47mm Horizon tire. They sent the tires mounted to their Ci24 rims, built to White Industries hubs. While the wheels fit with enough clearances on my Firefly, I wasn’t a fan of the Horizon tires. Sure, they looked great and rode even better on sealed roads, but I found them to be less-than-ideal on the fire roads and singletrack I frequented in the mountains of Los Angeles.

Jump forward a year and WTB’s newest “road plus” tire, the Byway is now available and I’ve been riding them for a few weeks. The difference between the Horizon and the Byway is simple: there’s slight tread on the sides of the Byway, meant to give traction on loose corners. Well, does the Byway live up to the marketing jargon?

In its time, the Sequoia has had three authors. Three designers whose own vision of this bicycle’s intent would be realized as a large-scale production model. The Sequoia opened the doors for those with a love for touring. It was an off-the-shelf, do-it-yourself, vessel to the outdoors and freedom. You can wax poetic all day about the joys of touring and how in the 1980’s, it was all the rage in America. Touring forever changed the face of cycling.

Yesterday morning I had a date with a framebuilding legend from the American West. Like DiNucci, Strawberry, Bruce Gordon and others, Jim Merz was a key figure in promoting the production of custom frames in the ’70s and early ’80s. He was a machinist first, turned cyclist, turned builder. He was also an endurance cyclist, pedaling from Portland to Panama in 1970, logging over 8,000 miles. He also toured extensively in South Africa.

Jim brought his knowledge of loaded touring and trekking to his own operations, designing, fabricating and in a lot of ways shaping the world of touring bikes forever. So why haven’t you heard of Jim Merz? (Or perhaps you have, no assumptions here.) Well, Jim’s a unique guy and one that didn’t necessarily seek out the limelight like others in his day. That didn’t mean Jim wasn’t busy. In fact, in his ten years of solo framebuilding from 1972 through 1982, he built around 400 frames from Columbus and Reynolds tubing; he was the first US-builder certified to use Reynolds 753.

Lucas’ Orange Camo Cannonball Stoemper SSCX
Photos by Kyle Kelley and words by John Watson

Lucas works the paint gun at Stoemper and if this bike looks familiar, it’s because the predecessor to this particular frame was featured here on the site two years ago. Back then, Lucas’ SSCX was zebra striped and it demanded visual dominance by the contrast of the patterning. This round, Lucas has a new SSCX bike. One with a thru-axle front, XT hydro disc brakes, wider bars and a bright, orange camo paint job.

A month ago, Lucas was in town to soak in some sun and shred the local trails with Kyle. They took off to the upper Chilao trail network where Lucas rode everything on this bike. Now, I should mention, Chilao isn’t a walk in the park and doing it on a flat bar SSCX is quite the accomplishment.

“Lucas is like a cannonball” Kyle exclaimed when I reviewed his photos and yes, it shows.

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Follow Kyle on Instagram, Lucas on Instagram and Stoemper on Instagram.

The Ritchey Logic is one of the cleanest-looking steel road framesets on the market, ATMO. With classic lines, and standard tubing profiles, it has all the looks of a vintage road bike with the performance of modern steel, all with a carbon fork. I’ve seen many fine examples of these affordable frames built up over the years, but David‘s is one of my favorites. Built with Ultegra and Ritchey Super Logic Zeta wheels, David’s kept it lightweight and nimble, perfect for the crushing road climbs this cycling sadist enjoys on the regular.

“The top is just around this bend…”

I’ve heard it many times. David’s enthusiasm for road exploration brought all of us on the Clouds to Cactus ride last year and at the recent Team Dream shoot in the Eastern Sierra, his love for stupid hard routes had him already pining for more exploration. Without a doubt, this bike will bring David places and most importantly, back home in one piece.

Gunnar Cycles has had some pretty tricked-out bikes featured here on the Radavist over the years, but Jay’s bike holds a special place in my heart. First, you need an introduction to Jay. He’s worked at Topanga Creek Outpost for a few years now, and in his spare time spends hours upon hours exploring the neighboring State and National Parks as part of the Unpredict Your Wednesday outings. Jay is a lover of nature and the magic herb our Mother produces here in California. He’s a smiling soul with love and stoke always present.

Jay’s bike has that special something that stops people in their tracks and requires further visual inquiry. In a world of disc-brake dominated bikes, Jay’s is a Paul Cantilever-equipped machine, with clearance for a 40mm tire and a relaxed road geometry. If it had provisions for racks, it could even pass for a lightweight tourer. That hasn’t stopped him from strapping bikepacking bags on it in the past, however.

