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The 2011 KLEIN meets KLEIN event (Kleintreffen) was once again a great success with 58 bikes and 35 participants. The event organiser Matthias has kindly sent over a link to their photo galleries - a must for all Klein fans. Full details in the forum :D

Geoffrey Cleland Apps, the UK mountain bike pioneer has been once again nominated for the Mountain Bike Hall of Fame - hopefully this year he will be voted in and a glaring omission corrected. Mr Apps was riding bicycles off road in the mid 60s and his unique take on the 'mountain bike' pre dates the Marin County pioneers by several years. If you don't know about Geoff Apps I suggest you read up about him and his bicycles here on retrobike, here on wikipedia or here and here in the Mountain Bike Hall of Fame. Graham Wallace, long time Apps aficionado has made the nomination once again. What can you do? Simple. Click here to register for the Mountain Bike Hall of Fame and vote for Geoff Apps! I know votes are closing soon so please be...

Another excellent year at Mountain Mayhem for Retrobike. Big thanks to Bikefood for their excellent support once again. 48 riders and plenty of hangers on meant we had one of the biggest camps on site. Hope other riders enjoyed the 'encouragement' via the megaphone, 5 hour bear based DJ set and light show as they came past Retrobike HQ. The Friday night team presentation, BBQ and International Two Man Jenga tournament was also a classic. Think we might even have done some riding at some point too. Retrobike Mountain Mayhem aftermath thread now up, full report to follow soon (ish).

Selling out… Rather than the usual “goodbye” or “see you” for some reason I can’t help saying “keep it real” or “don’t sell out”. Hopefully I will stop it soon, but no doubt will move on to something equally annoying. Anyway, it started me thinking that it is actually a nice thing to do and while I don’t mean anything by it, maybe I should be taking my own candid advice. So, seeing as I race for Retrobike, I have the dilemma of riding old skool, whilst when it comes down to it, actually wanting to win. Perhaps this concept isn’t completely incompatible, but it could take some doing. So, to come clean right from the start and seeing as this is meant to be a race report, I do have a history of competing in quite a lot of mtb from...

On 11th and 12th June 2011, BespokedBristol hosted the inaugural UK Handmade Bicycle Show, with a nod to the well established North American Handmade Bike Show. Obviously the bikes featured would be handmade in the UK. On the evening of the 10th, The Guvnor and I, living the dream, went along to check it out. A few highlights included: -Milk Bikes -Lee Cooper Cycles / Alex Hatfield Concepts -Tokyo Fixed -Freshtripe -Brian Rourke -Feather -Enigma Full report and pictures of Bespoked Bristol 2011 can be found in the forum.

Traditionally Mountain Mayhem is Retrobike's biggest and best event of the year. This year will be no different! The weekend's schedule is now finalised. So whether you're racing solo or just coming along to hang out and heckle there will be something for you. Click here for full schedule. Highlights include • The Retrobike Concours Show • BBQ • Giant Jenga • Flea Market • DJ Bernard • Trackside heckle tent • Some racing (perhaps). See you at MM :D

This weekend sees the first running of Bespoked Bristol - the UK's first handmade bicycle show. The event is running on Saturday 11th and Sunday 12th June at the Paintworks, Bristol, click here for full details > http://www.bespokedbristol.co.uk/. The show includes numerous frame builders, bike designers and small scale manufacturers of premium components, clothing and accessories. Retrobike will be there over the weekend, look in here for a report and pictures next week.

This just in from Matthias about the 2011 KLEIN meets KLEIN event (Kleintreffen). Looks to have been a great event in previous years, check their website for more details. Dear friends of Retrobike.co.uk For the fith time in a row, we are organizing our annual "KLEIN meets KLEIN" event in Germany, bringing together friends, owners and fans of one of the biggest brands in mountain bike history. The event is being held the first weekend of July, 2nd to 4th of July 2011 in Eckolstaedt (close to Weimar, Eastern Germany). The "KLEINfreunde Weimar" are our hosts and you can get some impression of their passion for the brand on their website (sorry, german only): http://www.kleinfreundeweimar.com/ We will have a great mix of...

Details just in from OWMTBC stalwart 24pouces, sounds a great event. I organize in France the "mtb retrobike meeting" in the beginning of July. (it's the second time) This year, 4 members of retrobike are interested for coming : Trip from Spain, Oneshnark from Germany, and the OWMTBC team, Mr Kawa and Ned. If you want to come, you're welcome and invited. It's a preparation too for a big meeting in France in 2012 (The 25th birthday of the first international mtb race in Europe. It was in french Alps…) More details on the France Old School MTB Meet in the forum.

