April Fool’s…

Yes, today is April 1. Yesterday was March 31. I didn’t even think about today being April Fool’s Day until a few jokes started popping up on the internet yesterday. The bike industry, it seems, is rife with jokers. Some are okay. Some fail. Some are brilliant.

In the failed category, I submit Commute By Bike’s “Exclusive First Look: The Swobo Andale.” First of all, derailleurs on a Swobo bike? I think not. Second, all of Swobo’s bikes are named after streets in San Francisco. I could be wrong, but I can’t find Andale St, Rd, Ln, Blvd… And it showed up well after other April Fool’s Day. You have to be quick and first to pull the wool over most folks eyes. Fool me once…

In the okay category is Dave Moulton’s “A new cycling hazard.” Okay, because I really like to read Dave’s blog. He’s got that gift of writing that makes him easy to read and understand. And his topic choices are also very good. Something that is all to often lacking.

In the brilliant category (brilliant because I believed the product was true – not the actual claim). Some things are just so out there that there has to be some truth to it. Yesterday (cyclingnews.com is posted from Australia, so yesterday was today, thanks to the international date line), cyclingnews.com posted the Jacobsen Carbon Wrap-It System. Now, there really are aluminum parts that are wrapped with carbon – bars, stems, cranks, hubshells, so why not a frame. In the cases of the components, the carbon wrap is for looks only, but in Ritchey’s WCS stem it is structural and the carbon is applied under pressure to really make the stem lighter and stiffer. When reading about the wrap-it system, I kept thinking that there was going to be some sort of vacuum bag that the frame fits into that pressure forms the carbon to the frame, but it didn’t appear. Well, that’s just one big sticker, then. How’d they give them 4 1/2 jersies?

It wasn’t until I read the purported buy-out of Specialized by GM that I realized that the Wrap-It system was an April Fool’s joke – good one! If you have been to any Interbike and patrolled the aisles on the fringes and saw all the kooky concepts, you could fall for the Wrap-It system too.

The Specialized/GM prank was also in the brilliant category. The folks behind that one must have been thinking about that one for quite a while. There was a lot of resources committed to pulling it off. That one pulled folks in hook, line, and sinker. The brilliant aspect of it was having a UK site publish it first at 12:02 a.m. April 1, UK time. That meant those of us in the US got it on a very unsuspecting March 31.

I’m with Guitar Ted, though, when it comes to April Fool’s jokes. With this here internet thing, information is disseminated at light speed. Stories spread like wild fire. Falsities are truths. If you read it on the internet, it must be true. I’m also gullible and don’t immediately think someone is trying to fool me.

(What’s playing: KWMR’s West Marin Report)