Cycling mags

funkydisciple

Hello all,

So, where do you get your cycling fix from when you’re not riding? What magazines have you subscribed to or what website do you get your cycling news from? I’ve been enjoying reading the rouleur magazines and I been buying the Cyclist magazine for the last couple months and that particular mag has been kinda crap in my opinion.

lemme know

dodgy

I stopped reading magazines about 10 years ago at least. I can get all I want/need online for free. If I want opinions/reviews on kit, I get that from actual owners on forums.

CitizenLee

As above, I haven't bought a paper mag in years.

I addition to BikeRadar, I generally user these sites for news and reviews...

mtbr.com
pinkbike.com
singletrackworld.com
road.cc
cxmagazine.com

tangled_metal

Bought a cycle mag at the weekend because it looked like there was a touring bike review in the contents. Turned out to be a touring bike vs a gravel bike. Hardly a comparison of touring bikes. I then flicked through it then dumped it 5 minutes later on the back of the sofa. It promptly fell down the back of the sofa and I really can't be bothered to make the effort to finish reading it.

Waste of money! There is never anything of interest in them. Actually they often have one feature I think I might be interested in. I resist buying it because I know it'll be very poor feature. They are really just advertising for the brands and bikes being reviewed. If they're reviewing something you're looking at then don't buy it but wait a bit longer it'll republish on a website sooner or later.

sloppyschleckonds

Arrivee magazine is always an interesting read

exlaser

Still buy magazines a lot . Still enjoy the whole experience. Reading on line is a soulless thing in comparison and don’t even start me on forums lol

crescent

Occasionally buy 'Cycling Weekly' to read on a two hour train journey. Some weeks are better than others but generally feel a bit disappointed afterwards.

lakesluddite

I subscribe to both Cyclist and Rouleur - they fill two quite different 'holes'.

Rouleur played a massive own-goal this month, a joint interview/conversation between Alejandro Valverde and some bullfighting kn0b, presumably trying to get comparisons between them to tie in with La Vuelta. AS someone who detests bloodsports to their core, seriously considering stopping my subscription because of this, what is in effect, promotion of this vile 'sport'.
Unfortunately my subscription has just renewed, so by the time it comes to an end I'll have probably 'forgiven' them enough to continue!

CitizenLee

Principles, eh! :P

cgfw201

Get Cyclist every month on a freebie via work. Always fairly nice but nothing special or different.

Started paying CyclingTips.com last month, find they consistently churn out the highest quality content on cycling, and want them to keep going and getting bigger & better.

Signed up on the back of this brilliant bit of writing. https://cyclingtips.com/2018/08/finding-mr-x/

kajjal

I found the endless formulaic infomercial reviews got very tedious after a while and stopped buying them.

For mountain biking I read singletrack which goes into a lot more detail and is more varied with real articles.

Matthewfalle

MF has Cyclist on subscription. Some months good, other months meh but is too lazy to cancel the subscription.

MF has also started to re-read old copies as he found a load in MF's garageand started to sling them out. They do not age well and MF has found no reason to keep them.

#recycling.

MiddleRinger

I buy a magazine if I need something to pass the time on a flight or long journey, but otherwise no. They're pretty much just the same content year in year out now. Half filled with advertising and poorly written reviews which are just thinly veiled advertising anyway. All the race previews are out of date by the time it's published.

Sometimes there are good reads about riding in other countries or profiles, but pretty much everything is online these days.

Matthewfalle wrote:

MF has also started to re-read old copies as he found a load in MF's garageand started to sling them out. They do not age well and MF has found no reason to keep them.

I do buy most of my magazines from charity shops!

green_mark

Cyclist
- “look how much we suffered while riding in a really beautiful area”
- “look how much these really expensive bikes cost”

Cycling Weekly
- “look at these race results”
- “look how much these bikes cost”

Cycling Plus
- “here are ideas on how you should ride a bike”
- “look how much these bikes cost”

Bicycling
- “here are ideas on how you should ride a bike”
- “look how much these bikes cost in USD”

Cycle Sport/Procycling magazine
- “look at these pros”
- “look how much the bikes the pros ride cost”

Bikes Etc
- “look how much these bikes cost”

sloppyschleckonds

Arrivee Magazine

- "Look how far i rode my bike through this beautiful countryside"

dodgy

Tour magazine when it was available via the iphone/ipad app was pretty good. When they tested equipment, they actually provided objective metrics. All the magazines will say "these cranks felt stiff", Tour magazine will say "under a deflection test we measured a deflection of 'x nm' under a load of 'x KGs' and then compare with dozens of other cranks they tested. Same goes for tyres, frames etc etc.

