Latest / Full Spectrum Cycling / Weekly Dose of Fat – 8-22-14 – with Nick Ginster – Show #18

Transcript

Weekly Dose of Fat – 8-22-14 – with Nick Ginster – Show #18 · Full Spectrum Cycling

• 0:00
  This is the Weekly Dose of Fat for Friday, August 22nd, 2014, show number 18.
• 0:08
  [upbeat music] From the recently renovated Fatbike.com studio, it's your weekly dose of Fat with Sven and this week's special guest, JK Livin.
• 0:32
  This show is sponsored by Surly. We really like them Surly bikes. Look for them at surlybikes.com. As always, you can find the Weekly Dose and Fat Bike Radio on Facebook, Twitter, and now Instagram.
• 0:48
  Use the hashtag Fatbike.com, all spelled out just like that, F-A-T-B-I-K-E D-O-T-C-O-M, and put your stuff on Instagram.
• 1:01
  Plus, you can subscribe to the show in iTunes so you'll always be alerted to the latest episodes from Fat Bike Radio. Coming up a bit later in the show, we talk to Nick Ginster from Fixation Bikes. But first, grr. Grr.
• 1:18
  That was too much work right there. [laughs] Well, you got a lot done. Yep. What'd you bring us in the studio? JK brought the beer today, so, uh- Yeah, right here.
• 1:30
  A, l- uh, from Old Lakefront Brewery, Oktoberfest, even though it's August, but... [laughs] August, August-toberfest. Let's take a swallow of the Oktoberfestlager. All right.
• 1:47
  Well, we don't have any beer experts in the room today- [laughs]... but, uh, this brewed in Milwaukee beer is quite tasty. Yeah. And, uh, it kinda takes the edge off last night's, uh- [laughs]...
• 1:57
  fun and chicanery, doesn't it? [laughs] Yeah, yes, it does help out a little bit. [laughs] Well, and it's, it's an October...
• 2:03
  I, I, mean, I, I know what I like in beer, but it's not, it doesn't knock you over the head with a, you know, "Hey, I, th- this is an Oktoberfest," and it's all full of, you know, flavors and spices and whatever.
• 2:13
  It's approachable. Yeah. I d- I dig it. It's a good choice. Thanks for bringing it in.
• 2:19
  Sticking with the l- beer theme, I'm sure there'll be plenty of beer at Fat Camp that Zion Cyclery's putting on down at Zion State Park in middle of, uh, September.
• 2:30
  But before that, just wanna let you know that they've got a 50th anniversary sale going on, and you can check out Chris Daisy and all his buddies over there at zioncyclery.com.
• 2:43
  We'll be right back with Nick from Fixation right after this. You're tuned to Fat Bike Radio.
• 2:52
  [upbeat music] Up in the Great White North, they make bikes for every trail and every season. RSD guarantees you'll have a smoking good time carving lines with their fatty mayor.
• 3:07
  Next season, the big guy gets new builds with an optional Bluto fork up front, one by 11 setups, and new colors, too.
• 3:14
  The most playful fatty on the market still clocks in under 30 pounds for less than two grand, or talk to your RSD bike dealer about any of the trick new options, and always keep the rubber side down.
• 3:28
  All right, welcome back, everybody. We've got Nick Ginster from Fixation in the studio with us today, and, uh, Fixation is a local company.
• 3:38
  Thought we'd get Nick in and have him talk a little bit about what they're doing. He rode in on a fat bike today, so we'll talk about that in a little bit.
• 3:45
  But, uh, Nick, I just wanted to get an idea of, uh, your cycling, uh, industry creds. I know you've been around the business and the industry for a long time.
• 3:53
  Give us a little bit of a background on what makes Nick a cycling expert. Ooh, sounds serious. [laughs] Thanks for having me, Greg. Um, I have been in the industry for quite a while.
• 4:02
  I actually started my career in, in the bicycle world about 20 years ago as a mechanic at Wheel & Sprocket, like I think a lot of, uh- Wheel & Sprocket... yeah, like a lot of industry guys do.
• 4:12
  So I wrenched for years and, uh, at that time I was racing, uh, Cat 1 mountain bikes quite, quite a bit, and finding a career or a job in a bike shop was a dream, and I, and I, and I did find one. Awesome.
• 4:27
  You, uh, you kinda parlayed the love of cycling into... You went...
• 4:31
  Did you go to engineering school specifically to get into the cycling industry, or was that kind of a, a, a serendipitous thing once you got out of school? It was, it was always a hope, you know? I've always been a,
• 4:44
  I've always been a wrench. I was the kid taking apart TVs and motorcycles when I was 10 years old and, uh, trying to fix them, trying to make them faster, throwing an engine on my BMX bike, you know, that, that was me.
