Last month, when news spread that Michael Marckx was stepping down as CEO of Spy eyewear the big question on Southern California competitive cyclists mind was “what will happen to the Spy Ride Giant cycling team?” Well, now we know.
According to a press release sent out today (September 14, 2015) the Spy Giant Ride team has merged with Monster Media Racing to become. . . well, Monster Media Racing. But there’s more: the Monster Media Racing Team will now be owned by and operated by MMR Sports Group, LLC which is, in turn, owned by Chris DeMarchi, Derric Swinfard, Phil Tinstman, and Michael Marckx.
Here’s what they’re saying:
The unification not only marks the most significant cycling team development in the region—the most competitive cycling arena in the country—it also paves the way for the strengthened team to both own the leader boards in all men’s and women’s road categories. In addition, and more importantly, the new team will serve as a marketing and distribution agency for the team’s sponsors across the country, where MMR has plans to launch with seven chapters in 2015 and grow to fifteen chapters by 2016.
“MMR will create opportunities for all stakeholders to enjoy the services and pursuits of the team as a marketing agency,” said Michael Marckx, former president/CEO of SPY and MMR Team Partner. “Our unique program is for both cyclists in pursuit of their athletic dreams and brands seeking new ways of communicating their brand messages while competing in the increasingly challenging cycling marketplace.”
For the official word from Monster Media Racing, please follow the jump. [click to continue…]
Popular fitness tracking device manufacturer Fitbit today announced a partnership with Strava in a deal that has the two companies giving users the ability to automatically share their fitness data between the two ecosystems.
Once users connect their Fitbit and Strava accounts any activity logged on Fitbit will be posted to Strava and any activity posted to Strava will end up on a user’s Fitbit timeline.
This comes as a welcome surprise to Fitbit Surge GPS watch owners who only last month got the ability to easily track bicycle rides on their devices. On the launch of the new bike feature many Fitbit Surge users felt that tracking a bike ride without being able to post it to Strava defeated the whole purpose of tracking the ride in the first place. That appears to no longer be a problem.
Strava already syncs with many GPS enabled devices and now a legion of Fitbit users will have to opportunity to see their activities tracked and ranked against Strava’s competitive disciples.
The only downside is for those who like keeping their two fitness timelines separate. Some use Fitbit for tracking casual activities like walking, sleeping, and dietary intake while saving Strava as a record of serious training efforts. Once the two apps are connected users will no longer have the ability to keep the two timelines apart.
In the end Strava gets a whole new set of compatible devices and Fitbit gets access to loads of location based fitness data while the users get a smoother way to combine their activity tracking timelines.
Once you start paying attention to your ankle wear it’s hard to go back to basics. Suddenly that plain black pair of team socks you’ve been wearing overtime looks a bit boring when you head out for a ride. Take a tip from the world of cyclocross racing and show some individual style with a stylish pair of socks.
While you may be able to pick up a bright pair from your LBS—and we encourage you to do so—when you want a truly special pair you may have to search a little harder. We’re making it easy for you with our favorite picks from The Athletic, Ten Speed Hero, Sock Guy, injinji, and Stance below the jump. [click to continue…]
It’s been called “a cyclocross bike deserving of the Santa Cruz name,” but we’re just kind of giddy that Santa Cruz has resurrected the drop bars with a carbon framed, disc brake loaded all-around, all new Stigmata. Here’s how Santa Cruz is playing it:
We started the development of the new Stigmata a couple years ago, because we missed the old Stigmata, and felt that there was a lot we could do with carbon that we were unable to do with aluminum. At the same time, hydraulic disc brakes for road bikes were becoming a reality, meaning that we wouldn’t have to put up with ancient braking technology to get our drop bar on. . . The new Stigmata is versatile. It’ll fit 41mm-wide tires with room for mud, but handles nicely with skinny road tires for base miles. It’s also home to our first PressFit 30 bottom bracket. We didn’t make this decision lightly, but not only is PF30 capable of accommodating all road bike cranks, it allowed us to make the bike lighter while maintaining the strength and durability you expect from Santa Cruz.
Sounds like it might be our perfect N+1 bike: epic for cross, great for gravel, and just fine for road. Click the link for all the specs.
According to a study in Northwestern Medicine people tend to drink more alcohol on the days they’ve exercised, and according to a story Outsideonline.com that’s a bad thing. In fact, alcohol is a bad thing for athletes all the way around.
If you still think a post-race beer isn’t a bad idea, consider this: alcohol interferes with your muscles’ post-workout rebuilding process by reducing protein synthesis. “So not only does alcohol interfere with recovery of muscle damage and injury,” says Barnes, “it also reduces the processes responsible for building muscle.”