This just in from the organiser's of Anjou Vélo Vintage, looks a great event. "I am pleased to inform you that the general council of Maine-et-Loire (Loire Valley) will organize the “Anjou Vélo Vintage” which is a cyclotouristic bicycle rally. This event will take place from Saumur along the Loire valley, France on the 19th of June 2011. This original and friendly event will gather all the people interested in the retro bicycles: like fixed-gear bicycles, single speed… It also concerns the nostalgic of the legends of cycling racing and any vintage bicyclist: those who are willing to feel an unique and a vintage atmosphere. You will have the choice between three different leisurely routes of approximately 30 km, 70 km and 100 km...

Original Source Mountain Mayhem 2011 - Sign up to a team NOW! :: Date: June 17th - 19th 2011 :: Location: Eastnor Castle, Deer Park, Ledbury, Herefordshire. :: Meeting at: Watch this space, RB usually demarcate an area elusively for Retrobike riders, drinkers, hecklers, etc. :: Camping: Camping is free of charge, free showers and bike washing facilities too. Catering is by form of large catering tents, burger vans, etc. Plenty of RB bbq's on the go too. :: Distance: Laps are approximately 9 miles in length around the grounds of Eastnor Castle. :: Terrain: A great mixture of fast single track, woodland, fire roads and wide open fast grass. :: Event website: www.osmountainmayhem.co.uk For more details click here or click more. This...

I'd always fancied riding l'Eroica ever since I read about it a couple of years ago. Sunday was my chance. Here's what happened. Executive Summary A fantastic ride in Tuscany on old road bikes. Wine, cheese and ham at the food stops and a warm reception for all. A must for all lovers of old bikes. http://www.eroica-ciclismo.it/english/home.asp For those who can cope with the self-indulgence, here's more. A while back I posted up about l'Eroica to see if anyone was interested. Quite a few were but without any definite commitment. Then Fraser said that he was keen and would sort out accommodation - it was on! After far too little training or preparation I found myself at Pisa Airport on Friday, ready to meet Fraser – apart from...

La Marmotte is a one-day cyclosportive event in France, utilizing some of the climbs used in the Tour de France. The route is 174 km (108 mi) long and features more than 5180 metres of climbing. The event goes over the Col du Glandon, Col du Telegraphe, Col du Galibier and finishes at the top of one the most famous Tour de France climbs, Alpe d'Huez. Boom, Simple! The who and why? Me and two friends, why not. Well, I’ll tell you why not…… Back at the end of 2009 my friend Alex sent me a link to La Marmotte, I was just back from doing 3 days in the Alps as part of a Macmillan Cancer Support challenge and thought it sounded like a good idea. I had trained hard for the trip with Macmillan and as a result had gone really well over all the...

OWMTBC has always been a fairly loosely defined concept – we knew what we wanted to do but we didn’t necessarily want to hard sell it down people’s throats. ‘Build it and they will come’ was certainly my approach although I’m not sure who was Costner. It’s pretty self-indulgant to write up an event you organised but I’ve never lacked ego-centricity so here goes. Barely had the dust settled from OWMTBC09, indeed we were still on the ferry home, and Max had been co-opted onto the Organising Committee. A combination of fatigue and beer had him agreeing enthusiastically. And so it began, ending last Sunday in Betws-y-Coed with an impromptu Fireroad Half Wheel Challenge. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Way ahead. In darkest, coldest...

OWMTBC takes place this weekend in North Wales. See a few of you there hopefully, just off to the garage to try and sort a bike to ride. A global celebration of classic mountain bikes in action at OWMTBC 2010. In its second year, the Old World MTB Championship is a weekend dedicated to showing and riding classic mountain bikes with fellow enthusiasts, re-living the spirit of those free spirited early MTB weekends. The OWMTBC was designed to give an outlet to the growing fascination with the birth and early years of mountain biking – with the Retrobike forum in the UK having over 9,000 registered members, it looks like it is more than a minority interest group! The OWMTBC weekend, over 3rd, 4th & 5th September, is all about original...

6-7-8 AUGUST 2010, Pickering Moor, North Yorkshire Moors National Park So here it is - North East &Yorkshire Area Groups flagship event. Our second year promises to big bigger and better in 2010. There are a few innovations and tweaks to make your weekend one to remember this year. Now with RetroBike Classic Event Status we are going to be pulling out all the stops to make this one of the highlights of your year. Click here for more details!

This just in from the nice people at the Brighton Big Dog. For more details of retrobike involvment please click here. It's less than a month away and despite the event selling out in double quick time, they haven't been taking it easy. From fine-tuning the already popular course to getting the youth racing (Little Dog) off the ground, here's a round up of what's been going on over in the Big Dog kennel. Little Dog After last years successful event the Big Dog team wanted to make sure the whole family could get involved in the big day out. Working with the very highly regarded VC Jubilee (http://www.vcjubilee.co.uk) they are putting on The Little Dog in the morning prior to The Big Dog and all Little Dog racers will get the same...