Dedicated solely to the exhilaration of road cycling, Cyclist is the very first magazine of its kind. A celebration of the rides, the travel and the latest gear – we'll show you how to get the best from your ride every time.
The eagle-eyed among you will have spotted that the body copy is a touch different from before, while the mole-eyed (of which some of us here at Cyclist are becoming more every day) will hopefully notice that the magazine has become a little easier to read. From cover to cover, we’ve introduced new fonts, new feature formats and whole new sections. The three front-end sections from previous issues – gear, pro racing and training – have been replaced by a single section called Leadout. This will help to prevent too much similarity between issues (a little bit of reader feedback) and give us more flexibility in the kind of articles we produce and the subjects we cover. At the back of the magazine, the Bikes section has been replaced by…
I came for a model launch, and what I got was an education. The story of the 10th generation Giant TCR is not complete without context and my thoughts around the accompanying tour of Giant Taiwan Manufacturing (GTM), the Giant factory. It’s one of nine worldwide, but the only one that produces the TCR Advanced SL. GTM is Giant’s flagship centre of manufacturing, with all its top-level carbon products coming out of it. This article is a first look at the latest TCR, but also a look at GTM, because one is not complete without the other. The more things change… you know the rest You can feel it in the welcome from the chairperson of Giant, Bonnie Tu; in the unveiling by Global Head of Product Andrew Juskaitis; as…
Merida could have halted the marketing campaign for its latest Silex after Matej Mohorič won the 2023 Gravel World Championships on one. By the Slovenian’s own admission – never mind his bike sponsor’s amazement – he wasn’t really supposed to win, and it might be fair to say the Merida Silex wasn’t supposed to win either. But then, that’s the thing. Merida says the Silex has been designed to be way more capable than the average gravel bike and has introduced some fairly radical features into the second generation of the model to ensure it lives up to its billing. The headlines are as follows: max tyre size 700c x 45mm (or 42mm with mudguards); dropped chainstays; 1x and 2x-compatible; multiple fork and frame luggage mounts; dropper post-compatible; option for…
Campagnolo Ekar GT $2,549, campagnolo.com Campagnolo’s first gravel-specific groupset, Ekar, was released in 2020 and is still the only one of the big three gruppo manufacturers to have a 13-speed ensemble. The Ekar GT has improved many aspects of the Ekar, added a little weight and dropped around $800 while keeping the headlines: 13-speed, mechanical, off-road-specific. From a rider’s point of view, the main improvements with Ekar GT include the increased cassette and chainring options, affording a broader gearing spread. Campagnolo is keeping the tiny nine-tooth lowest cog, and now has a cassette line-up featuring 9-36t, 9-42t, 10-44t and 10-48t. There are also five chainrings offered from 44-teeth down to the new 36-teeth. A maximum ratio of 36-48t should be enough to get gravel riders and bikepackers excited to get…
Usually I say the harder the better, but I’m not a huge fan of rain,’ says Michael Storer from his home near Varese, Italy, barely a day after he returned his name to the upper echelons of the WorldTour. ‘I tend to prefer nice and hot and dry weather, like we get in Perth.’ The Western Australian had just finished sixth on GC in the UAE Tour, with an impressive fourth place up the Jebel Hafeet climb on the final intense stage. There aren’t too many races on the calendar hotter and drier than the UAE Tour, but it was a terrific start to new beginnings for Storer in his first outing with Swiss outfit, Tudor Pro Cycling Team. Storer has moved on from a two-year stint at Groupama-FDJ, and…
Name Richard Romero Job title Bus driver at EF Education-EasyPost Nationality Spanish Seasons in the job Two Teams worked with EF Education-EasyPost In all the excitement of a Tour de France stage, the spotlight rarely falls on the team bus driver. Except in 2013, when the driver for Orica-GreenEdge, Garikoitz Atxa, endured the infamy of getting the team bus wedged beneath the finish gantry of Stage 1, with the peloton just kilometres from the finish and getting closer by the second. ‘Have you ever had bad luck like that?’ Cyclist asks EF Education-EasyPost’s bus driver, Richard Romero. ‘Thankfully not,’ the Spaniard replies. ‘It looked very stressful. Mind you, so is driving a long and heavy vehicle up and down the mountains.’ Romero is a recent recruit to the cycling bus…
