Determined to not take retirement lying down Adam Blythe has partnered with British bike brand Genesis to explore fresh new challenges away from the confines and rigid structure of professional road racing. Blythe is no stranger to differing disciplines of cycling, having been both road and track national champion in the past. With this partnership with Genesis however he's setting his sights on wider horizons and altogether different challenges.
Genesis are certainly a perfect fit for this deviation in Blythe's focus and have long been hailed as one of, if not the, original adventure focussed UK bike brand. Responsible for some of the most loved, versatile and durable machines such as the Croix de Fer it also is no stranger to making rapid race bikes. It's also the brand which, alongside the UK distributor Madison, is responsible for the Madison-Genesis team: one of the most successful domestic road racing teams ever seen in the UK.
One of the key characters on the British road scene for the last decade, Blyth started his pro career as a stagiaire with Silence-Lotto in 2009, before moving on to ride for some of the biggest teams in the sport like Omego-Pharma-Lotto, BMC, Orica-GreenEdge, Tinkoff and the ill-fated Aqua Blue squad. It was whilst with Tinkoff that he won the British road championships in 2017. Blythe finished off his career with Lotto-Soudal before retiring at the end of this season.
Blythe showing off the British national champs kit.
(Image credit: Getty Images)
For his part, Blythe is really looking forward to something different after 10 years of road racing: “I can’t wait to start working with Genesis and Madison as a whole. There’s a lot of fun stuff that we have planned with a lot of cool collaborations as well which I think is going to be great.
“I also can’t wait to repay Madison, they always stood by me through my career – even though I was in a different team they’ve always helped me as much as they could. I really can’t wait to just start working with them and show everyone what we can achieve together.”
Kellie Parsons, marketing director at Madison and Sportline, said: “We are so excited to have Adam on board for next year as an official Genesis ambassador and representing a number of our other brands. We have some big plans for Genesis in 2020 and we hope that having such a high-profile, popular face in Adam will help elevate the brand to a new level. There is a lot of love out there for Genesis, so alongside several other of our ambassadors Adam will be helping us launch the Genesis Bicycle Club – but more to come on that next year.”
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With the success of EF Racing's 'alternative race calendar' and rider's such as Lachlan Morton, more and more pro riders are realising the amount of fun and sheer variety of challenges and races that gravel, MTB and other areas of the sport can offer. It looks like we can hopefully (maybe) expect to see Blythe take on some of the big challenges such as GBduro and Transcontinental next year.
As well as Genesis, Blythe will be also working with Shimano, 100%, Lazer and Madison Clothing. You can keep up to date with his progress on Genesis' social media platforms such as Instagram and Facebook.
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James Bracey's career has seen him move from geography teacher, to MBR writer, to Cycling Weekly's senior tech writer and video presenter. He possesses an in-depth knowledge of bicycle mechanics, as well as bike fit and coaching qualifications. Bracey enjoys all manner of cycling, from road to gravel and mountain biking.
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