Hi there!
How was your weekend?
I returned on Thursday from a week of riding in Murcia, Spain. I even managed to cameo on my 2nd auf Deutsch episode of GravelTIME while there. Thank you, again, to Felix for the invitation & hospitality! 5 Days of warm weather riding with friends old & new was just what I needed!
The reason I came back to Amsterdam early was the 1st edition of Dox Under The Tracks at Workspace Six was Friday. We started the concert series with a performance from Willem 't Hart & thus the title of this issue. ; ) More about the show below!
Tomorrow, I'm starring in my 2nd photoshoot with Super 73 & Twotone will be kicking off with them soon as well, so I'm listening to Micromobility's recent interview with their founder, LeGrand Crewse.
Wishing you a nice week ahead, and thank you for reading & sharing this newsletter,
Jon
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- 📷 Featured image courtesy Kike Molares at our 1st Dox Under The Tracks
Cycling
Bespoked Goes to Dresden, Germany this October
BESPOKED, Europe’s largest annual exhibition of custom bikes, will take place in Dresden, Germany, this October 13th-15th. More than ever, I'm stoked for Bespoked!
The show, in their own words, is aimed at "celebrating, elevating and contributing to the sustainability of framebuilding by showcasing some of the most outstanding and exciting work in the cycling industry."
The whole Twotone team is really looking forward to this edition of the show!
The Pro Cycling Media Market: Riding Out The Turmoil
Late last month, Richard Pestes at Pez featured a long-read The Outer Line article by Steve Maxwell (one of the founding partners of Pocket Outdoor Media, and a minority shareholder in Outside & a regular VeloNews contributor). He wrote about turmoil in the cycling media market & it's a pretty compelling read.
If you're in the industry, it is certainly worth a look. Maxwell makes some recommendations for endemic cycling media outlets:
🏗️ 1. Build back original advertising and find new commercial partners;
👨💻 2. Develop a more authentic editorial brand and strategy – a “personality” to differentiate oneself from the competition;
💡 3. Identify and define the specific characteristics and size of the target market they wish to serve;
🪢 4. seek out and develop other new and complementary revenue sources that can be logically bundled with legacy media content to add value; and
🛠️ 5. utilize the economic cushion of these strengths to grow digital subscriptions/membership revenues
Exploring Texas by Bicycle
This is a wild one! A ~4828km (3000 mile) trip around Texas.
You can read details about each week: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8.
Fun fact: You can almost fit Germany into Texas twice!
Another fun fact: I grew up in Oklahoma! 😅
Ideas
Why Young Professionals Should Prioritize Rest Over Work
Determining why you overwork, and exploring how you truly feel about it, will help you design the life you want.
Haha, the irony of penning this newsletter at 11 pm on a Sunday & sharing this article is not lost on me 😅, but there are the takeaways:
🎛️ Regain control over your time. Remind yourself that even if everyone else around you works long hours, that doesn’t make it “normal.”
😌 Redefine “leisure time.” Instead of labeling your free time as “unproductive time,” remind yourself that the time you take for leisure is needed to recharge your energy and make room for new ideas and creative thoughts.
🛑 Quit your toxic workplace. When all else fails, you may realize that your workplace is toxic, and it’s the culture that’s pushing you toward overwork and burnout.
Connecting Europe by train: 10 EU pilot services to boost cross-border rail
The European Commission announced late last month that it will support 10 pilot projects to establish new rail services or improve existing ones:
- Hungarian Ministry of Transport: new services connecting Hungary, Austria, and western Romania
- Connection Germany - Denmark – Sweden, with the participation of SJ (new night train service Stockholm – Copenhagen – Berlin and day train Hamburg – Gothenburg (and potentially Oslo, in co-operation with DSB and DB), Snälltaget (enhanced night train service Stockholm – Copenhagen – Berlin), České dráhy (new service Prague – Berlin –Copenhagen, in co-operation with DB and DSB) and Flixtrain (new service Leipzig – Berlin – Copenhagen– Stockholm)
- Midnight Trains, new night train service Paris – Milan – Venice;
- Flixtrain, new service Munich – Zurich;
- WESTbahn, new service Munich – Vienna – Budapest, an extension of existing service;
- Nederlandse Spoorwegen, enhancement of the existing Amsterdam – London service, in cooperation with Eurostar
- European Sleeper, new night train service Amsterdam – Barcelona
- Ferrovie dello Stato Italiane /Deutsche Bahn, new services Rome – Munich and Milan – Munich, with a possible extension to Berlin
- ILSA, new services Lisbon – A Coruña and Lisbon – Madrid;
- Ferrocarrils de la Generalitat de Catalunya, new services connecting Catalonia and the South of France.
'Gorpcore': How Did The Outdoors Drastically Influence Fashion And Style In The 21st Century?
What is Gorpcore? Well, besides being an acronym for ‘Good Ol’ Raisins and Peanuts’, it is an outdoor-oriented style that places a particular emphasis on utilitarian and functional design.
An albeit high-level history of this funny fashion trend that by way of bike packing & ultra distance has certainly extended into cycling circles as well.
Friends
Three Rides Closer
For my friend Jeff at Ritchey, things are complicated as he's living between two countries, though being keen to be in only one. He has family across the ocean, and works for an international company. Needless to say, I can relate to his story and regret of having ridden quite a bit less in 2022 than in years past. This one spoke to me!
Daft Music Studios – Selected Highlights 2022
Our friends at Daft had a great year in 2022! I'm proud to say we contributed with a fun weekend shoot for PRO Bike Gear last year. Read more about Daft in their latest newsletter.
Tough as Silk | Part One
My friend Fish shot this footage during the inaugural Silk Road Mountain Race (SRMR) in August 2018. The film was never released & he wanted to do justice to the race, the people, and his own efforts. So, 5 years later, he made his own studio (in Workspace Six!) and started editing the footage he had been sitting on for so long.
SRMR is one of the toughest bike races in the world. and this series will show how hard it can be. He made this series in the original timeline. He did not race so unfortunately, he did not ride the whole course.
Every Wednesday, a new episode will air. So subscribe and put on the ping!
Radness
Friday's Dox Under The Tracks Nº1 was a success!
On February 10, 2023, Workspace Six & Twotone teamed up with Dox Amsterdam, an Amsterdam-based music company, for a night of jazz featuring Willem 't Hart & his band in our office.
Willem 't Hart is a Rotterdam-based artist. His solo project fuses creative influences from Willem's background as a high fashion model with jazz, electronica and neo-soul. Stream Willem's music here.
Photos by our very own Kike Molares are here as well.
Our in-house drummer, sound engineer & bike mechanic when he's in the mood, Stefan 'Fish' Vis made a live stream recording of the concert for you to enjoy below.
The next edition will be in April & announced soon!