Richard Sachs Cycles

[e-RICHIE]

The Mosey Ride™

The Mosey Ride™ season began today. Version 4.0. We started doing these after returning to the river valley. Maybe the weather and the plague thing are combining to nudge us. We hit the driveway at noon, turned left, and began pedaling.

These Mosey Rides™ aren't about riding much as they are about being. Being on bicycles. TLD™ (my wife, The Lovely Deb) on her trusty 44 built D.E.B.™ (Do Everything Bike). I'm on my new road unit, the one I've been rearranging most of April. Almost there.

There are no rules for TMR (I'll spare you the spelled out words and service mark.) But if your heartbeat exceeds your weight, OR if you perspire, OR if your thought bubble contains terms like cadence or tire width or I'm in the wrong gear, it's against the rules.

We rode to Essex and made the first turn into the marina. Deb and I are always ready to say that we're here to see the commodore if anyone points to the Members Only sign. Learning to blend is key for a successful mosey ride. We don't belong to the Essex Yacht Club.

From there we went to the end of Main where our snails pace slowed to a halt as someone in a motor vehicle (an Escalade) tried to negotiate the traffic circle with one hand on the wheel while the other was holding an iPhone streaming a How To Drive YouTube.

We were out for two solid hours. Maybe 16 miles. But who really cares? Note: that was a rhetorical question. Deb and I love these times. We look around. And at each other. Giggle. These moments together become ours. And rather than ride, we can just be.

All This By Hand

[endo shi]

Back to Campy e-Richie?

[e-RICHIE]

Back to Campy e-Richie?

For road, definitely.

[e-RICHIE]

My middle nineties brochure. An evolved version of a B+W one printed several years prior. The words were written in 1990 to accompany a half-page print ad I was running in VeloNews. They were tweaked for both brochures, mostly to correct for timing and proper nouns.

This one in 4 color was a trip and four fifths. It has 10 panels, printed both sides, and the heavy coated paper stock had to be scored and manipulated so the folds allowed each panel to nest comfortably in all the others. Hats off to whatever technology produced that outcome.

We did all the storyboards using old an fashion-y analog design studio process. Then, because we planned to use this newfangled digital printing everyone was all wet and sticky about, each art file had to be - doh - digitized. 1996 was way to the left side of the developmental timeline.

After one failed printing run in which some of the color transitions went sideways, we accepted the next batch of one thousand. These were self-mailers so my task included printing Dennison labels on a word processor each time one would be mailed. I had to learn myself this method.

By the time these articles of RS information, fluff, and self-absoprtion began to circulate and make a difference, something came along and made all of it redundant. There was this thing called the internet. And by the turn of the century websites became the next delivery system.

All This By Hand

[e-RICHIE]

INTERVIEW: RICHARD SACHS

TSC: Without the rise of Cyclocross in the US (and globally) would you still be making bikes?

RS: Hmm.

Read more here:
INTERVIEW: RICHARD SACHS - Thomas Hassler

[e-RICHIE]

to a roadie
on a road bicycle
everything is a road

All This By Hand

[72gmc]

Thumbs up on The Mosey Ride™.

It's become a staple of these times for me. My version is ONB (Only Nose Breathing).

[NCC1701]

Richard_

Hope your well?

Can you please tell me where the pics were taken, looks like a great quite trail

Thanks,

KJ

[e-RICHIE]

Richard_

Hope your well?

Can you please tell me where the pics were taken, looks like a great quite trail

Thanks,

KJ

The paths within Cockaponsett.

[e-RICHIE]

I didn’t want to get in trouble. I wanted to be troubled. Like those men I used to see at 13th and Third. And across from the Port Authority on Seventh Avenue. And inside the lunch counters in the garment district. Those rooms that were 10’ wide and 90’ deep. One long space with a single surface next to forty stools. And this guy on one of them. Alone. Drinking the same cup of coffee for an afternoon.

These men who were somewhat nattily attired but in clothes that looked slept in. A houndstooth jacket that reeked of dried perspiration and hard living. A Daily Racing Form crumbled in one pocket. These men who had that air of being lost. But since they never looked up, you couldn’t really know their truth. I’d stare. I’d try to look into their eyes and maybe make a connection. And hope none ever noticed. I wanted want they had.

With the well-spoken body English that said leave me be. The detachment. That routine of monotony. And the full life that delivered them to whatever very day it was that my orbit collided with theirs. There were so many days like that, most before I left my teenage years, and the ones after too. I wanted to know what these men knew, however dark it may have been. To be derelict. To be a new breed of derelict.

All This By Hand

[GeneK]

Those men sound like something Edward Hopper might have painted.

[Moke]

Richard are you scouting sites for a new Factory? Little bit o work and those would do
just fine.

[e-RICHIE]

This bad boy is six weeks old today. I made it last summer, then sent it over to Milano for the #columbuscento exhibition, then received it back in late January before deciding what to do with it. I didn’t make it so I could have a new bicycle. I’ve been on a CX unit since 2002. But my hardwiring yearned for something different, something new. It’s a theme that catches more in its net than bicycles. One revolution at a time.

