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Fresh Goods Friday Podcast Episode 11 - Hannah talks Boom Time plus Listener Q&A
Apr 18, 2025
This episode is psonsored by Join.cc - the training app for cyclists. Like a personal trainer in your pocket.
Hannah interviews the founder of a startup making a bike computer to track your air time and race telemetry. Benji and Mark answer your questions on the cycle to work scheme and whether expensive bikes give you more joy on the trails.
Benji explains the tech that is hidden in a new helmet just out in the last few days that can detect crashes and alert the right people.
Check out https;//join.cc/singletrack for a free 30 day trial.
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0:06
[Music]
0:19
how do we start these things hello like that straight in i'm Mark i'm publisher
0:25
here at Single Track Magazine i'm Benjamin James Howeth technical editor
0:30
date of birth not telling you because that's what all my pin numbers are all right okay um well we've got no Hannah
0:36
this week Benji so you're kind of stuck with me we might never see her again what's she doing well she's meant to be
0:45
bicycling from here to there which I think is her house to Adrienne's wall or
0:50
something really wow what's she doing that on uh the bicycle the Cotic Cascade with
0:59
some Ortle luggage luggage uh yeah we're going to find out about
1:05
this it's going to We're going to This is a story that we're going to actually tell is it with beliefs if if Well yeah
1:12
she survives well the best stories are the ones that go wrong so there's every chance the I don't know if there's a theme to it particularly or what
1:18
actually survival yeah or I don't think she's done anything like that for a
1:23
while anyway yeah never done anything like that right any Anyway so how how
1:28
was your summer Benji i did tell everyone I ride I rode with do ride with that this is summer so get out right now
1:37
a lot even if it means getting in trouble at home just f it cuz it's going
1:42
to end it was a good two weeks two weeks it was longer than that I think but yeah it's um it was grand everywhere was very
1:50
nice yes and now we're now we're back straight back into It'll be fine i think it's cold we We'll say that i'm not too
1:57
worried about the level of rain cuz everywhere's quite dry yeah so it's fine anyway this episode what we're going to do we're going to do a bit of Q&A we've
2:02
had some questions from some of our audience i put out an appeal the other couple of days ago on the forum and on
2:09
the socials got a bit of a response filtered out all the stupid stuff you know who you are and um and got a couple
2:15
of questions which we'll go through that and then after that we have a special guest who's popped in to see us and uh
2:22
you can have a chat there okay I'll think about it yeah think about it think about some good things to ask okay and then we're going to round it all off
2:28
we've got an interview coming um we've got an interview that Hannah did with uh the founder of a company that makes a
2:34
bike computer specifically for mountain bikes specifically in regards to the fact it apparently tracks it tracks your
2:40
air time yes it's like a black box yeah is it there you go just thought of that bit late never mind so there's that
2:47
coming up so that's that's what we're going to do today but first of all I'm going to take a moment to talk about the sponsor of this episode we have a
2:53
sponsor so the sponsor of this episode is join.cc
2:59
yes I've heard of them yeah you've heard of them they're um they're a training app specifically designed for cyclists
3:06
i've been getting to know it for the last couple of weeks and I've got a particular goal in mind which is a bit
3:11
unusual really because I'm actually in September I'm going to be doing an ultramarathon which is literally all the way around
3:17
Windermir which is the largest lake in England I think yes yes it is it's a
3:24
water it's 47 miles in total is it yeah i did an ultra did you know that
3:33
well my wife entered me what pardon yeah anyhow 47 miles 47 miles got 24
3:40
hours to do it uh I did shall I say a practice ultra in January did a 31
3:46
mileer and it absolutely ruined me so I'm under no illusions of how much work I've got to do in the next 5 months and
3:51
that's where the join app is coming in join is an app that takes whatever level
3:57
of fitness you're at and whatever goal you want to achieve to work out a training plan to get there you tell it
4:02
how much time you can spare and it will do the rest well it won't actually do the work that's on you but it's like
4:09
having a personal trainer in your pocket it takes everything into account like your age your fitness levels what kind
4:15
of riding you prefer to do and for me it even incorporates off bike training there's a bunch of material available in
4:21
the app and I read a great article on weight training for those of us at a certain age range i had no idea that as
4:28
you get older you benefit more from weight training to maintain fitness so that's now part of my training oh okay
4:35
did you know that no yeah we should be picking stuff up and putting it down again apparently at our age I do that quite a lot but it's only small items
4:42
such as remote controls so join also connects to all your other apps so it joins to Strava it joins to Garmin it
4:50
joins to all the sort of built-in stuff if you've got an Apple Watch it's got the fitness stuff pulls all that data in
4:56
so it know it takes all your normal riding data and it uses that to help guide you towards your goal join is free
5:04
to download and sign up and the best features are part of their subscription and you can try it for free for 30 days
5:10
by heading to uh join.cc singletrack
5:15
thank you very much join.cc is that right?C CC right before we get to the Q&A Q and some A's give us
5:25
some product highlights from the week what have you got those of you who were
5:31
quick enough to read Fresh Goods Friday before I got the email saying that helmet shouldn't be in Fresh Goods Friday and it was duly removed from it
5:38
will recognize this as an O'Neal Trail Finder Evo just a helmet
5:45
right so for those uh for those um listening in black and white Benji's actually
5:51
