Business of Endurance

From Banking to Bike Innovation: Alex's Journey with Ku Cycles

• Charlie Reading • Season 8 • Episode 1

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Welcome to this episode of The Business of Endurance podcast! Today, we're thrilled to have Alex Bok, the visionary founder of Kú Cycle, with us. Alex's journey from a successful banking career to revolutionising the triathlon bike industry is nothing short of inspiring. In this episode, you'll discover how Alex’s insights from Formula 1 engineering and his passion for triathlon led to groundbreaking innovations in bike design. Learn about the importance of marginal gains, the impact of aerodynamics on performance, and how Kú Cycle's unique business model is disrupting the industry. Alex will share stories from his collaboration with top athletes, including his work with the legendary Brett Sutton and the rising star Rico Bogen. Whether you're an athlete, entrepreneur, or cycling enthusiast, this episode is packed with valuable lessons on fitness, business, and personal growth. Don't miss out on Alex’s practical advice and inspirational journey!

Highlights:

  • Transition from Banking to Bike Boutique
  • Innovative Concepts in Bike Retail
  • Founding and Philosophy of Kú Cycle
  • Technical Innovations in Kú Cycles
  • Challenges and Evolution in Bike Design
  • Team BB and Professional Triathlon Insights
  • NextGen Project and Future Goals
  • The Evolution of Aerodynamics in Cycling
  • Balancing Innovation and Production in Bike Manufacturing
  • The Role of AI in Modern Cycling
  • Funding and Business Strategy for Kú Cycle
  • Ku’s Marmite Effect: Love It or Hate It
  • Tony Robbins' Influence on Personal and Business Growth
  • The Power of Books and Compounding in Business
  • Understanding CDA and Its Impact on Performance
  • Future Goals and Innovations for Kú Cycle

Links:
Click here for additional helpful content mentioned in this episode.
Connect with Alex Bok on Instagram & LinkedIn & Web.

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Claire:

I'm Charlie Redding and I'm Claire Fudge.

Charlie:

Welcome to the Business of Endurance.

Alex:

You do get quite a group of people who say, oh, you're a new brand, you must sponsor me, give me a bike and I will promote your brand.

Charlie:

Welcome to the first episode of season eight of the Business of Endurance podcast. Wow, eight seasons, well over a hundred amazing athletes, coaches, entrepreneurs interviewed so far and we've got an incredible season eight lined up for you. And today I'm thrilled to start off with an incredible interview with a guy called Alex Bock, the visionary founder of Coup Cycle. So Alex's journey from a successful banking career to revolutionizing the triathlon bike industry is nothing short of inspiring. In this episode, you'll discover how Coup's insights from the world of Formula One engineering and their passion for triathlon led to a groundbreaking innovation in bike design. You can learn about the importance of marginal gains, not just in sport but also in business, the impact of aerodynamics on performance, and how coup cycles unique business model is disrupting the industry and revolutionizing the way that bikes are delivered to athletes. Alex will share stories from his collaboration with top athletes, including his work with the legendary Brett Sutton and the rising star that is Rico Bogan. So, whether you're an athlete, an entrepreneur or a cycling enthusiast, this episode is packed full of valuable lessons on fitness, business and personal growth. So check out the incredible advice and the inspirational story and the wisdom of Alex Bock of QCycles and Alex is going to touch on and delve into why marginal gain, both in the product and in business, are so important, and if you stick around to the end, I've got a gift for you that'll help make sure that you generate marginal gains in your business.

Charlie:

Alex, welcome to the Business of Endurance podcast. I'm really looking forward to chatting to you and, particularly as I know today we can get into some sort of the areas that I love to talk about, things like marginal gains and innovation in a sector. So I'm really looking forward to chatting to you. But I really want to go back to your roots a little bit, and you started your career in international banking and then you've come through to the bike boutique and now, of course-Cycle. So tell us a bit about how you went from the world of banking to the world of Q-Cycle. Tell us about your roots in this sport. Hi, charlie.

Alex:

Hi, claire, great to be with you guys today. So I started my career 12 years in banking, three banks in particular, and of that most of it in Asia, and then sometime also in consultancy. Triathlon though since 1999, was my sport of choice and also my passion. So I've always done it like to keep my sanity besides 80 hour working weeks, to see how you also keep your lifestyle up. And after I moved to Asia in 1999 with my wife, she actually went full heads into Buddhism meditation. So that's the first part where you have somebody talking to you and you start to sometimes question the corporate world or how to balance it.

Alex:

Then I went through a lot of personal developments with people like Tony Robbins, deepak Chopra, but also a good book which is from Stephen Covey, the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, where he, like rule rule number one says keeping the end in mind. So suddenly I started to look like so what if I'm 65? And I look back, I started to understand Charlie, or started to see, maybe, that the corporate world would not keep my interest or passion for the next 30 years. What really started to inspire me was human performance and then, I think, pushing the boundaries through triathlon, but also in the bike retail industry. So that's like in a short story, how I take a drastic move which my dad didn't agree with for 12 months, leaving the comfort of the corporate world and actually go really into the bike retail and triathlon industry.

Charlie:

So how did you leave the world of banking and what did you do next and how did you get to where you are now?

Alex:

It was a drastic move as a senior vice president at the largest bank in Singapore, the management team of the consumer banking division. So in 12 years I ended up in a position where, financially working, wise and mentally, you're being challenged and you have a lot of fun and you're driving teams. I had invested in a bike shop in Singapore. After six to 12 months they came back hey, can you top up and invest a bit more? And then I said, hang on, let's look at what are you doing with your store. How are you creating a value and how do you make customers excited? You start to quickly see there's space for improvements and things to change. I resigned and the next day I joined the shop. It was called the Bike Boutique. We rebranded it and relocated it to the central business district in Singapore.