I’m riding two to three hours a day. Longer on the weekend. One day off for every seven. I still subscribe to the routine bubble bath for training, therapy, and mind control. Mine, that is. An hour in what begins as scalding hot water with more bubbles than a Lawrence Welk rerun, along with a recent copy of W or Robb Report, and with two liters of iced water with a splash of cranberry and orange juice to keep me hydrated during the shvitz.

All This By Hand

[e-RICHIE]

It's a visual language, not spoken. I understand it. But never hear it. I know it when I see it.

A file in the maker's hand is communication. The tool and the surface it's rubbing up against.

To rearrange metal or to blend it seamlessly is a quiet yet deliberate chat held daily at my bench.

I’m an eavesdropper listening to a conversation about strokes and shapes and file marks.

There’s a perfect amount of effort. It’s controlled and unscripted simultaneously. Like jazz.

Look closely. Every scratch tells a story. But only one scratch tells you the story just ended.

All This By Hand

[Amaro Bikes]

Wow, amazing shot.

I'm already used to your spoken wonders, but this shot is beyond words

[Mark Walberg]

It's a visual language, not spoken. I understand it. But never hear it. I know it when I see it.

A file in the maker's hand is communication. The tool and the surface it's rubbing up against.

To rearrange metal or to blend it seamlessly is a quiet yet deliberate chat held daily at my bench.

I’m an eavesdropper listening to a conversation about strokes and shapes and file marks.

There’s a perfect amount of effort. It’s controlled and unscripted simultaneously. Like jazz.

Look closely. Every scratch tells a story. But only one scratch tells you the story just ended.

All This By Hand

I'm happy to say that I get it.

[e-RICHIE]

There's a balancing act of chaos when I stand at the bench to make a bicycle frame. The part I love the most is the part after the very beginning. When the pipes are mitered and I'm sure all the interference fits meet a standard. That's when the torch is lit for the first time. Little pieces of metal balancing on round tubes. Each has a function and an exact place to be. The tactile senses are heightened when the smell of an oxyacetylene flame dances on a pile of surrendering paste flux. But when the business end of the brazing rod I'm holding begins its travel under and ever-so-slightly around every joint - that's when I become overloaded. The scent of heat and the mastery necessary to shepherd molten filler into places only I command it to go. Nothing after this is better.

All This By Hand

[e-RICHIE]

There's a little known side of me that involves tears. The kind that flow from eyes. I cry easily. Ya know - like at the end of the Jerry Lewis Labor Day Telethons. I cried for most of the film, Miracle. I've seen it often. I even watched the game live in 1980. And cried. In American Beauty when Ricky Fitts narrates as a paper bag falls prey to the breeze. Whoa. And at the end of Friday Night Lights when a Hail Mary pass is thrown and the ball lingers, and lingers, and then comes down months later, in a stadium where a completely different team practices. Maybe it’s just me, but my ducts well up no matter how many times I see that.

I also tear up when I see a rider conquer a magnificent course and ride in solo to a finish line filled with thousands of fans, the streets lined with bunting and advertising banners and all sorts of celebratory shit. To separate himself from all the others with numbers pinned on, using guile and cunning, and hopefully rim brakes and a mechanical group. From Campagnolo. I love a good drama played out. I'm a drama queen. And I cry almost but not quite on cue. And I always thought, I always knew, that if I ever even got close to winning a big one that I wouldn’t be able to contain myself. To be continued. Maybe.

All This By Hand

[e-RICHIE]

Bicycle racing is an old sport. It's a pre-war sport. It's a pre-motorsports sport. It's a pre-televised sports sport. It's a workingman's sport. Think boxing. A game run by old and retired former racers whose male-dominated and closed backroom culture have been in the DNA since forever. It's a bit charming from a distance. But when I put my on enlightenment lenses and look at the big picture, my sport just seems so dated, so icky, so corrupt.

It's so beautiful to watch. It’s so difficult to ponder. It’s been my muse since I first learned about these hard men in Europe whose stories dominate a history that's so rich. It's European rich as opposed to rich with lore that includes my own countrymen and in my own country. There’s something so old-school and colorful about the lot which may explain why bicycle racing speaks to me. Often, I listen. At times I ignore. The sport makes a sound that can’t be unheard.

All This By Hand


0F671504-B3E5-43C2-9D82-56AE5A9D3ABB.jpg

[e-RICHIE]

I’m giving down. That’s a term I use when I change my mind. It happens rarely. But when it does, I own it.

The Richie-Issimo 2.0 fork topper was conceived in 2009. It became a reality some time in 2013. I loved it.

After a season or three the bloom was off the rose. Was I reaching? Too many competing design elements?

I shelved the part. Picked up the pieces. Went back to using the 1.0. Until a month ago. Then I had a rethink.

I gave up on the 2.0. I never knew why. The shapes called to me one night. We talked it out. We’re a thing again.

All This By Hand