I saw two guys out riding this morning in matching RCC kit. What motivates someone to plunk down a couple hundred bucks to join this virtual club and I assume a few hundred more to get the matching outfits for a Sunday morning ride? At least they were pretty fast.

I have no idea, I only know I lack that particular motivation.

Been down this road and got beat up, so....

It's the same that motivates a guy that just bought a new Trek Emonda SLR 8 to buy a Trek Madone 9.9 before ever taking delivery of the Emonda.

I guess if you have the cash, you can do whatever makes you happy with it.

Membership to the RCC unlocks the bottle flip maneuver.

Any club that allows me to be a member, is not one i'd want to be in.

Why do some people plunk down a 100k initiation fee for a country club membership?

This is a Zwift thing? What's the "virtual" reference?

Does the RCC have their own roads closed to public traffic?

Isn't Rapha Club in New York the name of the Rapha store?

All of the Rapha stores are called Rapha Clubs. The club this post is referring to is an actual membership deal. As far as I know, you get the ability to buy exclusive club kit and if you happen to be close to a Rapha Club (store), you probably get some other VIP type perks for events.

It's honestly not much different between being a big spender at your local area shop. It's just perceived as more pretentious because Rapha. Either way, it's their money. Someone has to keep the economy rolling.

More info if you really want to know. Not of interest to me at this point though:
https://www.rapha.cc/us/en_US/rcc-pub...ation#benefits

$200 for an annual membership.

The NYC "club ride" is up 9W. You can do it for free any day and there's plenty of free groups on the weekends.

That true statement would also apply to the routes of almost every club ride.

There is no Rapha store in Chicago that I know of, so I assume The RCC Chicago is a virtual club? I don't really know, which is why I posted the question. I presume there must be more to it than the matching outfits.

Rapha Clubs are stores, located in key cycling cities. The Rapha Cycling Club is a membership group.

If you're in the club, you get opportunities to go ride in cool places for cheap. Basically, you pay for membership, and then get discounted bike vacations and other cool stuff.

Ironically, some people actually like combining vacations and bike riding, wow!

And trash the cost of the clothes all you want, the stuff is quality and is the same price as any other cycling kit of the same quality.

Actually sounds pretty cool. I try to ride on most trips, and it would be much easier to have someone help organize rentals and routes. But what happens if you show up without any Rapha kit?

I don't think anyone is trashing the quality or that most of their stuff is worth it. $200 for a club is a bit expensive for most. But if you're an international traveler and vacation all over the world, then being able to take advantage of all the perks make the membership worth it.

Esoteric | Definition of Esoteric by Merriam-Webster

Give it time, someone who's never owned Rapha anything will show up in this thread to complain about the price of the clothes and say they're no better than such and such.

The last time this blew up, I actually went out and bought a Rapha kit just so I could be educated in the quality of the kit. I will honestly say, it is high quality, some things aren't as nice as my Black Sheep kits (similarly priced) other things are nicer. Still, they're hands down better than my $100-$200 kits, without a doubt.

In fact, I liked it so much, I bought a second kit a week later from them.

I didn't splurge to become a member, maybe one day.

Assos is the best stuff, Q36.5 is second best and Rapha is 3rd. Everyone knows that.

Nope. Brandt Sorenson.

And OP, who cares?

Never heard of it so I googled to see.

$400 bibs and $200 jerseys

But then when you can spend $1700 on a set of match quad KT88 vacuum tubes for your amp, $400 bibs are a bargain.
https://www.tubedepot.com/products/e...e-matched-quad


Esoteric | Definition of Esoteric by Merriam-Webster

Ugh. Thorfinn-sassquatch's clothing line.
Who is Thorfinn-Sassquatch? The mysterious case of a Los Angeles Strava legend | CyclingTips

This is great! I love the Internet! Nobody can hide!

To be completely honest...I can ride a century in just about anything. Just wear whatever you think looks nice and don't worry about it so much.

I live in the north suburbs of Chicago, and on a nice weekend morning in the summer time I might see a few dozen riders out, maybe more. Some people ride with their club or their team and they may have matching kit. That makes sense to me. I also see people out with rapha kit. That makes sense to me too.

What caught my attention was two guys riding with matching kit that I didn’t recognize, so I looked it up when I got home and saw that it was this RCC thing. It struck me as a little odd that two guys would pay to join this club that as far as I know doesn’t have anything going on in Chicago so they can look like the guys in [MENTION=52523]Disco Stu[/MENTION] ‘s photo. Maybe they go on the trips that [MENTION=333534]SpeshulEd[/MENTION] mentioned.

I found myself imagining what the conversation may have been like.
“Hey, I just found out that you can join Rapha Cycling Club and get the exclusive RCC team kit.”
“That sounds pretty cool. Let’s join so we can wear our matching RCC kit when we go for rides on Sheridan Road on Sunday morning.”
“OK, I’m in. I’ll text you when my kit arrives so we can make sure that we both wear it on the same day”
“This is going to be awesome”