Julius Koivistoinen is a young Finnish student passioned about photography. He's mostly self taught but has already been working as a photographer for a couple of magazines published not only in Finland but worldwide, and his photos have reached to become the cover shots of those magazines for plenty of times. In addition to commercial work, he loves to work on personal projects and with smaller clients. Currently he's available for assignments near Helsinki and Lahti.
Be sure to visit his portfolio and Flickr page!
The title says it all.
Today I participated in Tour de Helsinki which was a 140,1 kilometres long bike race. First time riding such a long distance at once, and especially with a fixie, so I’m quite happy of my result.
That’s me in the left hand side. Photo by Mikko Rantahakala. More of his TDH2010 photos here.
140,1 kilometres in 4 hours, 42 minutes and 42 secons. With one gear and no brakes. I positioned 816th out of 1683 riders completing the race.
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A quick shout out on Bike Polo Cup 2010 and its top 3 teams!
Yesterday I was playing this wonderful game again and at the same time witnessing a historical moment when this year’s cup finals were played here in Helsinki.
Here are the finalists!
The winning team in the middle wearing black t-shirts: IHB!
Second place went to the team on left hand side: Nopsat koukut!
The team positioned third is on the right hand side: Mallets of Doom!
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I bet everyone has been aware of the increasing number of single speed bicycles everywhere. But while visiting different cities around Europe I noticed that there were new, even more creative ways to commute around the big metropolises.
Some of them are even landing to the shores of our Northern country.
A unicyclist in Basel, Switzerland
Unicycles
One may think it’s just one of those extreme sports which belong to circus. But when you actually think about it, a unicycle is almost as small as a pogo stick, it gets you around faster than walking and is a great way to improve your balance.
It’s definitely a great way to get more socialized plus fixed gear enthusiasts love you for it too!
A unicycle spotted in a metro in Helsinki!
Even my good ol’ pa decided to give it a try and has started practicing the unicycle. Here’s me packing his unicycle into my courier bag:
Kick scooters and roller skates
These are the devices I loved to ride in my childhood – but then they just disappeared! Luckily they’re now making a comeback a little by little.
The funny thing is though that not just the kids are riding them to school as back then but again, working citizens use them as transportation from home to the market or to work…
Older woman took a stop with her kick scooter in Hamburg
And of course
Single speed bikes with Bianchi bodies in a flea market in Berlin
As I mentioned already the single speed cycles and fixed gear bikes have taken over the streets once and for all. I’ll be writing about it more in depth later though, as the phenomenon is worth an article of its own. 
Fixie riders in Paris
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On the August 23rd I at last got to know with a sport which has fascinated me since a friend of mine told me about it many months ago in the army. He too is into fixed gear bikes and in addition has worked as a bike messenger in Helsinki back in the days. (Note: I actually photographed him a while ago riding a busy street on his fixie in Helsinki. See the photo in the end of this post!)
Bicycle Polo is a team sport similar to traditional polo, except that bicycles are used instead of horses. There is 3 players on each team and you may not touch the ground with your feet or you must go and “tap out” by riding to the mid-court and hitting either side of the court with your mallet.
We were playing in a court right next to the centre of Helsinki, in Hietaniemi. There was about 30 persons playing and watching the games in total.
View Helsinki Fixed in a larger map
The fixed gear bikes are ideal for this type of playing by the way, as with them it is very easy to “track stand” in a single position for example. When you’re totally in control of your bike with your feet only it’s a lot easier to concentrate on steering and waving the mallet with your hands.
Jump on this article to see the rest of the huge photos I took that sunny afternoon! (+ the photo of my friend Toni Aikasalo riding his badass fixie) Bike polo photos are taken using a Canon EOS 5D camera and objectives ranging from 50mm to 135mm.
Oh, and if you’re in one of the photos, feel free to share it on your Facebook profile for example, but be sure that the undersign is visible or add a caption “Julius Koivistoinen photograhy – http://www.julious.fi” to the image. And don’t forget to comment or at least hit the Facebook’s like button at the top of this article. Thanks!
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