Ride Along The Oregon Manifest Design Challenge

Dan Kaufman brings out the Disco Trike to cover the Oregon Manifest Bicycle Designers Challenge field test . The challenge http://oregonmanifest.com/challenge/ is to find the "ultimate utility bike for modern living".

This 50-mile course and judging offered car free paths, country roads, off road, hills, highways and lunch in between. Pereira Cycles electric assist offered a huge advantage on the 20-mile hill section (even though it wasn't a race). That and all the other features impressed the judges enough to give Pereira Cycles best in show for the second year in a row. (Check out this closer look Dan shot Friday http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUsOats7D7k

There is quite a bit of controversy surrounding the win, the course, and the criteria, as usual. Check out this BikePortland.org post on the subject http://bikeportland.org/2011/09/24/tony-pereira-takes-top-prize-at-oregon-man...

Are electric assist bicycles the wave of the future? They have not seemed to catch on yet. Is this the direction builders and enthusiasts want the design challenge to go? Will there need to be separate categories created?

The 2011 Oregon Manifest was much more than electric assists and Pereira, though. There were incredible designs in all categories of bikes and almost every builder and rider will tell you they had a great time and learned a lot.

BUT there was only one DIsco Trike and Dan rode the hell out of it (except for the 20-mile uphill section) and there is much more footage that will likely be making into other projects in the near future - even at 12+ minutes we couldn't fit it all in.

A big thank you to all the people and businesses that made the Oregon Manifest happen.

A very special thank you to http://www.CrankMyChain.com sponsor BIke N' Hike http://bikenhike.com/ - be sure to check out there full line of GoPro cameras and accessories as seen in this video.

Music by Aidan Kaufman
Copyright 2011 PDXK Productions http://www.pdxk.com

Category:

Autos & Vehicles

Tags:

• oregon
• manifest
• tony
• pereira
• ira
• ryan
• custom
• bicycle
• frame
• builders
• bike
• portland
• design
• designers
• challenge
• electric
• assist
• cycle
• crankmychain
• dan
• kaufman