Postgirot Open 1985

You know, I was about to give you a review of the Craft Sportswear cycling gear that I currently own - the X-over Convert Jacket M (labelled as a mountain bike item, but it works just fine for road too), knee warmers and a neck tube. But when I mailed them and asked about their thoughts upon manufacturing their products in China - you know, a totalitarian state that oppresses dissidents, threatens Taiwan and occupies Tibet - I didn't receive a reply. I admit that I'm a sucker for Italian cycling gear, clothes and accessories from Barbieri, De Marchi, Diadora, Nalini, Kask, Santini and so on. They're really good-looking, of high quality and the connection road cycling - Italy just feels right. The fact that they are often made in Italy and that Italy neither oppress dissidents, threatens Taiwan nor occupies Tibet is just a bonus. (Yes, there is racism in Italy too and the Giro d'Italia will start and have three stages in Israel this year, but let's not get into that now.)

But I kind of like Craft too. They're Swedish, at least they're recognising that there are problems with manufacturing products in China, they think about the environment and they use non mulesed wool. (And yes, using or not using wool is another complex question to which I don't feel that I have a right answer. But I'm more than willing to discuss and/or write a blog post about it, so don't hesitate to give me your thoughts!) But since they didn't answer my questions I won't.

Instead I'm going to give you a new part of my series Postgirot Open (memorabilia). And I  apologise to all you who end up here when you do a search on "Postgirot Open" and get a crapload of politics every time. (I just don't seem to be able to shut up.) Now it's 1985, and this is when Postgirot Open started to get a clear graphic profile, and a good one too! This post card is just plain cool.

Other than that there's not much to say, I don't really have any information about the race, except that the winner was Marc Gomez of the team La Vie Claire. Well, I do know that the La Vie Claire jerseys and riders looked awesome. Just look at these guys! First Marc Gomez himself:

(I borrowed this picture from Capovelo.com. Hope that's OK!)

And then Greg Lemond and Steve Bauer. 1980's fashion just might be underrated.

(I borrowed this picture from Rouleur.cc. Hope that's OK!)

Ride safe!

Classics or monuments?

A couple of years ago I mentioned Nalini's Le Classiche collection.

(As before, we borrowed this picture from Wielerjargon. Hope that's OK!)

From Italian cyclewear company Nalini, a collection of five really good looking bicycle jerseys (or at least four good looking, we're not entirely into the red one), celebrating five Classic bicycle races. Liège Bastogne Liège (or Liegi Bastogne Liegi, as Italians would spell it), started in 1892; Amstel Gold Race, started in 1966; Ronde van Vlaanderen (or Giro Delle Fiandre, in Italian), started in 1912; Milano San Remo, started in 1907; and Paris Roubaix (Parigi Roubaix in Italian), started in 1896. I have to say that I was a little wondering over the selection, what races Nalini considered to be Classics. Couldn't La Flèche Wallonne, first run in 1936, be considered a more Classic race, than Amstel Gold? Or Omloop Het Niewsblad? (OK, Omloop Het Niewsblad was first held in 2009, but its predecessor Omloop van Vlaanderen was first held in 1945.) But anyway it's a great collection, as well as celebrating the bicycle races, the jerseys are also made of recycled PET bottles. Good lookin and eco friendly, that's awesome. Unfortunately though, not available anymore.

And right here I just want to mention the Italian word "giro". If you say "giro" in Sweden, if they know at all what you're talking about, they will think that you're talking about the Giro d'Italia. But "giro" is just Italian for "round". For example, my Italian neighbour Rolando always refers to Tour de France as "Giro di Francia". But then he also see Tour de France as slightly inferior to Giro d'Italia... Which I, until the announcement of Giro d'Italia 2018, would agree upon. Giro d'Italia was a better looking, more exciting, more monumental race, filled with heroic efforts, drama and passion. (In short, the race was more Italian.) But I am most disappointed that the 2018 Giro d'Italia will start in Israel, as well as the weak attitude shown by the Giro d'Italia organisation towards the force politics and demands of the Israeli state. I will write more about this in the future, because I can't just stay quiet as the Israeli state continue to oppress the Palestinians and Palestine, while now trying to get goodwill and publicity by hosting the first three stages of Giro d'Italia.

