Flint Zeigler’s daughter Scarlet set a Erie Canal time trail several years ago and we featured her video here on The Radavist. Today we’ve got a special Readers’ Rides that Flint wrote about Scarlett’s build, made by a local builder in Pennsylvania named Tony who normally builds “I Am Cook” BMX bikes…
Though I have no idea what time it is, what I am well aware of is how hungry I am. My stomach feels like it is grinding itself together and I am finding the movements my body wants to make are hindered by the lack of nutrients to actually make such movements happen. It’s also difficult to tell the time of day because I’ve been wandering about in a basement with only artificial light since arriving here earlier this morning. It could be noon, but it feels like 11pm. The following day. It becomes apparent that eating isn’t going to happen anytime soon when my host is distracted with yet another side-project.
I drove 2 hours this morning with the intention of watching and documenting my buddy Tony as he constructs a dirt jumper frame for a mutual friend of ours. This is all irrelevant at the moment as Tony has wandered to the back of his basement shop to retrieve another customer’s old bike and new frame that needs the parts swapped over. Tony has decided I need to put my own eyes on the atrocities that the other frame manufacturer calls “dropouts”. I look longingly back at the frame jig that holds the same headtube, bottom bracket shell and un-tacked downtube that it was holding when I got here hours ago.
Tony Cook operates ‘I Am Cook’ bicycles out of Conyngham, PA, from the view of his basement. Tony is a third-generation machinist/welder/builder and his love of speed and racing is just one of the many hand-me-downs that make up his skill and personality. “The Cook Racing legend really began with my great-grandfather. He had a speed shop in Conyngham and sold performance parts to local racers in the 40s and 50s. He was a true craftsman and built cars from scratch. He would form body panels on old tree trunks that he shaped into a forming tool. He made a machine to punch louvers in the hoods for air vents.” The jig that is currently holding the frame I came here to watch come to life is a testament to that same approach, Tony fabricated it himself. “My grandfather, Ben, wasn’t actually much of a craftsman according to my dad; he was a salesman.
He could make money off anything. Ben had an in at Boeing and would go to the sales when they would sell surplus to the public. He used to get all kinds of titanium airplane hardware and figure out what he could turn into race car fasteners and resell them.” Hearing Tony speak about his family, one aspect that reaches me is how the previous generations have passed along the praises of talents and unique abilities of each other, not where they lacked. It resonates with Tony’s “can-do” attitude and his own problem solving. Instead of being focused on the trouble, Tony naturally sees what’s an asset and focuses instead on the challenges.
As if keeping with the unassuming name doesn’t give it away, Tony is very much a Cook. His way of approaching everything is the way his family would have approached it. Hell, if we were going to get religious, I’d say Tony follows a WWCD? mentality, What-Would-the-Cooks-Do? Most of the time, the answer must be “not eat.” “My uncles, Ben and Bill, were twins and they really got the race car bug from my grandfather. They were building their first race car together in their basement before they were even 16. I watched them and my dad in my early childhood make anything they wanted; if you can imagine it, you can make it.”
Tony’s admiration for his family is reflected right back on him when his dad drops by after work. When Jon enters, the basement becomes several lumens brighter and the atmosphere has an energy that feels close to what it’s like getting shocked by an electric fence. He is riveted with Tony and the rapid-fire banter seems to pick up directly from the day before. When I am introduced, I’m met with darting eye contact, a quick wave and possibly a mumble of verbal acknowledgement, then Jon’s attention quickly turns back to Tony.
Or, as Jon calls him, “Tone”. Jon winds into a monologue that ranges in topics from: will Jon will get fired from his job?, a heartwarming story about Tony as a kid, exactly how much of a moron Tony’s one uncle is, gushing over the fit of the seat tube to the bottom bracket shell, the lack of progress on Tony’s Volvo project, had I been told that Tony still uses the milling machine and lathe from Ben Cook Racing?, Jon picks up a chunk of titanium that happens to be lying beside the bench and guessing the weight; all in the matter of a minute or less. The apple doesn’t fall far from this tree. While Jon doesn’t help move us in the direction of getting food, he is one of the most entertaining and likeable people I’ve ever met.
