Photos of Floyd Beattie

Many of you already know who Floyd Beattie is. He's a speed and distance
unicyclist from the Athens, Ohio area. You can do a google seach using
his name and "unicycle" and probably find out that he still holds some
speed and distance records from the '80's.

There is a grad student where I work who is from Athens. She told me
about seeing Floyd riding around with his wild hair and outfits when she
was a child. She told her parents I was a unicyclist and they talked
about the good old days when one could see Floyd riding around their
area. When they returned to Athens, the parents spent some time looking
Floyd up and, when they finally located him, were surprised that he
drove all the way out to their house to meet them and brought

' THESE PHOTOS ' (http://www.unicyclist.com/gallery/albut75)

and a short note to me with him. I'm not surprised and neither are you.
We've all met lots of unicyclists and we know what they're like. The
photos are excellent 8x10 black and whites. Anyone interested in higher
resolution (I scanned them at 300dpi and made 5Mb files) please let me
know and I will gladly e-mail or somehow transfer the big files to you.


--
harper - Old dog, no tricks

-Greg Harper

B L U E S H I F T

"... is it better to have the seat too high, or too low?" -supertones

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Harper,
Darren and I use to race with Floyd at the Nationals in the late '80's.
He was a fast rider then and loved his distance riding as well as track
racing. I am not sure if he still rides or not. He used to ride with
green and flesh toned cycling outfit. From the back you could only see
the flesh toned lycra and the long hair. From a distance you had to ask
yourself if you where seeing a naked female or not. It was a very eye
catching outfit.


--
Mike Rocks - Vancouver rider

Java Jacket
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Frank A. wrote:
*Those are some cool photos. Do you know if he is still riding?

*


From the note he sent me I gathered that he is unable to travel to
conventions. I am not sure whether he still rides or not.


--
harper - Old dog, no tricks

-Greg Harper

B L U E S H I F T

"... is it better to have the seat too high, or too low?" -supertones

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Mike Rocks wrote:
*From a distance you had to ask yourself if you where seeing a naked
female or not. It was a very eye catching outfit. *


What exactly were you looking for, Mike? This scares me. I've ridden
with you behind me before.


--
harper - Old dog, no tricks

-Greg Harper

B L U E S H I F T

"... is it better to have the seat too high, or too low?" -supertones

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That is one hairy man (check out the pic with his shirt off...)


--
paco - Proud owner of 2 opposable thumbs

"The guy wouldn't know majesty if it came up and bit him in the face!"
-Strongbad
"That happened once!"
-Coach Z
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Hey Greg,

I can’t tell you how surprised I was when I looked at this post. I’ve
read, and heard lots about this guy over the years. It is funny how
things eventually show up. Good job Greg! He is truly a pioneer of
speed and distance unicycling. If there was ever a book written about
the history of S&D unicyling, this guy would be the majority of it. One
tuff guy!

Tom Miller told me many years ago about the tenacity of this guy. He
held the 100 mile distance record before the 6 hour 15 min was posted.
He was also known to take off for days and ride 500 plus miles.

Thanks for the post and PLEASE send me a high res pic of him on that big
wheel. You have my work email address.

dan


--
dan
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Floyd Beattie...

Wow, this brings back memories of a great guy.

I have lots of pictures of him from the mid 1980's
I will get them scanned and post them here.

He raced in Bowling Green Ohio in 1986 with toe clips on his pedals !
He was fast, lapped others.

I remember the outfit that made him look naked !
lol

Mike Rocks, John Foss, Dustin Kelm, Andy and Connie Cotter, Ken Fuchs
and Sem and Teresa are unicyclists that are still riding these days that
come to mind who all rode with him back then.

Tom Miller (The Unicycle Factory) replaced Floyd's
big wheel rubber often as Floyd rode on gravel roads long distances
daily.


Great to hear his name again... a blast from the past!

Cheers,
Darren


--
Darren
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On Sat, 20 Dec 2003 02:40:54 -0600, harper
wrote:

What exactly were you looking for, Mike? This scares me. I've ridden
with you behind me before.

This coming from the man who let 'that photo' in the open.

Klaas Bil - Newsgroup Addict
--
"Friends don't let friends drop to flat - Kris Holm, discussing large drops to flat ground."

Klaas Bil wrote:
*
This coming from the man who let 'that photo' in the open.
*


Not 'that photo', \"THE PHOTO\"!!


--
harper - Old dog, no tricks

-Greg Harper

B L U E S H I F T

"... is it better to have the seat too high, or too low?" -supertones

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Floyd Beattie's track unicycle:
http://www.unicycling.com/garage/special.htm
Third one down the page, with the disk wheel. Here's the caption:

"At left is a disk-wheeled racer, built and ridden by Floyd Beattie of
Ohio. Floyd was into aerodynamics and wore a full skinsuit and an aero
helmet, but his giant beard kind of canceled it all out. The usefulness
of a disk wheel is debatable, due to the natural wobble that occurs when
pedaling at high speeds. It also makes the unicycle difficult to ride in
a crosswind."

That picture was taken at UNICON II in 1986. Note also the full
toeclips!

Last, notice the person in the background, wearing the yellow shirt.
That's Carol Bricker (Carol Bahorich then), the host of the
recently-announced NAUCC 2004 in Salt Lake City. That year she won the
women's artistic title, and possibly also the world racing title!

Floyd Beattie had a previous 100 mile world record, set an "official"
top speed record at an IHPVA event at Indianapolis (about 22 mph), and
established a modern hour record for unicycles, at something just under
14 miles. Hard-charging accomplishments for the hardware of the day!


--
johnfoss - IUF Director

John Foss, the Uni-Cyclone
"jfoss" at "unicycling.com"
www.unicycling.com

"I ain't goin' to no mall." — my nephew Austin Miller, on being invited
to join his sister and mom at the mall on Saturday Dec. 13

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