Bike season is RIGHT around the corner

Cycling season seems to be upon us early this year. Customers are scheduling maintenance and purchasing new bikes already. Keep your eyes open for a local mailer which will contain early season service specials.

There are a couple of new bikes that are noteworthy: Scott Genius and Santa Cruz carbon Blur. The Genius which I took to Moab and Fruita last Fall is truly a bike that can do it ALL! Constructed of full carbon and 6" of fully adjustable travel--allows you to ride a race-like hardtail and all-mountain machine all in the same ride. Here is a review and picture

Santa Cruz, not to be outdone is producing their long-time favorite Blur in full carbon, along with updated bearings and pivots, complete with grease ports: review

Methow Cycle & Sport has a fleet of Kona and Scott Demo bikes for customers to ride. Come and check them out!

New Product Rolling In...

I just received one of a fleet of Scott Demo bikes for 2009. Many of you know the merits of the Scott Addict road line up--the lightest production frameset, classic road geometry and ride compliance that is great on chip seal or uneven pavement. Here is a link to the latest review in Road magazine: http://scottusa.com/us_en/news/product/1711/11853

Crossfit: A new formula for pain and suffering

Maybe this is old hat for folks but I've been following Crossfit for the last couple of months. What is Crossfit you might ask? "CrossFit is the principal strength and conditioning program for many police academies and tactical operations teams, military special operations units, champion martial artists, and hundreds of other elite and professional athletes worldwide" (crossfit.com).

So I've been around elite level sports for most of my life and I can honestly say that Crossfit has punished me more than anything I can remember. Today's workout was less than 6 minutes in duration and after I was left a worthless heap on the floor! Literally I couldn't stand up or move... Sound fun?

Check out crossfit.com

Its Winter now...

Funny--three days ago I was out riding on dry pavement on the fixie and I was actually too warm! Since then, here in Winthrop we've received about 8 inches of snow and VERY cold temperatures. Today I had my first ski on snow this season. I went up to Sun Mtn. and blasted around on my skate skis for a bit. It was -15F at my house this morning so needless to say, the temp. while skiing was brisk. Sure was nice to have clear skies and sun however.

This Fall has been one of the longest and nicest I can remember--meaning we've been very busy in the shop. One thing that still amazes me about the Methow is the activity level of folks.

Finally--time to re-invent and re-energize the MCS blog...

Phew, the last couple of years have been a blur. I realized that my last post was some time in 2006! My goal for this Winter is to get up to date and give folks a glimpse into Methow Cycle and Sport and the Methow Valley. BTW--you can find the Methow Cycle & Sport website at www.methowcyclesport.com

Phew... Today has been a very long adventure. It began at 6am with a stiff cup of coffee followed by a quick breakfast and then straight to work. The last couple of months have been taken with building the business: Methow Cycle & Sport and today was no different. I had two out of town customers picking up custom built bikes which I still needed to finish--and truth be told, had hardly started on. In addition I had a tandem with S&S couplers which needed an overhaul along with retrofitting some very cool Campagnolo cantilevers--still housed in a sealed plastic bag.

One of the daily struggles is weaving repair work with helping customers, answering the phone, and corresponding with suppliers. Today I managed to get a bit of a head start with most of the tandem and Bianchi custom ti bike complete by noon or so. After placing a couple of orders and a quick bite to eat it was back in the shop to make some more progress. I worked on four kids bikes which belong to a local ranch. The ranch often hosts extended family and friends and they needed all their bikes ready for this weekend--Memorial Day. All in all there are 12 bikes we've prepared in the last few days for the ranch.

Around mid-afternoon a customer came in to pay his bill and began talking about how a friend of his wasn't acknowledging his waves and "hellos". Turns out his friend has a small shop about 10 miles west of mine and he didn't appreciate my customer buying a bike from me. I always struggle with not wanting to step on other businesses toes but at the same time confident about what I'm doing and its place in the community. I guess I'll become more used to it over time.

Finally at about 4:30 the out of town customers showed up to pick up their bikes. Of course I needed to do the final fit and subsequent adjustments which always takes longer than one thinks. Finally at about 6:30 they finally had fastened down the bikes on their rack and were off. I suddenly felt exhausted! Oh--one more tune up for a local doctor here. Once that was finished it was inside to wash my hands and relax a bit. Tomorrow will come soon enough with more work to be done...