We found this love-ly shot via ARTCRANK’s Facebook Page, and felt compelled to share it for two reasons. 1. It’s beautifully, subtly and undeniably bike-themed. And 2., Its message is what this holiday season is all about: Love.
From all of us at Osprey; Cheers to a brand-new year that’s filled with as much love as possible.
Back in October, we wrote about an incredible new bicycle that’s made entirely out of cardboard. Now we’re back to show you the newest in cardboard creations: a helmet that’s designed with a corrugated cardboard interior that mimics the corrugated cartilage standing between a woodpecker’s impact-heavy beak and its precious skull.
The new “Kranium” helmet is crafted with cardboard in such a way that, according to NPR, a whopping “90 percent” of its liner is actually air. Specifically, the helmet is uniquely designed by “incorporating a network of honeycomb-shaped corrugated cells” that would safely dissipate the energy of a blow to the head.
We’re excited to see new innovations hitting the bicycle and bicycle helmet market, which are changing the way we see transportation and the safety that’s necessarily involved in it. What’s more, we’re hoping that inventions such as these spark people’s interest in riding bikes, regardless of what they’re made out of.
Active Lifestyle, Advocacy, Bikes Around the World, Ditch Your Car, Health, Travel, Video
‘Tis the season to be jolly and to listen to caroling favorites. The only problem is: playing those tunes on repeat has the potential to drive even the most spirited singer to want to jingle all the way home. Fortunately, we’ve found something that’s not only brand-sparkling-new — it’s bike-themed, too!
This new holiday tune, aptly named Big Red Bicycle, comes to you via Nora and One Left, who’s all about “music, bikes, seeing what’s over the next hill.”
Cheers to a safe, happy and healthy holiday season full of love, laughter and, of course, bikes!
Osprey was introduced to 88Bikes when we first entered the bike industry with our Osprey Hydraulics™ line of hydration packs. Their model is simple yet incredibly powerful: provide bikes — often the first — to young people living in challenging environments across the planet. In places like Cambodia, Uganda and Peru the addition of a bicycle to a young person’s life almost always is a life-changing event.
It’s undeniably the season of giving, which can equate to added stress over finding the right thing to give the ones you love. The good news is, if you want to embrace the spirit of the season and gift up something meaningful, it’s easy. Through the non-profit 88bikes, you can donate a bike to a child in the name of your special someone and know that you’re quite simply helping to pedal change on a global level.
Want a little more background? Here’s how 88bikes gift-giving works, directly via the non-profit’s site itself:
Bike contributions are $88 each, which will be used to purchase one bike for one child for the project. Your name will be added to the website, and we ask that you send a photo of yourself to us by email so that we can print it out and give it to the child who receives your bike. We’ll take a picture of the child holding your photo, with her new bike, and send this back to you. 88bikes is a registered 501(c)3 non-profit organization, and your donations are fully tax deductable. 88bikes does not maintain a staff or an office, so that 100% of your contributions go towards our projects.
You can choose to donate a specific dollar amount, one bike or multiple bikes by going here. You can even print your own gift certificate to personalize and wrap up for the holidays yourself. However you choose to donate, 100 percent of your donation goes to the cause. What’s more, “Each child is given his or her bike in person by the founders or an 88bikes volunteer, on behalf of the individual Sponsor who donated the bike. The child is also given a postcard with a photo of their Sponsor and a world map, indicating the Sponsor’s hometown. Photos and film of the project are made available to the Sponsors, and each Sponsor receives a thank-you letter with a photo of the child who received their bike.”
Adventure, Advocacy, Bikes Around the World, Non-profits, Pedaling Change
Osprey sponsored mountain bike racers Jake and Nye Yackle show us their skills and awesome attitude toward getting away from the video games and enjoying the outdoors.
It’s that time of year again: National Geographic Adventure has nominated ten individuals to stand in the running for 2013 People’s Choice Adventurer of the Year. This year in particular, we’re incredibly proud to announce that the outstanding Shannon Galpin of Mountain2Mountain is one of the Adventurer of the Year nominees — and you can vote for her now!
M2M, which Shannon founded in 2006, “believes in the power of voice as a catalyst for social action,” and has touched the lives of many since its inception. In its latest project, Streets of Afghanistan, M2M utilizes the power of photography as the voice of change.
In 2009, Shannon became the first woman to bike in Afghanistan, challenging societal norms and gender perceptions in that part of the world. In general, Shannon’s work has seriously highlighted the significance of perpetuating equality for women and girls in conflict regions, and will continue to impact generations to come.
For good reason, Shannon is nominated as Humanitarian of the year. Via Nat Geo Adventure:
The 38-year-old has braved some of the most violent periods in Afghanistan—a country considered by many humanitarian agencies to be the worst place in the world to be a woman—to work on women’s education and health. She fostered midwife training to combat infant and maternal mortality in the Panjshir Province. In Kabul and Kandahar, she helped develop reading programs for the daughters of women in prisons, some of whom were jailed for adultery after they were raped or for escaping arranged marriages.
