The Paceline Cycling Podcast

It’s summer in Pennsylvania! This week we tackle a Paceline-style PSA in the form of CPR training. Selene has quite the story. Riding eMTBs on singletrack is an activity that can elicit some strong opinions. Patrick takes on the use of these bikes on singletrack in the various kinds of…

My guest this week is someone that you likely haven’t heard of before. His name is Ryan Johnson, but his resume is arguably one of the most interesting I’ve come across in the bike industry. For anyone who wants to know how the bike industry works, Johnson is someone who…

Say you’re going on vacation, because it’s summer, and say you’re taking your bike, because duh bikes. And say you’re going someplace mountainous. Also, say you live at sea level. Will the altitude ruin your riding? Selene talked to some experts to see just how much the reduced oxygen will…

This week our show is an appreciation of frame builder Bruce Gordon who passed away June 7th at the age of 71. Gordon was one of the most experienced and talented frame builders ever to pick up a torch. He learned the craft from Albert Eisentraut in the first frame…

We begin with a reader question about how to rescue a day that doesn’t seem to be going according to plan. You’re not as fast as you thought, don’t have the power you anticipated, your gut rots or maybe you’re just bonking. What do you do? Selene sets off for…

First up, thanks for enduring this several-week break due to my travels. I would have loved to get an episode squeezed in there somehow, but today’s show required a fair bit of tending to create; it wasn’t the simple conversation that so many of these interviews are. So this week’s…

Selene is tough. We all knew that. But last weekend, she went to Oklahoma for an event known as Tulsa Tough. The question of the day? Which is tougher: Tulsa, or Selene? Easy there, champ. Patrick’s idea of a hard ride has been downgraded since Dirty Kanza. He’s still in…

This week we begin with a reader question regarding max heart rate. Will that “220 minus your age” formula accurately predict your max? And if not, does it matter? And if it matters and it’s not accurate, what should you be using instead? Selene talks max heart rate and the…

This week Selene admits that she’s been taking a fresh approach to some of the events she’s doing. And it’s not some new training regiment guaranteed to make you kick butt. Instead, she’s decided just to wing it. With Dirty Kanza just a few days away, Patrick is in the…

It’s been said that predicting a bad future is a way to set a negative intention. Last week Selene suggested she might not be 100 percent ready for the Keystone Offroad. It might not have been her most successful day ever. But clearly, she’s had worse days, right? She had…

My guest this week is Santa Cruz-based builder Paul Sadoff of Rock Lobster Cycles. I first encountered Rock Lobsters in the late 1980s when mountain biking was exploding. It was only later that I learned just how accomplished Sadoff was in building road bikes and especially cyclocross bikes. He is…

Selene isn’t ready. In a good quarter of a century she says she’s not quite ready for this coming weekend’s race. Yeah, we had the same reaction. After all, if Selene isn’t ready, who is? But that’s her central issue for this week’s show: preparation. She delineates between fun suffering…

This week we shake things up a bit and Selene takes the reins of the show. Patrick talks about his longest ever day, mileage-wise, on the bike. Selene recently reported on a new study on personality and exercise. And if you think that cycling is the domain of lone-wolf introverts,…

This week, I’m devoting the show to frame builder Roland Della Santa who passed away last weekend at the age of 72. Della Santa is most famous for helping to launch Greg LeMond into bike racing; one of the earliest shots of LeMond winning a bike race is of him…

Last weekend, Selene rode the Lu Lacka Wyco Hundo, a 100-mile ride in northeaster Pennsylvania with its share of dirt roads, steep hills and, on this day, plenty of cold weather and rain. Let’s just say it was an adventure, but the best part was when she met Paceline listener…

In the second part of my interview with Tom Kellogg, we begin with a discussion of geometry for track bikes, and while this subject may not seem super-compelling on its face, it brings in a very interesting discussion of position, weight distribution and handling geometry on the bike. As a…

Pennsylvania in spring is a good place to be a cyclist. The landscape glows in technicolor and the events can be unusual with equal doses of nutty, fun and camaraderie. Selene shares some of the unusual events that she does, like the 666 Cinder Race Series. For her, these oddball…

This week my guest is Tom Kellogg of Spectrum Cycles. Kellogg’s career in the bike industry spans more than 40 years and includes relationships with brands like Merlin, American Bicycle Group and Time. His bikes have won more dozens of national championships and even world championships, which is why…

Patrick is back from the Sea Otter Classic so we are back on our normal schedule. This week he reports on a new gravel bike, one that happens to be fully suspended, to be released later this year. The Niner MCR offers 40mm of travel in the fork and 50mm…

This week my guest is frame builder Steve Rex. Back in 1997 I moved to Redondo Beach, Calif., and began doing the local group rides. There was a guy on that ride who wasn’t on a Trek, Specialized or any of the other big brands. He was on a Steve…

This week Selene takes on a couple of training questions, and prepares Patrick for some of the hard work he’s going to need to do as he gets ready for this year’s Dirty Kanza. She discusses the usefulness of group rides and intervals, even for a rider planning to do…

No. 22 is a newcomer on the custom bike scene. The company was founded in 2012 by Bryce Gracey and Mike Smith on the idea that titanium just rides better. After working with a couple of different contract shops that produced prototypes for them, they settled on Saratoga Frameworks—the operation…

