Script

(not verbatim, contains typos, and sometimes I go off-book)


SRAM, SRAM, SRAM, sram…I don’t really dislike you guys—it’s just bad timing. No, I’m not complaining about the ham-handed marketing of having a launch event and then embargoing it for three days in this interconnected, live-tweeted milieu, or that you’re offering hydraulic road brakes—despite being not strictly necessary, and entirely incompatible with everything else on the market, from a mechanical standpoint, they could conceivably address the few pertinent issues present in cable-actuated brakes.

Ah, Cyclocross—scruffy, fun-loving younger brother of road cycling. None of the endless training and expense, all of the fun, dirt, and beer handups, right? Surely this is the most populist of all sports, is it not?

No, actually—not even close. Not since a third-generation Yalie picked up a Texas accent and ran for President as a Washington Outsider has a brand been so obviously out of sync with its own reality. Cyclocross, while thrilling and fantastically enjoyable, is also the most expensive cycling discipline for those with an actual desire to be competitive, and the least friendly to the common racer stepping up to give it a shot.

In its natural state / by Brian Ellin cc-nc-sa

Occasionally, people ask me why I don’t more actively seek out work in the cycling industry. Aside from the fact that it’s an insider’s game and I’ve got the schmoozing skills of a dyspeptic orangutan, there’s just no way I could bring myself to participate in the absolute nonsense the positions tend to require—all the more so when that nonsense runs contrary to the interests of the company I would hypothetically be supporting.

Case in point—the sidewalls of the pro cyclocross bikes making the rounds on cycling news websites the past few weeks. While I applaud the spirit of whichever mechanic or press agent decided to turn Ryan Trebon’s sidewalls into a massive, garish Clement ad, it’s pretty clear no one was fooled by the effort. And while I’m sure the people at QBP smiled warmly at James Huang’s insistance that the uproariously camouflaged Dugast was merely a placeholder, it sure doesn’t look like the Typhoon has been cut from Treefarm’s arsenal.

The luxury of data in cycling—or any sport, really—was once the rarified domain of the rich or professionally supported. Sure, we commoners had cyclocomputers and heart-rate monitors, but they generally only delivered data to a postage stamp screen, and had to be reset between rides.

If you really felt like spending, you might get a blocky device with a usb cable and CD of poorly-written software (PC-only, of course) that turned your speed and HR into confusing looking graphs that you could compare against all your other confusing looking graphs from previous workouts, and not much else.

A little more than a year ago, I was riding through the local trail system, over rugged MTB terrain, entirely unhindered by the fact that there was a ‘cross bike between my legs. I was railing loose gravel corners, and clawing my way up steep, bony trails, enjoying plush compliance and plier-like grip. I was plowing over rocks, roots, through streambeds, etc., all without pinching or having my seat punch my backside up into the air. I was thinking “this is amazing—it is totally going to change the CX world”.

If you’ve been following the Cyclocosm Tumblr at all, you’ve probably seen a few interesting parts failures over the past few weeks. But today’s post is less about a specific failure and more about a broken philosophy: the idea that any clincher with knobs on it is somehow race-appropriate componentry for cyclocross.

It’s Not All Bad, I Guess

I should be specific here: most cyclocross-branded clinchers work well enough—so long as you have no plans to actually race. And in and of itself, that’s not a bad thing. For decades, a loud and long-bearded contingent of Internet cycling personalities has bemoaned the popularity of race-inspired equipment that is ill-suited to the needs of the casual cyclist.

I know my way around the end of a wrench pretty well, but at 6am, on three hours’ sleep, in my cramped, poorly-lit basement, with the bike inverted because I don’t own a stand, things can get confusing.

All the more so, in fact, when you’re dealing with a wrecked, seasons-old bottom-bracket, where half the cup teeth have been chewed off, and everything’s sealed with a fresh coat of North Beach mud. I had been pretty confident about the correct direction to turn things, but after a few mintes of struggling, I figured it’d better check the directions. RTFM or STFU, right?

If you’ve noticed the distinct, sharp-edge whiff of bile around the cycling world at the moment, don’t attribute it entirely to an excess of cheer at various holiday gatherings. Headlines at the end of the year—and the end of a decade, especially—always seem to reek more of regurgitation than perspiration.


It’s not that I’m above a year-end retrospective; I’ve done it at least once, and frankly, despite the four years that have transpired between then and now, that post is still one of the best end-of-year recaps around.

Right off the bat, the title should give you a hint that you might want to take this one with a grain of salt. Or several.

That said, despite regularly producing some of the most original, creative, highest quality work in the cycling world for the past four years, there’s a fair amount of respect I’m not getting. I don’t think there’s anyone out there doing what I do or even coming close to it—certainly not the people collecting redirects from the parties targeted above.

What the hell kind of sales pitch is this? Mr. “it is impossible to win without doping” Bernhard Kohl is now opening a massive bike shop? How are you gonna sell all that gram-saving, wind-cheating schlock to armies of overpaid Masters racers when you’re on record as a member of the Better Living Through Chemistry camp?

Kohl had just better hope that no enterprising competitors—an ex-con, ex-manager, for example—decide to open “rejuvenation clinics” in the neighborhood.