Bike Hugger 

If we had more marketing budget, or knew a cyclist from the LA Bike Cult, would fly a Raise Your Seat banner behind their 12-foot tall, Stoopid Tall bike. The aerial adverting would promote a ride in the sky, a story tall! Don’t know that records are kept on the tallest bike, but Felix built an 18-footer in Cuba.

Quad Tall

In Austin, we rode with Tall Bikes during Mobile Socials, including this quad. The Tall Bikes flanked the rides like infantry sentries spotting cars and corking intersections. Also witnessed a joust in the Georgetown neighborhood and a chill moment with a Schwinn.

Joust Impact

What inspires a maker to build a bike taller than themselves? The same thing that causes a climber to reach the highest peak they can.

Sinewy, strong, fast

A Cervelo S5 arrived in time for road season, studying it, trying to best describe how it looks, all I got is Iggy Pop. So ugly it rocks. The shaping is like “Hypnotizing chickens worth a million in prizes and I’m just a modern guy. Got a Lust for Life.”

If you’re into this sort of thing, then this is the bike for you. To me it seems the engineering stopped at the head tube. Like all their budget went into slamming that tire up a seat-mast ass. The front end is unbalanced and twitchy with that high of a head tube, like steering a bus or flying an MD-80 in turbulence. Keep the gas on into a corner, so it doesn’t forget which direction you were pointed.

Thick and thin

The S5 does get down the road and accelerates and that’s why racers like it. The bike moves, but with the all the subtly of a Sagan, podium-girl butt pinch. It’s also the team bike of choice and for good reason, lots of zooma-zoom-zoom-zoom in a boom-boom on a working-class racer’s budget.

66s attached

In the time we had this bike at Hugga HQ, it didn’t stop raining long enough to shoot it until last night. At sunset, the S5 glows pretty and beckons you into a bike shop. We can’t recommend a 52/36 for racing, but a fondo, sure. Spin those sub-compact gears up the hills.

Cervelo wants this bike back now and we’ve got to make way for another. After the sunset shots, this morning the S5 is being packed up in a bike box. Would’ve liked to ride it more.

Finally something useful from Vine! Levar Burton posts a short video of the President pedaling a bike-powered water filtration system at the White House Science Fair.

Science!

Expecting good weather and plenty of ride time, took Giro’s Road Line to the SRAM 22 launch, wore it, and wrote this.

These shorts must be made for Republicans, ‘cause they only have a pocket on the right side

Maybe if Giro had said, “We’ve made an urban line so nice, you’ll want to wear it on a century,” their new clothes wouldn’t cause us to pause so much with, “what?” They’re marketing it as the new road uniform with loosely tailored fit and muted colors. There’s a market for more urban wear and anyone who wants to ride without stopping to change before a meeting, sure. That’s not what this line is though and isn’t priced for the commuter at $300.00 for shorts and jersey. We expect the highest quality wool at that price, soft and breathable, complimenting a jersey like this Ibex in the cycling closet.

Giro wants you say to your office mate that asks about riding more, but not in kit like a racer, try this out. Expect him to balk at putting that much money on his credit card. The bike he’s riding likely costs that much. He’ll lock it up outside a Banana Republic and shop, where the styling from this line could hang on racks, as new active wear for spring.

It is nice kit with some of the pieces sewn in Santa Cruz, but like their skull-shaping, aero helmet, we don’t get the aesthetic or racing in classic, lace-up shoes. I could hear Tim Gunn saying, “Edit, edit, edit!” when I tried to put various things into the shoulder pockets.

Corks fit the shoulder pockets

Are those pockets or maybe shoulder marks for your Fondo insignia? Note: Neither, we later learned they’re vents.

That they decided to compete with Rapha is good and deserves praise, as does more consumer choice in a bike shop. Why should one brand define what a generation wears or tell us that pink is manly and non-sanctioned racing is what gentlemen do? Giro wants to tap into a market that others have tried, like Levis, with a Gap-like line. It’s upscaled, mature, and from a name you know.

New road, sewn in Santa Cruz

We’ve been waiting for something like this too — another fashion release from a major cycling brand after being disappointed by jeans that don’t fit our thighs. That Giro went with industry-wide “research memes” like retro tell us they went down a checklist. Minimal, check. Details, check. That perceived production process is why we press pause instead of continuing to enthusiastically shuffle through their offering like a new album from a favorite band.

Do they ride like us? Is their lifestyle pitch from cyclists or marketers with an unchecked creative director designing pockets that have no purpose?

It’s not that we don’t like or dislike Giro’s new road line. Our enthusiasm for the line is as muted as their colors. You can dress yourself like a peacock or a mule in the sport now and unzip to use a fly, instead of pulling the front of your shorts down. Progress for a nature break! Selle also has a short with fly, but it’s not hidden underneath baggy shorts.

Giro’s Road line is a retail gamble that may or may not pay out. That they tried and threw their cards down on the table, where Rapha plays deserves respect. Many play there with wool like Ibex, Icebreaker, and Outlier. The mark for us of quality wool is how well it survives the wash and wear cycle. We’ll wait as long as possible to wash the shoulder-pocket jersey, expecting it to lose its shape. 5 years ago Ibex worked wearability issues like that out. Also how to make a wool jersey that feels soft against the skin with 17.5 microns instead of 18.9.

Will this road line exist that long? Hope so and that we get to know the Giro crew better out on a ride. They’re off to a good start and suggest the next evolution ship with color, better fit, and details that we understand.

Giro’s New Road line is available at your local bike shop and online. For more on Giro’s Road line, see this tag.

Updated and Correction

Those aren’t shoulder pockets for corks or 1/2 a pepperoni stick, but vents. After posting this review, Giro wrote to tell me that and also note that one of their VPs is a former pro who can still climb.

Surface RT first boot

Been playing with a Surface RT for a few days. Tiles and lists work very well on a phone and tablet. Browsing, reading, and statusing are all good. Also avoiding the Metrotop confusion by not opening the “desktop” or wondering why Office apps prompt a launch Office 365! Elegant is a good descriptor or a fast wheel that was built with a slight wobble. An OS that’s convoluted with desktop and mobile modalities is as much about a boardroom fight as the transition from old to new computing metaphors.

Live Tiles Updating

Why would a bike blog review Windows-based consumer electronics? Cause we’re based in Seattle and ride with many cyclists who work on Surface, Windows 8, and IE 10. They’re as into what they do as any creative and developer. Whatever market forces are at work causing Surfaces to get overlooked and hated isn’t my concern (buyers on Amazon sure like them), respecting the work of our colleagues and cyclists is.

In a few weeks, we’ll have Google Glass in at Hugga HQ too, and visited Google’s offices in Fremont last month. While there played with a Chrome Pixel and also very interested in that OS.

Touch IE demo

MS has done a good, great job with this tablet. Sure there’s some cruft in a Surface RT, but what OS is free of that? None.

If I can get photos to ingest from a SD card, edit, and upload, then the Surface RT will go on the road with me.

At SXSW, also tried out the Surface Pro and for what I want to do with a tablet, prefer the RT. You can practically hear the battery drain on the Pro and the heat will sear a Windows logo into your thigh. It’s a bit thick and heavy for a tablet and meant to carry from meeting to meeting. Not in a Chrome Niko bag on a ride or on an seat back tray flying to another media event.

I’m testing the 32 G Surface RT with a black TouchCover. Pricing for Surface RTs start at $499.00. Find them on Amazon, the Windows Store in a mall or online.