But right now, let me get back to the cycling jerseys. Nalini released their Le Classiche jerseys a couple of years ago, and this year Swedish sportswear company Craft released three bicycle jerseys, celebrating three Classic bicycle races. Or Monuments. Craft's definition of Classics, Monuments are Milano San Remo, Paris Roubaix and Ronde van Vlaanderen, which made me wonder which races are considered Classics and/or Monuments. According to wikipedia, there is a problem with the definitions, since there is no consencus about what a Classic bicycle race is. And so the term "Monument" was introduced, and the Monuments (in cycling) are Milano San Remo, Ronde van Vlaanderen, Paris Roubaix, Liège Bastogne Liège and Giro di Lombardia. Was Nalini opting for Amstel Gold Race and omitting Giro di Lombardia because one of Giro di Lombardias official sponsors is Castelli? I mean, why else would an Italian company not consider an Italian race a Classic?

Anyway, the jerseys from Craft (with a pair of bib shorts matcing the Ronde van Vlaanderen jersey) are really good looking as well. Check out for yourself:

(The Milano San Remo, or La Primavera jersey)

(The Paris Roubaix, or L'enfer du Nord jersey)

(The Ronde van Vlaanderen, or De Ronde jersey)

(We borrowed the pictures from Craft. Hope that's OK!)

What's especially cool about the Craft jerseys is that they also have the pet names of the races on their jerseys (on the sleeves). Just a couple of questions. Will Craft release Liège Bastogne Liège (La Doyenne) and Giro di Lombardia (Classica delle foglie morte) jerseys as well? And if so, why not now? Or doesn't Craft want to intrude on a race sponsored by Castelli? As far as I can tell Ronde van Vlaanderen is (among other) sponsored by sportswear company Doltcini, if Paris Roubaix is sponsored by any sportswear I can't tell, because I can't find any sponsors page on their pretty messy web site, and lastly Giro di Lombardia is sponsored, again, by Castelli. And lastly, shouldn't the Milano San Remo jersey really be pink? Well, you could write to Craft and ask them. (I really am too busy to do it myself.) If not I suppose time will tell.

Anyway the jerseys Craft have made are sold in with really good looking photos on their web site:

 (Milano San Remo)

(Paris Roubaix)

(Ronde van Vlaanderen)

(Again, we borrowed the pictures from Craft. Hope that's OK!)

Ride safe!

Darkness is upon us!

If there's something we're good at up here in the North it's darkness. From Tove Jansson's books (some of them, and there's always a light in the dark ones too) to death metal (OK, technically death metal wasn't invented in the Nordic countries, but you can't say that were not good at it) we excel at darkness. And as we're heading into midwinter it's literally dark outside as well. Just today I heard on the radio that parts of Sweden got their last share of sunlight today until some time in January... That's harsh! Down here in the South (of the North!) it's not that bad, the sun is still there in winter, it just comes up later and goes down earlier. As I'm writing this it's 3PM and it's already getting dark. It's pretty cold and it's raining too. And to top it all off I've had a cold for about three weeks now and yesterday I got lumbago. Good times...

Actually, though, it could be worse. If I would have had a cold and lumbago during the summer season... now that would have really sucked. As it's dark and cold and raining or snowing (or both) outside I pretty much consider the cycling season 2017 over. Instead I focus on some of my projects. I have three frames (bicycle frames, obviously) up in the attic: a Mongoose Tyax 29 Comp and no less than two Peugeot Aubisque. If I'm lucky the Mongoose is my size and then it will become my new hard tail mountain bike, but the two Peugeots are actually the exact same size and they are too big for me so I will simply fix up and sell them. I hate seeing good bikes go to waste, and while the Peugeot Aubisque may not be a great bike (for example the groupsets were pretty crappy) it is an OK bike and the retro 1980's paintwork is just awesome. (Check it out here and here!) If you're tall, at least 185 cm, you can buy one from me right now, before I have even started on any of them.

But before I start working on the above mentioned three bikes I have a couple of other projects. First there's a wheel that I'm building for a sort of guest bike (for anyone visiting) and then there's the misery.

