Carlo van Nistelrooy 0:05
Hello welcome everybody. This is Gravel Union Talks, a podcast series Full of inspiring stories, news and events from the world of gravel. Each month we will be chatting with guests who are passionate about riding off the beaten track, adventure riding, bike packing and gravel riding, gravel racing rather. I'm your host Carlo. I'm still having a slight cold. Olly is the co host all the way from Newcastle UK. In every episode, we have a star guest star guest of today you just entered the studio. There gravel union talks dungeon in Venlo the Netherlands.
Sander Kuik 1:00
Good afternoon. Good evening.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 1:02
Good evening. Welcome to our show. We will get back we'll be getting back to you a little bit later. Because we're going to talk about gravel tech today. Gravel Tech with with Sondra he is and a product director and the digital transformation director at Shimano Europe. So he'll need to
Olly Townsend 1:22
explain a little bit more about that. Sounds like he's very busy.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 1:33
Oh, job. So I don't know. We might be asking a little bit more about that. We'll be getting some insights on the world of the gravel deck. We'll be going over the developments over the last years history and future of GRX. And product development for different types of gravel riding. Maybe there aren't maybe there aren't. And, but we'll also be talking to somebody about his very own custom built gravel monster. More about that later. Ollie, in every episode, we have a look at the website, our things cooking at gravelunion.cc.
Olly Townsend 2:12
Great. And the big news for this episode is the new gravel union website. We've been working on it behind the scenes for what feels like years, but actually, it's probably not that long. But yeah, finally launched and bug free, we hope and it should give a much better experience to our viewers, we hope better imagery, we've changed the menu so that it's smoother and easier to navigate. We've got some new types of stories, we can do things called armchair adventures, which longer more detailed stories, really fantastic pitches, try and inspire people to go and ride in different bits of the world. See has taken a long time. But it's finally finally live and up and running.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 2:55
You know, good work takes time. Yeah, but we're ready now. So we're looking forward to get your remarks for fit when visiting the website. So if you want to give a feedback on the new website, please do send us an email info at gravelunion.cc or use the contact form on the website. The popular stories of last month, only
Olly Townsend 3:17
two completely different ones. The first one was we have a section on the website where we feature the builds of some of our readers. So people that have put together something particularly special or different or interesting. And this one was a British guy called Gideon Thomas, who built up a Genesis quad refer Genesis is quite a well known British brand. And acquired a fair was there. It's been around probably 10 years. So quite a long time in different different forms. And it's a steel gravel frame set. And he's built it up with with really beautiful components. It's everything color coordinated. And then a friend of his who's the mechanic is also a pro photographer and took some amazing pictures. So it was partly I think just how great the imagery was. So that was one of the stories
Carlo van Nistelrooy 4:08
are always pretty popular on our website, people would like to check out to build so far.
Olly Townsend 4:15
Yeah, I think everybody's keen to see what other people do. Instead of just being a factory build, it's something a bit different. So why did you choose the components that you put on it? And what are you going to use it for? And how do you make it different to a standard factory build? So yeah, Gideon did a great job. But that one, remember that our story was about the launch renew bike event for 2022 called the gravel Tour de mon block, which is a really amazing looking race that runs in the region close to Mont Blanc on the French Swiss border. And how long has it in it, they're gonna the rack and the top racers will do it in less than 24 hours. So it's it's a single day event but a significant amount of it. of riding and climbing as well. So it's gonna be
Carlo van Nistelrooy 5:03
known as a road event. But now there is also. Yeah,
Olly Townsend 5:07
that's it. So yeah, I think it looks really fun. fantastic scenery is I've just looked at it's 200 kilometers and eight and a half 1000 meters of climbing. So I can't can't imagine doing that kind of distance with that climbing in 24 hours. But yeah, a good a good challenge.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 5:29
Welcome Sander. Thank you. It's a well, it's an easy one because we live close by actually,
Sander Kuik 5:36
that's like, I think 700 meters,
Carlo van Nistelrooy 5:41
So you're here by bike? Yeah. Everybody's doing long distance goals. By bike. Okay. Yeah. We chatted on gravel components Earlier in June 2020. Correct. There's been a lot of developments in the market and also with with Shimano, but first, you are a product director and digital transformation director. Please elaborate a bit what's what's in your package? What what do you do during the time?