CitizenLee

MBUK

-Free socks
-Tress that grow at 45° (aka Dutch Tilt)
-Same features every month as the previous years

I liked Guy Kesteven's reviews though.

vinnymarsden

I too was abit bemused by Rouleurs article with VV and the bull fighter.
I like VV but found the entire article bizarre, what actual relevance does a bullfighter have to cycling?
His explanation of his “art” was cringeworthy, making himself sound like some kind of Gladiator!
There’s nothing remotely redeeming in killing an animal for crowd satisfaction, I just hope VV gave his agent a bollocking for signing him up for that gig!
I buy Rouleur on the rare occasion, this purchase made on a weekend lazy break with the wife.
She read the article and was shocked at its placement in a cycling magazine at all.
I remember a year or so ago, my last purchase, they did an article about Floyd Landis selling cannabis, another non cycling story.
It’s off the approved list now, in fact only Cyclist remains!!

FatTed

Ride magazine out of Australia is probably the best one I read, although only occasionally.

Sutton_Rider

I haven't brought a mag in years. I used to watch GCN they were great, but since they changed the format I find 90% of them are rubbish and get deleted within a few seconds.

thegreatdivide

Another ‘boo’ from me for that stupid AV/w@nk3r interview. An unrepentant doper and a bell end who kills animals for others entertainment. Really stupid idea. The Handsome Tom article on the other hand was great.

So yeah, I thoroughly enjoy Rouleur and I also like the US magazine Peloton. If you can track down this month’s photo special the pics are stunning.

cgfw201

cgfw201 wrote:

Get Cyclist every month on a freebie via work. Always fairly nice but nothing special or different.

Started paying CyclingTips.com last month, find they consistently churn out the highest quality content on cycling, and want them to keep going and getting bigger & better.

Signed up on the back of this brilliant bit of writing. https://cyclingtips.com/2018/08/finding-mr-x/

Another good reason to pay for something that's free on CT today

https://cyclingtips.com/2018/09/still-a ... s-america/

neeb

I usually buy the comic, mostly just for Hutch’s column but Katie Archibald’s one also cheers me up and they sometimes have some semi-interesting pieces on training, bike fitting or whatever. Every month I try to avoid buying Cyclist but usually succumb at some point. Mainly I use it just to flick through as bedtime reading for 1-2 minutes and rarely get further than looking at a couple of pictures of pretty bikes before I nod off.. :-)

Matthewfalle

this month's copy of Cyclist arrived yesterday.

Did MF get home, rip off the plastic bag and devour the contents? No he did not. Its still sitting there.

He may cancel the subscription......

neeb

The format of Cyclist is a bit too rigid. Always an interview / marketing piece with some artisan frame builder, always three bike reviews at the back, always the same peripheral columns. And then always that centrepiece based on some rambling article about a long ride somewhere abroad, invariably featured on the cover with a shot of some cyclists in the middle distance on a hilly road through rocky scenery with a blue sky and scrubby vegetation.. It's amazing how near identical the covers are, quite an achievement in dull anonymity. It sometimes takes me a minute when I'm browsing on the news stand to work out if I've already bought that issue or not.. If they went to one of the moons of Jupiter they'd find some part of it that looked like Mallorca to do the cover photoshoot in. On the latest issue it actually IS Mallorca!

Matthewfalle

12 pages of paid for promotion this month.

hmmmm - not really keeping mf hooked here ....

Matthewfalle

neeb wrote:

The format of Cyclist is a bit too rigid. Always an interview / marketing piece with some artisan frame builder, always three bike reviews at the back, always the same peripheral columns. And then always that centrepiece based on some rambling article about a long ride somewhere abroad, invariably featured on the cover with a shot of some cyclists in the middle distance on a hilly road through rocky scenery with a blue sky and scrubby vegetation.. It's amazing how near identical the covers are, iquite an achievement in dull anonymity. It sometimes takes me a minute when I'm browsing on the news stand to work out if I've already bought that issue or not.. If they went to one of the moons of Jupiter they'd find some part of it that looked like Mallorca to do the cover photoshoot in. On the latest issue it actually IS Mallorca!

mf agrees completely.

Matthewfalle

Matthewfalle wrote:

12 pages of paid for promotion this month.

hmmmm - not really keeping mf hooked here ....

ERRANDUM

MF didn't notice the 4 pages of Wattbike promotion first time round.

16 pages of adverts plus all the normal adverts.

not exactly great

#BAD

Pross

I think someone on this thread may have an affiliation with Cycling Tips. I started reading the initial article linked and described as a great piece of writing thinking it might be that Cycling Tips has evolved since I last looked at one of their pieces. It hadn't, I actually gave up after a few paragraphs as the writing style was so chaotic. If that's what now counts as great writing I fear for the future of journalism.

glenwatt

Has anyone tried Readly.

https://gb.readly.com/

For a monthly fee (£7.99) I get to read most of my favorite Mags, plus it keeps the rest of the family happy with other titles.

However I still do miss my little stack of reading material in the loo at times!

Matthewfalle

Pross wrote:

I think someone on this thread may have an affiliation with Cycling Tips. I started reading the initial article linked and described as a great piece of writing thinking it might be that Cycling Tips has evolved since I last looked at one of their pieces. It hadn't, I actually gave up after a few paragraphs as the writing style was so chaotic. If that's what now counts as great writing I fear for the future of journalism.

mf made it to paragraph 2.

its like it was written by a sixth form student who has read too many of his dad's hippy magazines from the 60s

#forgettable
#painful