(The misery)

I have started working on a fifth cut through the seat post, but it's just hard, tedious work. I have been really close to just scrapping the bike and go out and buy a brand new cheap bike, but other than the bloody seat post it's the perfect subject for building a winter bike. You know, a bike that you can use in the winter, it gets dirty and rusty and you don't have to mind. It's perfect because it' so ugly. I mean, I really like Kona, "Lava Dome" is a super cool name for a bike, and I have even seen really cool examples of this model, but this bike is just really effing ugly. I'm pretty meticulous about my three bikes (a road bike, a mountain bike and a standard bike), I keep them clean and in as good a running order as I can but this Lava Dome I would just simply mistreat. I wouldn't even mind too much if someone stole it, since it's so ugly.

And after those two project I will give my road bike a winter cleaning, when I go through it completely, and after that it's time for the last (?) upgrade. I will change some components, give it a new seat post, a new stem and a new handlebar, all from Deda Elementi. After that almost everything else on the bike will be either Finnish - the frame and fork - or Italian - the wheels, inner tubes and tyres, the stem, handle bar and handlebar tape, the saddle and seat post and the groupset. It will look fab.

(This stem, handlebar and seat post are from the awesome looking Ventisei series. And I borrowed these pictures from Deda Elementi. Hope that's OK!)

Talking about groupsets, I read that FSA is to realease a completely new groupset, the WE (or possibly We), an electronic, wireless and connected solution. It sounds exciting! Actually I'm not that into electronic groupsets, I prefer my bike to be completely mechanical (I do have a wireless bike computer though, I'm not a taliban), but quite possibly all new advances in the electronic groupsets will mean advances in the mechanical ones as well, so these really are exciting times. It also means that we now have:

- Campagnolo
- Shimano
- SRAM
- Rotor
- FSA

all making groupsets. Have I forgotten someone? And no, I don't mean anyone like Simplex or Sachs-Huret. (For Pete's sake, it's 2017, not 1977.) I only use Campagnolo and Shimano, and they work just fine. And anyone following this blog know that I love Campagnolo and my Campagnolo products (groupsets and wheels). I doubt that either SRAM, Rotor or FSA will give me a bike with a complete groupset to try and test (but if you're thinking about it, please do!), so there will be no future product reviews here, but since I am rather curious myself I will try to read up on them, and if I find anything interesting I promise to share it with you. And I am really good at having opinions on the aesthetic part of things! So keep your eyes open, and we'll see what happens.

In the meantime, ride safe!

Postgirot Open 1984

So... Now that I am up and if not running, then at least walking (slowly) with this blog again, why not continue with our series about Postgirot Open memorabilia? (If you want, you can check out the previous posts by clicking in the list just to the right, or click here.) We have now arrived in 1984, the third time the race was held. Does it show in the memorabilia from this year? Well... Um, no. Or judge for yourselves.

The post cards (and stickers, there were stickers made with the exact same motif) are a quite simple affair. It simply says "Postgirot Open - The biggest bicycle party in the Nordic countries, the 13th to 20th of June 1984", and then there's a picture of Tommy Prim. Tommy Prim was born in 1955 and was a professional road racer, who won a stage in the 1980 Giro d'Italia, came second in the 1981 and 1982 Giro d'Italia, won the 1983 Paris-Brussels and also won the Postgirot Open in 1982 and 1983. As far as I know he's retired now, and never used dope during his career. Respect to Tommy Prim. I think he looks pretty cool too, in that yellow Postgirot/Bianchi Piaggio jersey, riding a celeste Bianchi.

Other than that there's not much to say. The Postgirot Open really hadn't found their style or graphic design in in 1984, but it's not too bad. Just a bit boring. Ride safe!

Postgirot Open Jersey

Hello there! We're back!

It's been over a year since I published anything here. Things have changed, to put it mildly. I am no longer a student, I have a full time job, I have a good income (I don't want to brag, but it means that I have a bigger bike (parts) buying budget, I can afford things that were out of reach before... to a certain extent, at least.), I commute by train twelve hours a week and last but not least I have become a father. Oh, and to top it all off my computer crashed and my mobile phone was stolen.

