Canadian Cycling Magazine October & November 2021/ Vol 12 Issue 5

Columnist Bart Egnal has been chronicling his head-over-handlebars love for cycling in this magazine almost since he started racing. Like many, he got into cycling in adulthood. His passion, and bike collection, has grown. His stoke amazes me. If something catches his fancy, such as track cycling or mountain biking, he’ll just go for it. I also enjoy the way he can laugh at himself. That requires a certain amount of fearlessness. In his latest column, Egnal looks at his relationship with racing, especially road racing. Throughout the past 10 years, his life has changed as well as which facets of cycling he wants to focus on. His story is common for many of us. What we ride and how we ride can change. Still, the love for the bike remains. Writer…

Editor Matthew Pioro matthew@cyclingmagazine.ca Senior Editors Dan Dakin, Kevin Mackinnon, Dean Campbell Associate Editor Andre Cheuk Photo Editor Matt Stetson matt.stetson@gripped.com Copy Editors Amy Stupavsky, Rebecca Tucker Art Director Warren Wheeler layout@cyclingmagazine.ca [Roseander Main, roseandermain.com] Production Artist Warren Hardy MTB Web Editor Terry McKall terry@cyclingmagazine.ca Web Editor Lily Hansen-Gillis lily@cyclingmagazine.ca Podcast Producer Adam Killick Web Developer Sean Rasmussen Digital Operations Dmitry Beniaminov Publisher Sam Cohen sam@gripped.com Editorial Director David Smart dave@gripped.com Advertising & Sales Andre Cheuk andre@gripped.com Account Managers Joel Vosburg joel@gripped.com, Lorena Jones lorena@gripped.com Circulation Manager Robyn Milburn robyn@gripped.com Social Media Nikita van Dijk nikita@gripped.com SUBSCRIBE Send $20.95 (1 year) or $38.95 (2 years) to Canadian Cycling Magazine PO Box 819 Station Main Markham, ON, Canada L3P 8L3 or call: 1.800.567.0444 SUBMIT Manuscripts, photographs and other correspondence are welcome. Please contact Canadian Cycling Magazine for contributors guidelines, or see them on the web at cyclingmagazine.ca. Unsolicited material should be accompanied by return mailing address and postage. Canadian Cycling Magazine Tel 416.927.0774 Fax 416.927.1491 cyclingmagazine.ca Gripped Publishing Inc. 75 Harbord St., Toronto, ON, Canada M5S 1G4 Copyright 2021 Gripped Publishing Inc. The contents…

Kelsey Mitchell keeps, and covers, her head following her Olympic gold medal “You need to get higher up on track,” was some advice that Kelsey Mitchell received from one of the many seemingly instant track cycling experts that emerged within Canada following her gold-medal win in the sprint at the Olympics. “OK. Thank you,” was her polite but bemused response. Suddenly, after all the hard work on the boards throughout the past four years, Mitchell and her cycling discipline were getting a lot of attention. It’s the power of Olympic gold. “I love it,” she said. “People are really into it. Usually you’re talking hockey or soccer in Canada. It was cool that people were screaming at the TV or having beers or crying when I won.” A few days after the…

A small piece of glass or a little sharp stone – these longtime foes of cyclists will mess up a ride by slicing into a rubber tire. Early in the 20th century, the tire scraper started to appear on bikes to keep them rolling. The component is essentially a wire that brushes off flint, glass or anything sharp before it can get embedded in the rubber and cause a puncture. “When I was an amature racing in France – in ’96, ’97, ’98 – I still saw a lot of guys using them,” say Michael Barry of Mariposa Bicycles. “Guys definitely even raced with them.” These competitive riders had to weigh some pros and cons when it came to using tire scrapers. The scraper – or tire wiper or flint catcher…

After almost two years of e-racing and pandemic-inspired solo challenges, mass cycling events are returning to North America. As summer turned into fall, the traditional cyclocross season looked to be in direct competition with its trendier and debatably more enthralling breed of event: the gravel race. On the surface, both offer plenty of excitement for the price of admission, but if it came down to a choice between one style of race or the other, how many might abandon their 33-mm tubulars? Well before the onset of COVID-19, many cyclists flirted with the idea of ditching their cyclocross and road bikes altogether, in favour of the omnipotent modern gravel bike. A decade ago, before the term gravel bike existed, people would come to the bike shop looking for a Swiss Army-knife…

Could your next Amazon delivery be by cargo bike? Two Toronto entrepreneurs think so. In 2020, Ivan Waissbluth and Nick Gaganiaras started NRBI (as in “nearby”) a cargo-bike delivery service and hope others will follow their lead. In Toronto, there‘s already a pilot project with FedEx – the delivery company with vans, trucks and airplanes – involving a handful of cargo bikes bringing packages to certain neighbourhoods. NRBI, however, is dedicated to deliver only via bike. Home deliveries are up – from 50 per cent to close to 110 per cent depending on the market – since the pandemic began. The sight of white vans delivering food or goods has become ubiquitous in most cities and towns, and even rural spaces in Canada. For Gaganiaras and Waissbluth, the conversation about using…