Mitering seatstays, drilling for head badges, Hot Pink, check-in with the paint(t) shop and the view out our front door.

xoxo,

Sacha

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A new cross bike that built for one of most well loved customers. I don’t know if he knows it, but around the shop, he’s known as “the Woodsman”.

See more on here

Fabrication Marathon: Too much This American Life (though I never thought it was possible), lunches delivered to the shop so we can stay on task, Notorious B.I.G., Kanye West, Leonard Cohen, Pearl Jam (Scott had a hankering), routine maintenance in the paint shop to prepare for the tsunami of racing bicycles that will need hot pink and army green and Vanilla blue and *%$#%  &#%@$&. Black tea with milk and honey, curving, mitering, fitting up and brazing seatstays, enjoying further refinement of our process, being slap-happy. Meeting goals!

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Tina Brubaker has been a long time Speedvagen team rider (and Vanilla before there was Speedvagen). She has raced at the top level in cross and on the road for many many years both here in Oregon and nationally. Tina has been an ambassador for the sport of Cyclocross through mentoring youngsters, and being a positive force in general. She matches Speedvagen’s philosophy of tough, but not so tough that you can’t also laugh at yourself and be good to your competition.

Kind, loyal, foxy, knowledgeable, seasoned, fast. The perfect team member.

She recently went, on invitation, to Japan to race a handful of UCI races there. Here’s a note:

“Sacha,

Thank you again for giving me the opportunity to race and represent SpeedVagen in Japan.

Daisuke is doing an amazing job representing your bikes in Japan, their presence is very prevalent. As well, he and his family are truly generous and wonderful people. The public interest in Vanilla/Speedvagen is awesome. My bike was like a rock star over there….and THANKFULLY I made the podium in Nobeyama and go to stand next to the Japanese national champion, so the story has a very happy ending!

I highly suggest going there next cross season if you have a chance. What an amazing country. What amazing people.

You would love it.

Hope all is well for you.

Best,

Tina”

Photos credited to Hideyuki Suzuki. See more here

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In any given run of Speedvagen, there is about 3 months of prep time before the welding torch is finally ignited. 

During the prep phase we are gathering info from owners-to-be, fitting those who are going custom, designing the bikes, ordering materials from 12 different vendors, preparing the worksheets that we follow during the build,  800 miters, thousands of email, millions of sandwiches, endless soft rock, all leading up to a handful of glorious days. These, my friends are those days.

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