In our latest edition of Rider's Lens, we share a charming and colorful collection of illustrations from Colombian artist Camilo Parra, also known as Washedog. Read about Camilo's passion for working by hand, find his perspective on the parallels between bikepacking and drawing, and explore the pages of his sketchbooks here...The post Riders Lens: Cataloging Inspiration with Washedog appeared first on BIKEPACKING.com.

While this is ostensibly a bike blog, since 2010 Ive really been focused on one thing, and thats chronicling Best Made Co., a brand created by a guy who bought axes, painted the handles, and sold them to complete idiots for twice the price:I admit I was captivated by Peter Buchanan-Smith immediately, because he is the embodiment of a deeply pretentious lifestyle and worldview I find exquisitely annoying:So over the ensuing years I became his number one fan and de facto biographer. I was there for the triumphant moments, like when Specialized launched the Diverge at Best Mades grossly overpriced designer scout store in Tribeca:[Hey, do you like bikes? Do you have a first name thats usually a last name? Do you have an artfully curated basket bike locked up outside? Holy shit, me too!]And I was also there for the lows, like when Best Made finally had to close down or whatever:[Best Made fall down get boo-boo.]This was a crushing blow to effete urbanites everywhere, because now if they wanted stuff like axes and first aid kits theyd be forced to pay reasonable prices for them.By the way, that last post I just linked to included steamy photos of my erstwhile Litespeed taking a shower, and I admit I found myself lingering over them for a little too long:You know what? Im not so sure I should have gotten rid of that bike.In any case, despite having made following Best Made my lifes work, I completely missed that Buchanan-Smith has since bought the name back from the suckers who bought it and is resurrecting the brand:I dont know much about design, but one thing I do know is that the very best branding evokes fascism. Those Rapha armbandsAll those band logos with their iron crosses and umlauts and runes or whateverAnd of course Best Mades big bold X logo, which here makes Buchanan-Smith look like a hipster dictator, or perhaps an angry butterfly:So what is Der Bedzzler going to do next? Well, you know its going to be something relevant:Not like an actual product, mind youinstead, its going to be a mindset, which makes sense because nobody ever used their stuff anyway:Frankly I cant imagine a better brand to launch a new gravel race:But their brief dalliance with Specialized notwithstanding, Best Made seems to appeal to that subset of rural gentrifiers who dont particularly care for bikes and instead pay lots of money for refurbished Broncos and Defenders:Whilst virtually indistinguishable to the casual observer, theres a clear line of demarcation in the aging hipster community between bike people and non-bike people; visit Hudson, NY for example (its like Best Made built a whole city) and you wont see a single bike anywhere, not even a Budnitz.Anyway, throughout the history of this great nation, innovators have taken brilliant ideas and proceeded to build companies around them. Then theres Buchanan-Smith, who has made a company that exists for no other reason but to be a company. See, the product isnt the point, because Best Made isnt about fulfilling a need or making your life better in any way. Sure, it sells stuff as part of the LARP, but nobody actually uses it:Because its not about the product, its about the how:Id argue the real question is, What the hell does that mean?But whatever they start selling, you can be sure it will have emotional durability:Thats a concept they came up with during a meeting at the company that existed only to be a company and have meetings about being a company:Holy shit, I think I figured out what the new product is going to be!By the way, if you cant find the emotion in a pair of pants youre not looking hard enough. Id check that fifth pocket.

UAE Team Emirates have revealed their lineup for the Tour de France this Friday morning and it includes all eight riders that were initially planned to race the Grand Boucle. A big part of this plan to win the race revolves around Adam Yates who was on the podium last year and has recently won the T...

The temporary measures will be monitored for several weeks as theCrown Estate looks for a longer-term solution to prioritise safety and well-beingof Kensington Palace Gardens residents

It's a little scary to think how in modern cycling changing equipment can change a rider's performance so much. How 2 or 3 months of nutrition or gear change can lead to an extreme performance change. That seems to be what's happening with Rmi Cavagna, who does not seem so happy with his transfer f...

The e-Oltre weighs just 11kg in its lightest guise while the Colnago V4 features V4Rs styling at a lower price point

After supporting Primoz Roglic to victory at the 2023 Giro d'Italia, Team Visma | Lease a Bike rider Michel Hessmann was suspended by the team after having tested positive for a diuretic in an out-of-competition test. It was a lengthy and at times confusing battle to understand what has happened exa...