Not to mention everything that has been and is going on around the world. China continues to buy the rest of the world, North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un and his surrounding clique seem to have went completely bonkers to the misfortune of the North Korean people and the rest of the world, Putin and his clique continue to bully all countries that share a border with Russia, right wing parties all over Europe seem to be on the rise (and, thankfully, so the resistance against these ideologies seem to be), the English people were duped into believing they did not want to be a part of the European Union (no, I think they were misinformed), a complete buffoon was elected president in the United States, earth quakes in Mexico, conflict in Venezuela... Well, and good things too. Bicycle-related things (after all, this is a bicycle blog) are that bicycling is on the rise, both as a way to commute and as sport, more bicycle lanes are being built around the world and it is being realised that we need to change our way of thinking and planning cities, traffic and cityskapes in the future. The biggest thing in Sweden right now, though, is of course the #metoo-campaign.

And let me just take a minute here and say that it really isn't that complicated, what it means isn't anything ludicrous or impossible, it simply means that women should be treated as humans. They should be able to go to school or to work and not be shouted at, called things, be grabbed or groped by men they don't want to be grabbed or groped by, receive unwanted sexual comments or worry about any of those things happpening. And men need to realise that a patriarchal society isn't just holding women back, it's actually bad for them too, since it means that we all get stuck in roles we don't benefit from (typically, men are not supposed to have feelings, not supposed to cry, supposed to be the one who caters for the family and might be struggling to do so et c). Being a douchebag in a sexist manner preserve the patriarchy. And yes, you can still flirt with women, just as someone said: If you can't tell the difference between flirting and sexual harassment, stop flirting. Or more tangible: If you are saying or doing things to women that you wouldn't want other men to say or do to your mother, your sister, your daughter, your girlfriend, wife or best friend, you are probably being a douchebag.

But again, this is a bicycle blog, and even if I haven't been blogging I'm still interested all things related to bicycles and cycling. But I started finding paid for stuff out there, which borrowed a little too much from my blog without giving me any credit for it. I don't make a dime on this blog, but it's not about the money (see above), I just don't think that it's cool taking ideas and texts without asking. And really, I'm cool with most things as long as you ask, as long as you don't run some weird Nazis-on-bicycles blog I won't object. (And I won't charge for it, either.) Anyway, that whole situation made me feel a bit tired. But I'll try to post more regularly in the future, and this is a great subject to start with:

A mid 1980's bicycle jersey, from the Postgirot Open professional staging bicycle race.

Really, I don't know much about this jersey. Obviously it's from the race, but the leader of the race wore a yellow jersey, the leader of sprint awards a green jersey, the leader of the points awards a purple jersey and the best amateur wore a white jersey, at least in 1983. (There really aren't any mountains in Sweden, so there was no best climber awards jersey.) So was it a commersial jersey, sold as merchandise? I have absolutely no idea. All I can tell is that it must be from the mid 1980's (the colour!), it's made in Italy, it's made by Castelli and it's super cool. That is, it's probably stifling hot to ride in, thanks to the 72% nylon and 28% acetate mix, but it's looks super cool

A nice and easy restart to the blog, isn't it? Ride safe!

Why does it always rain on me? (A recapitulation of my racing season 2016.)

Admittedly I haven't been very good at updating this blog lately. I've been out riding! And that's exactly what I would have been doing today as well, if it hadn't started to rain... Yes, I'm a bit lazy. Or, actually I'm not that lazy - I just don't particularly like riding in rain. You get wet and sweaty, the chain might start to squeak (depending on which oil you're using) and the roads get slippery, which increases the risk of accidents. So most times I simply try to avoid it.

Bicycles are a part of my everyday life, though. Usually I ride my bikes to school or just to town, or I'm tinkering with my bikes or checking other people's bikes and bike riding people on instagram. Or in real life, for that matter! Well, summer is almost over and so is the the racing season for me. It didn't really turn out as I thought or had hoped it would

The Göteborgsgirot race was big fun. As I wrote earlier I entered the 140 km version instead of the 70 km version, in a fit of hubris, but it went quite well. My goal was to finish with an average speed of (at least) 30 km/h, but I didn't succeed with that. Other than that it was really hard and a lot of fun.

Race face on! At the last moment I decided to go for the Classic look with aviator glasses, instead of a more contemporary look. Why are today's bike sunglasses so ugly?