Beer works great for getting you fat and keeping you on the couch. For anything else, there’s water. Click the link for even more reasons why.
This makes about as much sense as most cross videos. But yeah, Chris Akrigg is pretty good on a bike and could probably do just as well on a kid’s bike with training wheels. There, we just put it out for his next challenge. Training wheel cross? You listening Mr. Akrigg?
While some soft drink companies may want you to think differently, all athletes know that you’re only as good as the food you put in your body. Next time you head out for an all-day roll, try slipping a Perfect Bar in your pocket. The all-natural, gluten free, and non-GMO snack bars are loaded with good stuff without a single bit of refined sugar. It’s a difference you’ll noticed from the first bite.
The bars are available in seven flavors including: lite cranberry crunch, lite almond acai, carob chip, fruit and nut, peanut butter, almond butter, and vegan almond coconut. And, while each has a slightly different flavor profile with the exception of the lite flavors, all of them pack in about 300 calories. The aforementioned lite cranberry crunch and lite almond acai use puffed crisp rice to keep the calorie count in the 200 range. In addition, more than twenty superfoods such as kale, spinach, celery and others are hiding inside the bar in a powdered form.
With all that inside, it’d be easy for the bars to taste like a dirty CX racer smells, but luckily they don’t. Instead, the bars taste like fresh peanut butter or almond butter mixed with a little honey and milk—because aside from all those ground up superfoods that’s basically what they are. Though we would have liked to see one or two flavors of the bars sporting a influx of oats for a slower-release of carbohydrates on a sustained effort, for the most part the Perfect Bar really was just that. Sure they seem simple, but after a few weeks of eating a Perfect Bar for lunch you’ll be hard pressed to go back to any pre-packaged energy bar that you’ve eaten in the past. You can find them online for about $20 for a box of 8 (or 20 bite-sized minis) at shop.perfectbar.com or in the refrigerated aisle of your local health food grocer (and occasionally even Costco).
That first round of Felt F65X and F85x cyclocross bikes that have been on sale since June 2014 have some frame issues it appears. The US Consumer Product Safety Commission says the frames on these aluminum bikes could break causing the rider to “lose control, fall and suffer injuries.” Felt describes the bike as:
The F65X is cyclo-cross ready but can do double duty for those rainy commute days. The Superlight Custom butted 7005 aluminum and a BB30 bottom bracket keep the bike light. The F65X is ready to jump the barriers, ride in the dirt, or tackle the urban commute.
Apparently that “superlight” frame was a little too light. The CPSC says “consumers should immediately stop using the recalled bicycles and contact their local Felt Bicycles dealer for a free inspection and frame replacement.” So far no injuries have been reported.
Seriously? In addition to a mountain, road, and cross bike we also apparently need a “gravel” bike? We’re not doing it. But if you are, then WTB has what looks to be a great tire in their new Nano 40c.
“The inspiration for this tire actually came directly from this show one year ago,” stated WTB’s Product Manager, Chris Feucht in reference to Frostbike 2013. “We were blown away by the number of requests we received for a gravel tire last year so we took a long, hard look at our tire line and decided to use the Nano tread pattern as a starting point. We wanted something that would appease racers due to its speed and light weight, yet also appeal to those wanting comfort over the long haul. By simplifying the pattern slightly, we’ve actually created a more durable tire while maintaining speed and the unique Nano handling characteristics, making for a winner.”
Personally, we’d just throw it on the cross bike (if we had one) and call it a day, but, hey, have as many bikes as you like. Follow the jump for the official word from WTB [click to continue…]
Sometimes it seems those slow-to-change cyclocross traditionalists are being dragged into the future kicking and screaming. First it was disc brakes (oh, the horror) and now it is tubeless tires. You know, like the ones mountain bikes have been running for years and cars have been rolling for decades. WTB is backing this latest development pretty hard with their new ChrisCross i19 700c TCS rim and Cross Wolf 700 x 32c TCS tire.
“The ChrisCross is named after me because I wanted it on my bike,” stated WTB’s Product Manager Chris Feucht, matter-of-factly. “Cyclocross needs tubeless, so I walked this rim from concept all the way to production, hence ChrisCross. Plus, it pays homage to one of my heroes, Chris Chance, who had a bike called the Chris Cross back in the day.” When combined with the Cross Wolf 700 x 32c TCS tire, also UST standards-driven, riders now have a tubeless cyclocross system available from WTB.
It’s about time. For the official word from WTB follow the jump. [click to continue…]
