Slow Guy On The Fast Ride

If you saw the time trial that opened up the third week of racing at the 2023 Tour de France, we'll forgive you for having a healthy dose of skepticism. But let's not forget to enjoy the spectacle: Jonas Vingegaard and Tadej Pogacar are going to slug this one out until Paris, and we all get front row seats. Neal Rogers (former VeloNews editor in chief) and Andrew Hood (Velo European Edit...

Spencer Powlison exists at a powerhouse crossroads in the cycling industry.  He was the news director at VeloNews Magazine; an editor for The Pros' Closet; a cyclocross racer, gravel racer, and now motorcycle guru. But this new venture for Powlison, Direct-Current.bike, takes him off his usual beaten path. While Powlison can claim victories on a wide variety of surfaces and bicycle styles, eM...

The Tour de France starts in just a few days. Veteran journalists Andrew Hood and Neal Rogers join host Dan Cavallari on the Slow Guy on the Fast Ride podcast to reveal the big storylines of the Tour de France 2023. Who are the true GC contenders? What about the green jersey? Can Mark Cavendish beat Eddy Merckx's record this year?  'Hoody' and Neal give their dark horse picks for th...

Mark did it! He went to Kansas and raced Unbound Gravel! Well, sort of. Like so many other unfortunate participants, Mark got time-cut after a 4-mile slog through an unrideable mud pit. But he had a great time anyway, and learned a lot about himself, and gravel-riding. Mark joins host Dan Cavallari on the Slow Guy on the Fast Ride podcast to recap his Unbound Gravel experience and clue us in on wh...

Kristen Legan of Rambleur Adventure Coaching joins Mark Still to talk about his Rebuild Mark project and event prep for Unbound Gravel 200, the differences between Colorado riding and Kansas gravel, how to mentally approach such a demanding event, and much more. She's done this all before so her insights are incredibly helpful and encouraging. Learn more about Kristen and Rambleur Adventure C...

How do you rebuild your fitness after years off the bike? My friend Mark Still has an idea and it isn't subtle. He's fallen away from riding bikes in recent years and suffered the consequences in more ways than one. From extra weight to other health issues, not to mention the mental health ramifications of leaving bikes out of his life, the consequences of continuing on his current path...

Gary Fisher has cemented his name in the annals of bicycle history already as the father of the mountain bike. Now, the dapper general of all things dirt has turned his attention to a new opportunity for revolution. As the e-bike world has expanded over the last several years, the physical products have ranged anywhere from meticulous but pricey to absolutely cheap and dicey. Gary Fisher's ne...

Newly-minted Gravel Hall-of-Famer Yuri Hauswald is a staple of the gravel scene. Go to just about any gravel event in the US and you're likely to spot Yuri, either toeing the starting line, repping Gu Energy, or just hanging out to meet people and help out where he can. Hauswald is a former winner of Unbound Gravel, but his racing days are largely behind him. Now, Hauswald is committed to enj...

David Hale Sylvester, more affectionately known as Big Dave for very obvious reasons, has used his bicycle to challenge himself, much like the rest of us. But more than that, Big Dave saw it as a tool to reach people he would otherwise never meet. When the bike took him to those places, Big Dave wanted to make sure he had a plan for the moment. As it turned out, the simplest plan has proven to be...

Adam Miller is already a 'serial entrepreneur' very early in his life and career. He founded Borealis Bikes, a high-end carbon fat bike brand based in Colorado Springs.  Then after selling that company, he went on to start Why Cycles, a premium titanium bicycle brand.  Not content with two successful companies, Miller started a third, and it's undoubtedly his biggest success yet: Re...

Marley Blonsky made a massive life change last year. She moved from Seattle to one of the new bike Meccas, Bentonville, Arkansas. A built-in bike community in an up-and-coming location making waves throughout the bike world seemed like the right fit. Once she arrived, Blonsky wasn’t content to simply start living the bike bum lifestyle (which, frankly, I would have!). Instead, she got to work leav...

There's no way to say it: The state of cycling media has been downright ugly in the last couple of years. Caley Fretz would know, too. He was, until very recently, the Editor in Chief of CyclingTips.com, and before that, he was a longtime editor and reporter at VeloNews Magazine.  Now both of those titles barely exist, and Fretz, along with most of the rest of the CyclingTips crew, has moved...

