Fun year round.

We’re all cut from the same cloth. Think about it, all of us that bike often like other similar activities. We ski or snowboard. We love the backcountry. We love looking at the world from a summit. A mountain biker is equally at home going sideways down the mountain through the powder. A committed road racer is likely to be skate skiing the groomed in the off season. I’m not sure about where tele people come from.

Many mountain bikers also motorcycle. Some may hide it, but all those with 5+ inches of full-suspension travel secretly have combustion envy. I mean 70 horsepower in a light, flickable two-wheel package is just cool joy. 65 mph on my road bike feels way cooler but sometimes a motorcycle will do.

Is it the process of taking a journey? Is it the competitive itch? Does the sensation of a mini-exodus fulfill our inner wanderlust? Are we all just geeks that find that biking pushes all of our buttons so we love the two-wheeled experience?

And what is it with dogs? How many dogs do you see at a trailhead or bike area? Big dogs, fast dogs, slow dogs, nervous dogs, but mostly just bright-eyed, happy dogs in their element running behind us. Are the dogs on to something? It has to have something to do with the dogs doesn't it?

NAHMBS.

North American Handmade Bike Show, Portland, OR, Feb. 8-10, 2008

I want to go so bad. I’ve wanted to go ever since I saw pictures of it when it was in San Jose, CA. I want to see the stuff Richard Sachs is crazy enough to sweat and labor over and then go race it in the mud and sweat of cyclocross. I want to see the emerald paint of Keith Anderson’s work. I want to see the new-school spit-polish of Sacha White. I want to talk with the personalities like Jeff Jones and John Castellano. I want to see the insight of designers like David Kirk and Tom Kellog. When you are talking with Steve Potts you are talking to one of the founders of the mountain bike sport! From new to tradition, anyone who loves the beauty and feeling of stillness one of these bikes evokes should make the trip.

I had planned to go this year. A friend’s (Cookie) uncle has a place in Portland where we were going to crash. Dreams of deep and luminous paint. Ornate stainless steel lugs cradling Reynolds 953 tubing. Organic and invisible fillet-brazed joints.

They moved the show up by a month this year. I won't be going. So if you love these things, that is the place to be next month. Just be sure to bring me back a show guide.