Hollywood Bankers

A very un-HK development on Hollywood Rd. Love the quote "The show flat appeals to world travellers, nomads who want a place to call their own." Read "rich bankers"...

http://www.dezeen.com/2010/12/23/twotwosix-hollywood-road-by-studioilse/

Tour de Lantau

A great day of 'All Mountain' (in every sense of the word) riding yesterday around Lantau. Led by Steve '26 bikes' Coward even the hike a bike was enjoyable in temperatures that never broke the teens, and visibility for some miles. If only it was like this all year round.

Keiren Berlin

Some great street art / a bike shop in Deutschland. The colours are slightly Christmas themed.

http://www.keirinberlin.de/store-and-cafe

XMas Bike Bling

In amongst the hoards of Christmas shoppers around Times Square I spotted this bit of fixie bike bling- zoom close up and it has sparkles Santa would be proud of. Merry Christmas!

Quarry Bay Today

A nice hike today (or 'walk' in non HK lingo) previewing my night time semi legal commute home as soon as I get a commuter bike sorted that I can lock up outside without fear of rust & theft. I do still wonder how the Ag & Fish justify it to themselves to tell cyclists it is illegal to ride a nice safe quiet tarmac road from the comfort of their mini van.

More from the 37th Floor

ICC in the distance. I like winter in Hong Kong!

Alila Bali Wow

Good to see my Ultimate Hotel Room feature in Wow Travel's top 5 places to stay in Bali. Take me back!

http://www.kiwicollection.com/wow-travel/destinations/five-fabulous-places-to-stay-in-bali

Colossi Tail Chasing

I've been chasing my tail a bit in my role as chief colossi.cc web bore recently, but since I updated it with reports from the Tour of South China, Shenzhen, Singapore etc. etc. I thought I'd post the link once more:

http://www.colossi.cc/reports

37th Floor Coffee

I've been quite enjoying the Pacific Coffee on the 37th intermediate transfer floor of our office in recent weeks with the clear skies and views to some potential new rides I'm lining up. What is quite amusing is that to get back down to the 31st I have to take a shuttle lift down to 1, go up an escalator to 2, then take another lift up to 31. I tried to buck the system by using (shock) stairs- but unsurprisingly once at 31 I was locked in the stair and had to take the goods lift back down to ground.

The Ultimate Hotel Room

Reasons to get married no. 362:- stay in somewhere ridiculously beyond your means and justify it with the phrase "you only get one honeymoon". And so Bali provided what to my mind must be the ultimate hotel room. I've never stayed anywhere quite so perfect and being a bit of a geek, I decided to draw the plan to work out some of the reasons why. Two daybeds, two sinks, two showers, shower jets, integrated Bose ipod sound system & wardrobe, all custom furniture etc. etc. in a perfect package. How will holidays ever be the same again? 

http://www.alilahotels.com/uluwatu

Paris Roubaix in Shenzhen Bay

A nice shot from Sunday's race in Shenzhen. I like the fact we look more Paris Roubaix than Shenzhen Bay. Alas the reality is a little different... Thanks to Sandy Chung for the image. Report to follow on www.colossi.cc shortly.

My Bikes: Colossi XCR

The story on my new Colossi XCR started around 6 months ago when the club (colossi.cc) that I'm closely involved with, started on the idea of team bikes. I began the conversation with some designs for a road frame, followed up by a factory visit where we decided that instead of going for a painted look on the team road frames we could do 'raw', using Jan's Columbus XCR tube set.

Columbus XCR is the most expensive tube set in the world, and is a triple butted seamless advanced stainless steel. The only other mass market version of this frame is the Cinelli XCR- yours for only 3000EUR (frame only). My colossi was a little less, but still looks a million dollars in my humble opinion with the gleaming finish set off by the brass fillet brazing.

Building this bike was not an easy task- many of the old parts I was re-using had corroded and the seat post I was trying to use as a temporary solution didn't fit, and the snailmail didn't arrive with my new one. All of which meant that it took over a week to build and I cut it very fine in breaking the golden rule of never racing with untested equipment by fitting the correct seat post 20minutes before the start line of yesterday's race. Going straight into a race like this as a first ride on a bike would usually spell disaster, but in fact going into the first corner the bike felt like something I'd been riding for the past two years. This is testimony to the custom geometry (and my tape measure), but also the fact I'd specced it to be very similar to my (now in bits) Ridley.

The bike felt sure footed and responsive- very similar in handling to the Ridley (a product of geometry), but much smoother over uneven surfaces. It's not quite as compliant as my Harry Quinn, but it's also much stiffer. You know you're riding steel, but it's not like any other steel bike I've ridden. It feels modern in it's stiffness at the bottom bracket and certainly you can race this frame without worrying you're giving anything away to the carbon competitors. Part of this stiffness is down to my new Record cranks, and the same goes to the front end with the oversized Thomson stem with Deda Newtons (that I'm really liking). Climbing & descending on rides since the first race has again felt like riding an old friend. Steel is real indeed. I'm not sure I'll buy an off the peg road frame ever again...

http://www.colossi.cc/frames

Edit Jan' 2013 See http://bikesandbuildings.blogspot.hk/2013/01/xcr-black-beauty.html

So you want to be an Architect?

A Bike Is Brewing

Watch this space!