Alex:

The innovation, as a sort of Dutch bike lover, was how do we get people out of cars with an increasing BMI index in Asia over the last 20 years, whenever McDonald's, burger King and Kentucky Fried Chicken landed its franchises in those Asian countries where healthy food and lifestyles turned into Western food and lifestyles? And then so we created the service called Bike Lodging that allowed people to bike to work, park their bike, have a shower, have a locker, order breakfast, and so I was actually starting to serve my old colleagues bankers, lawyers and insurance people and at that time we were a bit lucky that CNN was doing documentaries about living cities and Singapore is a good example of busy, crowded, but trying to find out lifestyles to make it livable for people. We were captured in that documentary and, if I fast forward, I've ended up building a retail franchise with six, seven stores from Australia, asia, europe and the US Slowly moved to the distribution business for Cervelo. So I was the distributor for Cervelo in 10 countries in Asia, worked with W2C or IMN on event apparel. Countries in Asia work with W2C or IMN on event apparel merchandise and expos.

Alex:

Move towards production and product development with John Kopp from Kopp Cycling in the US and on the side Team TBB, the professional driving team, and at the end Charlie Clara was like OK, this is all great. I've now tried to promote services, a healthy lifestyle. I've been selling products of other people's companies. How great would it be to have a product of our own. But I'm not smart and intelligent enough to really go through that innovation. And that's where my business partner, richard McKay, comes into the picture. We teamed up in 2019 and nurtured this baby called Coup Cycling for the last four years Fantastic.

Claire:

Talking about Ku Cycles, I love your story behind where you've come from and always looking for that human performance element. And with Ku Cycles, tell us a little bit about that real innovation around the Ku bike and the aerodynamics. Where did these key innovations come from? How did you get into this world of triathlon with these bikes?

Alex:

I would say richard is really critical in that part. He, after 12 years in formula one, seven years with ferrari as one of the lead engineers, team benneton he had been on the forefront of motorsports and learned how carbon composites, aerodynamics and engines all, as he says, glued together were really leading to innovation and to world championships and athlete performance. So if you're part of seven world championships with Michael Schumacher, build cars for him, people like Jos Verstappen, the dad of Max Verstappen and you're part of 91 Grand Prix and in that sort of non-stop, performance driven environment, yeah, you learn a lot. And so he looked at bikes and the bike industry from a completely different perspective. Very much like a Formula One car.

Alex:

And how does the wind hit the front of the car? How do you then move and control the airflow of wind underneath, around and on top of a car? And how do you actually push the wind at the end, how do you create a lift off the car? So I think for Koo, his initial part was really, I think the most important thing is the front of the bike, where we call the fork Airstream technology complete different way of thinking about how you tell the wind what to do in and around the bike. Then, when we came together in first talk I had a background of having developed a complete new channel in the bike industry, which is the bike fitters enabled us to go into a build to order model, and once you go into build to order, you can also create a bit of excitement and inspiration by personalizing frames. So that's sort of, in short, how this came about and for those people that haven't seen a q cycle.

Charlie:

I suspect that most of our listeners have, but there'll be definitely people who out there maybe not even triathletes that haven't described to somebody who hasn't seen one what makes them look and feel different.

Alex:

Well, I guess most people, if we say the Arc de Triomphe in Paris and we've just seen the Olympics, charlie and the Arc de Triomphe, I think if you stand in front of it like gives that sort of feel of the four that we have. It's a very wide, much higher than we used to, and the four legs are much more wider, and so what that really does is it reduces the blockage of wind on the front of the bike. If we take current bikes or all the other bikes, then you haven't hit you, so we have a wheel and we have a fork that is closely around the wheel. The reason that historically is there because we had brake calipers before. We had disc brakes and these brake calipers had to be attached to something which became the fork and the head tube. And so once Richard looked at bikes and said what has dramatically changed in the last five years in biking, it was the introduction of disc brakes. And then he asked has any other change been affected as a result of this disc brake? And to his astonishment he said actually nothing really changed to the bikes or frame designs after the introduction of the disc brake, but the brake caliper was removed, and if you remove the brake caliper, you can actually rethink the fork.

Alex:

So for somebody that hasn't seen it, an arctic tree with a much wider fork, much higher. That allows the wind not to be blocked by the head tube. But the wind then actually blows through the fork and once you do that you reduce the blockage. But now you can also manipulate and improve the downstream airflow along the bikes and the wind actually bounces through the legs of the rider. That was never been done in such a dramatic way. And then, while you control the airflow passing the bike, you can also control it where it leaves the bike. And that's, that's maybe the best way to describe in words how the bike looks like brilliant.

Charlie:

Thank you, and bike innovation has had a sort of a stop start approach, hasn't it? What has stopped innovation of bikes in the past and, as a result of your innovations, what results have you seen to suggest that this new approach is working?

Alex:

That's a great question. Historically the bike industry has organized so the big brands, trek, specialized, canyon, canyon and all those cervello. They really focused on the grand tours, because the grand tours that created the most media, the most attention, so most product development will go into the grand tours tour de france, giro. So then we have these road bikes, either arrow roads or bikes that we use for climbing, and then we have this really strange discipline called the time trial, which is one or two time trials in each grand tour. So that's where funding went.

