Marginal Gains Cycling Podcast, Presented by Silca

We have found another reason to love Cyclocross and he is in this episode. Ben Frederick is our guest. Ben has had a short yet extraordinary career in bike racing with his primary focus on the discipline that involves running with your bike over barriers and up stairs mixed in with the occasional bunny hop and mouthful of mud. Ben knows all of that and more.  
Ben's Cross career was about to take off when a crash put him behind the eight ball, His injury was not the obvious or more common collar bone or road rash. His was a Traumatic Brain Injury. It's the kind of thing that has no clearly defined prognosis. While the races kept happening, Ben had to wait out the symptoms he appropriately labeled "monsters."  It took him years to get better. 
Ben's injury changed him forever and his monsters -while not as scary- are still with him. But he's back racing and has laid out one final, big goal. 
Ben's Brain Injury Group     https://www.thesmallmonstersproject.com/
Marginal Gains Media Documentary on Ben  https://youtu.be/UsI3KK2MzYo?si=kg9Q2Y9uAIy73Z0S
Ben on Instagram  benjamfred

Ask Josh Anything is back and a listener wants to know how much faster Tadej Pogacar's bike setup compared to Marco Pantani's. Tadej took down Pantani's KOM on Alpe d'Huez this summer; a record that stood for more than 30 years. Most of it was Tadej's legs but the bike must have played some role. The question is how much? 

Hottie asks Josh about the Navier-Stokes equations. Simply put the equations are the math behind the flow of fluids like air. Open AI recently declared that it had discovered a problem with the math. Josh explains what it could mean for those  who rely on the equations for CFD simulations. 

Speaking  of Aero .. a listener wants to know if his hairy arms would be better off covered with a long sleeve jersey. Naturally Josh's answer is prefaced by "it depends." 
Josh is also asked about the carbon's double personality. In some cases (bats and hockey sticks) it is extremely resilient to impact. But in the case of bike frames it seems to take on a fragile identity.

Josh has often spoke of the people in cycling he most admires. Rob Gitelis is a name he mentions frequently. Rob is the head of Factor Bikes. Rob's company is coming up on its tenth anniversary. The rise to prominence has been quick. Barely a year after Rob took over Factor, its bikes were on the start line at the Tour De France. Factor bikes have been ridden to three stage victories at the Tour. Factor has also celebrated wins at the Tour Down Under and a Gold Medal on the Track at the 2024 Olympics. 
Rob's credo is similar to Josh's: performance and quality first. If it costs a few bucks more to make the best, Rob -- like Josh -- can live with that. Nowhere in the Factor lineup is that more evident than the Factor One. The bike has been labeled the fastest in the world. A super aero machine that now has a partner in Factor's Gravel lineup: The Elara. These two bikes represent Rob's pursuit of high performance. The bike world has taken notice.

We believe in staying in touch with the history of bicycles. Knowing where we've been can often tell us where we are going. That idea has been frequently used when discussing the emergence of the 32 inch wheel. "It's like when we went from 26er to 29er" they say.
But what was it really like to be in the trenches through the birth of the Mountain Bike? The struggle to find parts. The original wheel size dilema. The passion to push the industry in a new direction. Gary Fisher know what it was like. Gary -- as you probably know -- is a Mountain Bike OG:  Pioneer. Thinker. Doer. He helped bring a new style of riding and the new bikes to ride on into the world of cycling. He is a part of bicycle history.  
Josh and Hottie talk to Gary about what it took to see a vision become reality. From hanging out with the Greatful Dead to bombing down Marin County's Repack Trail. Gary has a million stories that somehow are stored in one amazing cycling mind.

Hottie and Fatty pepper Josh with tire questions. Specifically what is and is not a radial casing and how his team was able to move towards a radial ply angle without disrupting tire stability. Josh also explains how they arrived at Protocol's knob shapes and patterns. 

From our listeners we have quesions on putting gels in cargo bibs. Does this result in unecessary heavy lifting? Josh answers one on the optimal place to mount a mini pump. On the downtube or the seatube? We also get into why in the spirit of manipulating air flow we don't see more pros wearing long sleeve jerseys?