Episode 90: Brendan Quirk — CEO of USA Cycling

King of the Ride

Ted King

Sports, Health & Fitness, Business

4.8 • 660 Ratings

🗓️ 1 June 2022

⏱️ 85 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Brendan Quirk took the reins as CEO of USA Cycling late in 2021 with the hopes of reinvigorating the organization with the energy and enthusiasm that he remembers from his first races as a card carrying USAC member in 1986. Looking at the state of the cycling union: American racing needs help and hopefully Brendan is the person for the job. Brendan is the co-founder of the biggest cycling e-tailer, Competitive Cyclist, which segued to a position as EVP at Backcountry.com. He ran Rapha North America for a handful of years as well as being the cycling program director for the Runway Group, a project spearheaded by the cycling nuts in the Walton family. Brendan now splits his time between home in Little Rock, Arkansas and USA Cycling HQ in Colorado Springs, Colorado. He's the father of three children, a husband, and a terrific conversationalist. I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did. Don't forget to use code King25 at www.teamZealios.com to protect yourself this summer with the finest skincare designed for athletes out there.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hello, welcome back to King of the Ride podcast. I am Ted King, host here on
0:09.1	aforementioned podcast. Our episode today is one that I've been looking forward to for
0:15.6	quite a while now. Brendan Quirk is the CEO of USA Cycling.
0:21.9	Having taken over just recently, late last year in 2021, his experience in this position is
0:28.8	both as a bike racer, having first held a USC license, or actually USCF, US Cycling Federation
0:35.5	back in those days, in 1986.
0:40.3	And then with a handful of very successful stints in business.
0:44.5	It was with that initial love of cycling, which we'll hear more about today,
0:48.2	that brought him to all sorts of positions of business.
0:50.4	He co-founded the biggest cycling online retailer, competitive cyclist. The years that
0:56.0	followed in the sale to backcountry.com are something that I found incredibly interesting, and I think
1:00.6	you will too. Brendan's home is Little Rock, Arkansas, smack in the center of the state. It is not
1:07.7	Fayetteville, nor Bentonville, areas that are part of the NWA, northwest Arkansas,
1:13.3	the places that are, let's call it the burgeoning hotbeds of cycling in all disciplines here in America.
1:19.4	That's thanks to the interests of the Walton family, of course,
1:22.8	which is also something that we're going to talk about, namely his time as the cycling program director for the runway group. Now we're going to talk about all sorts of things in this longer than
1:32.1	normal podcast. What is the point of USA cycling, for example? What is the future? What is the
1:39.6	point of the Olympics? Why is the radical sport of BMX freestyle under the same umbrella as track
1:46.4	racing, for example? Where does Nica fit into this puzzle? Or maybe my favorite question of this
1:52.7	conversation, why would Brendan, someone whom I like and respect, take a job that from my perspective
1:59.1	seems thankless and highly critiqued
2:02.5	from the peanut gallery.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Ted King, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Ted King and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.