She has used her bicycle as an icebreaker with village elders in remote mountain villages, and in a particularly bold fundraising act, she’s mountain biked 140 miles across the Panjshir Valley. In Afghanistan, women cannot ride bikes because of laws and social customs, a fact that Galpin believes has hindered women’s education by preventing them from being able to independently travel to school. As a foreign woman, Galpin was able to cross this boundary and turn it into a conversation starter.
Women’s rights are personal for Galpin. At 19, she survived being raped and knifed while coming home from work in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
“I couldn’t think of anything worse beyond what had happened than being labeled a victim,” says Galpin. “I was petrified that I would be viewed that way and would have to wear that label for the rest of my life.”
Want to vote for Shannon Galpin? Go here to do so through mid-January.
Active Lifestyle, Adventure, Advocacy, Bikes Around the World, Events, International, Non-profits, Osprey Life, Pedaling Change, Photos, The Cycling Buzz
It’s that time of year again; pumpkins and apple pies and costumes abound. In light of the oncoming Halloween holiday, and for the sake of honoring it in an environmentally-conscious and bike-related way, we thought it’d be nothing short of perfect to show you what one amazing designer can do with a ton of old bike tubes.
The photo at the top of this post caught our attention on Klean Kanteen’s Facebook page, and took us to Ecotuerre, where we quickly learned more about what we were looking at. The costume above is a modern rendition of a Joan of Arc Suit of Armor, fashioned with a papier-maché bodice covered by woven inner bike tubes.
We’re betting this isn’t something just anyone could make as a costume at home, but it got us thinking: What kinds of things could you make with old bike tubes? Let us know in the comments section below!
Found on Klean Kanteen’s Facebook Page
Imagine a bike that costs $20; is made entirely out of cardboard; is waterproof and fireproof; and that is as strong as any bike you’d want to ride. Now, watch the above video and see it.
According to a Reuters article, 50-ear-old Izhar Gafni is the man behind this brand-new bike, which is now in line to begin undergoing mass production in just a few months. Of course, it took Gafni a year and a half of testing, trial and error to create the prototype we see today. From the article:
“‘When we started, a year and a half or two years ago, people laughed at us, but now we are getting at least a dozen e-mails every day asking where they can buy such a bicycle, so this really makes me hopeful that we will succeed,” he said.”
What do you think of the cardboard bike? Would you buy one and, more significantly, ride it? Let us know what you think!
Castle Valley Overlook on Upper Porcupine Singletrack
It has been a very busy but extremely productive event season for the Osprey Packs bike crew. We spent much of the summer traveling thousands of miles in our Sprinter van to attend bike events throughout the country and provide attendees with the opportunity to browse and demo Osprey cycling packs. This past weekend our event season came to a close with one of our favorite events. Outerbike takes place in Moab, Utah, just over 100 miles from Osprey world headquarters in Cortez, Colorado.
Outerbike is one of our favorites for many reasons; the spectacular location in Moab, the awesome team at Western Spirit that organizes the event, the amazing participants from around the world, and the opportunity to get some end of the season rides in before snow starts flying. This year marked the third annual happening of Outerbike and it was the best yet. Temperatures were in the 70s with sunny skies and light breezes each day, which provided absolutely perfect riding conditions. There were plenty of demo bikes to keep participants busy on the trails and out of lines awaiting a ride. Osprey had a very successful event, sending out a record amount of demo packs and raising funds for the Moab Trail Mix. Moab Trail Mix has been responsible for most of the new trails that have sprouted up over the past couple of years and reviving Moab as the mountain bike mecca. Extensive new trail systems such as the Bar-M network, the Klondike Trails network, Magnificent 7 and Pipe Dream are well worth a trip to Moab if you haven’t been recently.
The 2013 line up of packs in the Osprey cycling line were very well received by all. This is great news for us as the participants of Outerbike are dedicated cycling enthusiasts and their feedback means a lot to us. With the largest concentration of customer interactions coming first thing in the day and repeating at the end of the day, we were fortunate enough to get a few spins around the local trails ourselves. Here are a few pictures from a fabulous weekend:
Our friends over at 5 Gyres are always doing amazing things. Most recently they’ve embarked on The Last Straw Plastic Pollution Solutions Outreach Tour — a trip that will take 5 Gyres staff 1400 miles by bike down the East Coast in an effort to educate more than 50,000 people about what they’ve discovered in their voyages to our world’s oceans and lakes. You can follow the tour and find specific event dates and locations via the 5 Gyres Facebook page and its Blog. What’s more, you can pledge one cent per mile to support the tour and even take part in the 5 Gyres I Am The Sea Change challenge and win prizes for doing so.
Have 5 minutes? Take the challenge!:
To enter, follow the instructions on the flyer pictured above. That is: 1. Print the flyer out. 2. Spend at the very least 5 minutes cleaning up your environment (street, gutter, riverbank, beach). 3. Have someone take a picture of you holding your sign and your garbage up for all to see. 4. Like 5 Gyres on Facebook and share the contest link (encouraging friends and family to do so as well!) 5. Email your photo to betheseachange@5gyres.org with the subject ’5 for 5 Gyres’.
Do the above and you could not only win some awesome prizes, but help 5 Gyres and the cause to clean up our environment immensely. The contest runs from October 3rd through November 6th.
Advocacy, Contest, Events, Non-profits, Pedaling Change, Travel
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