The Paceline Cycling Podcast

"Spun" was an antidote to the driest of eyes. It was the story of Judi (nee Rothenberg) and Dominic LoPresti, two ex-junkies who had cleaned up, relapsed, cleaned up again and against the longest of odds, met, fell in love, and in the least likely of all turns, stayed clean, married and opened a bike shop. Steve Friedman's feature about the two was as raw as their past and ran in Bicycling Magazin...

Winter is here, huh? Selene takes on some of the challenges of winter riding, lot least of which is staying warm on rides. She talks skin care, cloverleaf routes and something that may not seem like a typical winter topic: single speeding. She says there's a logic to it this time of year.  Patrick is back from the Emerald Cup, the big annual cannabis festival in Santa Rosa, where he was able to le...

The Colorado Classic has announced a big change. It's a women's race now. Only a women's race. With a new course and new prize list and a plan to livestream the race on Facebook, the Colorado Classic will be very different in 2019. It's an intriguing change in direction and one that will be an incredible boon to women's racing. The last month or so hasn't been kind to the bike industry. The parent...

Jeremy SyCip is a real-life fantasy. He began college with an eye toward industrial design but quickly realized he wanted to be more hands-on. So he took a course in framebuilding at United Bicycle Institute. His teacher for the class? None other than Albert Eisentraut, arguably the most important builder ever in the U.S. and maybe the most important teacher of framebuilders in history. His next s...

Selene and Patrick open the show with an appreciation of broadcaster Paul Sherwen who passed away earlier this week. Sherwen was more than just a broadcaster; he was a pro rider in the 1980s as well as a media liaison for teams and PR specialist for races. Selene talked to former pro mountain biker and full-time badass Mark Weir following the discovery that his heart had a 99 percent blockage in o...

On this week's episode, I continue my conversation with Carl Strong. Strong is unusual among framebuilders in that he has constructed bikes in every mainstream material being used in high-performance bikes: steel, aluminum, titanium and now carbon fiber in his new venture, Pursuit by Carl Strong. In our second part Carl talks about forming Pursuit and his partners. It is one of only two companies...

Unless you're racing cyclocross, the off season is here. Selene says she's done her last event of the year and has recently returned to the gym for strength training. He gym routine may surprise you, but she says it's what most cyclists ought to be doing when they are trying to increase their strength.  With Christmas just around the corner, Patrick takes on gift giving and how he thinks about gif...

On this week’s show, my guest is frame builder Carl Strong. The Bozeman, Montana-based builder behind Strong Frames is best known for the titanium road and gravel frames he makes from titanium, something he’s been doing for more than 20 years. Recently, though, Strong launched a new venture, called Pursuit by Carl Strong. Working with some other bike industry veterans, Pursuit is building monocoqu...

It's November (you may have noticed) and that means that unless you're at the height of your cyclocross season, November can present challenges in terms of motivation for workouts, and is the point in the year when finding time to ride in daylight can be a challenge if you normally ride after work. Selene addresses motivation and taking on new challenges while Patrick looks at how sunlight or a la...

Patrick is back from his trip to Taiwan. While there he attended a trade show, rode a few ebikes, did a bike tour down the eastern coast of Taiwan and then visited a series of factories. He even managed to squeeze in a group ride. Before the jetlag sets in too much, he discusses with Selene the things that impressed him most on his visit.  There's no time like the present, right? We're always sayi...

Veteran Sarah Lee says she faced a choice. Figure out how to reconnect with her nation following her military service ... or kill herself. Fortunately for her, and her many compatriots and fellow vets, she found a way to reconnect with her nation. She decided to ride coast to coast and discover America at the granular level, one person at at time. This is a long interview, but it is worth staying...

How hard would it be to climb the height of Mount Everest in a single ride? That is, riding until you climbed 29,029 feet. So what about Everesting on Mount Everest? If there's a more difficult way to tackle that feat, it hasn't occurred to us. Selene interviewed Shannon Bufton who runs a tour company that took people to Everest base camp to ride a 1.5-mile stretch of road that climbed at 5 percen...

On this week’s show, my guest is writer and editor Peter Flax. Flax was features editor for the Hollywood Reporter. Flax is also a contributor to CyclingTips where he writes on a wide range of cycling culture topics. He is probably best known to cyclists as the former editor in chief of Bicycling Magazine. I was interested to talk to Flax because he straddles both the world of the writer and the w...

