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I don't think it correct to assume that "Supercar money" can not be made in the Bike Industry. You can make decent money in the bike industry, then reinvest that money in something that multiplies your wealth astronomically. We live in a crazy world, where you can make insane amount of money with speculation in no time, if you are smart and/or lucky. Now, that money may not directly come from the bike industry, but I would say he could have pulled off his wealth from smart investment of money that he originally made in the bike industry. I believe...

Handing someone a bill for replacement of a Campy drivetrain usually made for an easy Dura Ace sale..

I get the desire to move on from this story, but it deserves the attention it is getting. Here is why: First, there is not much else happening in the space. The Felt news is interesting, and I reached out to Cesar and may do something there later. He is a great guy. Outside of that, the only real story right now, in my view, is the health of the consumer, which everytime I bring up in conversation i get glazed eyeballs (lol...its riveting!). When you compare that to the personality of Markus, the very public way he is handling...

Here's another story of bike industry woes for those who want to read about something new today - CPSC has issued a "Stop Using Batteries in Certain Rad Power E-Bikes Due to Fire Hazard" warning to consumers. The batteries "pose a risk of serious injury and death," the agency says, after 31 reports of fires. Rad Power is NOT offering replacements or refunds, as doing so would be "financially ruinous," the company stated. More here: https://www.consumerreports.org/product-safety/stop-using-batteries-in-….

@Downtime Podcast Been busy and have sporadically been able to follow the thread. I haven’t listened to the DT podcast. Haven’t listened to Brines debrief. But I do know this. MF asked/paid Chris to provide a platform. Chris did that. Jumping on Chris for not asking the right questions is crap. MF was on the back foot from the company crisis. Chris didn’t put him there. MF had every opportunity to at least clear the air and admit wrongdoing. At any point during the pod MF could have said “Let me say this about that”. MF had an open mic...

To me, it seemed like MF('r) genuinely didn't understand the insolvency process or side of business at all leading up to YT falling into it. He straight up admitted it in the pod. TBF I don't either but it seems like until mid '25 there was an assumption that they could just keep "powering through, business as usual" until it was way too late and the house of cards fell. Sweet management chops. He addresses the insolvency like it was an unforeseeable natural disaster rather than gradual foreseeable mismanagement by the company itself. "How could this happen to ME?!" type...

How many people do you really think there are listening to Downtime that don't already know what's going on with YT? If you're nerdy enough to be listening to a mtb podcast with the owner of a bike company, there's a pretty reasonable chance you've already got a base level understanding of what's happening.

There's more than one way to skin a cat. You don't have to deliver a Stephen Sackur HARDtalk style aggressive rebuttal based interview to provide insight. You can just let your interviewee make his case, ask the questions and let him respond. Give him the rope as they say. For anyone complaining about the interview, who has listened to it and thought Flossman came of well? Do you really think anyone out there thinks that? Chris let him make his case, and he sounds incredibly tone deaf and has confirmed to all of us the naive incompetent narcissist that he...

I just want to recognize Chris for stepping into the bull pen that is this thread...

" You are very privelaged to be in your position whether you work hard or not." Might be one of the wildest statements I've read in awhile, and that's before the spelling... --- Chris, keep it going! Get everyone's side of the story, make some money while you're at it, and let the audience decipher the message. You (and all the other podcasts out there) are the platform, we are the interpreters, whether some of those interpreters like it or not. On a cohesive note, I think we can all agree that anyone who knows even the basic details of...

If your definition of making money in a cushy fashion is 4 days work for minus £40 and comments like this, then I must be that hanger on using mountain bikers for my benefit. Just to be clear, this was my decision to do this interview and I'm not unhappy about doing that at my cost. YT just covered the bulk of the travel to enable us to do it in-person, which I think provides not only a better quality audio and video experience for you all, but also makes the conversation flow better. This doesn't in any way change...

Thanks to those who've taken time to write kind words about Downtime. I was expecting to get some hate for this episode as there is definitely a lot of frustration out there on this topic and Markus appears to be a very polarising character. For what it's worth, I put in the time to understand the concerns of the MTB world as much as was possible from forums etc and I believe that all those key points were covered in this interview. I also took time to understand the mechanisms of Private Equity and just why growth is essential and...

It sure seems like Markus came back in early 2024 and the strategy / spending didn't change. Perhaps there were layoffs. Perhaps there were other cuts. But it really didn't sound like it from that interview. What's wild to me was that he was already going hat in hand to the PE guys at the beginning of 2025, and they told him they weren't going to give him 100% of the cash infusion he was asking for. That should have been a red siren moment for him. Time to cut and cut deep. Instead the strategy appears to have been...

This was great! Crazy fast turnaround, too. Thanks for your timely thoughts on the Downtime Podcast, Jeff. To your point about Markus being at the helm when he alleges that "PE was overly focused on growth," I agree. As I was listening to your 9-minute response, I was thinking about Andreas Kolb, who was likely signed to the 2025 YT MOB sometime around September of 2024, well after Markus came back as CEO in February of 2024. Kolb must have been a HUGE contract and represents YT choosing to double down on their DH and Enduro teams, especially given the...

As much as I love it (and am a Patreon supporter) I've started skipping/abandoning episodes because they seem like straight-up puff pieces...

Maybe that is a pod we could actually get.

Personally I'm just disappointed there wasn't a phase 6-7.

Whoops! First time playing with the new Google image model. I tweaked the output after generating the first variant and accidentally introduced that bug (missing phase 3). FWIW, I spot-checked a few numbers and it’s accurate. You all might not be as impressed as I am, but being able to visualize data this quickly and correctly is a huge unlock for anyone working with otherwise eye glazingly boring financial data.

I felt this was worth posting here. Yes, AI made it and yes its pretty spot on. It was built primarily off all financials from 2016-present.

One thing I always thought about YT, and I'd love to hear Brines opinion or maybe somebody who works at a shop and looks at inventory a lot... But how exactly practical is it, even as a d2c brand, to have THAT many sizes of THAT many specs, typically at 2 colors each? That's the shame of YT. I think people loved the Tues, loved the dirt loves, generally are at least ok with the Jeffsy and Capra. I think the Izzo and gravel bike were... A puzzling step for the brand though the Izzo turned out ok, imo. Just...