This is what you end up looking like, if you forget to use sunscreen. To be honest I didn't think that I would need it but Hello cycling tan!

Then the Nationaldagsloppet race was cancelled. Too bad! I wanted to enter the 108 km version of it this year, but c'est la vie. By the information on their website I get the feeling that there might not be a race next year either, but we'll see!

And then Kalmar Grand Prix Open race, or Hansa Bygg Kalmar Grand Prix Open as it was renamed, was cancelled too. Apparently due to a lack of race stewards and motorcycle police. Well, I have some thoughts about that:

1. Did they really need 120 race stewards and motorcycle police? That does seem a bit much.

2. Anyway, part of the problem with finding 120 race stewards might have been that the race was moved from the morning to the afternoon and evening. On a Saturday. I think most people would prefer to spend Saturday afternoon and evening with their family, maybe going out to a restaurant, rather than standing in some countryside village, handing out water and bananas to sweaty middle aged men.

3. And the race stewards didn't even get any salary or compensation. Instead money was donated, on their behalf, to research on child cancer, which is very nice, but really... If you were to consider spending Saturday evening handing out water and bananas to sweaty middle aged men on ridiculously expensive bicycles the thing that just make you decide to do that might be... at least something more than a free t-shirt. Were they even to get a goodie bag? I don't know. But a couple of movie tickets, compression socks or something else would probably have helped.

4. To be honest I wasn't too keen on riding in the afternoon either. What do you do all day, while you wait for the race to start? You certainly don't want to do anything too exhausting, as you want to preserve your energy and force to the race. (We're talking regular people here, not professional athletes.) So you were to spend a whole day mainly just waiting. That would suck.

5. And lastly, the name. Kalmar Grand Prix is a good name, it sounds classy and honours the town of Kalmar. But Hansa Bygg Kalmar Grand Prix? I have nothing against Hansa Bygg, it's a construction company, they're probably good at what they do, probably not much better or much worse than other construction companies when it comes to environmental thinking. (The construction sector is one of the sectors which has the biggest impact on the environment.) I was even impressed with their managing director, when he gave a short speech at the prize ceremony for Kalmar Grand Prix Elit. He talked about how he wanted the company and the race to be assets for Kalmar, to be something that would make Kalmar a better town. Great thinking! But it's still not a good name for a race. Think about it. Guldfågeln Kalmar Grand Prix? (Guldfågeln is a chicken slaughter company, which happens to sponsor the arena of the local football club Kalmar FF - Guldfågeln Arena.) Hennes & Mauritz Kalmar Grand Prix? IKEA Kalmar Grand Prix? It doesn't sound good, does it? Think about it some more. Leonardo-Finmeccanica Giro d'Italia? Schneider Electric Tour de France? Loterías y Apuestas del Estado Vuelta a España? It doesn't sound classy, does it? It just sounds commercial, and even though races are commercial... My suggestion is to rename it to Hansa Bygg presents Kalmar Grand Prix.

Well, anyway the race was cancelled. However, when I was in Kalmar on my holiday I learned that the Kalmar cykelklubb bicycle club were to organise a training round on the same day. It was a great initiative and it was great fun. They were really nice, I learned how to ride in a group, they were super cool with my mistakes and even though I said that I wanted to ride in a slower group we managed to keep an average speed of 31.2 km/h (Kalmar cykelklubb themselves claim that the average speed was 31.5 km/h, but that's not what my bicycle computer said.)

That's me to the far left. (As usual...)

I know that there are other races, I have been thinking about Tre Berg and Stockholm Velothon, but they are quite pricey and they would have required a lot of planning and some support, so... Maybe next year, who knows?

Race safe!

Goodbye Cykelcity

If you have had any interest at all in road and mountain bikes in Sweden you have known Cykelcity. Cykelcity is… Or Cykelcity was a chain of three specialised bicycle stores in Stockholm, Gothenburg and Lund. Now they’re closing down.

What the store in Gothenburg looked like, back in the day. (We borrowed this picture from Cykelcity i Göteborg. Hope that's OK!)