Alex:

So what happened was that first the UCI saw a lot of wild designs happening until 1995 for these time trial specific bikes and they they said, wait, hang on, this is getting too dangerous. Smaller front wheels, bigger rear wheels, massive chain rings. And so the UCI in 1996 introduced the Lugano Charter and that reduced and put rules to how you have to design bikes. So within that constraint the bike industry then said we have a time trial bike here, we have no dollars left, no investments left for triathlon bikes, but we'll take the time trial bike, put a longer stem on it, and that should be okay for a triathlete, where the time trialist, after 40 kilometers, being completely cropped up in an aerodynamic position, gets a massage and a drink, the triathlete still has to run a marathon.

Alex:

And so you start to see that that these time trial derivatives that we call triathlon bikes were not the same. So another part is that triathlon bikes were really sold like underwear small, medium, large and high performance bikes and if you really want to optimize performance, we feel there should be no bike. You go for a bike fit as much as you go to an optician to get your eyes measured or to a tailor to find out what are your body measurements. If you want to make a suit, and so we said the bike fit should be done first, stop using a small, medium and a large prey and try to then go to a fitter and make the bike get used to the body, but instead to say, build the bike underneath the body. So that's, in short, what hampered innovation and how we feel that some things really had to change, and that's really what we tried. That was the problem that we saw and that we've tried to address awesome.

Claire:

I love the idea and for me, who does have a Coo cycle, which I absolutely love, it's a game changer to actually have a bike that's built around you and your geometry, rather than the other way around. So, yeah, likening it to buying underwear, I think, is a very good way to describe it. Now, obviously, with the different design that Coo has, people are looking at that design, but they're also wondering where does the name come from, and the logo as well. So could you tell us a little bit about what Koo means or where that name originated from?

Alex:

Yeah, when you start a new brand and you're trying to create a high performance brand, it's not easy to keep it unique. Richard and I locked ourselves in on a floating boat on a lake in the north of the Netherlands to think about the vision, the values, really what we want to deliver to the customer, and ultimately we said, if you wake us up in the middle of the morning, it's about optimizing the performance. A name that goes with that came from Old Celtic Irish and the coup there means a greyhound, so the fastest dog in the world. There means a greyhound, so the fastest dog in the world, and that runs at 72 kilometers an hour, and we thought that's a great inspiration to see how fast we can get these to perform. So the greyhound enhanced the logo, like from the greyhound, but a slightly optimized and less doggy version, but a more futuristic version.

Charlie:

I love that, because I didn't know where that had come from at all and I hadn't made the link to the Greyhound, so that's fantastic. What stats can you throw at us that will explain why you think what you've built is a market-leading performance bike?

Alex:

Generally, the bike industry goes long on making clips and this is the fastest bike in the industry. We really try to stay away from that because, a it depends on the environment, it depends on the athlete, it depends on the body size. So you will not find on our website where it says we're the fastest bike in the world. What we do promise and guarantee at this is that, no matter what bike brand or bike model athletes come from, we guarantee them a performance improvement of 15 to 25 watts. That's A by the technology we call it new technology, the front of the bike, but B also the bike fit, the build to order model and spending a lot more time than we believe most of our competitors on aero testing. So optimizing the position, the helm, the shoes, the apparel of the athlete and the way then, ultimately, to make a claim.

Alex:

Instead of staying away from claims, we say if we can not find an athlete, 15 watts or more, they return us the bike and we return them their money. And then suddenly, as a small brand, hey, you're reducing the risk for the consumer to say hey, you're new, how sure are you? That's a performance guarantee. And two, you better make sure that you can deliver, otherwise you're going to have a lot of, you're going to have a lot of products returned and you have to repay all these people. And then you sit there with bikes that have been built to one customer and within that, we have currently a few hundred bikes in the market in 40 countries and we're quite proud to say that not one bike has been returned. So far, so good, but it means that we have to keep pushing ourselves every moment where we can to improve the performance.

Claire:

I think that's fantastic. You're setting out to increase everybody by 15 to 20 watts and obviously doing it by not having any returns as well. You gave us a little bit of a taste there about Team BB and Brett Sutton, and I just wanted to dive in here. Tell us a little bit about Team BB and I think I might know now where the name came from. But tell us, and what did you learn, particularly from working with Brett Sutton? How did that team come about? And also what did you learn from working with with Brett Sutton? How did that team come about? And also what did you learn from working with the athletes Chrissie Wellington as an example.

Alex:

Yes, the Bike Boutique was the retail franchise that we were developing. In order to promote the retail concept and into converting it into a franchise and to drive an interest, I thought I want athletes that have the brand on their chest. And then a road team is very complex. A mountain bike team I was not so familiar enough with mountain biking, but Triathlon I did. Somebody knew that I was trying to start a with mountain biking, but triathlon I did. Somebody knew that I was trying to start a professional team, called me, said Alex, we know you, you like big dreams and if you want to start a professional triathlon team, you don't want to take 10 years to get it to the top. So nope, that's right. Then you have to talk to this guy, brett Sutton. I did. He came obviously with an incredible coaching credential. We got together and really talked about what could this team do and we came together in 2006. He brought in a couple of world champions. We sat together and I said if we can create a vision and mission, values and what we want to achieve and write that on one page and both agree on it, then I think we have a focus on what this team could achieve and we actually set it out as the team. It never said we need to create world champions. It actually says we want to provide hope and opportunity through sports. And so the secondary part to that was can we create a development process to help and guide ace group athletes, how to get to the top, become a professional athlete and a winning professional athlete? And so the way we actually, I think, have done that and that's really what I learned from Brett Sutton His coaching experience obviously was heavily tapped.

