Friday News And Views

It's The Last FN&V Of 2023!

My weekly post on Friday's which generally features three to five news and opinion related mini-posts in one has been going on for many years here on Guitar Ted Productions, but the format for the post idea actually wasn't always fixed to appearing on Fridays. 

There has been a "Monday News and Views" before and every day of the week as well has been used as a News and Views day. Somehow it settled in on Friday and well, there it has been ever since. You can read more about all that in a 2020 post I wrote called "The "FN&V" Story".

In terms of popularity, the FN&V is, generally speaking, the number one viewed post of most any week here. Of course, there are exceptions, which you saw with my "Top Ten Posts of 2023" which came out Wednesday.

This post also generates more views for a longer period of time than most anything else I do here with rare exceptions. So, I tend to put a lot of effort into the FN&V every week and I hope that you all enjoy reading it. Obviously, I will continue to use Friday's as the day for this post for 2024. 

Thanks, as always, for reading the FN&V and the rest of my posts here on Guitar Ted Productions!

The Guitar Ted Podcast To Resume Soon!

Just a gentle reminder that the "Guitar Ted Podcast" will be resuming recording here soon. N.Y. Roll has agreed to continue on as a co-host and is letting me use his "Stone Castle Estates" venue as a recording site. 

We have been brainstorming up some episode ideas, but we are always open to suggestions. If there is a burning desire for you to hear us pontificate on anything bicycle related, let me know in the comments or contact me as always at g.ted.productions@gmail.com. 

We decided to take a break during the Holiday season and recharge our batteries, so to speak, and we hope to have renewed energy and new ideas going forward into 2024. 

Until the next episode drops, consider hitting that link and listening in to any of our past episodes. If I may suggest a few, in no particular order, they would be:

• "The Ethos Of Gravel Events": A discussion of the fall-out post-Unbound Gravel 2023 and the culture of gravel events
• "End of the Age Of Gravel": A wide-ranging episode that speaks to where we are with gravel events/riding. There is also some good tips on cameras for gravel cyclists in this episode. 
• "Learning From A Beginner": My sentimental favorite episode of 2023. I had the privilege of interviewing Morgan Osgood, a "rookie" gravel rider. I was fascinated to hear her takes on what made gravel attractive to her, what she experienced at her first events, and what we, as seasoned gravel riders, should know about first-timers to gravel. This also happens to be our most popular interview from 2023. 
• "Goodbye Cross Check!": Of course, how could I not suggest our runaway number one listened to podcast episode for 2023? Obviously this is all about that venerable, recently discontinued, Surly Cross Check. 

If you have any downtime over the New Years holiday, maybe check into one of those suggested episodes or any of the other 35 episodes in Season #1 of the podcast. Stay tuned.... Season #2 will start soon. 

Job Report:

Allow me a moment to brag on my job at the Cedar Valley Bicycle Collective. Our social media volunteer put this graphic together a couple of weeks ago and I thought I'd share this on the last "FN&V" of 2023. 

The image tells the tale, mostly. We have two paid employees, (myself and Carl, my assistant), but the rodeos, valets, the bike ride, and all that was done by volunteers. 

I taught the classes and Carl and I did all the builds and sales work. It is a very rewarding job, and while the numbers may seem insignificant to some, we are making a big dent in this community in several ways. Plus, there are a lot more intangibles that a chart like the one shown here can never reflect. 

In 2024 I'm looking forward to making more of an impact on the Cedar Valley and beyond.There will (hopefully) be more classes, and making more confident cyclists who can handle simple in-field repairs and adjustments should go a long way toward that goal.

This job has cut two ways for me. on the one hand it has prevented me from doing events and it has really thrown a wrench in my scheduling of rides. On the other hand, it has been the most rewarding job I've ever had. Onward towards 2024!

 

The LeMond eBike with drop bars was one of several that appeared in 2023.

Trends Of 2023

I thought it would be fun to take stock of a few trends I noted in 2023 here before the year closes out. There were a few things that kept cropping up all throughout the year that I will make note of here. 

In no particular order:

•  Alternative drive trains: Everyone keeps pressing in to make an alternative to the "Two Big S's" component groups. We saw a lot of buzz around several Chinese manufactured gravel groups, but so far, they have been either panned by reviewers or haven't gained much ground yet on the popularity front. 
• Racing Bikes With Big Tire Clearances: Are they "gravel" bikes or something else? It's getting more and more common to see brands pushing road bikes that can clear 32mm -35mm tires. Tire sizes that only ten years ago were considered "gravel bike tires". 
• Gravel Bikes With MTB Tire Clearances: And - of course - gravel bikes have morphed into territory reserved for XC hard tail MTB's with tire clearances that are approaching 2.1"ers in many cases. Some sport slacker than ever head tube angles and longer top tubes than most road bike based gravel bikes ever did. Are these really drop bar MTB's? 
• More Electrified Gravel Bikes: It seemed there for a while that every week I had another new electrified drop bar gravel rig to share. There were plenty of them making their debut throughout 2023. 
• Boutique Adventure Bikes/Gear: The other thing I noted was the amount of new, small builder, chi-chi looking adventure/bikepacking rigs out there now. I guess a lot of this had been going on previous to my noting it, but Instagram is chock-full of this sort of thing to the point that memes are being generated mocking the trend. 
• Fatigue Over The Whole Gravel Thing: I have been making an observation throughout 2023 that I feel people growing tired of "everything gravel". There are so many "bucket-list" events, reasons to care about social initiatives at gravel events, influencers, Pros, and social media surrounding "gravel" now that it has all become white noise to many people. Too much is....well, too much! This is why I feel we are entering a "post-gravel" phase now and which will intensify throughout 2024. 

Those are but a few of the trends I noted in 2023. Got anything in mind I may have missed? Hit me up in the comments and tell me what it might be.

That's a wrap on the FN&V for 2023! See ya next year!