 United Bicycle InstituteIntroducing Our Faculty |
 Schedule of Classes
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Every UBI faculty member has years of bike industry experience and was chosen for their extensive backgrounds in mechanics, frame building, shop operations, and other industry endeavors. Their teaching style creates a fun and creative learning environment which stimulates the mind and allows easy comprehension of each mechanical procedure. The size of our faculty roster means that UBI has the best student-teacher ratio in the industry. In our mechanics classes, our student-to-teacher ratio is 5.3 to 1, and in our frame building classes it is 4 to 1. |  Ron Sutphin, president of UBI, has been working professionally in the bicycle industry since 1978. His experience includes several years as a retail bicycle shop manager and master mechanic and has been a UBI instructor since the school was founded in 1981. He is intimately familiar with the many problems and benefits of bike shop operation. Ron is also a master frame builder, having produced scores of high quality custom framesets over the past decade. His skills as a frame builder and master mechanic provide a background that gives a perspective few instructors can match. Ron's easily understood style of teaching makes learning bicycle repair and frame building easy and enjoyable. |
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Gary Mathis brings both shop mechanic and frame building experience to UBI. His career started in 1988 at Topeka Schwinn in Kansas. He later did brazing, finishing and product development for Fat City Cycles, and went on to be a brazer for Independent Fabrication. Gary has also been a mechanic and instructor at Broadway Bicycle School, the worker-owned co-op in Cambridge, MA. | |||||||||||
 Matt Eames has 17 years in the bike industry, including seven years with Shimano as lead mountain bike technician and OEM sales. Before that Matt was a mountain bike race mechanic with Diamondback Racing. He also has seven years in the ski industry. | |||||||||||
 Steve Glass has over ten years of bike shop experience, including positions as Service Manager and General Manager for one of the Pacific Northwest's leading shops. He also has been trained as a race mechanic, and recently provided neutral race support for both the Cascade Classic and the Tour of Missouri. Steve is also a successful mountain and road racer, a certified river guide, and an accomplished back-country skier. | |||||||||||
 Jeff Menown brings a wealth of experience in the bicycle industry to UBI. His career started with wrenching in several large Seattle-area bike shops. Jeff later moved on to the manufacturer side of the industry, and he's served as product manager for both the American Bicycle Group and Giant. | |||||||||||
Nathan Riddle's ten years in the bike industry include positions as a shop mechanic and work for a parts distributor. Nathan is also an elite-level downhill racer. Come to think of it, he's elite-level on the uphills, too. | |||||||||||
 Rich Arvizo started in the bike industry as a shop mechanic. He's also worked for Yeti and the custom frame fabricator Black Sheep Bikes. Rich is our resident engineering expert, holding a Master's degree in structural engineering. He tends to win all the geeky tech arguments around UBI.  Jim Kish teaches UBI's Steel TIG and Titanium frame building classes. A frame builder based in California, Jim has earned a reputation as one of the best TIG welders in the business. You can learn more about Jim's bikes at his web site.  Mike DeSalvo teaches UBI's TIG Welding Seminars. A native of northern California, Mike now calls Ashland his home. He has quickly established his name as a versatile frame builder in steel and Ti. You can see Mike's frames at his web site.  Paul Sadoff joined UBI's staff as a guest frame building instructor in 2008, and he will teach a session of UBI's Steel TIG Welding Frame Bulding class every year. Paul has been building frames full time since 1988, and is best know as the creator and builder of Rock Lobster Cycles.  John Baxter, UBI’s Administrator, joined UBI's staff in 2001 after a 25 year career in media, including public radio, TV, publishing and the Internet. He’s also been working on bikes since he was old enough to drop a wrench, and has been a bicycle commuter and advocate since high school (which he kind of remembers). John is an avid cyclist, speed skater, skier and hiker.
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