Alex:

He did all the coaching, I did more the management and the funding of the team and sponsors and I would say, in working with Brett, creating the environment or ecosystem where success is inevitable. I think that's his biggest win. He creates systems, processes, a way of thinking where you pick and stick to things that you work, you adjust where you you can, but also there's no magic bullet. It's how it works. It. I think it's the level of thinking of human performance and to also understand that it is the body, as much as the mind, as much as technology, that you all need to put in place. And the team produced, in seven years, five world champions, 66 half Ironman champions, so I guess we didn't do too shabby at the end of it. Brad continued and is still on the forefront of coaching. I think every Olympics since Stratham was been has been included in the as an Olympic sport. He's won medals, including just a couple weeks ago in Paris. Great respect for that. And he keeps producing more champions.

Charlie:

For now, we have tried to create our own program, sql Cycle, and see how much we can replicate from what we learned in the past Brilliant, and I think you're referring to the NextGen project, aren't you, which Rico Bogan, a recent guest of ours, has benefited from, and we did speak to him about it.

Alex:

But tell us what you're trying to do with the NextGen project and how you think that will shape the future of coup and also triathlon sometimes these programs start because you're getting questions and then, as a young little company and a baby, you get questions that you feel like cost that would be really great. So we had a lot of athletes you're a new brand. You do get quite a group of people who say, oh, you're a new brand, you must sponsor me, give me a bike and I will promote your brand. And then you're like, you can do that a few times. Who do you give a bike to?

Alex:

So, instead of giving bikes or making a scientific guess of which athlete to support, our first decision was when our investors said, oh, don't we need a world champion on the bike to promote it? I said, yeah, that's good. Why, and who is that? That will be Jan Frodeno. Why don't you get Jan Frodeno to ride our bike? I said, first of all, that's going to cost us a quarter million to get Jan really excited. Secondly, I don't really think buying world champions is the way to build a brand. Ace group, at least these days, are educated and smart enough to know that, yes, professional athletes get a bike and they need to live. And so, rather than that, I thought why not we create, develop a program that run, that builds champions rather than buys champions. And so then we said let's not stay away from professional athletes, first work with age group athletes. So we created in the uk. That was the. So then we said let's not stay away from professional athletes, first work with age group athletes. So we created in the uk. That was the first country. We said let's pick three boys and three girls that are really good age group athletes. They buy into the program, so it's not a free bike, they buy into the program and once they buy into the program, we give them so much value. Most of all, they get a free bike fit. We build the bike for them. They're invited to an aero camp in the netherlands. They know they will go home with what's found. They get a race bonus. So it's a whole program ultimately focused on how do we take you from where you are now as an ace broker to the top and that means your age group in kona, in nice or wherever the 70.3 World Championship is held.

Alex:

We achieved that within nine months with Marlene de Boer in the Dutch Next Gen program, where we won the 2021 Ironman World Championship with her. She had a 22 minutes advantage over the second girl and she won overall. So that was like, ok, this is great girl. And she won overall. So that was like, okay, this is great. Then in 22, I started talking to rico, who came out and says, hey, your bike looks very technology advanced.

Alex:

Nobody got a free bike, but they did get what we promised. And then in the last 12 months we said, okay, now we have a rico bogus. And then suddenly, in 23, way ahead of schedule, he wins the 70.3 Ironman World Championship. And now we thought, ok, out of this pool we then select the best performance and guide them into a professional career. And so it's like a pyramid. It looks a little bit like Team TBB, but it doesn't have one coach. Every athlete can keep his own coach. So people like to select their own shoes, their own nutrition, but it is a program that does, in a way, also provide hope and opportunity for age group athletes to become professional athletes and then winning professional athletes, and we have quite a few of those in the meantime.

Claire:

It's fantastic to hear about a different approach as well in terms of nurturing and making your own athletes, and I think in the world of sponsorship right now we've heard lots of stories from different athletes about how difficult that is, and I really like that approach of working with an athlete rather than just giving them something as well.

Claire:

So Alex was talking there about the ecosystem that coup cycle is creating for the next gen project of age group and up-and-coming athletes, but also creating that part of a family within the atmosphere that they're creating for people buying bikes, athletes buying bikes. And if you want to also dive into an ecosystem, I'm giving you the opportunity to sign up for a free webinar all about optimizing your performance, increasing your vitality and energy and improving your health. So if you'd like to sign up for that free webinar and become part of an ecosystem around nutrition and performance, and if you click in the link below, you'll have access to our waitlist. You talked about Richard in the development of the coup cycles and you mentioned a little bit about his background in Formula One, and I just wondered if you could tell us a little bit about what did Richard bring, his lessons of working within Formula One, because I understand he's got such a rich history behind his experience. How did he bring what he knew from Formula One into the development and the design of the coup cycle as it is today?

Alex:

I would say that's probably three areas. One I think we all know that formula one it is about an engine and it's the combination of the engine and the aerodynamics that make a huge difference. So we don't have engines, we humans are the engine. So that's the part that we can't influence, that's the athlete themselves. But first of all, I think, thinking of how to optimize aerodynamics, telling the wind what to do and, as he would say, alex, I believe much less that we need to try and hide the bike from the wind. Oh, we need to tell the wind where to go and what to do. So that's the first part. The second part is in formula.