As I wrote Cykelcity was a chain of specialised bicycle stores, they only sold road, mountain and triathlon bikes (and, of course, clothes, bicycle parts and accessories). To be honest, they could give you quite an attitude. The first time I went there I was looking for a cassette for my 1988 Peugeot Mont Blanc, a six speed cassette. The guy behind the counter looked at me, said “No, we don’t have anything like that” and the other guys in the store started sniggering. That attitude. Some time later I saw, from a distance, a guy dragging his old bike into the store, only to storm out seconds later, still dragging his bike. When we passed each other I saw that he had a flat tire. I have no idea what the guys in the store said to him or what they did, but he was fuming. Cykelcity didn’t deal with old bicycles and they certainly didn’t deal with regular bicycles, but… just because you have a specialised bicycle store you don’t have to be a jerk.

To be honest I don’t remember what made me come back there. Maybe I was looking for something that I knew that they sold, or it was around the time that I started to put together my road bicycle. Anyway, now that I started buying specialised, expensive stuff I got treated completely different. The guys in the store talked to me, helped me and explained pros and cons of the products I were looking at. When I bought a complete Campagnolo groupset (well, almost – they didn’t have everything in) and Fulcrum wheels I got the royal treatment. I started accepting that Cykelcity is a specialised bicycle store, they sell and serve high-end road and mountain bikes. I still don’t think that you have to be a jerk, though!

And maybe it was that attitude that forced them to close down. When you’re treated badly it takes a bit to come back to the place. (Now that I think about it I think I might have been accompanying my friend Christian the second time I went there.) And rumour spreads, if you’re treated badly you will tell your friends to not go there. But there are also some other factors that I think have played a part:

1. It felt like they started focusing on selling triathlon equipment. I have to confess that as a bicyclist I am completely uninterested in triathlon. (As a human, I am a little fascinated by the sport, the effort and the athletes.) And aren’t triathletes sort of the unfaithfuls of the bicycle world? They only ride bicycles because they have to, not because they want to. They only ride their time trial bicycles really fast, they don’t take the time to enjoy the surroundings, the nature, your company... To be honest, I don’t take the time to enjoy all of those things either at times, sometimes I am just trying to push myself, riding fast and letting my body work… but sometimes I really just enjoy the sunshine! Anyway, there is a limited market for triathlon equipment, and I think that “regular” bicyclists are quite uninterested in that stuff.

2. They stopped selling brands that were sold in other store chains (like XXL). Crank Brothers, Sidi, Tacx… Officially they didn’t want to sell stuff that you could buy just anywhere, but I suspect that it was hard to compete with the prices of the other stores. For example, the distributor of Sidi in Sweden is in fact a Norwegian company, and XXL is a Norwegian store. It’s a pity that small, passionate shops always have to lose to big corporates!

3. And, of course, it’s hard to compete with the choice on the internet. Most stores and shops can order the stuff you’re looking for, but it’s just as easy and often cheaper to order it yourself. Small special products might be impossible to order from the local stores (try offset brake pad holders – I had to order them from a factory in Taiwan) and again, the prices on the internet can be really competitive. What you lose when you buy your products on the internet instead of supporting your local shops is the help that the local shops can provide, the expertise that they actually have. I won’t go deeper into this, this discussion is ongoing in the bicycle world, but what I can say is that I try to mix, to only buy the stuff online that I can’t find in the local shops. But I admit that it is hard to resist good prices.

4. Lastly I don’t know if it’s an effect of the competition from the internet-based stores, or if it’s simply the fact that when you know and have seen what can be bought online, the choice in the Cykelcity store seemed a bit… limited. There weren’t that many shoes, that many jerseys, that many helmets… And for some reason Italian brands were especially limited – Santini, Nalini, de Marchi… However, that could be due to the Italian sales and distribution chains, I guess. (We love Italians and the Italian cycling heritage here in Ensliga Bergens cykelklubb, but the Italians really are a handful in some aspects.)

5. Talking about Italian brands: A specialised road bicycle store chain that doesn’t sell Campagnolo? Come on! About two years ago Cykelcity took the decision to stop selling Campagnolo. Officially it was because Campagnolo products simply didn’t sell that good anymore. I don’t know if that’s true, but Campagnolo will always be a part of road bicycle history and if you have the means you simply have to sell their products. If you run a smaller, independent bicycle store it’s harder, especially since Campagnolo used to resist OEM sales, but... Well, we just don’t know the truth. But the text that Cykelcity wrote in their (physical) catalogue when they took the decision to stop selling Campagnolo was crap. (And we have to admit that we love Campagnolo!)

