Who’s ready for some local industry news?

Here are the latest tidbits we’ve come across from Portland’s ever-changing bike business landscape.
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Mautner teaching a class.
(Photos courtesy Jackie Mautner)

This post is part of our Women’s Bike Month interview series written by Steph Routh and sponsored by the Community Cycling Center and Gladys Bikes.

If you have found yourself on or even near a bike polo court, chances are you’ve met Jackie Mautner. She has graced bike polo courts and on both coasts when not cultivating some serious acumen as a bicycle mechanic. Her most recent challenges have been framebuilding and cyclocross.

Jackie and I sat down at Tiny’s Cafe in inner northeast Portland for a quick interview last week…

How did you get involved in biking?
Aside from biking as a kid, I started commuting when I went to college in New York City at Cooper Union.

Shortly after I started biking regularly, I came across bike polo totally by chance. The court in NYC is right off a main bike artery, and I would ride by on Sundays. I would see them swinging mallets. I got curious about what they were doing, because they were on bikes. I started watching, and this person who’s been playing since almost the time that bike polo started in NYC — he’s almost 70 years old now — invited me to play. For someone his age, he’s not the fastest on the court and gets heckled, but he puts up with it. I thought if he could put up with the heckling, I could, too.
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