1976 Track Frame

When I was building frames in England back in the mid-1970s I recorded frame numbers in a little hardcover note book. I still have that book.

It contains little information, just a customer name and a number. It is a miracle the book has survived to this day. The only reason for keeping it in the first place was to keep track of how many frames I built, and to make sure the serial numbers stayed in sequence and I didn’t miss any.

At the time as I stamped a number on a newly built frame and wrote it down in my little book, probably the last thought in my mind was that I would be corresponding with people about these very same frames 43 years later. I don’t think anyone living at that time could have envisioned the Internet and email.

 

A couple of weeks ago I got an email from Rob Rix who lives in Lancashire, England. He wrote about a frame I built for him back in 1976. He gave me the frame number M6110, I opened up my numbers book and sure enough there is Rob’s last name, Rix.

In his email Rob wrote:

“Many years ago you built a frame for me and I still have it in my possession. The serial number is M6110. Back then we had to rely on letters and telephone calls to place the order. This bike has been all I ever wanted from a track iron - stiff and ultra-responsive.

The best place I had on it during my racing career was Nation Silver medal for the 1000m sprint. Well done Dave you did a great job for me and the proof is in the length of time I have had the bike, I really would not part with it.  

The front forks were bare tub clearance and originally undrilled however the fork crown was drilled some years later when I used the bike in Hill Climb events.

The only slight damage on the frame is from the inevitable track crash where the handlebars hit the top tube and put a fair dent in it. The frame was originally finished in bright yellow with red head and seat tube contrast panels.

After a couple of seasons racing I had it chromed for durability and it has remained chrome ever since. I have always been satisfied with the bike and you did a first class job for me.  Many thanks for such a good product.”

Rob Rix.

The frames I built in the UK were racing bikes that were used for racing. They did not have the finish and aesthetics of those I would later build in the USA. It is nice to hear a story of a frame that was used for the purpose it was built, and has served its owner well.

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In the best shape of my life

Some say that the time for reminiscing about when we were in the best physical shape of our lives, is for when we are done riding. When that time comes for me, I already know when that was, 1970 and 1971. It started literarily by accident. 

I was living in England, it was early in the 1970 season. I was out training alone after dark and was rounding a bend on a relatively quiet country road when a motorcycle traveling in the opposite direction, took the same bend on the wrong side of the road, and met me head on.

The motor cycle, ridden by a sixteen year old with no driver’s license or insurance, with a youth of similar age riding on the back. These kids were on a big ol’ British Norton Dominator and were racing some others who were following also on motorcycles. Because they did not see a light from an approaching car assumed it was safe to take this particular corner on the inside. 

All I remember of the impact was a huge headlight coming straight for me, the next moment I was lying on my back in the road. What actually happened was that the motorcycle passed slightly to my right, the handlebars of the motorcycle passed over my bike but hit my right forearm. Remember this was England so I was riding on the left side of the road.

The impact threw me up in the air, doing a complete summersault, and I landed on my back in the road. Rather like a wrestler, doing a move called “The Irish Whip.” It happed so fast I do not remember that part, but know that is what happened because the back of my head was slightly grazed, (We didn’t wear helmets back then.) and the back was ripped out of my sweatshirt.

The motorcycle also went down and the two youths picked up some road rash as they slid across the road and ended up against a wooden barn on the opposite side. Apart from this they were uninjured. I was not so lucky. My right forearm was shattered, broken in three places. My bike on the other hand was completely untouched, not even a scratch in the paint.

I experienced the worst pain in my life that night lying in a hospital with my arm a temporary sling hung by my bed. The next morning they operated, and had to put a stainless steel plate in my arm to hold it all together. The plate is still there today, and I wouldn’t know it except for a six inch operation scar to remind me. 

They put my arm in a cast from my hand to my armpit, with my elbow held at 90 degrees. This cast was on for five months. I could drive a car and do a few other things but couldn’t work. I decided to keep riding my bike and rigged it up with a single fixed gear and a brake lever in the center of the handlebars so I could ride with one hand.

I rode every day as much as 60 to 80 miles. Weekends I would ride with the other guys in my cycling club. They cut me no slack and would drop me on the first hill we came to. I was riding with my left hand only so had to sit down on the hills, and could not get out of the saddle to climb. I would chase the group for miles, sometimes catching up, other times I never saw them again.

Weekdays I would sometimes ride with an older retired guy. He was probably in his late sixties, where as I was 34 at the time. He kicked my butt, and told me months later that I had the same effect on him. He kept telling himself that he couldn’t let a cripple with one arm beat him, while I was thinking ‘I can’t let this old man beat me.’

When the cast came off after five months, the doctors were amazed, my right arm had muscle in it. My left arm got a hell of a work out and I have heard that if you work one arm or leg it will affect the other. So riding my bike was probably the best thing I could have done for my recovery.

The end of that year and the one that followed was my best season ever. The five months that my arm was in a cast I had been doing over 400 miles a week, and doing it all on a single 69 inch fixed gear. (46 x 18.) I could spin and was as strong as a horse on the hills. There is no doubt in my mind when I was in the best shape of my life.

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Update on Fast Eddie Williams' track bike

Ever since the untimely passing in August 2016, of New York’s Legendary Bike Messenger, Fast Eddie Williams, I had wondered what had happened to his bike. Not having direct contact with Eddie’s family, I had no way of knowing.