Alex:

They have these fantastic budgets to work with in each team, whether that's now under the cap, 500 million a year, it used to be. Some teams would use to have 700, 800 million. So from that sport he always said, alex, I've never, ever had somebody question me whether I had budgets to improve a product, a component or process. As long as things were coming out making the machine and the person faster, we could do anything. How can we make it faster? What can we still improve? What processes can we completely rethink? I think that's very important and I think Formula One is about that Every week a thousand people in Milton Keynes in the UK are thinking about how to optimize things for that car Third B, I think, aeroscience data.

Alex:

There's no point saying your car is faster. Let the numbers tell the true story and only then you can really make improvements. And if those improvements don't lead to race wins or to real race results, then yeah, then you got a lot of talk but no action, and I think we can all start to see how that thinking is infiltrating not only Trampon, but even if we look at the Tour de France, the thinking of aerodynamics is now also starting to hit the mainstream bike industry much more than before.

Charlie:

You must be constantly coming up with new ideas, and we'll come on to sort of marginal gains in a minute, but at some point you've got to stop and go. This is the bike. We make this bike and you must still come up with new ideas. But how do you balance that constant desire to make it even better? And also, what's the biggest challenge you're currently working on for the next version?

Alex:

the cool thing, charlie, is this when you build to order, you're already moving away from an entire industry model because they have a yearly model. And so they design, they develop, they build, they test, they introduce. Then they produce 10,000 pieces of a model, push it in a container, send it to three parts of the world and say guys, go sell this stuff. We don't have that, we don't have stock. So, from a development point of view, once you've gone through your cycle, yes, in 2019,. When Richard knocked on the door, he said Alex, this is my idea. And I first laughed at him and I said Richard, I really think the world has enough bike companies. I would take your technology, take it to Canyon, take it to Trek, try to license it and then sit back and see if it works. And he was like I disagree, this is so drastic, this is so innovative. I don't think they will really understand or get it. I don't know if people are willing to make it. So then I asked him about what it was, and it was indeed so innovative.

Alex:

So we went through one cycle. He had already performed computational fluid dynamics, he had his design ready, he did finite analysis, and so I asked him. I said how do you know it's faster in software? We've tested it completely against what I believe is the gold standard in triathlon. We both said that's the cervello p5. Yes, I have been a distributor for cervello for six years, sold thousands of cervellos in Asia, so I knew that was one of the best engineered bikes at that time. And he said my current CDA and CFD models show that we can be three to six percent faster than that model. And I was like Richard, be careful, that's 15 years of engineering. How do you think you can match or break that? He said I'm confident I'll show it.

Alex:

So we then went through a full cycle. But now we make little upgrades. So we get feedback and from a performance improvement or from a user performance level or from a service point of view, we can make little changes 3D printed grips instead of barbed tape, implementing a new cockpit on the bike. Behind me, working with other partners that have improved things, rico will suddenly come with a new cockpit under his arm into the velodrome and says I think this thing is faster and we are pulling our hair along. My friend, how do you want us to integrate that cockpit onto our bike? But because we always are open to re-question and to try new things, and then let the numbers tell the true story, as what we just discussed about Formula 1. It works and the cycles are small and an improvement that we accept today.

Alex:

Richard. It implements within six to eight weeks. We can change the molds of our frames in less than six weeks, and then we don't have stock, so that improvement then sits in every new bike that we deliver. So we always say, let's say, when Claire bought her TF1 from us, we say Claire, that's the fastest TF1 we have right now in the market. In three to six months, that thing can be a little bit improved and so we never will introduce the 2025 model of the TF1. There's one TF1 and it constantly gets improved, and that's also how we work on our next model.

Charlie:

How do you see AI helping you in this approach in the future?

Alex:

That's a really interesting field, and especially on error testing, on interpreting the data, on modeling, and there's lots of developments happening. A few examples Silverstone there's lots of developments happening. Few examples Silverstone wind tunnels, taking wind aerotesting to a complete new level. Outdoor testing with aerosensors, again often driven by Formula One, where you put devices on your bike and you actually measure 5,000 to 10,000 data points per second rolling resistance, wind yaw power, your power speed, gps locations where you get a light source of what would be the wind drag of you and the bike together as a system moving through wind. We're playing with all these areas and ai.

Alex:

I think predictive modeling, learning from that data, is a big thing as a small company, not easy in our ecosystem, with technology partners, with factories. I like playfully call it innovation through co-creation, because we do not have a formula one budget of four or five hundred million a year. We need to work and team up with athletes, coaches, coaches, media technology partners and try in a very open way to say guys, we're here, how can we help each other and how can we actually get the benefits of technology? Sharing is caring, where you actually open up your knowledge, and AI will play a very important role in that as well, charlie.

Claire:

AI is certainly one area, so I was expecting a question to come on AI, but I think it's really interesting about working with that as well. Charlie, ai is certainly one area, so I was expecting a question to come on AI. I think it's really interesting about working with AI as well. And, alex, you talked a little bit there about the big budget that's there in Formula One. That isn't necessarily there and you touched on it a little bit, but tell us a little bit about how, with Koo Cycle, from a business perspective, how did you, or how are you, raising capital for Coup Cycle, because you're entering, or have entered, this market of a very competitive market, as you said, of making another bike. So could you tell us a little bit about how that has worked for you?