• 4:55
  So I always knew I'd go to engineering school, and it was always a dream of mine to actually take that love of riding and love of
• 5:05
  mechanical things and turn it into a career, and, and I was fortunate enough to, uh, to land an internship at Hayes Brake- Oh... uh, while still in school. And, uh, so you worked at Hayes for a while.
• 5:15
  Uh, I know you went overseas to help them work on some stuff over when they did production in, uh, Taiwan. What led from the career at Hayes to taking a big leap of faith and starting a company like Fixation?
• 5:27
  Uh, a leap of faith is, uh, to say the least. You know, that's, uh, like jumping off a cliff, actually.
• 5:32
  [laughs] I, at the time, uh, prior to starting Fixation, I was actually the, the chief engineer for Asia for Hayes, so I was in charge of all their production, sourcing, troubleshooting, and, uh, working with the product design teams in the US and, and Taiwan to, to bring all their great mountain biking products to market.
• 5:49
  But I've always had that entrepreneurial drive in me, and, uh, while living overseas, the opportunity presented itself to kind of do something in another segment of cycling that, that I love, which is, uh, the urban transport side of things.
• 6:02
  You know, I've always, always been a dirt guy, riding enduro bikes since I was a kid, mountain biking, BMX. But at the same time, I w- I was always commuting.
• 6:09
  You know, I lived in cities, and to get from point A to point B, I was, uh, was on some type of city bike.
• 6:15
  So with the growth of the urban transport segment, we took a leap of faith and actually designed a proprietary tire. Ah, yes. And that got Fixation started. Right, the Fixation... Session 700... Session, which- Yeah...
• 6:27
  a lot of people might rem- or it's still a very popular tire out there.
• 6:31
  It had a wraparound tread for the guys that are doing fixed gear stuff, doing more tricks and more aggressive urban riding, kind of like an old BMX race tire.
• 6:41
  It, it was very similar in profile to a BMX race tire, full wraparound tread.
• 6:44
  But what we did that was different, and, uh, I always laugh because if, if you were to tell people that you're gonna start a company, you know, sit down in front of a bunch of investors and say, "Hey, I'm gonna start a company that's going to compete against Michelin and Panaracer and Continental, and I have this great idea for a tire," I'm pretty sure they would laugh you out of the room.
• 7:03
  [laughs] But that's what we did. And th- we designed our, our...
• 7:07
  Session 700 was the first colored tire, which were very popular at the time, and it was actually a good product, Kevlar belted, foldable, shielding to resist punctures, and a wraparound tread.
• 7:17
  And it was a good product and, and received by, well, by a lot of people. Yeah, I've ridden them quite a bit. I got them on my, uh, Superfast still. Um, so my first...
• 7:26
  Well, actually, I was gonna say that my first introduction to Fixation was through the Mesa pedal, but really it was through the tire.
• 7:33
  But one of the ways we got really into knowing a little bit more about Fixation was that the Mesa pedal became one of the kind of popular pedals in fat biking, which it's kind of an interesting story.
• 7:45
  It is actually, Greg. You know, the Mesa pedal, we, we d- have a big line of pedals. We actually ca- have five different models of pedal now.
• 7:53
  Uh, and the Mesa really made a, a, a transfer over to fat biking, I think mostly because it's a, it's a impact-grade nylon pedal, sealed bearing, very durable.
• 8:02
  And as everybody knows, that having that nylon between you and, uh, you and your cranks is an insulator.
• 8:07
  When you're riding in 10-degree, 20-degree weather, to have your foot on a big piece of aluminum that's attached to a giant heat sink, which is your frame, just sucks the cold right through your foot. Yeah.
• 8:19
  And the Mesa pedals are actually a great insulator, so they have a couple things going for them. They're super durable. They keep you warm, so. And then you made them with metal pins.
• 8:27
  [laughs] And then we made them with metal pins. Which was a great idea. [laughs] That really, really, really helped out when it was, uh, super cold, below zero, and those metal pins really grab well.
• 8:35
  And honestly, the, the, the feedback we got from the fat bike community, um, from fatbike.com listeners and, uh, viewers was, yeah, the, the Mesa pedals are great, but when it gets real sloppy we need something more.
• 8:46
  And that's, that's where the, the Mesa MP came. It was directly out of, uh, fat bike input. Right on. I see that you rode in on a fat bike today.
• 8:56
  Uh, a lot of things I'm seeing on that bike, I haven't even seen some of the stuff on [laughs] there. I know some of our listeners have probably heard about a few things, but, uh, you know, maybe you could tell us.
• 9:05
  It looks like there's a lot of 2015 goodies on there. Tell us a little bit about what an industry guy gets to play with before everybody else gets to play with them.
