I’m a bike guy. it’s not a secret, bikes are my vice. I like riding them almost as much as building them up. I love talking bikes (though not with my wife because she is sick of hearing about it by now). I am  also a “have to figure it out myself” person. So when I started looking at single speed commuter bikes, I refused to buy an out of the box, mass produced version like the Bianchi Pista. Not for me. No, I scoured Denver yard sales looking for a classic steel frame touring bike with rack and fender mounts and horizontal dropouts in my size. Just the right bike. I knew it was the right bike when I found it at a yard sale around the house from my apartment at the time because when I asked how much they wanted for the beauty the lady said she wanted it to go to a good home and it was free to the right person, me.

I took it home, stripped off the front chainrings and put on a new one for a single speed, put some spacers and a single cog on the rear hub, cut the drop bars down to bull horn style, put some sweet platform pedals on it and a sweet brooks saddle. In two years we roamed the Denver streets almost everyday on my commute back and forth from work. When my (now) wife and I moved to Durango, the bike came with us. I often thought about changing the gearing (42/17) to be a little easier in the hillier terain of Durango, but instead I just pedaled harder uphill and went faster downhill. I also got the occasional “f*ck yeah!” or “get it brutha!” as I passed people going uphill on their fully geared rigs. They didn’t know that in reality I wasn’t being a badass, I just knew I wouldn’t be able to get going again on the hill if I lost my momentum.

Over the years, the bike received some cutoff riser bars and then the super wides in the picture along with some nice Avid brake levers. It got fenders for rain and snow commutes and a flip flop hub laced to a Mavic rim for the back wheel. The bell, rack and Detours panniers came last year in probably it’s best upgrade. Through it all the 420 just kept putting in miles and putting a smile on my face. After six years, we had put in several thousand miles together.

Finally, early this year, I decided it was time to move on. I wanted a “do it all” bike that had big 29er tires for wintery snow commuting, had some gears for trail riding, the local ups, heavy commutes and pulling my almost 4 year old daughter around in a bike trailer (although I have done this on the 420 as well – quite the workout), and could do some bikepacking in comfort. I put an ad on craigslist with a very cheap price tag (I wanted to pass on the deal I had gotten years ago while paying for some of the upgrades – but I did keep my Brooks Saddle ) Within a day of putting it on craigslist last week a college kid stopped by with the money in his pocket and gleam in his eye. The bike had, again, found the right person.

With his promise to put many more thousands of miles on the bike and to “enjoy the ride”, the 420 was off with it’s new owner. I can’t say it was easy for me, but the sexy purple beast currently being built up on my bike stand should certainly help stifle some of the pain.

So goodbye dear friend. May you continue to ride on!