Kitsbow CEO David Billstrom knows his products offer some of the highest quality on the market. That's a blessing for sure, but it also means there's tons of gear out there that's got a lot of life left in it. What a shame it would be for those pieces to end up in a landfill. That's partly why Kitsbow recently launched its Experienced Apparel store. Anyone who owns Kitsbow clot...

If Ben Delaney's name doesn't ring a bell, chances are you know him anyway: he's been producing some of the best gear and tech coverage in the bike industry for decades. Formerly the editor in chief at VeloNews Magazine, and editor at BikeRadar, Ben has since branched off to create his own YouTube channel, "The Ride with Ben Delaney." Same excellent coverage, new format. D...

Ned Boulting has watched a lot of bicycle racing. He has to, after all, since he's the voice of the Tour de France, among other races, for ITV4 on British television. It stands to reason, then, that Boulting should have lots to say about the stories, results, polemics, and minutiae that defined the past year of racing. That is perhaps why he found himself as the editor of The Road Book, cycli...

For many years during my tenure as technical editor at VeloNews Magazine, I always knew where to go for answers. My managing editor Chris Case's desk was only a few feet away after all. Case was a wealth of knowledge then. His new venture, Alter Exploration, seeks to exploit Case's thirst for the why, the how, and most importantly, the where. Alter Exploration is a natural extension of C...

The Alchemy Bicycles experience center in Golden, Colorado houses all the trappings of a much bigger bicycle manufacturer. There’s the CNC machine, welding stations, a carbon-cutting room, and a dedicated paint room. Alchemy can, and does, build just about everything in-house. But what’s more noticeable about the experience center is just how quiet it can be. That’s by design. While the manufactur...

As a small business owner, I'm always fascinated to hear from other folks making the push to start a business. Rob Einaudi is doing just that with Bikelist.com, a new marketplace for used bikes. The idea, he says, is akin to the music equipment buying site, Reverb.com. It offers an experience tailored to cyclists, unlike the behemoth that is eBay. Einaudi's undertaking comes at an opport...

Sadhbh O'Shea has covered the Tour de France as a journalist before. But never like this. The historic Tour de France Femmes this past summer gave O'Shea a front-row seat to the overwhelming success of the women's race around France. And like the riders on course, O'Shea and her fellow women journalists made history too by pumping out an intimidating amount of high-quality repo...

If you've been listening to cycling podcasts long enough, it's just about guaranteed you've come across the Outspoken Cyclist Podcast . Diane Jenks's podcast is one of the longest running cycling podcasts out there, not to mention one of the most popular. Jenks's radio background makes her especially adept at creating compelling shows. But more than that, it's Jenks&a...

 Sofiane Sehili doesn't mind being alone in the woods. As long as he's on his bike and moving, Sehili has an innate ability to go long periods of time without sleeping. So that makes him perfectly tailored to a race like the Tour Divide. In fact, Sehili is so well-mated to the race that he won it in 2022, all while setting the fastest known time.  On this episode of the Slow Guy on the F...

For a group of folks who wear skin-tight clothing in public, cyclists sure can be weird about anatomy. Talk saddle sores, butts, vaginas, and anything else that gets a tad rugged on a ride and giggles and pearl clutching is sure to follow. Chamois Butt'r founder Steve Mathews is over it, though. He's been making butt products long enough that the topic feels natural. Mathews joins host D...

Lee Lambert is the Executive Director of the Cascade Bicycle Club. But before that, he was a hobbyist cyclist who found himself riding from Seattle to Portland and really soaking in one of the best times of his life.  He did the ride again, and again. He even did it on a tandem with his wife. So it seemed only natural to get involved even more with the Cascade Bicycle Club, the outfit responsible...

Specialized Globe eBikes are poised to be significant. And we haven't even seen what's behind the cactus yet. Why? Specialized is perhaps the most well-known bicycle brand on the planet. With name recognition like that, Specialized Globe bikes will become a formidable space in the mobility world. Keep in mind, of course, that this isn't Specialized's first foray into eBikes. Th...

PeopleForBikes Director of Enterprise Partnerships Ryan Birkicht thrives on messaging. It's fortunate, then, that his day job is to convince more companies to get people riding bikes and leaving the car behind. The message is a great one, as any cyclist can attest. But in today's Climate climate, it's also a vital message to save the future of our society, and our planet. No pressur...