opening a box and he's got a helmet yep so describe this helmet for those who are just color actually it's like an
5:57
off-white with a lavender trim uh place it on my head thus and it's
6:04
probably Fidlock i seem to recall who's been wearing this there it is right so I don't think the
6:10
helmet's particularly new they've done one of these before but underneath pull one of these central
6:17
what you call that pad pad finger pads inside yeah and looking at there there's something inside the like Tinker Taylor
6:23
soldier spy where we realized someone's been bugging us all this time there's some tech in there there's basically a
6:29
little sensor called Quinn don't know why mighty Quinn that was a song wasn't
6:36
it um it's called a pro smart sensor crash and ride analytics
6:42
not sure who came up with that but there we go so it will alert your loved ones
6:47
or not so loved ones um if it thinks you've come off your bicycle and you've
6:52
done yourself a mischief it will uh phone home um and it will also detect
6:59
things like how much air time you've got how much G forces you've pulled and
7:05
things like that cool that's all built into a helmet yeah it's called Quinn right maybe does five things cuz that's
7:12
Latin it is isn't it please don't take that as truth it's just Where can you
7:18
find out more information about this this will be in Fresh Goods Friday again like it properly should have been cuz
7:24
it's out tomorrow which is yesterday right fantastic helmer is not so bad
7:29
actually price-wise cool and what how much it cost oh gosh insert price here i think it's 80 quid is that real not with
7:39
Mr quinn ah right so that's the Quinn thing is like three figures so you can
7:45
buy the helmet and the Quinn thing separately and the Quinn thing plugs into the helmet right i see we'll find out what the retail for the pairing cool
7:52
look on there you'll be testing the impact um I'll give it a go fits me which is almost half the battle with
7:59
helmets if you don't want to wear it cuz it goes that I'm going to wear it are you all right yeah i That's the thing
8:05
about a helmet isn't it it's all about the comfort first and foremost it's all about wearing the flipping
8:11
thing isn't it yeah indeed and people have different shaped heads someone even noticed no they do that's weird we had
8:19
this combo the other day about saddles it's like I can review this saddle but I think it's a genuine five out of five
8:24
saddle it's in the next issue won't tell you what it is but like if someone else could sit on it it's not going to No no
8:30
but I've listed my type of saddles that I like so if you like them you like them
8:35
and that's a bit like helmets isn't it like I do not fit Bontrega helmets the
8:40
Jiro uh Urge and that's about it actually yeah I
8:46
don't get on with Bell helmets no they don't fit my head either fox are all right we get those to fit so yeah it's
8:53
true there are some things that are kind of almost unreable and uh helmets probably come under that
9:00
but I did I'm going to re-edit the copy because I thought of something while I was driving in because I thought I was going to recommend it for the flat ass
9:06
so Society which is like a pun on those nutters
9:11
right who I'm probably not even going to say cuz they'll find us yeah they will let's not What else is shaking we've got
9:17
Q&A all right yeah we've got some questions right okay so I'm going to refer to the question i did appeal for
9:23
these questions and I said that if anybody um emailed them to us and we read them out that there would be a
9:30
dubious prize of uh low value that's probably from something under our desks
9:36
oh yeah that we would give something yeah it might be just something we're swimming in possibly helmets so got the
9:44
first question that I've I've got here right okay so this is um this is from someone who calls himself Eddie Halen
9:52
fine yeah not Yeah um which is clearly not their real name anyhow uh he wants
9:57
to know is this No this is this is interesting is the cycle to work scheme good for bikes the bike industry
10:04
mountain bikers roadies commuters getting people on bikes has it worked as intended what do you know about the
10:10
cycle to work scheme i've never done it um I do know the
10:17
limit isn't there anymore or something is that right grand isn't it it used to be £1,000 yes so for people uh listening
10:24
from outside the UK you want to know what the cycle to work scheme is it's basically a governmentbacked scheme that
10:29
allows um if you're an employee a full-time employee you can actually buy
10:35
a bike and the intention is you're meant to buy it so that you can commute to work on it m and effectively what
10:43
happens is the price of that bike is taken out of your wage before the tax
10:49
gets taken out so it's there's a tax advantage basically mh um when it first started the limit for the bike was
10:56
£1,000 which could get you a good bike and also at that time the the the the
11:03
way that it financed itself was VAT wasn't included either so it was an amazing deal because you didn't you
11:11
didn't buy the bike technically your employer would buy the bike
11:16
they as an employer would be able to reclaim the VAT on that so they get it cheap and then you pay your employer
11:26
repayments out of each wage for the bike until it's paid off and you pay that
11:32
before you pay your tax so it's kind of complicated but with a spreadsheet you could see that you actually got this
11:37
massive discount and it was like about up to like 30 40% yeah but then they they changed it after a while and they
11:44
said "No the the payments that you make against it have to have that on." So that kind of changed things a bit it
11:51
wasn't quite as good value it depends on your tax level as well but anyway they they changed it a few years ago and took
11:57
that,000 limit off yep and so now you can buy a bike of any value or your
12:03
employer can or there are schemes that your employer can subscribe to that handles it all for you and as an
12:09
employee you could so the that's what it is is it any good i don't know the the main
12:16
thing there would be has it had a desired effect the desired effect I imagine was to make more people who were
12:25
currently motor vehicling their way to work to bicycle their way to work
