Story of my Junior High School Bike
Part Diary, Part Blog, Part Technical Manual

8/25/2013 - When I was reaquainted with my 1988 Specialized Sirrus back in 2007, that was a pretty cool story that went pretty far back into my youth - but it turns out that was not all. Back in 1982, BMX was a huge part of my life, spending most of my days riding around at the local BMX track. During 7th grade, I had a nice Redline bike that got stolen. God bless my dad, we went to Las Vegas to look at new bicycles when we saw the ultimate in BMX bicycles - the Diamond Back Turbo. It was the factory ride of Harry Leary, complete with black chrome finish, amazing three-piece cranks, a bunch of trick details, and a whopping price tag of $500. I remember reading all about it in my BMX Action magazine review. Somehow I convinced my dad to buy that bike back in 1984.

As I got older, Junior High became High School while priorities and interests changed. Even though I stilled loved the bike dearly, as I got older and grew taller, a 20 inch BMX bike was no longer suitable for me. So as an upper classman in high school, I gave this bike to my cousin Tim and didn't think too much about it anymore. Tim eventually outgrew the bike and got a Specialized Stumpjumper, so he gave the Turbo to his younger cousin in Cerritos. Turns out that cousin ended up having two more siblings, so I imagine all three of them had spent some fun times on the bike. Now in 2013, the youngest of those cousins was in high school, so the bike no longer had any use. So when the aunt and uncle were cleaning up their garage, they came across the Turbo and thought they would ask my parents if they wanted to bike back. My parents said yes.

When I called my dad one evening, he mentioned that the Turbo was coming back home. I was totally surprised and nostalgically happy about it. But then a bunch of troubling thoughts entered my head. What if the bike had been neglected? What if the bike was left outside all these years and was a total rust bucket? What if a lot of the original parts got "upgraded" over the years, leaving just a shell of its former glory? Funny how these thoughts would not gave crossed my mind the day before, but now its cause for serious mental anguish! So on August 17, 2013, my beloved Turbo was brought back to my parent's house. I won't be visiting until October, so I was curious to see what condition the bike was in. I asked my mom to take pictures of the bike with her iPad and a couple days later, she actually figured out how to email a couple pictures to me!

10/18/2013 - Boy was I relieved! For a bike that is 29 years old, that had passed through so many hands, the bike appeared to be in very good condition. The only things that I noticed were different, were new tires, a different saddle (those original suede saddles did not age well), the front brake was removed, and the decals on the fork was gone. Other than that, the frameset, the crankset, the bearclaw pedals, chrome stem, chrome wheels, it was all there. Now I just have to wait until October to bring the bike back home with me. I hope my daughter will be riding this bike in a couple more years, I sure would like that.