I am but a humble internet influencer.

Just kidding.

The only thing I influence are deez nuts jokes.

Because everyone is currently holidaying out, I'm gonna throw a short one in here for any who might be concerned.

So, I scooted the hell out of dodge to sunnier points south to house sit for my old pal Jeff (the sales guy from Swobo V.1, for any whose memories extend that far) and if my math is correct, this post it going to actually land on Christmas day which means one or two people are going to see it anyway.

I'll preface today's short effort by reminding folks of the days of the Shimano Gravel Alliance. We were a rag-tag group of cyclists who Shimano supported through 2017-2018. I was glad to have been looped in but never in my wildest would have thought I'd still be getting spiffed all these years later.

Lo and behold, in September a brand new 12 speed GRX group landed in my doorstep. Since I was shy one King spline drive (that would take another couple of months to procure), I patiently sat of the boxes.

Fast forward to a few days before I skedaddled, (and as I discussed last week), local Shimano tech honch Aaron Bradford invited me over to his mountainside barn where he did the finer and more complex wrench turning;

Truth be told, I was still a bit traumatized from building this bike out to begin with. Navigating the rat's nest of wires from the shifters through the bars, into the stem, and to points downward and elsewhere was as much as my brain and hands could handle.

The new wireless system is far more simple, or at least that's what Aaron told me. Even still,  I left it to him and within a couple hours I was off to tend to other obligations. 

The following day I packed up my whip and waited for departure day;

Finally after a few hours in the air, and one drawing later;

I landed at LAX;

From there, it was a short 10 mile/one hour commute through the world's most complicated freeway system until I landed at Jeff's place. I built up my bike, and took 'er out for our maiden spin, and at the risk of gushing, Shimano's done it again;

It's sleek, it's elegant, and thus far in our travels together, is absolutely bomb proof.

Initially, I had a 2x system on this bike based on the environment in which the bike was born, but I threw caution to the wind one went with a 1x this time around, and so far I am not sorry one time bit. 

Anyway, it rules, and I can't thank Shimano enough for their continued support.

So having covered all of that, and since we're practically in the butthole of December and everyone is probably doing battle at the mall and/or drunk on the floor with family, I'll pinch it off now.

In closing, how would you like the brand newest episode of Revolting?

Influencing nothing but dick jokes since 2020.