12:31
um I would imagine that would be how they wangled it as a government kind of
12:37
idea yeah there's no real policing of it no there's no way of knowing whether any of these or how many
12:45
of those cycle to work purchase bikes have been used for cycling to work or how frequently or whatever was it if
12:53
they haven't is that bad or good yeah I mean that's the government's problem ultimately from our point of view we
12:58
could get cheap the consumer point of view you can get a cheap bike in many way it's good for cyclists I suppose but
13:05
it's if you've just used it to remove tax from the system then it's
13:11
probably not good for hospitals and schools and infrastructure so in a
13:18
bigger picture it probably hasn't been very good for general society because I don't think many people have actually
13:23
started cycle to work working from it do you no i mean in terms of the industry I guess ultimately the industry would was
13:30
like all for it because gets more bikes out the door bike shops there there was like an admin
13:37
burden from them is because the you know all these things had to go through a special sort of um administrative burden
13:44
and there's a lot of red tape bike shops so little bike shops probably didn't benefit greatly from it big organizations like Halfords and stuff I
13:50
think they did really really well out of it because they could just partner up with a cycle to work scheme Yeah organizer and just keep shipping those
13:57
bikes out and and from employees of big companies you just went down a list and ticked a box saying I'll have that bike
14:02
and then few weeks later it turns up so I'm not entirely convinced that the small bike shops benefited from it i
14:09
know there was um there was like a voucher scheme for bike shops to enable to you know to try and simplify it so
14:15
that they could actually benefit from it but yeah I think anything that gets people on bikes is a good thing i don't
14:22
think the scheme does what it was meant to do i think the argument there's no lack of evidence is a issue so we're all
14:29
just here saying aren't we but did it put anyone on a bike who wasn't already on a bike the cynic in me thinks no
14:36
probably didn't nah probably true anyway there we go i think there we go so thanks for that Van Halen and uh and
14:43
I've got another question here i've got to find it on my email because this came in just before we uh sat down here and
14:52
just hop off the server the mail that's not my email right this is from Ben Shaw
15:01
the uh fizzy pot magnet right good keep on it out so on the I put a poll on the
15:08
forum the other day basically asking people to tick a box to say what they earn it's one of those sort of survey
15:13
things it's kind of fascinating to know but it's kind of useful to us from a sort of a you know knowledge of who our
15:21
readers are kind of thing and that sparked a interesting forum thread called um money doesn't buy you
15:28
happiness so okay it went from a statistical nice straightforward
15:33
statistics kind of thing into this sort of um more philosophical kind of discussion and uh Ben says "Does riding
15:40
a stupidly expensive bike make you happier than something very cheap?" Uh where is your personal pounds to smile
15:47
ratio nirvana right he goes on a bit there right but that's basically what he's asking
15:53
so difficult isn't it ignorance is bliss i think it's like when we talk about old
15:59
bikes and stuff um you can't say those weren't enjoyable
16:07
experiences but I think if you got on an old bike now it probably wouldn't be
16:13
the same level of enjoyment different mean laugh in a different way but it
16:19
wouldn't be like you wouldn't want to keep doing it yeah we did an article
16:25
u couple years ago we had uh Sunonny and Nick Craig went to the uh Peak District
16:32
i was there cuz I was taking pictures and the idea was Sunny was on a
16:38
25year-old specialized rock oper okay and um Yeah and
16:45
excuse me and he hated it it was awful um so yeah I mean it's just
16:52
because I mean what we're doing here we're conflating old with cheap which maybe isn't the question here yeah so I
16:57
don't know but I think there is a point asking around people who've been around
17:04
for a while like what's the highest you would or do
17:10
spend on a bicycle before you realize it's just a massive diminishing returns or just what you asked you asked that
17:16
before we came before we sat down and it's quite interesting because in the kitchen there was there was Ross there was me there was our special guest and
17:23
we all kind of hit the same number yeah about four and a bit grand it's not saying that's the minimum it's
17:29
just that's like the maximum almost after that it's just
17:34
not getting any diminishing returns after that isn't it yeah but it depends
17:40
on what the cheap bike is as well because there are I'd rather be on I'd rather and I do if they got the choice
17:47
i'd rather ride the boss nut that we had than the really more
17:53
expensive ex other bike that was how many how many times more it was
17:59
expensive five times more well there's a bike right behind you for those listening and and there's a bike right
18:05
behind us on the sofa here the LA Elijah which Halo model isn't it yeah yeah it's a Halo model so it's the
18:10
one you know it's 10 grand yeah it's got all the toys on it it's got the
18:16
electronic shifting wireless shifting wireless dropper yeah uh flight attendant is it flight attendant yeah
18:22
flight attendant on the shocks everything wheels and Yeah carbon wheels it's It's awesome it's brilliant would I
18:28
pay 10 would I drop 10 no no but some people do
18:33
but the interesting thing is I've had a lot of fun on it and then in the same weekend that I was out on that I
18:40
discovered out in the it been lost to me for like over 10 years i discovered an
18:45
old single speed an old steel Sanderson single speed that had uh 650 mil bars
18:51
and I pulled it out and I ordered it up and I I serviced it a bit and I got I had so much fun on it yikes well Ross
18:58
made a really good point didn't he ross actually made the point that it depends where you are the trail that you're on
19:06
if you're on a really rubbish trail on a really good bike you probably won't have a good time
