The SkiBike Shop

1979 saw the launch of BRITON Engineering Developments, but the story begins 10 years earlier.
When British winters were reliable for heavy snowfall, enthusiastic engineer Brian Thomas combined his two main passions, skiing and engineering. The goal was to get the most out of the seasonal snow. After various experiments he created the perfect solution, the BRITON Portable Ski Lift. It was an instant success and used Worldwide including the French and Japanese Winter Olympics in ‘92 and ‘98.

Ski lifts remained the sole objective of the company and when synthetic slopes started using the Portable, BRITON saw a new opportunity, leading to the invention of the QueueDodger in 1981 and the BritonButton in 1985. Both lifts are still widely used.

The company’s dedication to innovation was acknowledged in 1984 when Doppelmayr appointed them sole UK Agent, a position still proudly held with the world’s leading ropeway manufacturer.

BRITON increased its involvement with synthetic slopes as UK winters became less reliable for snow. The invention of BritonMist, the remarkable slope lubrication system was heralded by the industry as “The Biggest Advance in the Dry Slope Industry for 25 Years”.

The company went from strength to strength as it rounded off the decade with a key role in building Nevis Range, the UK’s newest mountain resort. This was a great recognition of the skills and expertise the company held.

1990 saw BRITON turn its attention back to the synthetic slope market. Seeing a chance to improve on current slope styles BRITON seized the opportunity to expand its design and build packages to create more exciting slopes..

This move was rewarded with the 6000m2 Søhøjlandet Snowsports center contract in Denmark and included the creation of features such as moguls, jumps and a half pipe previously seen only on mountain snow. The project was another great success, although injury rates highlighted the problems with outdated surfaces. BRITON could see that urban snowsports were still far from their potential; the challenge to improve the industry was too tempting to resist.

In 1996 after several years of intense development, encouraged by two UK Department of Trade and Industry awards, the revolutionary snowsports surface Snowflex® was launched transforming the possibilities of synthetic slopes.

When interviewed about Snowflex®, John Shedden, Director of Coaching for the English Ski Council said;

“…for the first time we have a safe, clean surface that people will come back to time and time again.”

Tired of the painful products manufactured as a sideline by the brush, plastic and carpet industries, BRITON had engineered Snowflex® on a clean sheet basis. This achieved the key criteria of producing a cost-effective, high quality urban snowsports experience.

Another recent internet discovery, the amazing fat snow bikes:

Fatbikes.com was really born in February of 2004 at the Susitna 100 winter endurance race in Alaska. Pushing their "fat bikes" equipped with uber-wide 44mm Snowcat rims through the night, Bill Fleming and Jamey Stull forged a friendship that ultimately resulted in the founding of Chain Reaction Cycles in Anchorage, Alaska. Taking their passion for winter cycling to the next level, they developed and produced the first aluminum fat bike, the 9:ZERO:7, named after the area code of Alaska. After selling their frames far and wide around the globe, it occurred to them that maybe a website devoted to fat bike afficianodos might assist in sharing their passion with others. And Fatbikes.com was born...

Anyone who SkiBikes is bound to be a bit weird, so it will come as no surprise when I confess another dark secret....I don't have a TV, I got rid of mine in 2003 after I got a BroadBand Internet connection. The idea of having to wait for someone to broadcast a programme you wanted to watch just seemed so last century.
And don't even start me off on the whole TV licence and viewing subscription issues!

I digress, I recently came across the BlinkBox website, where you will find a selection of both; free to view and chargeable films and television series, all available to watch on-line. The quality is good and there is very little buffering or glitching. You can find out more about BlinkBox here

One of their freebies is the excellent Freeze-Sports series, "A full-on winter sports series taking in freestyle boarders and heli-skiers; from Himalayan hot spots to the coolest ski destinations in India."

Here's what one reviewer had to say:

I don’t really watch much extreme sports but I felt this show was nice and refreshing. The whole programme is shot to perfection and the perfect soundtrack adds to the atmosphere of winter sports. There are plenty of slow-mo shots, making sure that the audience captures every detail of the stunt and it is something that you don’t complain about. You just wonder how they do it and you find yourself taking your hat off to the people who do this for a living. It would be nice if there were some commentaries or interviews with some of the boarders and skiers but that is just a minor thing and nothing to fuss about. Like I said before, the perfect soundtrack takes care of that and it suits the content.

Freeze-Sport - hurry up winter!

A recently released government video featured Mayor Arturas Zuokas gleefully driving an armoured vehicle over a Mercedes that was illegally parked, in a stunt to act as a warning to negligent drivers. During the video, the Mayor is heard saying: "What should the city do about drivers who think that they are above the law? It seems a tank is the best solution."
The Mercedes was specially bought for the video. Afterwards, the Mayor is seen ticking off the 'owner', then getting on his bicycle and riding into the distance. The cycle-enthusiast's Rambo-style tactics were received well - he is already popular with residents and is known for installing cycle lanes during his first term.
"Mayor Zuokas wanted his message to be loud and clear that the city will not tolerate brazen and disrespectful behaviour by drivers who disobey parking rules," said his spokeswoman, Irma Juskenaite.

Cycling generates nearly £3bn a year for the UK economy, a report by the London School of Economics has found.
The figure takes into account factors such as bicycle manufacturing, retail and cycle-related employment.
The report says £51m was raised for UK manufacturers from the 3.7 million cycles sold in 2010 - a rise of 28% on the number of cycles sold in 2009
More than a million people also started cycling last year, bringing the total number of cyclists to 13 million.
Last year more than £1.5bn was spent on bikes and another £850m on accessories, with the LSE estimating that the cycling industry is now worth some £2.9bn a year.
There are now 23,000 people working in cycling, contributing more than £600m to the economy in wages and taxes.
The report also says rising fuel costs, improved cycle networks, concern for the environment, and the pull of the Olympics are all possible factors for the increase in popularity for cycling. Read more here