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What's New BQ?

By Slate Olson • 23rd February 2010 11:55pm • Posted in Misc

Rapha has the fortune of partnering with a handful of the better cycling retailers around the world. Housed in a newly built, state-of-the-art office in Little Rock, Competitive Cyclist continues to be at the forefront as an online cycling retailer. Beyond their innovative saddle demo program, they are some of the first that we've known to really use video reviews well to bring products to life.

In an area called the Service Course, Competitive's fearless leader, Brendan Quirk is the honest and sometimes provoking voice behind the "What's New" weekly report of trends, happenings, and insider cycling information that makes our sport and this business so entertaining. Chances are Mr. Quirk's keyboard will bring more openness or opinion to any number of topics than some people are wanting to face, but that is why "What's New" is so great. Blame it on his New York upbringing, or his front of the field mentality, but Brendan can be counted on each week for some of the more gratifying reports in the business.

If by chance you're blessed with ample time, you can also find musings from the Belgian-tested Joe Parkin and follow Michael Barry all season long via Competitive's Service Course.

I found this little gem of inspiration a couple of weeks back. Grab a snack and enjoy.

Comments

Ryan Watson

24th February 2010 05:11pm

When I first read the headline, I thought Rapha was partnering with Bicycle Quarterly!
That would be a match made in heaven.
I'm a big fan of Competitive Cyclist as well.

Guy Levesque

25th February 2010 01:06pm

Wow! it took a British compagny to show me a part of the cycling history of Quebec! Never heard of such race. The images are really amazing too. I'm wondering how you guys find out about this movie and about that race… Was it well known in the 60's?
Cheers!

Tim Cox

27th February 2010 04:33pm

Fabulous film, Slate, thanks for digging it up. How on earth did you run into it? Some of those crashes were pretty horrifying, and some pretty gnarly road surfaces, too. Hard men, for sure.

Otis Rubottom

28th February 2010 03:23am

A nice little detail is that Brendan has a framed print of Francois Minard's chart showing Napoleon's march into and out of Russia depicted as a data visualization, representing the loss of troops over time/distance covered. This graphic is thought by some to be the greatest data visualization ever created, for the sheer accuracy, simplicity and impact of it, not to mention how ahead of its time it was. Apparently Brendan's an Edward Tufte fan--all the more reason to give him props!

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