CyclistTour de France history: Pantani goes from hero to legendThe list of riders to have claimed both the Giro dItalia and the Tour de France in the same season is a short one. Until 1998 it contained just six names, unsurprisingly all giants of the sport: Coppi, Anquetil, Merckx, Hinault, Indurin, Roche. No need for first names. Then in July 1998 came a seventh rider: Pantani.Born in 1970 in Cesena, Pantani had risen steadily through the Italian amateur ranks. He won the Baby Giro in 1992 and turned professional with Carrera.Two years later he broke into the Grand Tour elite when he won back-to-back stages at the Giro on two monstrous days in the Dolomites, riding impressively over such feared climbs as the Stelvio and Mortirolo and finishing the race second overall.A 24-year-old boy, born in Cesena, is perhaps the great climber that Italian cycling was waiting for, wrote Gianni Ranieri in La Stampa. Six weeks later Pantani took third overall at the Tour.By the time 1998 rolled around, despite having been dogged by misfortune and sickening crashes, Pantani had a number of impressive Tour stage wins to his name, including a brace of victories on Alpe dHuez.But he had not been able to better second and third overall at the Giro and Tour respectively. All was soon to change. In early June he broke his Grand Tour duck by claiming the Giro, cementing his overall win on the climb to Plan di Montecampione. Then came the Tour.The 1998 edition was plagued by scandal before a single rider had even turned a pedal. In the run-up to the race, a car driven by Willy Voet, a soigneur on the Festina team, had been stopped and searched on the France/Belgium border, his car found to be full of banned drugs of almost every sort.Voet was arrested but the Festina team still took to the start line. Soon team hotels and buses were being raided and entire squads taken in for questioning. Riders threatened to go on strike and staged sit-ins over what they saw as invasions of privacy. The Tour descended into chaos, the actual racing lost among all the controversy.For a time it looked likely that the race might not even get to Paris. The events were an embarrassment to all sport, never mind just cycling, and it was against this background that Pantani rode himself into the history books.Master of the mountainsEvery cycling fan knows the importance of time-trialling in a Grand Tour. Cast an eye backwards from 1998 over the preceding 20 years of Tour results and you find every winner bar one took time over the eventual second-placed rider in at least one TT the sole exception being Greg LeMond, who trailed Bernard Hinault in all three solo efforts in 1986.Pantani was different. He was a pure climber, a man who needed the long and high climbs of the Alps and the Pyrenees to shine rather than the tick-tock of the clock. Over the course of the 1998 Tour he lost more than seven minutes during time-trials to second-placed Jan Ullrich, but it didnt matter. It was in his mountain playground that Pantani went to work.First he soared to a stage win at Plateau de Beille, where this picture was captured, escaping 12km before the finish and taking 1min 40sec out of the yellow jersey-wearing Ullrich.Five days later, now lying fourth overall and still around three minutes behind Ullrich, Pantani decided it was time to make his definitive move.Stage 15 was 189km from Grenoble to Les Deux Alpes and took the peloton over the Croix de Fer, the Tlgraphe and the Galibier before a final climb to the ski resort.It was the first time that Les Deux Alpes had featured on the Tour and the weather was miserable. The scene was set for a stage that would turn into a classic.On the Galibier Pantani attacked and quickly distanced Ullrich. The German watched the Italian disappear, had a chat with his sports director and then did nothing. After all, there remained around 55km to the stage finish, with a technical descent and a final climb still to go once they had crested the Galibier. Surely this was a move born of desperation. But Pantani had committed and rode on.Standing on the pedals in his unique, crouched way, the diminutive Italian tamed the Galibier. At the summit he had an advantage of more than two minutes. While it had been a devastating attack, he still needed more time if he was to end the day in yellow.Pantani dropped from the Galibier, flew down the Lauteret, hung a left by the Lac du Chambon and then waltzed skywards towards Les Deux Alpes. Clad in wet and lurid Lycra, his shaven head covered with a bandana, his face grim with pain, he found nearly nine minutes on Ullrich to take over the race lead.On that sodden day in the Alps, Pantani was untouchable. It was one of the great attacks of the modern Tour and monuments would be erected on the Galibier and in Les Deux Alpes to recall the moment. Six days later he stood in Paris wearing yellow as only the seventh rider to record the Giro/Tour double.The Italian never again reached such heights. Distraught after being thrown off the 1999 Giro while wearing pink after failing a health-check his haematocrit level breaching 50% Pantani declared he had been betrayed and would never ride again.In time he would step back from that threat and return to racing, claiming further Tour stage wins, but he remained a troubled man and died on Valentines Day in 2004, alone in a cheap hotel in Rimini. Cerebral and pulmonary oedema was the official cause of death, with the coroners report stating it had been brought on by acute intoxication from cocaine. He was 34 years old. This article originally appeared in issue 115 of Cyclist magazine. Click here to subscribe Related Posts Marco Pantani: Death of a Pirate podcast review Tour de France history: Stephen Roche does the Giro/Tour double in 1987 Tour de France history: Coppi triumphs on debut for first Giro/Tour double Tour de France history: Miguel Indurin time-trials to unique double-double Mens Tour de France 2024: Route, how to watch and all you need to know Marco Pantani: The birth of Il Pirata The post Tour de France history: Pantani goes from hero to legend appeared first on Cyclist.

Jasper Philipsen was at the end of his contract and had the interest of many teams in the peloton. It was certainly not an easy task for Alpecin-Deceuninck to keep their prime sprinter, but the Belgian has renewed with the team until as long as 2028 - the same length as Mathieu van der Poel's contra...

The Swiss resort makes the perfect stress-free escape for those last-minute long weekend riding trips. Crans Montana video thumbnailStart planning an alpine riding holiday and the first places that probably come to mind are Morzine and Les Gets. Continue reading