After the whirlwind that was the MADE Bike Show and the Builder Bikepacking trip, my time in the States was finally coming to an end. Since the last two days happened to fall on the weekend, Keita and I decided to make the most of our final days by heading out from our Airbnb in Portland and pedaling toward Forest Park for one last ride.
We were headed to his place.
That's right, we headed over to the home of Patrick from ULTRADYNAMICO, who you might remember visited Circles back in June. He’d told us to be sure to stop by whenever we were in Portland, so we were finally making that visit a reality.
Patrick lives in a place with instant access to Forest Park. His home is up a somewhat steep hill from downtown, and it is a truly wonderful house—the kind of impressive structure you’d expect to see in a magazine like *Casa Brutus*.
The latte he prepared for us as soon as we arrived really hit the spot. After he showed us his bike garage and yard, we were ready to get going and hit the trails.
I’m truly envious of the fact that he can access Forest Park with just a 5–10 minute bike ride. Even Chris King, where the SimWorks USA office is located, is in an industrial area relatively close to Forest Park, which is part of the appeal—being able to head out for a quick after-work ride during the long summer days.
Forest Park has countless trails zoned for different activities like hiking and cycling, so you can mix and match various trails to build a ride that fits the time you have and your desired difficulty level. For this trip, we decided to take it easy and go for a quick morning ride, and Patrick guided us through a great route. That first climb once we hit the trail was brutal, though (lol).
The reward for our climb was some prime downhill, and Patrick was riding aggressively. He was descending with such speed you’d never guess he was on a rim-brake bike.
Patrick’s way of enjoying Portland is to ride in the park all summer long, and then, because there’s too much rain to ride during the winter, he stays active by running through Forest Park instead.
Hearing how he comes up with his tire concepts during these daily rides and runs really made sense. For instance, the first ULTRADYNAMICO tire, the Rose, was mainly Ron’s (a.k.a. UltraRomance) idea, while the Cava was Patrick’s. The newest one, the Mars, is a tread pattern born from combining both their ideas. It really hit home for me that the magic of ULTRADYNAMICO lies in the fact that their different locations—Ron in Connecticut and Patrick in Portland—allow each of their unique ideas to take shape.
Riding through the dappled sunlight of Forest Park was simply the best. It was the perfect ride to wrap up this trip.
And finally, here’s a bike check of Patrick’s setup.
Patrick, who often rides a gravel bike (or as he calls them, a fat-tire drop-bar bike) when heading to Forest Park, rides a Crust Romanceur. He runs 27.5×2.25″ tires front and rear—their signature combo of a Mars on the front for extra traction and a Cava on the rear for smooth rolling.
It makes me happy to see that he still cherishes the now-discontinued SimWorks So Bar. He’s tried all sorts of things, but he says the flare on these is just perfect.
The build is clean, featuring mostly Campagnolo, but there are little details, like the Deore rear hub, that show off his inner bike nerd. Speaking of, Patrick is obsessed with Shimano’s PD-A600 gravel pedals (also sadly discontinued). He swears by them, praising their lightness, the size of the platform, and how the outer cage makes just the right amount of contact with the sole even when clipped in. In fact, since we had the chance to meet with the folks from Shimano when he visited Japan recently, he made sure to tell them personally!
It was so nice to ride with you Patrick!
Thanks for showing us around, Patrick!
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