19:12
but if you're on a pretty mediocre there's there's limits to this obviously but if you're on a mediocre bike but
19:17
you're on a fantastic trail you're probably going to have an amazing time so yeah it's an unanswerable question
19:24
right well any other questions no I think I think we'll leave it there god for that because we've got a lot to fit in because it's time to introduce our
19:31
special guest who could it be is it Legend from
19:37
[Laughter] Gladiators hello special guest time and
19:45
who could it be it's me it's Amanda do you remember Amanda she used to work here still alive still going where are
19:52
you now uh I'm at dowatcher.cc CC which is an ultray website so we host all the
19:58
races where people go on like your loved ones go and find where you are and see
20:04
if you're sleeping in a bush or do you reckon anyone does that for a long time do they just watch it it's actually a
20:11
bit of a sport in itself is it yeah i've done that no I haven't i don't think No
20:17
there you go you could do it this weekend no thanks what you doing this weekend then i'm doing the Dales Divide
20:23
which is 600 kilometers of off-road cycling so it's
20:29
onside Bolton Abbey somewhere okay scarbor North Yorkshire Malls North
20:35
Allan is that actually the route it's just like a It's just like an eye shape okay
20:42
good so I've broken it up into three in my mind get to York leave Scarra finish are you doing
20:50
it on your own yes it's unsupported that's the theme of ultracling is it's
20:57
this guy who lives lives near you lives with you lives around you
21:03
is he not doing it lives in my shadow he's Yeah he's doing it but you can't race well you could enter as a pair but
21:10
that's pretend you're not doing it together you have to not do it together blinking right are you going to sit
21:17
though yes he'll be He's got a two-day plan i'm having a nice time not Okay
21:23
right two days mhm jackie will do that yes right i'll watch your dot yes he
21:30
will so how do you watch your dot then so you go on dot watcher uh and there's a race
21:37
what do you call them like a tab in the menu you click on races and then Okay
21:43
dale's Divide will be at the top and then you can either like star your favorite riders so it'll only show them
21:49
on a map oh and you can see the details of people on what bike they're riding and there's a commentary so Kitty that I
21:55
work with is doing the commentary and she's going to be like in real life dot watching so she'll be rousing around
22:02
with a camera taking pictures of people and keeping everyone updated why don't
22:08
you do that job do you know I was going to right i don't know what happened i went on
22:16
went on a bike packing trip in the Dales and thought "Oh this is lovely." It was dry and it was sunny and it was
22:21
leisurely and I thought I could do more of this so then I entered and
22:26
now I do regret it a bit well but it's only it's a few days of my
22:33
life and how many are you doing in a year how many are you doing in in a year personally two all right i'm doing so
22:40
this one is this weekend and it's 600k off road so that's quite hard and then
22:46
I'm doing dead ends and cake which is exactly what it's called it's dead end
22:51
climbs in Switzerland oh and they give you cake at the top which is why I
22:57
entered it i love dead end climbs don't know why um I think it's just that
23:02
there's a definitive end to the climb that you're on um and I like cake how do
23:09
they manage going back down again you're supposed to like stay no you're supposed to stay to the left you know like
23:17
roads people coming up are you going up the other side i thought it was a dead end no you go back down the other side
23:22
of the road you're right up on Wait which side do we ride on so I'll be going up on the right hand side what if
23:28
you're really struggling and you're having to zigzag and someone comes down this hasn't been thought about this
23:33
whole enterprise you look up and you Well that's I was going to do
23:39
it but it's not been organized properly you're not interested what cake is it uh
23:44
it varies i watched a video on it and it really is a case of suffer cake and you
23:52
have to have the cake even if you don't like it that would be quite good that would it thing at single speed or something
23:58
you got to like have to smash a Swiss roll be a Swiss roll
24:05
surely unless you cross the border i think it's posher cake than that
24:12
strudel trifle can you imagine anything worse than a trifle at the top of a climb i hate trial
24:22
what's your favorite cake uh almond slice that would be quite good wouldn't it
24:28
it's a little It's not really sweet i was going to say it's not quite as sweet but it's mega sweet but it's a little bit
24:34
Nothing I suppose so no
24:40
I used to like trifle but then um my uh brother worked in
24:48
trifle no he worked in uh Burnley Job Center right that's that's how a good
24:53
story starts so I used to work front line Bley job center and uh a lot of the
24:58
uh people who may have had heroin problems used to come in and what they used to eat while they were waiting to be served was just like Morrison's
25:05
trifles it was a big kind of gloopy no teeth required
25:12
um suck it down slurp thing like energy gels really you could just have any
25:18
yogurt but like Reon's energy gels now I'm going to judge anyone I see
25:23
buying trifle well it depends where they take it doesn't it but yeah I like trifle i used
25:31
to where do you take your eat yes but if I take it to if you go and take it and
25:36
swaffle it in front of someone behind a glass security screen in a job center that you probably can look a little bit
25:43
of scance at them that'll be all right poor little guys
25:48
so there you go so I don't have trifles since then right then i'd like to right that's enough from us in the studio i'm
25:54
going to hand over to Hannah who's interviewing David Bacon from Startup Boom Time which is a bikesp specific
26:02
computer thing hello and welcome to this week's Single
26:08
Track World podcast i'm Hannah Dobson managing editor at Single Track World and I'm here with David Bacon from Boom
26:15
Time hi David hi Hannah thank you for having me now Boom Time is a startup
26:22
