About PEZCyclingNews.com
“What’s cool in road cycling” defines our content and means as much now, as it did when I started this website in 2002.
We’re a group of passionate cycling fans dedicated to publishing original, credible, and entertaining articles, photos, and reviews about the sport of elite level road cycling. We put our real names on all our work because in my books, making a good first impression starts with a proper introduction, and how else could we expect you to believe anything we write, let alone come back for another visit.
I started PEZ because there wasn’t a website reporting the thrills, spills, & chills of road bike racing like I wanted to see it. The reportage of the day didn’t show the excitement or emotion I felt being at the Tour, Giro (or any other bike race for that matter) so I thought it would be cool to start a website that took readers along for the ride.
Unemployed, with no budget, no content, and few contacts in cycling, I was encouraged by a good pal (and yes – alcohol was involved) to push my half baked idea out of the hangar and see if it would fly.
So I started PEZ as the place where cycling fans like me could live the life vicariously through the wonders of the “world wide web”. After a stumbling first 6 months that actually saw a meagre readership decline during the 2002 Tour de France, we were fortuitously granted credentials to the Vuelta A Espana, where Alastair Hamilton’s top assignment as our first reporter at a Grand Tour was to “take pictures” so I could launch our photo galleries. He also had to pay his own expenses, but he took the assignment and we went from almost none to 5000 readers in a month. Hope was sparked.
From the beginning we’ve always been about quality content, and while I’ve never lost sight of the reality that cycle sport itself exists purely as entertainment, I’ve always felt that your time spent with us should be a rewarding place to connect with riders and fans like yourself – even if only for a few minutes a day or week.
Our consistent quality of work has earned the credibility and respect from the sport, the industry, and readers, that allows access inside the barriers. As you can imagine this takes being a fan to a whole new level.
Personally, I’ve really come to value the talents, camaraderie and friendships that have come from this group attracting writers, photographers, contributors, and readers for all over the world. In the past 14 years we’ve seen a lot change in cycling, and in our own lives. Many of us have started families and become parents, we’ve seen the sport go through turmoil none of us could have imagined 14 years ago, and we’ve said sad goodbyes to some of cycling’s greatest heros, and the industry’s best people.
But even in this time of micro-second attention spans, we still believe in telling a bigger story, providing context, meaning and reference to our readers, as we chronicle the evolution of pro cycling.
For those of you who’ve been here for this part of the journey – thank you – for those of you who’ve just joined us, thank you as well and I hope you stick around.
We’ll be here to see where this thing takes us …and hope you are too.
Richard Pestes
Publisher
[email protected]
