It’s officially mountain bike season around Planet Bike HQ, so last Friday we loaded up the Planet Bike Sprinter Van and pointed it northward to the 24 Hour National Championships. Once again this year, the 24 Hours of 9 Mile was the arena where solo riders and teams met to duke it out for the coveted stars and stripe
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We just got a shipment of new red wool socks from Sock Guy today. I’m pretty stoked about how they turned out. You can buy a pair for yourself, or for the feet of someone you love here.
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Our product design philosophy consists of two main tenets. We realize that sometimes it’s hard to get up the motivation to ride, so the first rule is that our stuff should be easy to use in order to make riding more simple and enjoyable, never more complicated. The second is that everything should be rebuildable in or
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About a week ago, we got a call here at Planet Bike HQ informing us that we were winning some type of award. We were all pretty perplexed, but after a few hours of phone tag, we figured out that indeed, we had been tapped to receive an award from the City of Chicago. Mayor Daley’s Bicycle Advisory Council 2007 award fo
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It’s been a pretty busy time around Planet Bike World HQ the last month or so. It’s finally spring, well, now it’s almost summer and we’ve been riding, and working like crazy.
We hired a new member of our team, Chris Follmer, to handle our warehousing and shipping duties. Chris has a background in warehouse management
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I happened across a series of images by artist Chris Jordan that depict various statistics (fifteen million sheets of office paper are used every five minutes) in a very striking way. I encourage you to let the images load and scroll down through the series.
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Lee Unwinn has spent the last few seasons trying to break himself and a few handfuls of our products in the insane arena that is Endurance racing. We listen to his feedback to help design better products for you.
This season, aside from being sponsored by us, Lee is also riding for Van Dessel bikes and Ergon grips. He
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Most of the time we aren’t really car guys at Planet Bike. But living in Madison, you kind of have to have a soft spot in your heart for this guy
As you can see, Erik couldn’t help taking a run at the champ.
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The first Planet Biker to hop into a road race this year was Founder and El Presidente, Bob Downs, who rode in the Great Dane Velo Club Criterium. He managed to get into the breakaway group and snag a podium spot in the sprint. You can check out the action below (Bob is center in the first shot and far left in the s
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Getting pumped about a 30+ mile race that has about 12 miles of unknown in the middle of it is tough. Throwing in a snowstorm 4 days before the race, adds an element of surprise. But when Saturday dawned sunny and warm, the 16 racers gathered at Madison’s Orton Park were visibly happy with how the weather shook out.Th
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In the spirit of classic European one day races, some of the riders around Madison came up with the idea for the Madison-Basco-Madison. The idea was to have an out and back competitive ride that mixed as many cycling disciplines as we could think of into one tough day in the saddle; a healthy dose of road, some mountai
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In the beginning, there was a bike; and it was good.
But in the wetter climes, the riding was muddy.
And the people cried out for their bikes and yea, their own selves were wet and covered in mud and grime such that their likenesses were unto a herd of swine.
And the gods heard their lamentation and created the full
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Yeah, this is a rant, but I’ll keep it really quick. We had nice weather this weekend, and we all got really stoked to ride. But since then, the weather has steadily deteriorated….well out like a lamb and all that. Here’s to spring weather.
When we were looking to find a good name for our new fenders, we wanted a word that would conjure up thoughts of misty mountains, foggy hinterlands, driving rain, slop and sleet, without sounding like a bad ride. That’s tough to do. But we knew of a place, where all those things can hit at a moments notice, but the rid
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Planet Bike,
I wanted to send you guys this shot from a photo shoot that i did while in school for photography. love my pump and decided to do a blow-up doll. Since this shoot I have relocated to NYC and am working in photography. Anyway, I bought this pump while working for SmartWool (note the socks) back in 2003.
I
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The Cascadia has landed! If you’re looking for a full coverage fender with the biggest Mud-Flap in the business, then you’re in luck because the whole line of Cascadia Fenders is now in stock. This includes the 29er version, which has been long awaited by the big wheel set. Check out Guitar Ted’s recent review at twen
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If I put a standard rack and panniers on my bike my heels hit the panniers. So I had local frame-builder Ahren Rogers fabricate a squirrel rack. The curvy double-decker one-piece main platform is based on a rack Ahren built for his sweetie.
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This weekend is the annual dealer show at Quality Bicycle Products up in the Twin Cities. Most of us will be heading out Friday morn, but Jay will be here to help you with questions on Friday should the need arise. For us, Frost Bike is the kick off of the season and we’re looking forward to the warmth and longer days
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Can’t wait to get your hands on some of our 29er fenders or the hard-to-find BRT Straps? Here is an update on when (we think) everything will be in stock on our website and your local bike shop: – Cascadia Fenders: February 23 – Blaze half-watt headlight: March 9 – BRT Strap: March 1
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Fingertips rejoice! We now have all sizes of our Borealis gloves back in stock, just in time for the coldest weather of this winter. Ask for them at a shop near you!
Winter has officially settled in ’round these parts. The trails are snowed in and finally ski-able, and the mercury regularly bottoms out below zero at night. Only a few intrepid souls venture out on their bikes after dark and about 99.9% of those are commuters coming home from work, or folks running short errands. Bu
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“It’s always night, or we wouldn’t need light”
-Thelonious Monk
We are cycling away from the winter solstice and light is reclaiming the night. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Depending on which end of a time zone you are on, the sun still sets between 4:45 and 5:15 (give or take an hour for those of you
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The brand spanking new site you are beholding is the result of several months of riding, conceptualizing, planning, riding, taking lots of photos and lately a lot of time in front of the computers around Planet Bike HQ. 2007 marks the 10th year of Planet Bike, and we’ve got some big plans for the coming year! The site
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