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Welcome to A&R 2.0

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If you are reading this, it should be fairly obvious that Asphalt & Rubber has undergone a bit of an upgrade.

This redesign has been a long time coming, but we finally gave the old girl a sprucing up, just in time for her 10th birthday, which will be in October this year.

I won’t bore you with the technical and editorial advantages that A&R 2.0 brings us, though there are many, but from a reader’s standpoint there are a few things we want to highlight:

  • Loads faster
  • More stories on the front page
  • Better category browsing
  • Mobile and tablet friendly
  • Photo galleries actually work (check it out at the end of this post)
  • New storytelling formats
  • Rich media friendly (videos, podcasts, etc)
  • Way more cowbell

The full transition to the new layout and site will take a few more days to complete, so pardon our dust while we work. The basics should all be ready for you at this point though: reading stories, navigating categories, and commenting.

Our A&R Pro readers have been taking the new site for a spin this last month, and we have gotten a great deal of feedback from them and are already making those changes to the site.

Now that it is live for everyone, feel free to kick the tires on the new design and leave us your thoughts on the layout.

We know things like the A&R Pro pages, contact forms, and sidebar need some work. Those should be ready by the end of the Labor Day weekend, if not sooner. 

A quick shout out to a few people who were instrumental at the various stages of this process, I doubt we would have gotten here without their hard work: Ivan Lo, Dustin Gibbs, Louda Peña, and Dan Lloyd. Many thanks to them for dealing with my reptile brain.

And as always, thank you dear readers for coming to Asphalt & Rubber every day. You all make the hard work worthwhile. Let’s all head to the comments section and sing kumbaya.

-JB

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News

Dear God Why? American Chopper Is Coming Back to TV

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Hold onto your butts, because the Teutuls are about to have a television show again, as the Discovery Channel is rebooting the incredibly popular American Chopper TV show.

In it, Paul Sr. and Paul Jr. will once again stir the pot of their family feud, as they face off against each other as they build custom motorcycles and vie for title of “Biggest Man-Child in the History Humankind” on cable television.

The news is of course a double-edged sword for the motorcycle industry, as American Chopper’s popularity was responsible for bringing motorcycling outside of our niche media focus, and putting it into the mainstream public consciousness.

Conversely though, the reality TV show feeds off some of the worst personalities that have ever been created, which doesn’t exactly put motorcycling’s best foot forward in the eye of the public, and only furthers the counter-culture perspective the general population has of motorcycles.

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Banter

Dirt Quake II: It’s Coming

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From what we can gather, Dirt Quake II is an anarchist movement grounded in the English biker gang scene that celebrates pagan rituals from ancient and mystic Britannic times. Mixed with a dystopian view of the world to come, along with an overindulgence of bangers and mash during childhood, the competitors who take part in the race are more than a special breed, and frankly we wonder if they still qualify as human.

As the following video depicts, attempting to join in this two-wheeled revelry could result in a propensitiy to only turn left on a motorbike, eat mud and other ferrous-rich dirt products, and possibly engage in intercourse with women of illrepute. We highly advise staying clear of the Norfolk Arena in King’s Lynn, Norfolk on the Eighth day of June in the year of our Lord, 2013. You have been warned.

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News

OCC Coming Back to TV? — Universe Collapses in on Self

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After a very public father/son break-up between Paul Teutul Sr. and Paul Teutul Jr., a steroid-ring scandal involving Paul Sr., and finally a bankruptcy proceeding, it appears that Orange County Choppers is the impossible to kill multi-headed hydra of doom that we all knew it was, as the custom chopper shop is once again headed to the small screen and recruiting some talent, on and off the show.

Looking for “someone who will work alongside Paul Senior, running the shop and helping build some of the best custom motorcycles in the world,” OCC says it will be back on television with a new show later this month (last we heard, the show was still looking for a creative director too). Please for the love of god, will someone give this man the attention he craves so dearly??! Or, just shoot us in the face.

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