early morning, as the bikes trickle into the rack. one hoopty old street bike, two jump bikes, one brand new fixie, and one xc bike with a kinda fruity front wheel...

For a company that is heavily staked in the full suspension world, the bike racks here at the cannery are something of a refreshing contradiction. the shiny new bikes with our names on them are pretty heavily outnumbered by the beaters that abound here, all proudly showing the patina of long lives lived and ridden hard. So many of the people who work here ride to work, work on bikes all day, punch the clock to then work on their own bikes, ride home from work again, and in their spare time, ride bikes for fun. That’s a good thing.

Although, riding bikes for fun can have its downside. Now that the days are longer, the local mayhem of Wednesday night rides has resumed. This year, El Gato Negro and Danny B have led the charge, and the first of this summer’s “Wednesday Night Races” went down two nights ago. Use of quotation marks there is to acknowledge that the phrase should not be taken too seriously. Anyway, the first event featured some arcane ways of leveling the playing field, including but not limited to handicapping the fast guys by making them fill their shoes with sand, roshambo contests, dirty beer chugs, and mandatory front to rear tube swaps. Sounds like Chapin got the short end of that stick for the most part – which is what happens when you’re the fast guy at work (note that in the linked photo he’s flanked by a couple of total nobody locals. pffff….

Karma can be a bitch though. After spending most of the evening acting as marshall and personally overseeing Chapin’s competitive circle of hell, Danny B took himself down on a fire-road near dusk, further reinforcing the wisdom of “do not follow Todd or Jenn when it is getting dark.” Here, with his freshly broken scapula, Danny B re-enacts the crux move (that, or he’s shouting out “oh yeah, back that thang up!” while getting his best hip grind on. you decide):

"And my hand just kinda slipped off the bar and then the stem went in my nuts and then my helmet broke and then I slid along on my back and I think someone else is gonna have to do the heavy lifting now..."

First Wednesday Night Race of a new season, and someone’s broken already. Could be a long summer. Chalk this latest up there with the 2 broken necks of years past, and the untold acres of gravel rash that Wednesday seems to have force fed the workers here. Fuck calling it hump day. From here on it might have to be take your lumps day…