Sander Kuik 6:11
It's so many things. So in my role as Product Director, I actually have three main areas, which is innovation, that's all things that are long out a couple of years, then I have a product coordination team that that really works with our engineers in Japan on the next generation of products, which is really exciting for everybody, because that's what they want to know what's coming around the corner. We also Yeah, I can understand that, but we don't disclose anything. And then the last part is really the after sales. So everything with warranty and service and technical support. And we deliver that from our headquarters in Eindhoven to all our distributors and our own sales offices. So that's, that's my old job. So to say, and as per officially the first of January, I will transfer into digital transformation, which means that we are going to build Shimano to zero but completely digital. So we are going much more to the digital customer experience. We are going to launch a new ERP in the next couple of years. So that's a big, big operation which we run globally.
Okay. Okay, so you do the European end. I will
be doing the European end. Yeah, correct. But still
involved in product development as well.
Yeah. Therefore, for that, we are looking for new people. So people can apply and people can apply there are plenty of jobs in Shimano, we are growing quite rapidly. So check out our job site. And there's interesting for for bike lovers a lot, a lot of nice roles.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 7:51
Okay, so that's a it's an open invitation. And that's on the on the Shimano Europe website. Probably
Sander Kuik 7:57
if you go to Shimano minus europe.com There you will find the jobs and so please apply we were looking for quite some people. So
Carlo van Nistelrooy 8:05
your Human Resources colleague is is glad that that is mentioned there are job opportunities at Shimano in Einthoven. Yeah. And Netherlands
Sander Kuik 8:16
by the way, also in our sales offices in France. So we have
Carlo van Nistelrooy 8:21
is there still a room available for Olli? In in the Newcastle office of Shimano or
Sander Kuik 8:27
any supply with Madison, and we have a distributor distributor in the UK,
Carlo van Nistelrooy 8:32
Madison in the UK, we know them very well. So he has close connections. Maybe you can tell our audience a little bit because I know you you've been working on gr X during the last years and you were on, I think at the first iteration even of direct tell our listeners a little bit more about how gr X came about, and what are you looking to future things in in the GR X realm?
Sander Kuik 9:01
Well, the story of GRX really started in the US were our colleagues. In Shimano North America, they saw that a lot of riders in the US we're using, let's say, cross type of bikes, but also normal road bikes to really ride the gravel roads in the US which are more over that. And then we have here in Europe, Europe is almost everything. Concrete fight, I would say we have a lot of concrete roads. But in the US, a lot of B roads are still gravel so people use that to get away from traffic and it was really a social aspect. The little messages on Facebook people would gather and would go in in this group right. And when we noticed that, that trend our engineers in Japan together with the with the guys in in the US and also in Europe. They started to investigate what was really needed in this in this new type of riding, what what cable type of gears what what gearing would be needed for something which was at that moment in time still known as gravel. And that's really how GX came about. And the first generation GX, which we have now on the market is, is a combination of the best out of mountain biking, but also components from road. And that makes it into the ideal combination for for gravel riding.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 10:38
And how long did it take to get from the first development to the, you know, bringing it out on the market with direct?
Sander Kuik 10:48
That that's always hard to say, but But typically, we have a development cycle from the moment that we really go, because actually development of new components and looking at new requirements is a continuous process. So the guys in the engineering department, they all ride their bikes, they all visit cycling events. And with that they gather market information. And that market information is then shared with the engineers in Japan, who are really constantly looking at what is happening in the market, what are the new developments and trends that we need to take into account. And then there is a moment that we issue with so called planning sheet and in that planning sheet, that's the formal start of development of a new group. And that new group set development roughly takes 18 months. So from the moment that we have the first, let's say prototype working on it, probably Yeah, earlier. And you also have the r&d department that are looking into the nitty gritty details. If you look at the components that it is a lot of metal, a chain, a chain set in the front, that has not changed over the last years. But it is all in the details. So hyperglide plus, which we right now have for our top tier road groups that's making shifting up and downwards easier. And those kinds of developments. That's what they constantly working on Japan. So the r&d department is really looking into how make the shifting much much smoother, much faster, much more reliable. testing new kinds of metals testing new kind of surface treatments. So that's all ongoing, and these kinds of developments then flow together in a new group. So
Carlo van Nistelrooy 12:40
what were your biggest challenges challenges when you when you developed GRX.
