Colby Pearce has been a Steve Hogg Certified expert bike fitter for the past 10 years and has worked with elite athletes and WorldTour teams, including EF Education First. He is also an elite cycling coach and has been passing along his wisdom to the riders he coaches for decades. Pearce’s repertoire of knowledge spans 30 years, five continents, hundreds of races, and countless miles in the saddle. The minutiae of cycling and riding technique are just part of the story that Colby shares. Alignment with nature, foundational principles of health, and treating the sport as a practice are some of the philosophies he shares. Cycling in Alignment features a diverse guest list, including those who may or may not be familiar names in the cycling world. Prepare to have your belief systems shattered.
Episodes
4 days ago
4 days ago
Pre-50, Post-50 Relationship to Cycling - Ep160
In this walking podcast, I unpack my thoughts on training and how it might differ for athletes younger than 50 vs older than 50. On a previous podcast, I spoke to Phil Cavell about his book The Mid Life Cyclist, which also covers this topic.
My thoughts are around Intensive training vs extensive training, but perhaps not in the typical sense they are discussed in cycling lexicon.
Concepts I consider: I really don’t like the “getting old sucks” mentality. I think it is regurgitated bullshit.
Repletion instead of depletion.
Training objective is experiential vs. exhaustive or maximally stimulative.
Think with more depth and sophistication than no pain no gain or more is better.
I think while it is tempting to push a bit more on days when you feel really good, more often is it better to keep it dialed back a bit and finish with a bit in the tank. When we zoom out and look at the big picture, it is far more common to be treading water or a bit under water in terms of the total load of life + work + travel + training, so when we are feeling like we have a surplus of energy we don't need to spend it immediately.
Additionally, younger riders are working with a higher level of anabolic hormones than us old people.
Perhaps you will find my thoughts useful, this is always my intent.
Wednesday Mar 12, 2025
Wednesday Mar 12, 2025
Thomas McDaniel: Knowledge is Horizontal (Part 2) - Ep159
This the second part of a conversation is with Thomas McDaniel, who has been in the cycling world for many years. He is currently completing his PhD at CU Boulder in Advanced Biomechanics. In the past, Thomas has been a PT, a bike mechanic, a bike fitter, and worked at Specialized, BMC and Trek.
Thomas and I are aligned in that we prefer to educate rather than treat our clients and the people in our lives. As someone who has offered bike fitting to many clients in the past, Thomas understands that not everyone fits in the bell curve of normative data and that every person is a unique individual.
After many other detours and explorations, we round out our discussion with a critical look at science and academia, and how they have been obfuscated from their conceptual ideals.
I am sure you will enjoy this deep dive into the mind of Thomas, who has a rich passion for helping others and is a deep well of knowledge and experience.
Links:
Chek Institute ►► https://www.instagram.com/chekinstitute/
Tuesday Mar 04, 2025
Tuesday Mar 04, 2025
Thomas McDaniel: Knowledge is Horizontal - Ep158
This conversation is with Thomas McDaniel, who has been in the cycling world for many years. He is currently completing his PhD at CU Boulder in Advanced Biomechanics. In the past, Thomas has been a PT, a bike mechanic, a bike fitter, and worked at Specialized, BMC and Trek.
Thomas and I are aligned in that we prefer to educate rather than treat our clients and the people in our lives. As someone who has offered bike fitting to many clients in the past, Thomas understands that not everyone fits in the bell curve of normative data and that every person is a unique individual.
After many other detours and explorations, we round out our discussion with a critical look at science and academia, and how they have been obfuscated from their conceptual ideals.
I am sure you will enjoy this deep dive into the mind of Thomas, who has a rich passion for helping others and is a deep well of knowledge and experience.
Links:
Chek Institute ►► https://www.instagram.com/chekinstitute/
Friday Feb 28, 2025
Friday Feb 28, 2025
The Inner Self - Ep157
In this walking podcast I share some of my thoughts about how you can be your own medicine and claim authority over your life. In this day and age we have access to so much information, it can be simultaneously overpowering and also paralyzing.
What I offer is a perspective on the difference between knowledge and understanding, and how each of these serve us in our lives.
Think critically, pedal consciously, act intuitively.
Wednesday Feb 19, 2025
Wednesday Feb 19, 2025
Tyler Benner: It Feels Easy When you do it Right - Ep156
This episode is a conversation with Tyler Benner from Strong Feet Athletics. Tyler was a member of the US National Archery team for about a decade, and a lifelong athlete.
He has spent the last 10 years making the world’s first barefoot style cycling shoe that is mass produced. They just started shipping the first model, The Leviathan, about a week ago as of the time of this recording. They generously sent me a pair to test although they only arrived a few days ago, so I haven’t had a chance to ride in them just yet. That said, the fit is very much shaped like my foot and I am excited to give them a try in the wild.
Tyler describes part of his inspiration for making the shoes was listening to Phil Liggett commentating for the Tour and talking about riders “dancing on the pedals” when climbing out of the saddle.
