This last week I attended the 2022 Sea Otter Classic, which was a boat-load of fun, BTW. While I was wandering the event getting the scoop on all of the new shiny bike bits that we all love so much, I started noticing a plethora of older, kick-ass personal bikes being rolled around among all of the new, expensive fancy ones. The bikes were all so different. Some were old mountain bikes being re-purposed, some were kinda neo-retro and a few were bikes with frames made by small boutique frame builders. I also documented a few brand new bikes with great, outa-the-norm builds. All of them are outstanding in their own right…really, every last one of ’em.
With the sight of each one of these older bikes, I was hit with a healthy dose of nostalgia, thinking “wow, I remember that bike” or “hey, my buddy had one of those”. It was fun to see, and it felt good to look back at a simpler time in the industry.
So, I decided that if I felt this way when I saw them, then maybe some of you would too…so I attempted to document them. I really wanted to try and focus on the unique bits and parts they used on the bikes as opposed to just the bike itself.
So, here ya go…enjoy these beautifully personal builds!
Classic Ritchey P-21
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- Ritchey P-21, some classic MTB history!
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- Yep…who needs a front sus fork?
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- Early Shimano Deore XT!
Nice Ol’ Raleigh Grand Prix
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- OG bicycle license dated 1980
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- Such a great head badge
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- A beaut’
Sweet ol’ Nukeproof
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- Sweet ol’ Nukeproof
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- Yeah, that happened.
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- Mmm…the old XTR seatpost…coveted.
One Beautiful Moots
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- Beautiful MOOTS build!!
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- Bar-end shifters for the win!
State Bicycles “Klunker”
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- Bitchen State Bicycles “Klunker”
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- Leather head badge
A Well Kept Kelly Cross Bike
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- Well kept old Kelly cross bike
Utilitarian Ritchy Dressed in Neo-Retro
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- Amazing Ritchey getting repurposed in a great neo-retro style
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- Shifter monkey…trigger shifter on the stem, FTW!
Tall Bikes Save Lives
English Cycles All Road Wonder Bike
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- This beautiful English was one of the SOC ’22 highlights!
Classic Specialized “S” Works
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- Some more MTB history
This old Trek Toured a lot of Asia
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- This Trek is the real deal!
A Nice Black Mountain Cycles with Alt. Bars
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- A favorite…
Voodoo Cycles Single Speed
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- Dedicated single speed frame 🙂
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- Classic Voodoo Cyles headbadge…
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- Early Easton corbon seat post
Late ’80’s Marin Palasades
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- This late ’80’s Marin Palasades looks like it’s been ridden every day of it’s long life!
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- To use a G.Petersen term…that’s a nice example of “Beausage”.
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- It’s not “if” you go down…it’s “when”.
Well, that’s it. I hoped you enjoyed the pictures as much as I did hunting the bikes down and snapping them!
Keep an eye out for more coverage of the 2022 Sea Otter Classic right here on your favorite website!
Love it! Still miss my Bizango.
nice photo layout