I bought this Campagnolo polo in the Cykelcity store in Gothenburg a couple of years ago.

Oh, and everything I have written refers to the store in Gothenburg. To be honest I have never even visited the stores in Lund or in Stockholm, which will continue to exist. One day I probably will visit them, though, especially now that I have this soon-to-be-vintage cycling jersey from Cykelcity! (It's pretty good-looking too!)

We wish the staff of Cykelcity all the best for the future. Be nice and ride safe!

Here’s the Swedish text, found on their website:


Vi drar oss tillbaka efter 35 år

Då var det dags att avsluta det som påbörjades 1982. Efter 35 fantastiska säsonger tackar vi för oss.

Vem kunde tro att vi skulle få vara med om en sådan fantastisk resa när vi slog upp dörrarna till vår butik i snöglopp i Lund 20/2 1982.

Veckorna innan vi öppnade skulle cyklar monteras. Vi hade fått hem Campagnolo, Selle Italia och alla andra tillverkares produkter som behövdes för att montera cyklarna.

När vi monterat 3-4 cyklar insåg vi att det mesta vi köpt in gått åt till att montera cyklarna, då blev det lite problem. Vi måste ju ha lite på hyllorna också annars ser det ju helt tomt ut, hur löser vi det?

Efter lite klurande kom vi på att om vi skriver ett litet E på lådorna ser det ut som om vi har hur mycket Campagnolo och annat som helst på hyllorna. E?

Kom nån som ville ha en Nuovo Record bakväxel gällde det att ta en låd utan E för E:et stod för empty, d.v.s. lådan var tom… Som tur var blev det ganska snart inga lådor med E på längre..

Det har under åren kommit och gått en otrolig mängd produkter som gjort det till ett sant nöje att få jobba i branschen, en del fantastiska, andra kanske inte lika fantastiska…

Det man kan konstatera är att det har varit otroligt kul att få vara med och följa utvecklingen inom branschen.

Det ska bli spännande att fortsätta följa utvecklingen, men framöver kommer vi göra det från läktaren.

Att ha förmånen att få jobba med sin hobby är få förunnat och vi ser tillbaka på alla åren med ett leende. Man brukar säga att det ska vara kul att gå till jobbet och vi har verkligen haft kul, varje dag.

När man tänker på alla människor man mött kan man inte annat än att le. Många profiler har passerat genom åren och vi har kunder, leverantörer och kollegor som har blivit vänner för livet.

Nu är det som sagt dags att tacka för oss, och vi ser fram emot att få lite mer tid över till andra roliga saker som inte riktigt hunnits med under åren.

Affären i Lund är såld och nye ägaren kommer att ta över verksamheten 15 juli. Namnet blir fortsatt CykelCity och vårt cykelmärke Columbus kommer också att vara kvar. När det gäller garantier och service på produkter köpta i Lund så tar nya CykelCity över ansvaret mot uppvisande av kvitto från CykelCity i Lund.

Nu tömmer vi butiken inför ägarbytet 15 juli så passa på allt ska bort i vår Super-Rea!

OBS! Alla värdecheckar och presentkort hos oss måste lösas in senast 15 juli!

Affären i Göteborg kommer att stängas efter sommaren. Det betyder att allt lager kommer att säljas ut under sommaren i vår Super-Rea och affären stängs senast 30 september.

När det gäller service av alla våra sålda cyklar och eventuella reklamationer på alla sålda produkter kommer detta hanteras av Sävedalens Cykel AB 1956 Göteborgsvägen 46 Sävedalen. Vid service och ev. reklamationer krävs att kvitto från CykelCity medtages och uppvisas.

OBS! Alla värdecheckar och presentkort måste lösas in hos oss innan vi stänger affären!

35 år! Vi vill tacka alla våra kunder, leverantörer, kollegor och vår personal för alla dessa fantastiska år.

Håkan och Anderz