• 9:12
  That, that is one of the advantages of, uh, being in the industry, being connected with the factories. You can get your hands on a lot of goodies. Um, yep, as you noted, I'm riding, uh, a lot of new stuff.
• 9:22
  First, first of all, I'm riding a, a carbon frame, which- Looks wide... it's wide. It's 190 spaced, um, which I really believe is, is the direction for most, most of the fat bikes in coming years.
• 9:36
  We can fit a 5.0 on there. Uh, I'm running- Yeah, you currently have it set up with a, with a 4.0 or 3.8 size tire, but there's a lot of clearance in there. There's a lot of clearance.
• 9:45
  5, 5.0 is no problem, but I mean, I'm... Right now I'm r- running the Maxxis Mammoths, which are new for this year. Um, I've actually got quite a- First time I've seen them, folks. They look really cool.
• 9:54
  Very nice tread pattern. Little bit low in the center. Looks like they roll real well. They rolled well in the hallway when I was riding it around outside the studio here.
• 10:01
  [laughs] Yeah, I was, I was pleasantly surprised with Maxxis.
• 10:04
  I mean, like a lot of people, I've, I've pretty much run, uh, the standard tires that have been available for the last few years from Surly, from Charge, or from, uh, from, uh, Vee Tires.
• 10:15
  [clears throat] But, uh, the Maxxis really surprised me. Low profile, like you'd expect on a, a trail mountain bike tire. And with the high pressure you can run this time of year, they fly. Awesome.
• 10:27
  Yeah, I'd be interested to ride those. I'll probably have to take this out for a cruise in a little bit. I see you've got a Bluto on there. I know people have heard about that.
• 10:36
  Um, what's the, uh, the spec with the, uh, the drivetrain and the brakes? Drivetrain and brakes, I'm running, uh, I'm running Avid DB3s. I think they're a good compromise of, uh, cost and durability.
• 10:48
  They're super solid stopping power, and they're, uh, not gonna break the bank. I also got the Race Face Ride components on there for both s- seat post, stem, handlebars. As you can see, I have it cut them down.
• 11:00
  I'm a believer in, uh, wide bars so you can... The trail's not telling you what to do. You can tell the trail what to do. [laughs] Almost looks like a production spec on that bike. Uh, it does, doesn't it, Greg?
• 11:11
  [laughs] So y- y- I know this isn't your first fat bike. You've had several in the past. And, and where you live, uh, real close to the Milwaukee River, there's some really cool trails. Uh, one of the things that...
• 11:22
  I mean, last winter was just so cold here. Our... The river froze completely over, like really solid, which hasn't happened for a long time. Mm-hmm. And I know you've got a chance to get out there a bunch of times.
• 11:32
  What, what's it like riding on a frozen river on a fat bike? You know, living right next to the river, I know how quickly it can change.
• 11:38
  I mean, we've had ice skating rinks they were skating on one day, and the next morning you wake up and the thing's gone. So you always have to be cautious on the river.
• 11:45
  But this year we actually had snowmobile traffic coming past the house, which gave us a little extra assurance that we were gonna be okay. I know those guys can fly across water, though, and I don't know.
• 11:55
  [laughs] I've only seen one fat bike fly across water in one video at one point, but yeah, it was, uh... We even got to ride up the waterfall right over by your house. That was pretty cool. [laughs] That was remarkable.
• 12:04
  Yeah, you know, we spend a lot of time riding the river, and the neat thing about that is that there's, uh, there's trails right off the river.
• 12:10
  We have a couple miles of single track, so you could literally do a long, long ride on the river, follow the snowmobile tracks, and then come back- Loop a little single track and, and head on down.
• 12:20
  And like, like you said, Greg, the waterfall, that was a surprise.
• 12:23
  And I've, I was riding towards that thing this winter and I s- following the snowmobile tracks, following them and wondering, "Where are they gonna turn?"
• 12:30
  And I got right to the edge, realized they went down, whipped back about 20 feet and took a launch myself. [laughs] There was a couple little holes that weren't completely frozen- Yeah...
• 12:39
  and this weird foam was coming up through there. It was just like... Once I saw you guys do it, I'm like, "Well, obviously we can do it, too." [laughs] Wasn't there like a picnic bench or something there?
• 12:47
  Yeah, I dragged that out of the woods. [laughs] Cool. Well, um, I know Interbike's coming up in a few weeks here. In fact, uh, you guys will be there.
• 12:57
  Is there, uh, anything that you're gonna be debuting at the Interbike trade show that we should know about? We have, uh, quite a, quite a few new things. Most, uh, most will have to wait till they show up on BikeRumor.
• 13:07
  But, um- [laughs]... we are, we are definitely expanding our line of, uh, urban transport products, which we're very strong in, and we have a, a couple other goodies to show at the, at the, at the trade show. Very good.