company that's making a bike computer that's focused on mountain bikes and mountain bikers and I've invited them on
26:30
the podcast because I'm interested to talk about not just the product but what it says about where mountain biking is
26:37
going so first of all David could you tell us what is Boom Time
26:44
certainly can so we are reimagining what a bike computer should be and do um as
26:51
it stands we've got some great technology in the market which is all about GPS navigation fitness tracking
26:58
but actually mountain biking is has got many facets to it many different types of sport really within the sport and
27:06
that kind of computer doesn't really fit everywhere um and actually when we've been researching this we find a lot of
27:11
people may have a a Garmin or something similar which they then take off when they're doing red or black runs or
27:18
something more adventurous and there feels like there's an opportunity to reimagine
27:23
and create something new that fits the market and the need of the the riders out there so we are coming at this from
27:30
a um angle of looking at jump and impact telemetry we will also be looking at um
27:37
the normal stuff like speed distance time so you'll have all that stuff for Straa but we are trying to bring action
27:44
metrics to action sports okay and so what sort of metrics are
27:50
involved in jumping is this like how high and how long or Yeah we we're going
27:56
to keep it simple to begin with so it'll be jump height length and hang time we'll also capture impact telemetry so
28:03
if you have a bad landing you'll know how many g-forces went through the bike okay that doesn't sound simple cuz I've
28:09
looked at the maths before in Rampage feature that I wrote and and calculating all of that is is pretty complicated it
28:16
is it is hugely hugely complicated i mean we're working with um Bristol
28:22
University uh and their sort of physics department to actually help build out the algorithms um and it's it's taking a
28:29
huge amount of time um and testing as well it's all about data data data data
28:34
to get an accurate output because I think it depends on whether you do like
28:40
a a takeoff and a landing that are at the same height and you have an arc between or whether you do a takeoff
28:46
that's like a step down or a step up like those all have different mathematical components to them don't
28:52
they they do and this is this is really part of the challenge so we are not
28:58
claiming to give 100% accuracy uh if you want to do that you need static sensors
29:04
lasers light radar liar and these are all sort of things that won't survive in action sports so we're going down a
29:12
static sensor route which sounds very boring I know but actually they will
29:17
survive and that's the critical part here is having a device that can survive um and out the back of that we are going
29:23
to be giving very very good data that will give a good guide so we're we're a
29:30
companion a guide we're not an absolute we can't promise that and I don't think anyone can but um at the moment when you
29:38
go and do a jump you know you go I did this really big jump and that's all you know or if you're measuring length we I
29:44
mean I've seen it on YouTube and speaking to people if friends are having competitions they'll use a stone or an old bottle to sort of try and measure
29:50
who got the furthest but we'll actually have that data um and we'll be able to sort of put that on our platform one of
29:56
the things we're wanting to do is bring a bit of gamification into this sport as well so we're looking to allow people to
30:02
set up bespoke league tables with friends so who did xroot the fastest or
30:08
who got biggest air or who had the biggest crash of the year you know there's so many ways we could play that
30:14
and and do you have some kind of uh big medical provider as as your uh sponsor
30:21
for this investor uh no but there will be some very very clear legal texts that people will have to sign up to when they
30:27
start using the device we can't be liable for that oh god yeah the I can
30:33
just imagine oh dear um what does this thing look like is it does it look like
30:39
a normal bike computer or is it a whole bunch of stuff that you have to zip tie onto your bike like the the shred mate
30:44
which was sort of a precursor to this yeah exactly right we are basically taking the idea of shred mate but
30:51
putting it on steroids um we are still finalizing the development phase in fact
30:57
we have a funding round open at the moment to bring this to market but um the idea is that it will be a a very
31:04
small device almost like a Casio watch if you think about that without the strap and the idea is that it'll sit
31:09
underneath the handlebars rather than above it so that if you crash it doesn't get smashed um and and that's all it
31:16
will be so it'll be very very small unobtrusive um and actually its main
31:21
purpose is to be a bit like a flight recorder in a plane it we're not looking to give loads of um live data to riders
31:29
because quite frankly our our view is if you're using this device you're more interested in surviving getting down the
31:34
trail yeah you shouldn't be you shouldn't be looking at a computer while you're mids superman no yeah but but I
31:41
mean it's interesting because when we talk about this everyone's going to be thinking "Oh this is for people who doing black roots and doing crazy stuff
31:48
but I mean I I ride at Peas Lake quite regularly and I'm going down the blue routes and I've got a on my ebike it's
31:54
got a computer on it and I've realized I never look at it when I'm going down a trail I am focused on the trail and
32:01
riding the bike and staying on it so this live sort of data feed that's so important for road biking I don't think
32:07
translates into sort of trail riding in the same way so we are working on the principle of having a data recording
32:13
device that will just give basic information so speed distance time you can select either uh any of those but it
32:20
will at the end you can download via the computer to an app to the uh to our cloud and get an immediate data back
32:27
which will give you a summary of your experience okay yeah that makes sense i hadn't
32:33
