With the brand new year just out of its plastic many of us are still brimming with optimism. I know I am! It’ll be at least several months before I give up on my goals and revert to my usual state of resignation and cynicism.
I’m pleased to see that boutique bicycle maker Canyon also has high hopes for 2026 and beyond, and has set an ambitious sales target of one billion European Social Welfare Coupons:
Apparently up until now Canyon has “lost direction because of changes in its culture:”
The founder and returning chief executive of German premium bike maker Canyon says he can raise annual revenue by a third to about €1bn within three years, claiming that the company has lost direction because of changes in its culture.
This provides much-needed context for last year’s Grizl broccoli bike release. Like a hapless bikepacker, Canyon had lost its way, but they’re now Jesus-carrying themselves into a glorious and highly profitable future:
Or, to put it another way, they’re undercutting their competitors in a desperate race to the bottom:
Arnold, known for his deep knowledge and attention to detail down to the tiny bolts on Canyon bike handlebars, wants to cut internal red tape as he refocuses the direct-to-consumer brand on its long-standing strength of premium bikes at competitive prices.
Soon after his return, he cut the price of Canyon’s latest top-end gravel bike by €400 to €3,999. He acknowledges the hit to profit margins but argues that lower list prices will result in fewer discounts and enhance customer loyalty.
“The direct-to-consumer model gives us a price advantage, and it matters a lot that Canyon is seen in that light,” he said, adding that the brand will soon launch a new series of lightweight top-end e-bikes at competitive prices.
Presumably that €400 is just enough to convince that potential Grizl buyer not to patronize a bike shop, even though he’ll eventually wind up paying a bike shop to assemble it for him–though I think Canyon have even made an end run around that scenario as well:
I think Rivendell need to include a similar option for their customers where two technicians arrive at your home: one to perform the ritual quill stem insertion, and the other to provide banjo accompaniment.
By the way, could someone explain to me how you perform a 35-point safety inspection on a bicycle?
Are there even that many parts on the bike? I guess a typical road bike has barely that many spokes now, so maybe it’s checking each one individually and then making sure both brakes work. Meanwhile, a 35-point inspection wouldn’t even get you past a single wheel on many Rivendells.
As for Canyon, you’ve got to feel for them, because they’re making many millions of Euros, but apparently they’re not making enough many millions of Euros:
In 2023, Canyon swung to a net loss of €14.4mn which widened to €37.8mn in 2024 because of the costs of the e-bike recall. Over the first six months of 2025, the brand’s earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation fell a further 30 per cent, according to GBL’s half-year report, which blamed “oversupply” and “aggressive discounting” as well as one-off quality issues. The company told the FT that both its ebitda adjusted for one-offs and its free cash flow topped €50mn in 2024.
As always, I will point out that I am in no way anti-capitalist. Still, how the hell are we looking at numbers this big in an article about a company that sells bicycles? They’re not drilling for oil, or engineering superchips, or sending rockets into space. They don’t even make the bikes! Yet somehow this is a company with both a Gravel Project Manager and a Road and Gravel Brand Manager. Couldn’t Canyon just as easily be like four people with laptops? Make me CEO, I’ll send revenues through the roof!
Speaking of maximizing your revenue, why ride a bike outside when riding one inside is way more efficient?
Look, I know I complain a lot about language. And yes, maybe not using the word “build” for putting a bike together is a little extreme. BUT COULD WE STOP USING “HACK” THIS WAY PLEASE? Also, it’s not a “fitness hack;” it’s exercising. This is like calling watching TV an “entertainment hack,” or masturbation a “pleasure hack”…though I suppose I’d be okay with calling it “hacking off.”
But yes, riding inside does net you far more “quality” than riding outside:
“If we just look at fitness, the point is simple; on the trainer you can get more quality in less time,” says Cavallin.
So why is riding indoors more time-efficient?
“Out on the road you constantly have ‘dead time’: traffic lights, roundabouts, long descents where you’re barely pedalling, sitting in the wheels, sections where you have to slow down for cars or safety,” he adds. “Indoors, an hour of training is a full hour of work, with no interruptions.”
Of course I get that we’re talking specifically about training here, but isn’t all that “dead time” part of what cycling is? Isn’t avoiding hazards the visible brush strokes in the painting, and isn’t coasting the silence between the notes that is just as important to the symphony as the notes themselves? Must every pedal stroke really be “productive?”
Rouvy coach Stern says he spends nearly a third of his outdoors rides coasting at zero watts. Whereas indoors, he says: “Every pedal stroke is productive.”
Sure, if you’re a professional athlete this is true, but guess what? If you’re a “time-crunched athlete juggling work and family,” your rigorous trainer session is just as unproductive:
“For time-crunched athletes juggling work and family, which is most of my clients, this efficiency is transformative. You’re not training more, you’re training smarter.”
Why must a hobby be productive? If productivity is the goal, then why even have a family? Surely there’s a virtual option that doesn’t involve all the “dead time” like helping your spouse and visiting with relatives and taking care of the kids when they’re sick and all that other emotional junk mileage:
Certainly as Inspector Clouseau once observed, we would do well to embrace inconveniences such as falling into a fountain and catching pneumonia or occasionally having to slow down whilst bicycling or cleaning up puke as part of life’s rich pageant.
Still, you’ve got to admit, this sounds like a lot of fun:
The following example of an endurance turbo session shows how Stern’s indoor-outdoor time conversion stacks up. Indoors, you could spend nearly all of an hour ride at the right intensity stimulating the desired physiological adaptations. On the road, it’s hard to spend more than 70% of the total time in zone 2. So you’d have to ride about 90 minutes for the same benefit, and budget for more pre- and post-ride faff.
“Stimulating the desired physiological adaptations” sure sounds like hacking off to me.