Sander Kuik 12:48
Now, maybe not so much big challenges, but it was mainly bringing the mountain migrated Rayleigh with the clutch mechanism and the roads gearing together because the stroke of a of a shifter of a mountain bike shifter and a road shifter is different. So to bring that together is quite an engineering feat. It looks very simple, but it is all in those little little things that make it that make it hard.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 13:18
What has changed over over the last years. You're looking at the do you think, well, it's what it is right now. And we'll we'll we don't need to make big steps towards the future.
Sander Kuik 13:31
Now if you look at the market, the market is is diversifying here. So you now see really from the bike packer, which is the new type of holiday adventure app to the racer, and GRX was was a good mix of everything. So you had one buy you had to buy, you had some nice gear sets. But actually for the pro riders in the long races, they typically want to have bigger gears, because they want to have speed, they want to have power meters. So typically, if you look at the pro riders taking part in the 200 mile races they use do raise cranksets in the front, because they really want to have that power. But if I give that to somebody who is just enjoying nature, taking his bikepacking bike out for a multi day ride, that's way too big. So you see that the diversification in the market at the moment makes that you need to have a lot more combinations.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 14:33
And that's possible within the range of five Shimano, but do you think that something that we noticed also is that you know, the different aspects of like two, three years back it was gravel riding is now it's gravel riding? It's bikepacking adventure riding and gravel racing. Do you feel that product development will suit the needs of the three three categories or?
Sander Kuik 14:58
Yeah, it's In the combination of So, it is how you can mix various cassettes with with different chambering options in the front. And that can make the solution very suitable for the type of writing that you are doing. So I think in that mix, it will play
Unknown Speaker 15:20
because gravel racing is starting to develop also like in the US it's already big. We had a lot of effect on on the show winner in one of our last episodes is going to develop in Europe.
Sander Kuik 15:34
UCI is going to run some some races, so it's getting bigger and bigger.
Unknown Speaker 15:39
And then those races at this point use combination of wrote and directed probably,
Sander Kuik 15:46
yeah, if you really look at the pros or the x pros that now take part. In those careful races, they have been using JIRA arrays for all of their life so they don't switch back from them. Okay. And in the first ideas GX was really the the off road group set for Shimano. So, the idea was also there to bring it into the cyclocross market, which worked in the US, which is not a very high developed cycling crore cyclocross market, but if you look in Europe, all the pros still write your race and they stick to the race, you cannot bring them away, because that's what they know. And all those pro riders are superstitious as hell. So why should why should they switch. And that's also what you see, when they hit the hit the gravel, they typically use the road stuff on the gravel bike, but the only thing that is really, the thing that they need is a clutch mechanism in the rear derailleur. And we see the same if you have the, the grand finale of the Tour de France and they write the Shansi design with a little cobblestone Yeah, you also see that they are using long cage clutch mechanism really rayless because of the bumpy road, so it's mixing.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 17:06
So it's all intertwined between the markets on one end road.
Sander Kuik 17:12
Yeah, and I think if you take that trend away from the group sets and you look at the frame builders more and more, especially in the low end and mid tier categories of the road, you see the frames are getting wider, you can fit bigger tire so that market is is integrating you have a moped multipurpose road bike, you can run fatter tires, that gives people more confidence, but also brings new new riders to the to the world of cycling.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 17:46
Because you've been talking about development is in Japan, a lot of pro riders making the step to gravel racing are using your race, because that's what they know. What kind of people are testing GRX products
Sander Kuik 18:04
want to sitting across?
Carlo van Nistelrooy 18:06
I know cuz you do you do. When we have a ride together, you sometimes are very secretive about things that are in your own bikers.
Sander Kuik 18:12
Yeah, but then the engineers in typically the first prototypes test by own own stuff from Shimano. So either we do that outside, but sometimes in the later stages of the development, we definitely go to races or events tested there. And then we have a group of riders that tested in the field for for a little bit more duration typically with the top tier group, so if you take again, Darius and we recently launched our new race groups that that is then in the final stages tested with with Pro two teams in gravel, we don't have pro riders yet. But maybe in the next generation we will also start testing it with with pro riders.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 19:08
So I know that all is always volunteering to do the testing. Anjali.