As he leaves, he tells Tony goodbye and that he will see him tomorrow. Jon begins to walk out the basement door but I catch him glance back to see if Tony is watching. With Tony’s back turned, he shoots me a quick look with a devious grin and silently sneaks up behind. He suddenly pinches Tony’s ass and as Tony screams and jumps into the air, Jon’s loveable laughter can be heard resonating through the house as he now sprints out the door.
Tony built his first frame when he was in high school, a steel BMX racing frame that took him to regional Gold Cup finals in 2002 where he won first place in his class. That frame still hangs in the shop, along with other memorable moments in Cook history. “It was 2001 when I made my first frame. I was 16 and I had to do a graduation project for school. I went to the shop and asked my uncles for help. The geometry wasn’t great, the back end was short for a race bike, I might as well have picked the numbers out of a hat. Uncle Billy showed me how to notch all the tubes and we made a headtube. I found a mail order place to get a bottom bracket shell.”
What Tony learned from that experience led to 5 more frames with updated geometry that went to himself, his brother and some friends. Most of what Tony welds up these days is still BMX racing frames (Tony and his wife Erika sponsor and run a racing team) in both 20” and 24” wheel sizes, though the 26” dirt jumper is bringing ‘I Am Cook’ into new territory. The racing frames feature a rear dropout design that Tony created and makes himself, as well as his own seatpost clamp design.
The parts he cannot fabricate in-house , he is dedicated to sourcing from local suppliers as much as possible. The headtube badge (a paw print that gives a nod to the dog Tony remembers running around the family speed shop) is now outsourced to a local manufacturer, yet Tony handmade all the early ones.
I was part of our local BMX track when I first met Tony. My daughter, Scarlet, was racing and we hit it off immediately. The subject of gravel bikes and adventure bikes came up from time to time, but it wasn’t until after Scarlet and I rode the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route in 2022 that I really entertained the idea of how we could be involved in an ‘I Am Cook’ bicycle. Scarlet’s Specialized Sequioa had already been a hand-me-down and it was showing it’s fatigue. We also had several ideas from our years of touring that we thought would make for a perfect bikepacking/touring frame. Those ideas were all welcome challenges from Tony and we began formulating a plan.
We took some numbers from a Specialized AWOL and a Crust Bombora. We wanted a large front triangle and a short rear triangle. Sliding dropouts, fully housed yet internal cable routing and internal dynamo wiring were part of the equation that Tony had to navigate, add to it all that this was his first geared bike. Tire clearance is a huge part of the numbers game on an “all-road touring bike” and we decided to base it around a 650b wheel with enough room for a 2.3” tire while maintaining a traditional non-boost English bottom bracket. Most of the time it sees a 47mm tire, but it’s nice to have the option. Tony hates building forks but felt this called for a matching one and knocked it out of the park with his design. “I have a handful of favorite frames, I don’t know if I could pick one more than the other though. Scarlet’s bike is a huge milestone for me.”
The finished product is a masterclass in detail. Tony did an iridescent clear finish that explodes into a glittering rainbow when sunlight hits it yet, being just a clear coat, still showcases his flawless welds. His proprietary seatpost clamp design became a custom-made taillight mount and allowed for completely internal dynamo wiring. The fork is also fully dedicated to the dynamo with internal wiring, a hollow headlight mount that acts as a wiring guide, a grommeted hole in the steerer tube to route directly back through the top tube and a titanium cap that is bolted to the underside of the steerer tube to hide and protect the wiring. Tony didn’t decide between form or function, he chose both.
