Landlords Cycling Sport Group returns with a new kit and team for 2019. A secret society of like minded individuals that exist inside the constraints of a generally monotone sport culture takes to the streets, trails and race courses once again. A team bound by a common mentality.
The shattered glass of the new Landlords kit is a graphic talisman to protect against the ever increasing dangers we face every day. It represents our fallen riders and the trauma that collectively weighs on us. As the popularity of cycling increases so do the threats we face from an apathetic and disassociated self important urban population. Centered in the cities of the US our team has a spectre of death and injury floating over it.
The kit was inspired by a number of unpunished local cycling deaths in the spring and summer of 2018. Members of our community were run down in the street. There is no collective healing for these painful losses. Ghost bikes dot our city streets. The general population is at best apathetic and at worst hostile to the community. The police don’t care, politicians don’t care.
“There’s no justice, it’s just us.”
At points riding a road bike in the city feels like going out to fight. For lack of a better term it’s hardcore, it’s punk, it’s danger. At it’s safest it’s a clandestine individual activity, done early in the morning, when the streets are empty, before the monster of society begins feeding. At it’s most dangerous it’s attempting to ride in the machine at rush hour with the rusty gears trying to crush us. Laughing in the face of death.
GS Landlords is for all of it. It’s for pushing yourself physically and mentally. It’s for racing. It’s for being alive and wearing the marks on our body. It’s for remembrance and celebration of those no longer with us. The shattered glass of the car windshield, the shattered glass of our souls, the damage done mentally and physically. Our final pure expression.
We must embrace what we can not change and ride together as a collective force. There is a message behind the kit-we will stay alive. At points we are shattered, but we are not broken. We will continue. We will not give in. Cycling is an act of letting go and feeling release. Dropping the ego and the guilt of survivorship. It is a true test of the mental and the physical being. We experience a freedom few know or care to know.
Landlords represents the unsung heroes of the street. The riders who have been there for generations, not for a paycheck or to see their name in print. The ones who have watched trends come and go and the ones who are no longer breathing. This is our way, this our life.
This kit is to be worn as an act of defiance, it is a message. We are here still, we ride for our own personal glory, we ride through the pain, we ride through the loss. We ride for release and for joy. While others give up on the fight we will persist. Each breath into burning lungs, each pedal stroke, each heart beat, every descent, every climb, every rush. The yin and yang of fighting and accepting gravity.
We are the Landlords, we own these streets.
Our inner most anger and fear is released through riding. Our happiness and joy is amplified. Our zen moment of clarity is attained through our physical expression. The message for those who want us gone, the ones who fall into rage at our very existence, we will not stop.
VISIT :
https://squareup.com/store/santini-usa/item/fractured-glass-jersey-pre-order
https://squareup.com/store/santini-usa/item/fractured-glass-bib-shorts
HERE
Kit being offered at team prices now. Retail will be available late spring at shop price.
Pre-order will be open for one more month.
We will hold our bi-annual competitive team fundraiser soon.