Olly Townsend 19:13
I probably not quite as skilled as someone like Mariana vos or material Vanderpol. But I'm happy to give some feedback if it's useful.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 19:21
You're also you know, you build your own bikes.
Olly Townsend 19:25
It's true, but probably not quite the same level.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 19:29
Okay. Can we expect new developments in general no specific but can we expect new development and direction for the coming year
Sander Kuik 19:42
2022 2022 I'm not going to disclose any dates, but if you look in general what is happening in the in the road market and in the in the Shimano world, you can see things that are that are happening They will trickle down that's what we always did. We always develop new tech in the top tier groups first we launch it there and then it goes down and it will it will go to other groups as
Carlo van Nistelrooy 20:14
I'm doing the calculations here. So we might have new products somewhere 22 and 22 Maybe 23
Sander Kuik 20:23
There will be new products in 22 in 23 / 24
Carlo van Nistelrooy 20:27
is very political about this
Olly Townsend 20:31
I guess is that his job there isn't it not to give too much away? We can try though.
Sander Kuik 20:37
I love my job at Shimano so I need to keep my mouth shut.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 20:41
But because I know there are some specific details of GRX people love the handlebars What do you like best of your GRX setup
Sander Kuik 20:55
I really like my my shifters. I think the generation direct shifters that are now there and I use the DI two versions. They are super they are really super they you can have a nice grip on it with the elevated breakage points you can easily break with with one or two fingers that's that's fantastic. I really love that
Carlo van Nistelrooy 21:19
yeah it's ideal because yeah, you're on top of your shift is quite quite often when you're when you're on on on on the on the on the off Route bit. So do you have any any remarks on direct from from your side Ali? Do you do you think they need
Olly Townsend 21:36
to save my favorite? No, well the shift is the bit that's my favorite the same as Sunday I'd absolutely amazed how comfortable they are. But also how now I spend all my time off road on the hoods rather than than drops and they give such extra security you don't feel like you're going to get bounced over the top of them. So it's
Sander Kuik 21:57
even when you're in in the in the drops with a little hook on the end you can easily grab it with your finger if you aren't you and you need to hold on it's they are fantastic.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 22:11
I love it just another question No no no no development do you use I can imagine that people have an opinion about products and maybe give you ideas of what you might improve Do you have like a feedback from like users like like Ali and myself?
Sander Kuik 22:31
You You know the answer to that we use some some ambassadors in in the gravel union as well which right with our products and we use that feedback that's that's the way we get market Rebel Alliance, the gravel Alliance members it is it is our staff visiting all kinds of cycling events we people in product team but also in the in the service department, which I have, they must go to consumer events they must visit that I went myself to the Garda Mountain Bike Festival this year. Of course the events are limited now in the in COVID times but we went there and only when a day. At such a event. I stood in the booth where people could bring their bike we had a talk, we talked about what they liked about Shimano products, what they dislike and that's all what we write down in feedback which goes back to Japan so we carefully listen to the consumer.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 23:31
Yeah, and the gravel Alliance members are typically your your average because we have some some races and some bikepackers adventure riding and again
Sander Kuik 23:39
that's the difference between between the Pro Tour teams and the group sets that we developed for them because there you have a professional which doesn't do anything else than riding his bike but in gravel like I said, we don't have the real dedicated pro riders yet. You see more and more pro two teams coming up while UC UCI is now starting to organize these these races. And you already saw EF education with their, their their program. Lachlan Morton doing all kinds of fancy stuff on his bike, mountain biking, gravel riding. And I think you will see more pro teams going that route. And that will spark the interest as well.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 24:21
Yeah, I think that's something that we see in the gravel union area. Also more people get into diversification like Utah. We have gravel riders, you have your your bike packer and also the gravel race, which going to be a whole new part of the gravel.