We’re gratified to report that we’ve been hearing from listeners who have been getting health issues checked out as a result of Mark Weir and Jess Cera’s stories. Selene just did the Hell of Hunterdon and it sounds like she says the first word in the event’s name was well-earned. It…

This week my guest is frame builder Nick Crumpton. We may be in the golden age of frame building thanks to the fact that some of the finest steel frames ever produced are being built today. That didn’t stop Nick Crumpton from deciding he wanted to apply his knowledge to…

Before Lance and LeMond, and 7-11 and Motorola, there was a group of cyclists paving the way for American racing on the International level. They were the Raleigh Boys of the 60s and 70s. The Raleigh Boys set the benchmark as the first fully sponsored American Cycling Team competing abroad…

Chef and racer Jess Cerra is the brain behind one of the newest bars on the market, JoJé Bar. With her knowledge of nutrition, the needs of elite racers and her understanding of food as a chef, she decided to formulate a new bar with less carbohydrate, more fat and…

The UCI has announced the first-ever eMTB world championships. There will be multiple categories for both men and women and the prize money will be equal. Of course, there are people who think that this should be sanctioned by the American Motorcycle Association, not the Union Cycliste Internationale. And then…

To hear Aaron Barcheck tell it, he wasn’t even planning to be a frame builder when he went to UBI to take their titanium frame building class. He definitely wasn’t thinking of starting a brand. But after finishing the class and working for Dean Titanium, well, one thing led to…

It may be February and she may live in Pennsylvania, but Selene has started her season with the first of the season’s Spring Classics. It was cold and reasonably wet, but she says all in all, this year’s edition was more pleasant than last year’s. Patrick takes on another listener…

In the annals of the North American Handmade Bicycle Show few builders have been as celebrated as Curtis Inglis, the man behind Inglis Cycles and Retrotec. Inglis has taken awards home more than a half dozen times from the show, due in no small part to the artful curves of…

Again, we take on some listener questions this week (you guys are killing it!). Selene takes a look at night riding and how to get past the fear of not being able to see all that much, even with the addition of lights. She also gives her take on the…

My history with Brad Devaney goes back more than 30 years to Memphis, Tennessee, when we were both students at the University of Memphis and working as wrenches for the Peddler Bike Shop. Even then, Brad was impressive. His work was as thorough as it was efficient. After I moved…

It’s reader questions once again this week. Selene was asked how to structure a training plan so that a racer can maintain a high level of fitness year around, especially if there are six “A” events spaced throughout the season. Most training plans start from zero, and honestly, how many…

This week I’ve got a twofer for you. I’m interviewing two people responsible for creating new clothing for Pearl Izumi. Cory Hibbard is an apparel designer who has worked on a variety of products, from their BikeStyle line of casual but cycling-functional apparel to new jersey designs hitting bike shops…

Selene was recently a guest for Lovingthebike’s Bike School. She was asked a number of questions, but two memorable ones were: what is the lowest temperature you will ride in? How cold can you take it? Another was what your favorite ride distance is. How long does a ride need…

This week, my guest is Steve Hampsten, the man behind Hampsten Cycles. While Hampsten Cycles may draw its fame from Steve’s brother Andy, the only American winner of the Giro d’Italia and Tour de Suisse, Steve has been in the bike industry for more than 30 years. He has worked…

This week we take on a veritable buffet of reader questions. Selene opens with oval chainrings, moves on to whether or not frame material matters, why there aren’t more Clydesdale categories in races and winds up with the age-old question of whether or not your choice of chain lube matters…

In the second part of my conversation with photographer Brian Vernor, we talk about storytelling through photography as well as photography when it is in service to a written feature. We also discuss the difference between commercial work and editorial work and how storytelling is a more compelling way to…

You’d think eating is easy. We’ve all been doing it longer than we can remember. But eating on the bike while pedaling hard enough to make people miss the couch isn’t easy. If it was, we wouldn’t be getting listeners asking about how best to execute so they don’t bonk….

On this week’s show, my guest is photographer, writer and filmmaker Brian Vernor. For many cycling aficionados, Brian Vernor came to prominence as a result of his work with Rapha here in the U.S. His photography seemed to capture the experience of being a cyclist and doing the hard miles…

This week Selene veers into gymnastics. Don’t worry, she’s got a good reason. Perhaps you’ve seen the video of UCLA gymnast Katelyn Ohashi’s perfect-10 performance. Selene muses on body image, what it means to be supported and guided, and ways in which we evaluate our bodies that don’t do us…

In the second part of my interview with veteran framebuilder Dave Kirk, we talk about the last phase of his career with Serotta, and then his move west to Bozeman, Montana, where he opened his own shop. This interview takes a really deep dive into fillet brazing and the finer…

My guest this week is Dave Kirk, the man behind Kirk Frameworks. The path to becoming a skilled framebuilder isn’t set. I’ve met masters who apprenticed under legends. I’ve met geniuses who chafed under menial tasks at big productions houses and left to figure it out for themselves. I’ve met…

This week Patrick and Selene take on two reader requests. First up is an explanation of flow states; Patrick begins with a definition of what constitutes flow and how to identify the experience as well as an explanation of why it feels so incredible. He also goes into the neuroscience…

It’s the new year and it’s a time to establish what the next 12 months will bring. Selene took a look at her year-end summary from Strava and was amazed by her totals. Nearly 8500 miles ridden, more than 600 hours spent on the bike and enough climbing to Everest…

“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,…

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…

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…

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…

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…