Let's talk about dressing for cold weather riding. How important is humidity in how you dress? Should 45 degree weather result in the same kit selection regardless of where you live? Maybe not. Selene digs into this with a funny story about some recent transplants who are struggling to adjust. Patrick is headed to Taiwan. He's going to be riding from the northern tip to the southern tip and encoun...

So just what is gravel? What should a gravel ride be? Should it include singletrack? Should there be creek crossings? What is reasonable for a person to expect when they sign up for an event and just what should a promoter be obligated to communicate to attendees? Selene has events like Iron Cross on her mind. Do you huck? Are you rad? Patrick has set a personal goal to improve his mountain biking...

Rebecca Rusch has what may be the ultimate nickname not just for a cyclist, but for any endurance athlete. She’s known as the Queen of Pain. And she has more than earned that nickname. She has won the Leadville 100 four times. She set the record for the Kokopelli Trail, and has seven world championships to her name, not to mention being the first woman to climb the 5.11c Bermuda Dunes route up El...

For pro teams, finding sponsors and keeping said sponsors happy is more difficult than ever before. This week Selene takes a look at the new strategy from EF Education First-Drapac-Rapha. They have announced that they will be taking on some events that aren't part of the World Tour, which means we may see some pink kits at events like Dirty Kanza and the Red Hook Criterium. This could get cool.  A...

Have you ever ridden across the country? It is one of those things that many of us have considered, and most of us haven't found either the time or the motivation to do it. Selene encountered a vet named Sarah Lee who rode from the East Coast to the Golden Gate Bridge. We have a short clip from the interview and she talks about what she encountered on her trip. Stay tuned for an episode of Tandem...

Everesting. It's a thing now, as we say. And Selene is a bit obsessed with the idea of doing one. Then she ran across a group that went to Everest Everest. How meta. How quintessential. How unbeatable. Patrick is back from Interbike and is afraid grandma might not be coming home from the hospital. She's ornery and won't take her meds. The misses for the show this year seem to outnumber the success...

On this week’s show, my guest is Mike Ferrentino. In the early 1990s Ferrentino rose to national prominence with the launch of Bike Magazine and his column the Grimy Handshake. Since then, Ferrentino has gone on to help found the Sierra Buttes Trail Stewardship and directed marketing for Santa Cruz Bicycles. These days he’s in PR with Uncommon Communications, but he’s still dedicated to advocacy i...

Selene has a dilemma. She lives in a town with amazing riding culture and plenty of people to ride with. However. (There's always a however, isn't there?) Her favorite riding buddy is injured. He hurt his ankle and is off the bike. And now she's discovered that she, like so many of her readers, is having trouble with motivation to ride. Maybe time for some of her own medicine? Interbike is next we...

On this week’s show, we continue our conversation with Erik Noren of Peacock Groove. Last week we talked about some of Noren’s signature creations like his Evil Dead bike and his Appetite for Destruction bike. While those works generated some controversy, much of this week’s show will focus on a bike that has been widely acclaimed for its incredible attention to detail. That bike is his collaborat...

Forget 'cross is coming. 'Cross is here. Last weekend, Labor Day Weekend for crying out loud, the first big race of the season was held in Delaware—Granogue. And yet, it was hotter than than the seat in a Congressional hearing. Considering cyclocross was invented as a winter sport to keep bloodflow to the feet, what is a person to do with such intense racing in such hot conditions? Selene ponders...

Among the many builders I’ve interviewed in my career, I can say that Erik Noren is truly unique. In a room full of unusual cats, he still manages to stand alone. This episode, and the next, because honestly, the conversation was that long and too interesting to chop into a half hour, are going to be unlike anything I’ve produced previously. Part of that is Noren’s fairly colorful use of language....

Selene is away at Rebecca's Private Idaho, competing in the event's new stage race that runs from August 30 to September 2. So rather than our usual show, we're taking the opportunity to give you the full interview that she recorded with Hanna Grant, chef and author of Eat. Race Win. Selene discusses with Grant what it is we get wrong in feeding ourselves to achieve our best performances on the bi...