So imagine my delight when David Perry, one of Eddie’s mechanics since the late 1990s, emailed me to say the bike was in his keeping, being safely held until Eddie’s immediate family decided what to do with it.

Last fall, a curator for the Museum of the City of New York came by inquiring about objects to loan for an upcoming exhibition: “Cycling in the City—A 200-Year History,” from March 14 to October 6, 2019. The museum has chosen to exhibit Eddie’s bike.

Since David Perry is not the bike’s owner, he had to get written approval from Eddie’s family to loan the bike to the museum. That happened this weekend, and David was kind enough to pass the news on to me.

I hope this bike will remain safe in the future, never refinished but left as is, a working bike. Possibly find a permanent museum home, where all can see it as a memorial to Fast Eddie.

Click here, then scroll down to read previous articles about “Fast Eddie”

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Track Bike

The Fuso track bike above was built 30 years ago in 1988. It is still owned by the original owner, Dave Watring, and is pictured at the Los Angeles Velo Sports Center where it is still being ridden three times a week.

I built only a few of these specialist track frames over the years, there was little call for them at the time. They were not yet a fashion fad to be used on the streets. They were only ordered by someone who actually had access to a track or velodrome.

The track bike is as simple and as basic as one can get, which is part of their appeal. A single fixed sprocket screwed directly to the rear hub, and no brakes. What, no brakes? The uninitiated will ask. Isn’t that dangerous?

No, actually when used as intended, on a banked velodrome, brakes would be more dangerous than “No Brakes.” Everyone is riding counter-clockwise around the track, there is no need to stop, and the last thing one needs would be someone slamming on their brakes when riding only inches from the rider in front.

If someone falls, and it happens, the riders are so close and going so fast that there would be no time to stop even with brakes. The best defense is to steer around the fallen rider. For this reason, track bikes are designed with a steeper head angle to steer quickly.

On a road bike, to go around a corner, the rider leans in the direction he is turning and the bike steers itself around the bend. On a banked velodrome, when the bike and rider are traveling at speed, the bike is leaning, and in theory is at 90 degrees to the track surface at all times. It is as if they were traveling in a straight line.

The time to deviate from that straight line, is to go around an opponent, or a fallen rider. The track rider learns a whole different skill set. He steers the bike by turning the handlebars. Something a road rider rarely does.

Watching a track meet, one can always pick out the inexperienced road riders. In the event of a crash, the first thing they do is try to stop pedaling, and reach for brake levers that aren’t there.

Track bikes I built had a 74 degree head angle, and 1 1/8 inch (30 mm.) fork rake. Less trail than my road bikes which were 73 head angle, 1 3/8 in. (35 mm.) More trail for self-steering qualities, less trail for track bikes meant to be physically steered.

Footnote:

I am late with my blog posting this week partly because I am preparing to attend the Classic Rendezvous Weekend event in Greensboro, North Carolina, May 18-20. I will probably be late next week for the same reason. I hope to meet up with a few of you there.

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Fast Eddie Williams

I awoke Sunday morning to the sad news that New York Bike Messenger Legend “Fast Eddie” Williams had passed away.

Apparently, when Eddie didn’t show for work on Friday morning a coworker went to his apartment where he found Eddie had died during the night.

Life is strange, death is even stranger. We all know it is inevitable, and yet when it happens we are so ill equipped to deal with it.

We are shocked, stunned, we can’t believe it. Or is it just that we don’t want to believe it?

Eddie had been a bike messenger in New York City since 1983, long before riding a fixed wheel, no brakes, track bike on city streets became a hipster fashion. In fact it was the bike messenger who started the craze.

Bike messengers provide an essential service in the city, delivering important documents when overnight delivery is just not fast enough. Speed is of the essence, and a fixed wheel track bike is the perfect tool for the job.

A skilled rider has tremendous control over the bike, able to speed up or slow down easily and thread between cars when traffic is at a standstill. A courier on a bike can get from A to B quicker than any motorized vehicle.

I met Eddie just once when I traveled to New York in November 2014. We met in a bar/restaurant in Brooklyn, where Eddie lived. (Picture above.) He was a big man, at least six-four, maybe more. Soft spoken, humble almost. He showed me his bike, a track bike I had built in 1983, and had been raced on the Trexlertown Velodrome. Eddie had bought the bike from the original owner in 1998.

Then just two months later around Christmas 2014 Eddie’s bike was stolen. Eddie was devastated. He needed this bike to earn a living. I listed the bike as stolen on my Bike Registry, and several months later the frame showed up in a Queens bike store. Someone contacted me, I contacted Eddie, and he got his bike back.

That was the last time I spoke to Eddie just hours after he had retrieved the frame. The parts were gone, but Eddie had other parts and had already re-built it. I asked if he had found the thief.  He replied, “Oh, it was just some young kids.”

This response was typical of the man. He wasn’t vindictive or looking to punish someone, he was just full of joy to have his bike back.

I will always be grateful that I got to meet Eddie, and also with the help of many others was able to get his bike back to him when it was stolen.

I hope that bike never gets restored, but that it remains as is, with its thousands of paint chips. A working bike, displayed in a bike store or somewhere, as a memorial to a Legend.

Rest in Peace Fast Eddie, I will always remember you, as will many more.

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