Monday, July 04, 2011

Bums On The Saddle ...

Selling anything is hard. Especially if you aren't selling just a commodity but an experience. That's what I learnt when I 'interned' at Bums On The Saddle.

Let me first just say this: Bums On The Saddle Rocks. Period. In BOTS you'd be never sold a bike, but an experience.

Okay, back to topic. I took a short break from all IT stuff and started working with BOTS with Rohan and Sid. I do have some retail selling experience as a cashier at a restaurant , as a waiter at a hotel and Salesman at an ice-cream shop. But boy was this different !

First, nothing goes just smooth. There will be a lot of things that aren't just going to fall in place. As a local bike shop guy, there are a hundred things you need to take care at any given point of time.

In this short period of time we :

Moved to a new place
Started designing the new set-up
Made a downhill training session happen ( big shout out to Nelly and Iggy !)
Made live streaming of Tour de France happen at the shop.
Put quite a few people on new cycles !
...


Thanks BOTS for the experience ! Love you guys :)

Friday, July 01, 2011

Tour de France 2011

Mother of all the cycling races is around the corner ! Tour de France starts on July 2nd.

Though all time favorite Lance is not racing this time around, I am totally rooting for Mark Cavendish, one of the best sprinter of our time. I can't wait to see Team HTC-Highroad leading him out to front and then Mark beating hell out of others :D

Imagine cycling at around 50 km/h for about 150-180 kilometers and then for the last 500 meters or so, sprinting at 70-80 km/h ! That is a treat to watch !


Here is old but informative article about all the questions you may have about Tour de France.

http://likeithateit.net/?p=240


Timings of stages as per IST here: [ http://goo.gl/MW4MM ]

[ https://spreadsheets.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?hl=en_US&hl=en_US&key=0Alpl9ukYBm8mdEY4SkFFMFFGSmpKejlxNHRlRnZJdkE&output=html ]

:-)