really thought about that that you you never look at your computer as you're riding along yeah well I don't because I'm not into computers but there we go
32:40
um and so yeah you mentioned you got a funding round and you're developing these things so you must think that
32:46
there's enough people out there that that want this um this kind of information so um yeah what what's the
32:54
jump airtime market like do you think so we've been um working on this for five
33:01
years now blime me um and we've undertaken a lot of research uh both
33:06
from a grassroots level i've talked to people locally and we've conducted global research as well we were
33:11
partnered with work with studios um and we did research across the US Canada EU
33:17
and UK uh focus on people who were visiting bike parks just to try and get a feel for you know what this audience
33:24
is now we've we reckon about 25% of mountain bikers globally consider jumping to be a core part of their sport
33:31
right um but there's no tech to measure it really mhm
33:37
okay and so the jump market you think there's enough growth in there because
33:43
it's quite a far cry from like gravel and ebikes which is what the rest of the industry has kind of been seeing as the
33:50
growth market do you do you see that 25% growing um yes so that's 20 we've
33:57
identified 25% now that is about 5 million riders roughly who are not
34:03
really using existing tech we also believe that there's a crossover so uh for example my non-executive director he
34:10
has a Garmin he uses it about 70% of the time but as soon as he goes to a bike park or does something more adventurous
34:17
he takes it off so there's this usage gap the the challenge we have is we are
34:23
I I believe meeting a uh unmet need in the industry so when you say oh I jumped
34:29
telemetry people are going well yeah we don't need it we haven't got it um we
34:34
are looking across at a different sport kite surfing which is actually where I came from um now there's a device from a
34:40
company called Woo Sport that was launched 15 years ago or so that does
34:45
measure jumps in that sport and once people realize what they could capture um jumping's a really funny
34:53
thing because it's a very personal uh activity to do you know it's a solo sport solo event and it's it's the most
35:01
one of the most exciting things you can do in two wheels now the moment you start putting data behind that and have
35:07
you know have I done my biggest jump it's it's quite an addictive thing to start looking at so we have really
35:14
really strong um belief that this is something that will uh interest a lot in
35:19
the market and I guess on the free ride scene there is
35:24
the the rather like Tom Esteads that are going for the biggest biggest longest
35:30
jump for sure but then there's also the likes of um Seuk and Vero Sandler and
35:36
they're doing sort of creative stuff and it feels like they're not necessarily
35:42
doing measurements and VO's made a very conscious choice to move away from racing um and like it's more about
35:49
almost dancing right um so yeah have you had any feedback from the the free
35:56
riders scene um well actually um the uh the testing we've done today we
36:03
actually did with Vero and Sam Hodgson as well right so they they've actually been instrumental today in um in getting
36:10
us to where we are uh and a big thanks to them by the way they're amazing people absolutely nuts i mean what they
36:15
do on a bike is beyond anything but um yeah they've been they've been involved so we we've we consider it very
36:22
important to have really uh reference points across the capabilities so we
36:28
want to work we are working with pro riders to measure those really big jumps but it's also equally important for us
36:35
to be accurately measuring small jumps for people like me because at the end of the day this is a a computer that should
36:42
be for anybody who's interested in mountain biking who's going beyond just doing some countryside rides and is
36:49
looking at sort of getting serious about trail riding yeah okay so so the even the creative
36:55
like some of the most creative riders I think that there are right now they can see a point to this or the purpose to this yeah i mean I mean you could take
37:02
this from many different angles to answer that question but I think one of the big
37:09
things for me uh because there's two parts to Boom Time there's the computer but we are also looking to integrate it
37:14
into a race timing system right now the reason I talk this up is um a lot of
37:21
this crazy action stuff that you're seeing is all about getting onto social media for content for people to digest
37:28
um one of the challenges I see with social media is you're looking at these big jumps on small screens and it's very
37:35
hard to sometimes translate the real crazy onto that small screen so the idea
37:41
is that we want to bring that jump telemetry and impact telemetry and how fast and all this sort of stuff onto the
37:47
social media side so that when people like Vero are doing some of this nut stuff that she does you know she can put
37:53
some data behind it so that people like me when we're watching it can have a better understanding of what she's doing
37:59
i mean I was watching Tomstead's uh crazy gap jump um from Rampage this year
38:05
yeah yeah bfg BC rather yeah you know I was I was getting sweaty palms just
38:11
watching it but um what I what I realized was wouldn't that be great if he had you know he hit hit that jump at
38:18
30 mph um and actually it was a 70 foot drop and it was 10g on impact when he
38:23
landed when he when he fell off the bike there was another sort of 10g you know we can bring some some I think value
38:30
added data to this sport well that's exactly the calculation that we
38:36
attempted to do on the basis of um like video clips and stuff um for the Rampage
38:42
feature that I've done in issue 159 yeah tried to tried to calculate like the
38:48
force on impact of him staying on the bike versus falling off the bike um and
38:55
yeah the impact on suspension so yeah it was complicated you know like some some
39:01
of this stuff it it goes beyond I mean as I say you can come from many different angles so there's this pro
39:08
um content side where we can add value but I mean we could also talk around the safety side so if you're going to a do a