Sander Kuik 24:40
I really hope that with with the gravel racing scene coming up that we that we keep the spirit of gravel
Olly Townsend 24:47
Yeah, that's something that we're good that
Sander Kuik 24:49
and so far, you saw the the ex pro riders, the ones that went with retirement, so to say, and then they could drink beer afterwards. then they could have a barbecue because in their pro life they could not do that. But I hope we keep that spirit also around the races and I truly hope that we don't get too much rules Yeah, let's let's stick with with the freedom of of gravel riding let people ride what they want in the races. And that I think that is nice and I started myself in mountain biking in the early days, the end of the of the 80s, early 90s And then we had the same spirit and I think within mountain biking that's still that's still the fact if I go to World Cup mountain bike races it's still easy going a little bit relaxed or atmosphere then when you go to a big cycling road cycling event with all the security and the passes that you need and those kind of things
Olly Townsend 25:57
well we do agree don't we only
we do. But I think I'm really looking forward to it diversifying. I think hopefully there's enough gravel for everybody and we can have those people that want to do non competitive rides and just ride with their friends there's something for them but also there's the the top end racing world for those that want to do it and I hope then it will it will just grow and grow.
Sander Kuik 26:21
Yeah, but I think over the last years gravel open to cycling market to so many if I if I look quite close to me, my own wife I wanted to get her on a mountain bike but that was always steep going down technical difficult. And then we tried on a on the road bike on narrow tires and difficult and it's going fast but now she's running in gravel bank. Road but easy go and gravel. And she enjoys it and she goes out herself nowadays with with a gravel bike. So that really opens a new new perspective for for people to ride.
Olly Townsend 26:59
Well, we see a lot of a lot of
people entering and a lot of women,
a lot of women. So the inclusiveness of the whole gravel communities. That's what that's what we, you know, we all embrace is that everybody should have his own place if you want to race race. But please have the beer afterwards. So
Sander Kuik 27:17
exactly when I ride with Carlo yes, yes.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 27:21
As always Guatemala at the end somewhere. Ollie you've been doing an article with with some Ron is on a special bike.
Olly Townsend 27:29
Yeah, we did. We did a couple of articles earlier in the year didn't we sound a review your T lab. I wondered how you are getting on with it, whether you're still in love with it, whether you've made any changes to it or what you thought about it after having had it for for six or seven months now. It is
Sander Kuik 27:46
it is still an amazing bike. It is still an amazing bag. I'm still in love with it. It rides fantastic. It is stiff. I always had the feeling titanium is more compliant. So it will be kind of squishy. But this this really, this really rides like like an ordinary carbon frame, which is stiff as well. So now okay, I'm still enjoying it. I didn't change much. Maybe different tires and some some other wheel sets. But no, it's still in my in my possession and still read and a lot of people can
Carlo van Nistelrooy 28:27
check out the article, its articles, because it's you've been you've been doing the whole built yourself.
Sander Kuik 28:33
Yeah. So I was on the lookout for a titanium bike. And I wanted to do something special. It has always been a dream to own a titanium bike. So now I had the opportunity and came into contact with the Aussie from T-lab in Montreal, Canada. And these guys really helped me fantastically so we documented the whole built from from the moment that they that we signed the order and they made some photographs. It was shipped over to me I build it up with of course Shimano components. What else? And yeah, we made two articles for for gravel union.
Carlo van Nistelrooy 29:17
So people can can look back and see the whole experience because that's the fun thing. I'm not a technical guy at all. I have to be to be honest about that. But I can, I can imagine that it said that the whole process of you know, building it from scratch is self expression.
Sander Kuik 29:34
Yeah, but that that's also the road to making the bike it was it was sometimes quite difficult. When when we talk geometry, I can tell you exactly the geometry that I wanted. But then the big question came, how should it look? Shall we paint it? Shall we keep it as is? What kind of colors do you want? And we had a lot of sketches In a lot of ideas, in the end, we kept it plain and simple because it's also the beauty of the metal. It's it's the craftsmanship that goes into a handbuilt titanium frame. And what they did is really the logos are bead blasted on it. So it is it is a really a piece of jewelry for for decades to come. So you're the proud owner? Yeah, I'm a really proud owner. And I'm, I'm an advocate of of de Lappe in Europe, you don't see many because it's it's a Canadian brand. But people should check them out. Really, they make fantastic titanium frames.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai