Wowzers. NAHBS was absolutely amazing today. I spent pretty much the whole day walking around, chatting with tons of people, and pretty much trying not to drool on too many bikes.

If you want to cut right to the chase, check out the gallery on picasa web albums that I put together. There are captions on a lot of them, so make sure you read along as well.

The cool thing about NAHBS is that it’s just as much art show as it is bike show. Sure, there were some really innovative mechanisms, gadgets, features, or accessories. There have to be those things. But, more than that, there were just a whole lot of over the top bikes.

I’ll let you all scroll through the pics, but there were a couple of highlights that I think need some additional attention.

First off is the new rear triangle singlespeed/travel system from black sheep. The top of the seat stays bolt to the frame, allowing them to either come off or pivot, and then there are either a set of pinch bolts or set screws just behind the BB on the chainstays. This allows the chanstays to change length to work with a SS drivetrain, and for the rear triangle to pull completely off for packing. Here’s a pic of Jake Kirkpatrick’s new bike with that system.

From NAHBS 2009

Speaking of rear triangles, there were a lot of belt drives this year, and I didn’t see a single one with the spot removable dropout to get the belt off. There was everything from mini S&S couplers to just using the existing bolts on a carbon rear end to get it on and off.

I’m also not sure how it was in years past, but this year I saw an abundance of commuter-style bikes, complete with jaw-dropping custom racks. Here was one of my favorites from shamrock cycles. By the way, he is headquartered 15 minutes away from the show, and therefore provided me with some homebrew from the huge stash at the booth while I oogled his creations. He said it was only fair that he brought beer because he had a super-easy commute to get there.

From NAHBS 2009

Have you heard of Bilenky? If not, shame on you. I hadn’t, and my eyes are now open. Wow. Pieces of art. Love this (I think) xtracycle-compatible cargo bike. The back has a pretty cool drive system to minimize long-chain-related complications and you can even completely disassemble the back part of the bike (rack off, and back off with some S&S couplers).

From NAHBS 2009

Finally, what would the show be without some over-the-top artistic steeds. The first one is from Naked Bikes. It’s a custom full-suspension bike which you could, literally, spend hours looking at all the details on it. Make sure you check out the gallery for some peeks at all the little touches on this bike.

From NAHBS 2009

And finally, check out the custom job that Keith anderson did for his sons. I didn’t get the greatest pictures of it, but it was absolutely amazing. Custom wood fenders, non-adjustable seat height, even a carbon fiber spoke card permanently mounted. Again, check out the gallery for some close ups.

From NAHBS 2009

There’s a ton more at the show, and I just don’t have the energy at this point to write any more, but I did add captions to around 95% of the 152 pictures in the gallery, so take the time to click through and enjoy. I’m spending tomorrow with the fam, but may be back up there on sunday, so if you want any more details on anything or need some more pictures for your fix, let me know, and I’ll see what I can do.

Enjoy.