39:15
new route and it's got a really big jump in it quite often people I don't know how fast to approach that well you'll
39:22
have that information with Boom Time because you'll be able to go onto the website and see what other people have done how fast they approached it so
39:28
there is while you kind of made a joke earlier on going well you know you could be in for some liability here with people doing crazy stuff there is also
39:35
potentially a safety side as well where by furnishing people with a little bit of information around jumps they haven't
39:40
done hopefully we might be able to reduce some of those um those nasty accidents when people are pushing their
39:46
limits um so in terms of like guineaing jumps
39:51
would you be able to do predictive uh speeds like this is what you should be
39:56
riding to clear it or is that not not Yeah yeah so so the the idea is that um
40:03
through the Boom Time platform you'll be able to see your own data but you'll also be able to see other people as well
40:08
in terms of what they done so you'll be able to not just not just see what they've done benchmark where you're at
40:14
but also look at uh if somebody was going down a I'm just pick a Barry knows
40:20
best at Peas Lake my favorite trail so um there's a couple of jumps in there you know you got to look at the history
40:25
of what other people have done you'll see that they've hit those jumps at between 20 and 25 mph at least you've got an idea of what
40:33
kind of speed you should be hitting those sort of jumps i mean Barry knows best perhaps not the best example but
40:38
when you're starting to get into big black runs with big gaps and stuff I think it starts becoming quite relevant that kind of data
40:45
and um so as viewers we could be watching events like Rampage or Hardline
40:53
and and be given live data as well is what you're hoping is it yeah yeah absolutely
40:59
um I mean we we have a belief if you're going to enter a market and try and do something different you need to have
41:05
more than one USP you need to come in and really sort of have a very strong proposition we feel that we are coming
41:11
from two angles it's that direct consumer computer which is radically different and coming from a different
41:17
place then you've got the race timing system as well that is also going to revolutionize and change things
41:24
it's it as I said it's only ever going to be a guide we cannot promise It's 100% accuracy so I don't ever see
41:30
us having competitions run around the data i think I think uh at this point in
41:37
time I'd be uncomfortable with that but I think um the value ad that we could
41:43
offer to the likes of Red Bull U and Monster um I mean you know Red Bull gets
41:48
about one and a half billion views i mean it's massive so trying to add some data um and uh bring bring a bit more
41:56
excitement to that audience I think will have a beneficial impact and do you think there's any you you touched on
42:03
safety do you think there's any potential for kind of oh now we know what the forces are um should we be
42:11
doing this kind of discussion uh I mean I've been doing action sports
42:17
of one variety or another all my life from rock climbing ice climbing surfing kite night surfing
42:23
motocross i've always worked on a principle of riskreward and that's a very personal
42:28
choice that I think everybody makes when they go out and do something adventurous boom time is not looking to
42:35
change that and we want to be super clear about that each rider has responsibility for their own safety and
42:41
pushing their own limits to a sensible point um all we are looking to do is to just
42:47
bring a bit more bit more uh data facts and fun you know benchmark with your
42:52
friends compare contrast uh check out new places you know see what's exciting um I think we can bring
43:00
bring a different angle to mountain biking in terms of uh that sort of data support right I mean I've been um
43:08
hearing a lot recently about helmet testing standards and how basically the the testing standards is kind of out of
43:15
date compared to the real world speeds that people are crashing at and I think
43:21
they're going to update those um those standards but they're they're modeling
43:26
it on imperfect data right because only so many rides are recorded and that kind of thing like to France yeah that's the
43:34
classic everything is recorded there so they can they can get some good data on
43:39
on speeds that riders were riding at um yeah I wonder whether there's implications for kind of product
43:45
development here and once you start seeing the numbers you can go like oh that's what we need to design to yeah I
43:52
mean I'm I'm aware of that there are tools for some of the suspension setups
43:57
to sort of measure impacts and that sort of stuff so some of this work is already kind of happening i think we'll just be
44:04
the first um provider to actually bring a mainstream product that is accessible
44:10
for everybody um will it have a broader impact i'd like to think yes um you know
44:16
optimistically um I I think that we will bring something
44:21
new uh the ramifications of how far that will travel through I don't know but um
44:26
I mean certainly during testing I mean just going around some BMS quickly we're hitting 9G on the bike so yeah you know
44:33
there will there should be data that will come through that may start impacting uh those with a little bit of
44:38
imagination who can see opportunities through that mhm well you said that a
44:45
similar product um was introduced in kite surfing so um what changes have you
44:50
seen in kite surfing as a result good question um I think one of the big
44:57
things from a from a sort of publicity point of view is it really started
45:03
bringing focus in on the biggest jump i mean over the past few years it's gone from sort of 28 29 mters up to 35 m plus
45:10
height now no one knew that it was just where we're at now people going big like that was a big big jump now they've got
45:17
science behind it and there's it's almost creating a competition so from that sort of top- end pro angle it's
45:23
definitely had an impact in kite surfing um right down to myself i mean I I I
45:29
