Mateo's AZ Gunslinger

As with many of the bikes I build this one started as a concept to address the riders needs and then evolved quickly into a personality all its own.  This bike will no doubt spend much of its life along the Arizona Trail as its rider is the director of the AZT Association.  He's a charger and has broken plenty of bikes as a result.  Our conversation led me once again to how bikes (production ones anyway) aren't really built for Arizona and everyone underestimates how demanding the terrain is on bikes.  To this Mateo says "Yeah!, You don't bring a knife to a gun fight."

The color is equally worth mentioning.  Mateo described to me a color somewhere between coffee, porter, and chocolate.  A trip to the powder coaters turned up a color just acquired but never shot.....Dark Roast.  It was a go.  Its a textured matte brown with lighter brown flakes buried within, just like ground coffee.  Brown really is a great color for bikes folks.  It looks right at home under a layer of Flagstaff moon dust and I'm sure will be equally comfortable under mud or what ever other configuration of dirt you want to add.  Its also a pretty close match to patinated iron in the desert or even carsonite trail markers.

As always,  thank you Mateo for the cool project and enjoy your new bike!