‘I Am Cook’ is a singular statement. It could be registered as simply Tony. But I feel this statement claims a broader spectrum than its face value. To be a Cook, you must take on, and accept, the entire family name; the history. Tony seems to be putting the emphasis on the “Cook” part, not the “I am”. To be a Cook, you must be resourceful, patient, meticulous, inventive and imaginative. Tony views himself as a part of a greater tribe that he is proud to belong to and readily accepts in anyone who is in harmony.
Erika sustains many parts of that harmony. “She is the reason our company has any professionalism and legitimacy. She started the LLCs, made sure we have insurance, does all the behind-the-scenes stuff and doesn’t get the glory or recognition. She is amazing. She works so hard, and I have the freedom to be able to be creative.” This kind of partner bond makes sense when I am told the story of how ‘I Am Cook’ was born, “We attended a music festival in 2018 and we were camping by a photographer that had some of his art there. We had a conversation about my old BMX bike I brought to ride around the venue. When he asked me where I got it, I said I made it.
He asked, ‘Like, you put it all together?’ I said I designed and fabricated it myself. He asked me what I did for a living and I told him I was a mechanic at a greenhouse. He said, ‘You don’t sound very enthusiastic, are you happy?’ I replied no. He said, ‘You’re an artist. Quit your job and build bikes.’ I went home so charged up to build a frame and start a company of my own. By December I had a shop in my basement, a new welder and I was going to figure it all out. I never gave up.”
Let’s get back to my hunger. As Tony weaves his way through the finished frames, road bikes, tubing, machinery and parts for builds he has coming up, I am saved by Erika who dropped in on her lunch break. She immediately recognizes that: A.) I got there in the early AM, B.)I am alone with Tony and C.) it’s a guarantee that I wasn’t offered food or even the chance to retrieve food. She heats up pizza and brings it down to us.
My plate is scarfed down the moment it hit my hand. When I left the Cook house late that evening, Tony’s plate still sat untouched. Tony has too many outstanding details to consume to have any need for physical sustenance. His welds are meticulous. The tubing prep is part science and part art. Each piece that makes up a frame is chosen, placed, decided upon, re-examined, placed again, looked at, felt, picked back up, possibly put on the bench, remembered, lost, looked for, bitched at, found, placed once more, examined and finalized. Then, quite possibly if not assured, that piece will repeat this entire process. Through the course of that day till I left, only one other tube (a chainstay) was placed on the frame I came to watch be built.
My time with Tony reminds me of the book, ‘Clapton’s Guitar – Watching Wayne Henderson Build the Perfect Instrument’ in which the author is struck by how unmotivated the luthier seems when given the opportunity to build a guitar for Eric Clapton. What is taken as indifference at first glance is revealed to be precisely the mindset needed to create a timeless work of art. I think of the critic at the art gallery indignantly commenting on a piece of modern art, “I could do that.” For Tony, it’s creating the perfect balance of strength, functionality and art and making it operate as a bicycle.
As Scarlet and I built her ’I Am Cook’ Model 38 in our shop together, I see with my own eyes what lurks behind Tony’s perceived dithering. It’s all in the details.
Build Spec:
- Wheels: 700c: Velocity Blunt SS rims
- Velocity Race rear hub 32h
- Velocity Dynamo front hub 3:h
- 650b: Velocity Aero rims
- Velocity Race rear hub 32h
- Velocity Dynamo front hub 32h
- Tires: Ultradynamico Cava
- Derailleur: Shimano Deore
- Cassette: Shimano Deore 12 speed
- Crankset: White Industries
- Shifter: Gevenalle (friction)
- Pedals: Funn
- Seatpost: Ritchey carbon
- Seat: Brooks
- Stem: Crust
- Bars: Ritchey Venturemax
- Headset: Chris King
We’d like to thank all of you who submitted Readers Rides builds to be shared here at The Radavist. The response has been incredible and we have so many to share over the next few months. Feel free to submit your bike, listing details, components, and other information. You can also include a portrait of yourself with your bike and your Instagram account! Please, shoot landscape-orientation photos, not portrait. Thanks!