We speak about the importance of training feet and ankles to be strong and stable, and how this is important in all athletics. Tyler’s experience as an archer led him to discover the significance of the conditioning and tone of his feet, and how it impacted his ability to hit the center of the target.
I am sure you will find his journey insightful.
Links:
Strong Feet Athletics Website ►► https://www.strongfeetathletics.com/
Tuesday Jan 28, 2025
Tuesday Jan 28, 2025
Lore: Creating Unicorns - Ep155
This podcast is a conversation with Lore CEO and founder Stephan Drake and lead engineer Rob Horacheck. If you haven’t seen or heard of Lore shoes, come out from under the rock you are living under and see the future of cycling footwear. Lore is a fully custom 3D printed carbon fiber shoe. Let that sink in for a moment. It’s a complete departure from any how any cycling shoe has been made in the history of cycling. [or any shoe, for that matter].
Enjoy our conversation as I try to contextualize Lore in cycling footwear history, and Stephan and Rob explain the features and philosophy behind this product.
If you are interested in being scanned for Lore shoes, this is a service I provide at my studio. As with everything in my fit studio, I don’t just sell these shoes, I use them myself because it is a product I believe in.
Links:
Lore Website ►► https://lore.cc
Tuesday Jan 21, 2025
Tuesday Jan 21, 2025
Ben Serotta: Where Does Responsibility Begin and End? - Ep154
This conversation is with legendary bike builder Ben Serotta.
Ben has been building bikes since the year I was born [1972!]. He is also one of the pioneers of bike fitting, founding the Serotta International Cycling Institute in the late 90’s, and creating the Size Cycle, so fitters could start from scratch to build a custom bike for a given athlete.
We discuss some of the conundrums of modern bike fitting, as well as the tension in business between making a product that is a labor of love and scale, and making a bike that fits the dream / goal / objective of the client.
Ben is a life long student of the sport and a humble and passionate person. I am sure you will enjoy this conversation.
Links:
Serotta Bikes Website ►► https://serotta.com/bikes/
Serotta Bikes on Instagram ►► https://www.instagram.com/serottabikes/
Ben Serotta on Instagram ►► https://www.instagram.com/benserotta/
Tuesday Jan 14, 2025
Tuesday Jan 14, 2025
Menachem-Brodie (Part 2) - Ep153
Greetings Well Dippers.
This is the second part of my conversation with Strength and Conditioning coach Menachem Brodie. If you missed part 1, feel free to start here but you won’t have the full picture until you listen to the first part of our discourse.
Hopefully this conversation reminds you to move consciously.
You may have heard Menachem on the Fast Talk Labs podcast, or read some of his writing on the Pez Cycling News website. He also has written a book, Strength Training for Performance Cycling. Be sure to check out his website Human Vortex Training if you would like to know more.
I hope you find our conversation insightful. We have been intending to have a discussion for a long time, and I enjoyed it very much.
Links:
Menachem's Podcast ►► https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-strong-savvy-cyclist-triathlete-podcast/id1452580151
Tuesday Jan 07, 2025
Tuesday Jan 07, 2025
Menachem Brodie – Part 1 – Ep 151
Happy New Year Spartans and Archadians.
This conversation is with strength and conditioning coach Menachem Brodie. This podcast was recorded for his channel, The Strong Savvy Cyclist & Triathlete Podcast, and I thought my listeners might enjoy our conversation as well so it is republished here. We recorded two podcasts and this is the first round..
We wander into various aspects of strength and conditioning and how it relates to cycling, as well as some of my experiences as a young rider attempting to navigate the world of S&C, hoping it would help me get dropped less often.
You may have heard Menachem on the Fast Talk Labs podcast, or read some of his writing on the Pez Cycling News website. He also has written a book, Strength Training for Performance Cycling. Be sure to check out his website Human Vortex Training if you would like to know more.
I hope you find our conversation insightful. We have been intending to have a discussion for a long time, and I enjoyed it very much.
Links:
Menachem's Podcast ►► https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-strong-savvy-cyclist-triathlete-podcast/id1452580151
Thursday Dec 19, 2024
Thursday Dec 19, 2024
Relationship to Cycling - Ep151
In this final walking podcast for this year, I ask you to consider what your relationship is to cycling, and does this relationship serve you? I unpack a few archetypes of riders I have worked with and raced with over the years.
Everyone has their own relationship to the sport. From my perspective, there is no “right” or “wrong” way to relate to cycling, this is a child’s perspective. We can think past The Disney Bias, everything in life is not good or bad. In fact, most things aren’t. That said, I think some people are likely playing out unconscious programming while they practice sport. This won’t lead to anything good in and of itself usually, although it can medicate your problems to some degree.
I would offer that most will be served by looking inwards at the true reason why the practice cycling, or any sport. The only way to do anything properly is with presence, which gives reverence, and with consciousness.
Otherwise, you might as well just live someone else’s dream.