Low Speed in High Style

Readers may be aware of the ‘slow food movement’ that has become popular in recent years.  Some of its principles revolve around using high quality, ethical and environmentally positive ingredients, individual skilled producers, and taking time to appreciate both the cooking and eating.

But are you aware of the Slow Cycling Movement? It’s about appreciating the moment while cycling – about slowly exploring, taking time to stop, and not staring at your heart rate, power output or fretting about the next Strava segment.  

It’s about taking impromptu detours, listening to the birds and chatting with the locals. It’s most definitely not about KOMs, marginal gains and laughable air deflectors (looking at you Bianchi!).

In New Zealand we have a cycling group that epitomises slow cycling at an annual grand fondo called ‘Le Race’. At just 100 hillyish kilometers, winning times are around the 2.5hour mark. Yet the route is stupendously picturesque. So much so that a bunch of local riders decided it would be a waste to charge through the course with nary a glance at the scenery.

So behold, the 6-hour Le Race group was born, with the objective of finishing the event as close to the leisurely 6-hour mark as possible. Social chats and photo stops become more common than gel-hits and VO2max thresholds, and power-to-weight ratios are swapped for coffees-per-kilometer.

It’s amongst these Slow Cycling riders that Soigneur jerseys are in their element. Our jerseys don’t have little aerodynamic dimples woven into them. They aren’t made from slippery oil-based plastic fibres.  The metal YKK zip toggle probably costs at least a watt. The jerseys aren’t mass-produced in some faceless factory.

Amongst a plethora of identikit fast-food jerseys, our slow cycling jerseys are made to order, of natural ingredients, by a skilled ‘chef’ we know as the Gordon Ramsay of cycling jerseys, David Carman (without the swearing). 

If a Soigneur jersey was in the food trade, it would be a tiny family-owned Michelin restaurant, not a McDonald’s.

You won’t find a glucose monitor beneath a Soigneur jersey, but you will find a comfortable, stylish and happy rider.