Alex:

Yeah, that's obviously. When Richard approached me and I once I understood after the first phone call how massively different his approach was, I knew that you need serious funding to get this off the ground, to even find factories to be willing to produce something. Since 1891, bikes have had forks that have a steerage and Richard Designs showed that to get that really for working, he cut off the steerage. So you you know there's technology risk. That means you need funding. In our first round we we really worked and we're very fortunate to have a, an angel investor who had done serial investments and said I really believe in what you guys are doing. That is different. I believe in the business model and the vision. Yes, we had a first round investor that said I will back this up and make sure you guys can develop, produce the bike and launch it in the market. So we're there, we've done that and we are definitely now catching and slowly growing the sales.

Alex:

It's not easy. If you look at car companies, introducing a new model costs about $1 billion. Companies introducing a new model cost about 1 billion dollars. Introducing a new motorbike is much less than that, but still it's serious money. Introducing a new bike cost you anywhere from two to three, four million. So that's, that was the first round.

Alex:

We are currently going through a second round. We see that through triathlon and the tf1 we're gaining traction the athletes, the performances, but also where our customers really say, hey, this has really taken my performance to a whole new level. That means, yeah, on google reviews you get really positive reviews that help, but then you get to okay, we want to take this technology and introduce a second model in a different segment, and so we are currently actually going through a second round of financing and we're not just looking for money also, but industry expertise and yeah, if there are listeners that say, hey, that sounds interesting, then I'm just one phone call or one whatsapp message away what I find fascinating about this bike is it looks very different and I would describe it as the Marmite effect.

Charlie:

There's a lot of people that either love it or hate it, and it was funny, actually, when I was listening to a podcast doing my research for Rico Bogan, there was a couple of guys I can't remember which podcast it was but before the episode started they were saying that basically, we're going to pick a really ugly bike and it's going to be one of it's either going to be Q or one of the others he listed three and we're going to race in on that bike. And then they went straight into the Rico Bogan interview and I'm like, hang on. So on the one hand they're taking the Mickey out of the look and the next time they're interviewing the athletes that's just won the world championships on that very bike. So tell me a little bit about the marmite effect and is creating a really polarized feedback where the people love or hate, a really positive thing, or is it a?

Alex:

negative. So we launched the bike right after covid was over. Actually, we first launched when covid just started, so we thought, okay, let's wait a little bit. When we launched in the german market third largest market in the world when we tried to work together with the local Toronto magazine, they posted it online and, as you alluded to, charlie, it was very horrendous. This thing is ugly. We saw pictures of puking tigers coming by and people very quickly agreed on that. This thing was probably the ugliest thing they ever saw.

Alex:

The editor, who's quite well known in aerodynamics, called us. He said guys, this is amazing. This is like the same signals and feedback that we received when we saw the p5 and the p5x being introduced, looking so different. You guys are really onto something and we were laughing already. So the answer to your question is we thought it was great. We knew that initially we would get pushback. That was fine, as long as it looked different. That was not the objective. The objective was does it make at least faster? And then suddenly, when people start to actually improve performance and when people get really faster and you start to produce your first Ironman champions, half Ironman champions, age group champions and first world champions, then suddenly ugly, quite quickly turns into fast, and then, before you know it, it becomes actually quite pretty.

Charlie:

I think it creates conversation, doesn't it? And, if nothing else, that there's a saying that no news is bad news, and so it brings people to the fore, and then you have to explain why it looks like that, and that obviously plays exactly into your hands. Now I can't let the Tony Robbins mention slip. What involvement have you had with Tony Robbins? Was it reading his books, was it attending one of his courses or events, and how did it impact your life, both in business and outside?

Alex:

somewhere in 2001 when I lived in singapore. We lived across the indoor stadium in singapore and my wife just signed us up for course, called upw, unleash the power within, and I think I see you nodding. For the first time in your life you're walking a 12 meter long fire walk over 1200 degrees burning co. I had always loved pushing the mind. I'm very interested in personal development and, yeah, just what we're doing with bikes, but doing it with your own mind, whether that's learning different religions, learning about meditation. So we signed up for another six, seven courses, went to his resorts and, as he says himself, I'm not your guru and I've never made him my guru, but the tools and the innovation and the thinking and the people he worked with, what Brett Sutton is in triathlon or I would call him like the Vince Lombardi of triathlon, I think Tony Robbins is in personal development and it changed my life dramatically became the tools for me to be daring enough to leave a very safe corporate environment to say, hey, hang on, I can start something for myself, no matter the challenges.

Alex:

I think the control over emotions when adversity kicks in, whether you're in the middle of a triathlon and you're in the marathon. All of us know that there are these dark monsters that come into your head when the pain comes in and your oxygen goes out and the lactate kicks in. How do you talk with these dwarves in your head? I think that is learning how to control emotions, how to focus, create a vision, how to use your body and how to use all the tools you can find in a psychological or NLP environment to talk to yourself and to motivate people and I think that's how innovation and success is created. So big believer but also in the balancing between mind development, physical development. It's fascinating to have all these tools and to learn about them.

Charlie:

I think that's really interesting. I think that you're right. We often need tools or push or something to help us make a big change that we know is the right thing to do but ultimately is difficult. And I think, having done UPW twice and walked on fire, and it is incredible and it gives you the strength to make the right decisions and ultimately that's changed your life and you've got a very different life as a result of it. So that's incredible. And it leads me onto a question we ask everyone on this podcast, which is books. I'm a big believer that books have helped me massively both Tony Robbins' books, lots of others. What books have you found that have helped you most on your journey and what books do you find yourself recommending to others?