This bike looks like a carton of American Spirits, or an old hotel sign in the southwest. It oozes Americana without being overly ostentatious. Like Jay, this bike is best observed and engaged with when you’ve got the time. Jay is moving up to the Bay Area and we’re all gonna miss him down here in Sunny So-Cal. That means it’ll be time to fender up this bad boy, right, Jay?

Second Time Around: 74 Allez Road
Photos and words by Erik Nohlin

In 2014, Specialized and Mark DiNucci released 74 numbered framesets as a celebration of its heritage of Specialized’s 40th anniversary. Each of these frames were auctioned to benefit the World Bicycle Relief. The red throwback frameset came with a custom designed kit including wool jersey, saddle, bar tape, bottle cages, bottles and a flask with the level of detail a company can only afford for something like its 40th anniversary. Mark DiNucci was rewarded Best Lugs and Best in Show at Nahbs for the work on this project. Nothing was saved to make this into a state of the art steel bike. Bryant Bainbridge, the other mastermind behind the 40th anniversary Allez, has described the project as “a black hole of cost” where both the tube set and lugs were designed and engineered from scratch.

I love Paul Sadoff’s creations. You know the ones. Rock Lobsters always grab my attention, especially special ones like this one. Max is special. In his own way and so when he decided he wanted another road bike, much less, another Rock Lobster, he contacted Paul to build him an S&S travel road bike that could fit a chubby tire. Since he’d be cramming this beaut into an S&S case, Max didn’t want to put anything super precious on the bike, so he went with a tried and true Sram Red 10-speed group that he had pulled off an old race bike of his, along with some alloy Zipp wheels. Ok, so maybe that’s not exactly the cheapest group for this bike, but what can I say? Roadies that race crits have all kinds of trick road gear just waiting to be bolted onto frames.

Max, thanks for being a good sport and for supporting a rad guy like Paul. I think it’s time you order another Rock Lobster… ;-)

This is a special Merckx Mondays treat. Sean from Team Dream recently acquired an Eddy Merckx Corsa Extra in the Motorola livery, laced with a beautiful NOS Dura Ace 25th Anniversary group. I’ve personally never seen this group on a bike, in person before, so it was a real pleasure photographing it. Sure, there are a few blemishes on the kit, like the insertion marks on the seat post, which were like that before Sean acquired it, but overall, this bike is a real gem.

Sean also has the case for the 25th group, which came with the fabled wrist watch. Once he replaces this group with a modern Campagnolo Athena kit, he’ll be displaying the 25th in its case at the Cub House, along with the bike itself. If you’re in the South Pasadena area, make sure you roll through the Cub House and check it out in person because no photos do this bike justice in real life!

Bobby’s Land Run 100 Moots Routt 45
Photos and words by Jarrod Bunk

Bobby knows the Gravel roads around Stillwater, when given the opportunity to make his ultimate gravel bike he chose the Moots Routt 45. This isn’t just any Routt though, this one has RSL tubing something that wasn’t an option until NAHBS this year. Other details include laser etched logos, and an engraved head tube. Bobby chose to use a Chris King 40th kit on this bike, to me something about the olive and Ti is just near perfect. The bike is outfitted with some new ENVE AR rims, Moots post, Thomson stem and a tried and true Salsa Cowbell bar. A Shimano Di2 build rounded it out with a custom machined Wolf tooth ring made to fit the new 9100 cranks.

Bobby and the crew at District Bicycles sure do know how to make one nice bike.

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Follow Jarrod on Instagram and District Bicycles on Instagram.

Jay Petervary’s Land Run 100 Salsa Cycles Warbird
Photos and words by Jarrod Bunk

Jay Petervary’s Salsa Cycles Warbird was pretty dialed for Land Run this year. Those Salsa Cycles X Brooks England LTD frames are so good. Jay has been doing the whole gravel and adventure racing thing for close to 18 years now. Fresh off his win at the Iditarod Trail Invitational a few weeks prior, JayP was in town for Land Run.

You can learn a lot about what works, and what doesn’t just by looking at his bike. Aero bars, double wrapped tape, 32c tires, bombproof Industry 9 wheels, and not overpacked with water and food. The name of the game on Saturday was mud clearance. It worked out pretty well as I’m told that Jay was at the front most of the day and even finishing with a 3rd place on the hardest Land Run yet.

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Follow Jarrod on Instagram and Jay on Instagram.