• 13:18
  Well, I always look forward to seeing what you guys have there, and, uh, we'll see you in a couple weeks. Sounds good, Greg. Thanks for being on the show. My pleasure.
• 13:26
  Next up on the show, stories from around the interwebs on the Weekly Dose of Fat. You're tuned to Fat Bike Radio.
• 13:39
  [laughs] We're the ladies behind Skirts and the Dirt, and we with assistant Gomez on Fat Bike Radio. [whistles theme song] This is your weekly dose of fat. Welcome back.
• 13:54
  Our first story from the interwebs this week is an awesome bit from the Belted Blog about Frank Schneider of the Gates Nikolai Mountain Bike Team shredding a new Pinion gearbox-equipped fat bike belt drive,
• 14:08
  uh, Nikolai-framed wonder bike in the gravel pit near Nikolai's home base in Germany. We're wondering if this is the future of fat biking.
• 14:17
  It's, as, as one of the bearded guys they, they allude to in the, uh, uh, promo, uh, I'm the guy who rides in the snow, but I say heck yeah, this is a, it's a really cool thing. The, the Pinion's an 18-speed gearbox.
• 14:29
  The belt drive takes care of a lot of, uh, maintenance issues. And check out a link in the show notes. Norco is bringing the Sasquatch back, this time as a proper fat bike.
• 14:42
  The new frame features a suspension-corrected geometry and, [coughs] excuse me, [laughs] a tapered head tube, a RockShox Bluto and a Shimano SLX drivetrain. I think this one'll be priced right.
• 14:55
  Look for more info down the pike. Right on, yeah, those guys are doing a good job. I know they had their Bigfoot last year, so, uh, this is adding to the Norco Canadian fat bike, uh- Eh. Eh.
• 15:07
  [laughs] Get the dat fat bike, uh, program up there in Canada. Uh, Cycle Monkey has just completed the build of their first Rohloff XL-hubbed Ventana El Gordo.
• 15:18
  This is the 170-millimeter Rohloff hub we talked about on the show with, um, Neil from Cycle Monkey a couple weeks back. It's a trail-oriented bike. This thing has a reverb dropper post on it.
• 15:29
  It's got a Bluto up front, and, uh, it's obviously complemented with the Rohloff XL and a belt drive drivetrain. Take a look at that story. There's a link in the show notes.
• 15:41
  Our buddy Jeff O'Gara has a new fat bike frame built by Dave Wiseman to shred the trails around Decorah. Jeff's one of the strongest guys I know, and he really rocks those trails on a single-speed fat bike.
• 15:52
  Like to see what Dave put together for him. You can see some pictures of the new thing g- uh, in, take a look at the link in the show notes. Yeah, a couple of the more persistent fat bike bloggers are out there.
• 16:04
  Have some new stories as well. Look for links to Jobu's blog, as well as the Coast Kids in the show notes. If you guys write about fat biking in your blog or otherwise, let me know.
• 16:16
  We'd love to get your, uh, links up on the show. Just shoot a note to greg@fat-bike.com, and we'll see what we can do for you. Hey, everybody.
• 16:26
  We've still got that Dog Days of Summer contest going on, and this week's secret word is Pinion. Take a look at the link in the show notes to learn more about the Dog Days of Summer contest.
• 16:39
  Gonna say our thanks out again to Surly Bikes. Surly Bikes. Did, what did it say about Surly b- what does it say about Surly- [laughs]... in the internet? I know you were doing a little looking. The internets. I, I, I
• 16:50
  was just curious just to see what the internet was gonna yield, and it was, "Surly describes behavior nobody wants to be around.
• 16:58
  Think of the irritable old guy who lives on your street and always seems to be simmering with some sullen, nasty anger." [laughs] "Whose every utterance he spits out with a rude snarl. He is the poster boy for Surly."
• 17:11
  Wow, I, I think those guys nailed it pretty well. [laughs] Yeah, yeah. Most def, dude. Well, thanks very much, guys at Surly, and, uh, we really appreciate you sponsoring the show. Check 'em out at surlybikes.com.
• 17:23
  Hey, I guess that's what we got for this week. [laughs] Yeah, right on. Boy, we blew right through that, didn't we? Yeah. I'm only- And I'm not even halfway through the beer, but- Third, third of a beer. Right on.
• 17:31
  Well, thanks for stopping in, JK. Uh, Gomez should be back in the studio next week. I hope he was having a good time.
• 17:36
  Uh, th- they might've caught a little bit of rain, but we'll check in with, uh, Gomez next week and see what happened on his, uh, off-the-grid fat bike vacation. Until then, cheers. See you later.
• 17:49
  [outro music] You've been listening to Fat Bike Radio's Weekly Dose of Fat. Find us on the web at fat-bike.com/radio. We'll see you next time.
• 18:06
  [outro music]