Alex:

Yeah, I think, unleash the Power Within. Even though it's now 50 years old, I think that's a big one for me personally, I mentioned earlier on that really impacted my life. I think it's still relevant. The seven habits of highly effective people. But I think also not so much books but the the power of now from a gentleman called eckhart tolle, how to sometimes just stand still and forget about the past and forget about the future and live in the now and to calm down the mind and find peace within because otherwise we keep running. So another area for me on wealth and investments, or templeton learning, the power of compounding. I thought those are books in different areas that have impacted my life.

Charlie:

Yeah, in a great way interesting that you mentioned the power of compounding. How do you take what you learned from that book and have applied it in your business?

Alex:

Investing and taking a strategic view and creating a buy and hold or pick and stick strategy. Most people overestimate what results can be achieved in 12 months, but completely underestimate, when you stick to a certain plan and execute, what can be achieved in three to five years. And I think the power of compounding in terms of money is a clear example. I wish, looking back when I was 25 or 23, that I had known then, because I was a bit of a late student in this field, that if your salary and you take a hundred bucks whether it's US or whatever and you put that in the S&P 500, if that's what you believe in and you do that for 20 years, you will be a millionaire by 55 purely by the power of compounding and, I think, taking that into our business. To take Richard's story when he explained it, questioning him and to really understand that the technology that he did was innovative, it was viable and the numbers were telling the true story we are currently on that three to five year path to prove that this technology will change bikes and how bikes will look like in the future dramatically. But if we would think that we could achieve great results in 12 months, we'll be kidding ourselves.

Alex:

Just as the power of compounding doesn't give you the biggest buck for the benefit within 12 months, it's the pick and stick and hold to your strategy. And that even goes back to a coach like Brett Sutton who takes sometimes athletes or other coaches. Look at them and think, oh, they don't look very athletic, athletic, oh, they don't really look like champions, and then takes a five-year approach and just trains them, gives them motivation, gives them psychological support. And then the swiss girl that just won silver in paris I had heard stories where people saw her six, seven years ago and nobody would give for her to ever win an olympic gold medal bre, brett Sutton takes that pick and stick strategy. So I think, across different fields, the power of compounding is a phenomenal thinking method and simple calculation where, if you apply that in different areas of your life, I think pick and stick is a good concept. As to thinking that everything will change just overnight with a stroke of luck or a magic stick, it reminds me of a saying that I think.

Charlie:

I can't remember where I first heard it, maybe Robin Sharma. But it's not the big things you do occasionally that make the biggest impact. It's the little things that you do often, isn't it Because of the compounding that takes effect?

Alex:

I love a quote from Mike Tyson, who said discipline is doing the things you don't want to do, but do it like you love it. And I think discipline is so important Business, personal life, relationships, wealth management or your health.

Charlie:

Brilliant. I completely agree, and we also have a tradition on the podcast where we get the last guest to ask the next guest a question without knowing who that is going to be. Our last guest was Dean Karnasas, so I think Claire's got Dean's question.

Claire:

If you could be world-class at anything but building bikes and a bike business, what would it be?

Alex:

I think I might have missed my sort of calling or maybe I didn't have upbringing where sports was seen as really important, partly because, coming from a Jewish background my dad and coming out of the Second World War, survival was at that time the most important thing, and so he was very business focused, so sports was not on top of his mind. So sometimes I feel I live some of my old dreams through the athletes. By working with Rico, I think there's a part in me that still yeah, if you could have, would have, should have that you would have more athletic sports and top performance in both. Brett Sutton often made funny comments about it. He said Alex, I have so many people here on the tracker in the pool and some of them were billionaires. They would give all that money away if they could be that world champion and have that recognition and that feeling of success on the finish line. And so money or success or achieving something yeah, I would say being a world-class athlete and have that feeling to cross the finish line with your arms in the air where you've done something incredible, I think that will be phenomenal experience.

Alex:

We continuing to push the forefront of triathlon bikes. We will have introduced a aero road bike that can both be used in short course triathlon, that is UCI Neagle and that has the same amount of innovation on the front of the bike and takes more Formula One technology into the bike. That will really help Olympic athletes and short course athletes, and that we have a road model the peloton will really make use and that probably we have a third model introduced. So overall we're trying to make a real impact on the bike industry by creating a completely different way introducing these products into the market. So quite lofty goals and I hope we can achieve them sounds really.

Charlie:

When do you expect the aero road bike to be launched?

Alex:

We're looking at second half of 2025. And Richard has worked for the last six months. The whole concept is there. Those people that were involved brought a tier to our eye. It's very innovative. It's a complete new way of thinking again about aerodynamics around a road bike, but now within UCI rules. Then we're also really active now looking for that second round of financing to actually finance the second model, because again it's expensive to test develop. Introduce into the market a complete new technology again, amazing.

Charlie:

Alex, this has been an absolutely fascinating conversation. We've ended up down alleyways that I didn't expect to Love talking about anything like Tony Robbins, eckhart Tolle, seven Habits just some brilliant nuggets of wisdom in there. Also, congratulations on creating an incredible product, an incredible bike, but also reinventing the process around it. I think it's absolutely fascinating and I love the way that you're shaping each bike for each athlete. I think it's phenomenal. I'm looking forward to seeing that road bike hitting the roads next and the Peloton next year as well. Thank you very much.

Alex:

Thank you, and I wish you guys lots of success as well with the business of endurance.

Charlie:

If you want to find out more about Alex and, in particular, q Cycles, the best places to find them are at their website, on their YouTube channel and on Instagram. Just to be clear, q is spelled K-U and their website is q-cyclecom. But you'll also find that their channel on YouTube gives you a whole load of information, not just about their bikes, but also about the next gen program that Alex talked about. So what did you make of the interview with Alex?

