Welcome to the CXHairs Bulletin, Season 2
Join us for our first year of covering North American cyclocross
Hello cyclocross friends, you are getting this message because you were curious enough about what’s going on at the Bulletin to sign up for our free newsletter or you have already signed up as a Bulletin supporter.
Last year was a good soft launch for us as we tried to figure out what we wanted the Bulletin to be, and this year, we start Year 2 with a strong focus on domestic cyclocross here in North America.
Thus far this preseason, we have given riders the chance to do their own power rankings, chatted with Ben Frederick about his amazing recovery from a TBI, did an exit interview of sorts with Courtenay McFadden as she announced her retirement, and interviewed Ruby West about her season living and racing in Europe last year.
As we move into the racing season, we will be on-site at most of the domestic racing weekends with video, photo, and written content; Bill will be bringing you the anticipated CX Heat Check Power Rankings; and we will have race reactions and recaps from the USCX series broadcast on GCN. In addition to that, we’ll have the usual bike profiles, rider interviews, and other creative content that has already become a staple of the Bulletin.
We will be providing a lot of our coverage of domestic cyclocross to everyone because first and foremost, our priority is building excitement and interest in the sport, but I wanted to take a few moments to offer an invitation to become a subscriber to the paid edition of the Bulletin.
Why Subscribe to the Bulletin?
Why subscribe? That’s a good question. After all, there are other publications providing content for free. Here are three reasons we feel the Bulletin provides value.
Bill and I are passionate AF about cyclocross, and it is reflected in our coverage.
Looking across the cycling media landscape right now, it’s absolutely incredible that GCN will be broadcasting live U.S. cyclocross this season. However, beyond that, we are the one cyclocross publication remaining that is committed to producing insightful, in-depth content that showcases athletes, tells stories, and provides insight into the silly sport we love.
No doubt, with the USCX happening this year, the big three media publications and probably even Bicycling will be providing cyclocross coverage, but Bill and I bring nearly two decades of experience (most of it his, tbh) of building relationships with athletes and folks in the scene, nerding out on the nuances of racing, and finding the storylines that make domestic ‘cross compelling. If you are into cyclocross, you are just not going to get that depth of content from anyone else covering the sport.
Bill and I are pretty darn good at what we do.
Before I became a member of the cyclocross media pit, I was a huge fan of Bill’s work at CXHairs. Like everyone else, I watched the Svenness videos religiously, but since the end of that series, I have probably been more impressed by how Bill continues to adapt and develop new ideas for covering the sport. Even when I was editor of Cyclocross Magazine, I knew I wanted to work with Bill because I respected his work so much, and thus when he asked me about starting the Bulletin, it was like the easiest decision ever. I still get excited about what’s to come when I see Bill editing a post for the Bulletin and am rarely disappointed.
Speaking of CXM, those who know me know I am literally the worst person ever at talking myself up, but you know what, I was a damn good editor of that publication for the 2.5 years I was there. I wrote regular features worthy of much bigger publications, produced a variety of content, pretty much invented covering gravel as a racing discipline, and most importantly to me, made Cyclocross Magazine relevant to the sport here in North America.
Although we are a bit looser with our adherence to some journalistic norms at the Bulletin, I feel like we have not missed a step in producing an impressive amount of quality coverage at the Bulletin while managing to not get fired from our day jobs.
Subscriptions equal more coverage.
When we started the Bulletin, we agreed we wanted to help support photographers and other folks covering the sport and decided to set aside a portion of every subscription to pay contributors. While last year was a challenge in this regard, we were able to publish a number of quality galleries from the Bulletin’s Euro Correspondent Ethan Glading with those funds.
This season we hope to do more of the same, as well as get ourselves to more races. Bill has an ambitious travel schedule to continue his on-the-ground coverage, and I am hoping to make it to several of the race weekends. Your support helps support these efforts in helping us provide more and better coverage of the sport.
At the end of the day, Bill and I are not looking to make bank off the Bulletin, but we do spend a lot of our nights, weekends, and even lunch breaks producing content, and having the support of subscribers is a great motivator to do that work.
The reality of the cycling media landscape is we can no longer count on publications providing free coverage of cyclocross, but if coverage of the sport is something you value, we are willing to do the work to make it happen.
What Do You Get?
So what do you get for your $8 monthly or $70 annual subscription? In addition to all of the free posts we have been providing, you get the following (click through for samples of each):
Spoiler-free results emailed to you the day of all North American and major European races
In-depth previews of every race weekend
An invite to the subscriber-only Slack channel
Regular race recaps and analysis
Start lists emailed to you every Friday
Summaries of European cyclocross news
Thanks again for believing in us enough to subscribe to the free version of our newsletter, and we’d love to have you along for the ride in 2021/22.
(If the subscription prices are a bit too steep for you right now or if you’re a current Cyclocross Radio subscriber who wishes to add a Bulletin subscription, contact us at cxhairsbulletin [at] gmail [dot] com and we’ll work something out! )