picked up the sport started to begin to learn to jump and the first thing I did was go and get a W device so that I
45:36
could then measure and monitor and develop my jumping skills and I could
45:41
see what was having an impact so it actually had a massive impact on my um participation in that sport oh okay so
45:49
it it's it's kind of like a standard piece of kit that you buy when you get into kite surfing now
45:57
it it was uh I mean I I the kite surfing community will certainly have their own
46:02
points of view right um it it was it went through a phase of being very popular i think it dropped off i think
46:07
it's perhaps coming back um uh I I I haven't kites here for a few years um as
46:13
I sort of moved moved my focus onto mountain biking but um yeah I mean it did have a significant
46:20
impact on that sport um and I I I would like I'd like to think that that was a
46:26
it's a great test case and I think we can do something similar for mountain bike
46:31
and so uh you said you've been doing this for the last five years um that's
46:36
kind of interesting timing in terms of trying to do something in the bike industry so um how has that been
46:46
well as a startup in the UK uh every time is a tough time um I mean we're
46:52
half a million quid in we've got a working prototype um we've been supported with an innovate grant um
46:59
we've got some great investors on board who've been really supportive um lockdown stopped anything happening so
47:07
we lost a couple of years in that in that window um but I always think great innovation
47:13
will always find support um and it's that faith and that ability to to keep sticking with it is
47:20
what will see us through so um yeah you know we're in the middle of a funding round again to actually get the money to
47:26
bring this to market we've got all the evidence to prove it and everything we've got the prototype it's been tested
47:32
um but uh yeah it's it's Chinese curse may you live in interesting times yes
47:39
so um so you've got a prototype and that people have used at like the backyard
47:44
jams and you've obviously used it in Baron's best um so uh yeah what is the
47:52
next phase like when are you hoping that people might be able to sort of be riding around Swindly with one of these
47:58
on them so it's a little way away um development of electronics getting it through all the uh legal stamps and
48:05
approvals manufacture it's going to be we're looking at March 27
48:10
so we're we're a little way away um for a consumer it might sound a long time
48:16
for a company that long to me to be honest yeah oh great fantastic yeah it's
48:21
I mean we're we're pushing as hard as we can to bring this to market at pace we've got a great team lined up um we're
48:28
working with Bristol University we've got a great development agency lined up um a full team everything's costed
48:36
planned ready we are just waiting to go so um you know if there's anyone on the
48:41
podcast listening um check out www.boomtime.com um you know and have a
48:48
look and contact us if you'd like to learn more okay and it just occurred to me could you integrate it into a bike
48:54
since like all all internal routing has to be the thing and you know we've got ebikes with everything integrated into
49:01
them yeah could it could it be integrated it's it's an interesting one that I mean there's uh definitely a trend towards uh decluttering the
49:08
cockpit uh I mean when I've been speaking with people a lot of people are saying "Yeah I'm I'm removing my computers and whatnot because it's just
49:14
distraction i'm not interested."
49:21
The the real value in what we're doing is in the software it's in the algorithm it's in all the data we collect and and
49:27
getting that accuracy in the jump in the jumps that we record could we could we
49:32
amend the electronics and fit them in in a in a bike absolutely we could the real challenge with one of our senses is an
49:38
alter so it actually needs access to air so having it actually put into the frame or something like that probably wouldn't
49:44
work but um never say never but I mean our focus is on a uh handlebar um uh
49:53
device mounted uh opportunity right now okay well uh will be interesting to see
50:00
uh how it how it progresses and indeed lots of these things that we see as kind
50:06
of startup inventions quite often seem to be consumed by bigger brands who who
50:12
see the opportunity as well that that seems to happen quite a lot so um yeah interesting to see where you end up uh
50:19
and however it ends up to see what impact it has on the sport so um yes I'm
50:25
curious like I I kind of like the idea of being able to put some numbers to
50:32
what someone's doing and equate it to double-decker buses or whatever um but
50:39
uh the idea of teenage kids down in the woods trying to trying to jump further
50:46
than each other frightens me yeah but I mean I think the argument
50:51
would be that they're already doing that they're doing it anyway you know so yes but we don't have the data to know it's
50:57
like being a parent right what they do down the woods that you can't see
51:03
doesn't happen yeah what you don't know doesn't hurt you um yes well unless you crash yeah
51:11
yeah well um thank you very much for for coming and and joining us and uh keep us
51:18
posted with with how it goes thank you very much Hannah thank you very much indeed
51:27
[Music]
51:43
that's all from the studio sofa i'm going to hand you over to Hannah Dobson who's done an interview with Richard
51:48
David Bacon richard Bacon's off [ __ ] big breakfast in he or something well in
51:55
David Bacon from Boomtown boom time boom time boom boom town richard Baker from
52:02
the Beantown Rats boom time have you ever ridden with a
52:08
Garmin and it's got the grit and flow and you're just cruising along on the flat and it goes "Oh sick jump hang time
52:17
40 seconds." Oh that sounds quite a good one 40 seconds it always It overjudges everything so my Garmin's got the alerts
52:24
on like a noise and it goes and then it says great jump but if you're on like a
52:29
pump track it's just going and it can't keep on top of it but it's like you've just jumped uh 20 mters and
52:36
you had a hang time of four days so maybe boom time's better than
52:42
that boom time room time
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