Claire:

I loved it. You know, having met the Coup family, got a Coup bike for me, listening to the story of where Alex came from in terms of his background, but the real innovation behind the bike. So, although I ride the bike, actually listening to more about where it came from and actually where it's heading is fascinating and I think we're just at the beginning actually of possibly where that brand and that bike can go.

Charlie:

Yeah, absolutely. And if that bike ends up in the Peloton, suddenly it's a game changer, isn't it? Suddenly, that gets everyone's attention. Triathlon is small end of the wedge compared to the rest of the cycling market, isn't it? So that would be phenomenal. I thought it was really interesting. Actually, when he talked about the risk reversal, which I know I've talked about in business coaching, that was brilliant in the sense that anytime anyone brings out anything new, everyone's oh yeah, but I'm really scared about, am I going to trust them? It's the same with tesla. When tesla started, when they brought out the model s, they gave an eight year guarantee on the battery, because the one thing everyone was like how long was the battery gonna last his? Was you get this number of watts back or would you take the bike back? I thought that was really good I think.

Claire:

Actually I was thinking about the way that you coach and, having sat in on some of your coaching sessions, a bit about that reducing risk. You know, let's face it, when you're spending a large amount of money on something that's new and looks really different, I think that is fantastic and it's obviously working for them, because they don't have any returns of bikes.

Charlie:

So, yeah, I thought that was extremely interesting and I think there's a second psychological piece around that once somebody gets it the idea of giving it back, even for their money back you've got to be really unhappy because it's now their bike. What we didn't touch on was the fact that you can put your visual stamp on it as well as it being made for you. So you've obviously got your corporate colors on there and you can make these things look really cool, whether you love it or not. But you can make it your unique bike, which, again, is really powerful, but also with that guarantee, because it would be nervous, wouldn't it? You'd be nervous going. Well, I'm going to spend all this money on a bike that I can't return because it's unique to me. So really interesting. What else did you take from the conversation?

Claire:

I was interested by your question around ai and you didn't surprise me. When you asked an ai question, I I wasn't expecting it, but then I wasn't surprised by it. I think the AI piece is really interesting, isn't it? It comes into every conversation that we have in terms of where does it go next? What are you measuring, what are the metrics? Who's looking at it? So that I thought was really interesting. I also really love his answer to one of the questions around business this idea of I think he referred to it quite a bit of pick and stick. Actually you were asking about the design as a bike and actually once you've got a design, then you've made it, then you've made that design and I think, in terms of business, actually sticking with a strategy and being true to that and making these small tweaks the whole time is really interesting. We didn't actually ask specifically about marginal gains, but he certainly answered it in terms of how they're constantly innovating, like you said.

Charlie:

It's actually one of the questions I've got lined up and answered. It for us is it's those little increments that make the biggest difference, it's not those big steps, and so I thought it was brilliant how they're constantly looking for that. What I loved was how their business model allows them to roll out each one of those little gains time and again. So if I go order a ku bike today, I get the benefit of the things that they thought of a month ago that weren't on bikes that were made a year ago, whereas, like he says, you go buy a savello, it's an amazing bike, but ultimately at some point they've got to make literally thousands of that bike and they're now set in stone. So I thought that was really interesting, and it's very much a business model that allows constant innovation, in the same way that, to go back to tesla, the software updates mean that the car keeps getting better and better.

Claire:

That's what they're rolling out, which is really fascinating so it's an approach that I use with my clients in nutrition. It's people want this huge change, but actually it's all about the tiny little things that you're doing consistently that make this huge difference and make this ongoing tweaks and changes to what you're doing the whole time. And one little nugget of information. I'm a bit of a history nerd. I think he quoted that the bike, or the design of the bike, hasn't been changed in terms of the front steering tube. Is that what he called it? I can't remember Since 1891 and I was like that's amazing. So I did have to write it down because that's phenomenal, that nobody's sort of doing it I agree.

Charlie:

And the other gem that I thought was brilliant was we've talked to a few people over 100 plus episodes about when they've pivoted in their life, but the important role at going to a tony robbins workshop gave him the confidence to pivot and make that change and create something. He could still be a banker in Singapore, but he's not. He's created some phenomenal success and some amazing products on the back of being inspired to do so. So, yeah, a brilliant episode. Loads to take away from that from a business point of view, also from a innovation in triathlon and cycling point of view. So, yeah, absolutely fantastic. So for all the listeners, in the meantime, keep on training.

Charlie:

Right at the start I mentioned I had a gift for you if you wanted to generate marginal gains in your business.

Charlie:

So I have a workshop called Three Steps to Entrepreneurial Happiness and one of the three steps within that workshop is called the Game of of gains and it will show you how you can create constant innovation, constant marginal gains in your business.

Charlie:

So if you go to wwwthetrustedteam and go find our virtual workshop called three steps to entrepreneurial happiness, which is completely free of charge, it's a full three hour workshop and we'll show you how you can generate marginal gains in your business, not just today, but for eternity. If you want us to keep getting amazing guests onto the Business of Endurance podcast, we don't ask for you to pay for us. We don't ask for patronage. All we ask for is that you subscribe to the podcast, ideally on Apple. Give us a five-star rating because it shows us you care and, if you've got time, leave us a comment. One word is fine, something like inspiring or amazing or something like that, but we really do appreciate it and it will help us to continue to deliver amazing guests on what we hope you find to be an amazing podcast. Thanks very much.