Expert Bike

Antoine Lacoste

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

A bike taken apart on the garage floor

Antoine was 10 when he rescued his father’s old steel racing bike, forgotten at the back of the family garage near Annecy. Instead of simply pumping up the tyres, he took it apart completely on the garage floor, piece by piece, to understand how everything fitted together.

Putting it back together took the whole summer. He came out of it with a conviction that has never left him: a bike is not a fixed object, it is a set of choices that can always be improved.

Camille Rey

Mon, 01 Jan 0001 00:00:00 +0000

A summer on the hairpins of Alpe d’Huez

Camille was 9 when her parents took her to watch the Tour de France climb the hairpins of Alpe d’Huez, a few kilometres from the family home in Isère. She spent the whole day by the roadside, flag in hand, waiting for riders she would only see for a few seconds.

That same evening, she asked for a road bike. Two years later, she got her first racing licence with a local club.

About Expert Bike

Mon, 12 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000

A magazine to choose well and ride better

Expert Bike is an online magazine about performance cycling: road, gravel, mountain bike and e-MTB, training and routes in France. The site publishes practical guides, brand and model comparisons, route guides and stories on the highlights of the season.

The goal is simple: help every rider choose the right bike and enjoy it, with concrete benchmarks (geometry, size, weight, observed prices) rather than slogans.

Contact

Mon, 12 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000

The editorial team can be reached by email:

contact@expert-bike.com

What can you write to us about?

Suggest a ride: a loop, a climb or a route in France that deserves a page in Our favourite rides.
Report an error: a price that has changed, an outdated specification, a modified route. Corrections are published with a new update date.
Brands and organisers: to share technical information, event dates or official visuals. Articles are still written according to the editorial charter.
Partnerships and press: for any collaboration proposal.

Response time

Messages are read every week. A reply is sent within 5 working days on average.

How to prepare for the 2027 Roc d'Azur?

Mon, 12 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000

In brief:

The 2026 Roc d’Azur ran from 7 to 11 October in Fréjus, Roquebrune-sur-Argens and Saint-Raphaël: its 42nd edition.

Pre-registration for the 2027 Roc d’Azur is already open on the time to platform, ahead of the official dates and the opening of final registration.

Required documents vary by event: an FFC licence or a medical certificate less than 6 months old for timed mountain bike races, an FFA licence or PPS health questionnaire for trail events, no document at all for non-timed rides.

Electric mountain bikes remain banned from almost every timed event, except the Enduroc Électrique and the non-timed rides whose name includes the word Rando.

What is the Roc d’Azur, and why plan ahead for 2027?

The Roc d’Azur is a mountain bike gathering held since 1984 in the Var department, based at the Base Nature François Léotard in Fréjus and spreading across the towns of Roquebrune-sur-Argens and Saint-Raphaël. It takes place every year in early October, between the Maures and Estérel mountain ranges, bringing together timed races, family-friendly rides and an exhibition village dedicated to cycling and the outdoors over several days.

Legal notice

Mon, 12 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000

Publisher

The Expert Bike website is published by the Expert Bike editorial team, on a non-professional basis.

In accordance with French law no. 2004-575 of 21 June 2004 on confidence in the digital economy (LCEN), the publisher, a private individual acting on a non-professional basis, has chosen to remain anonymous. Their personal identification details have been provided to the host, whose contact details are given below.

Company name: not applicable (private individual)
Legal form and share capital: not applicable (private individual)
Address: that of the host, GitHub, Inc., 88 Colin P. Kelly Jr. Street, San Francisco, CA 94107, United States
Company registration: not applicable (private individual)
Contact: contact@expert-bike.com

Hosting

The site is hosted by GitHub, Inc. (GitHub Pages service), 88 Colin P. Kelly Jr. Street, San Francisco, CA 94107, United States (github.com).

Who we are: our story

Mon, 12 Oct 2026 00:00:00 +0000

A magazine born from a simple question

Which bike should you choose, and in which size, when you cannot try it before buying? The question keeps coming up, when moving to road cycling, getting into gravel or replacing an old mountain bike. The available answers often boil down to hard-to-read spec sheets or conflicting reviews.

Expert Bike was born in 2026 to meet that need: a magazine that explains the differences between bikes, compares brands on concrete criteria and suggests routes to ride the very next weekend.

Paris - Massy - South Paris Green Corridor

Wed, 30 Sep 2026 00:00:00 +0000

In short:

The South Paris green corridor (Coulée verte du Sud parisien) links Place de Catalogne (Paris 14th) to Massy-Verrières station over 14 km, with about 100 m of climbing and 1 hour to 1 hour 30 of riding.

Around 12 km run on a car-free greenway of smooth 3 m wide tarmac, with 2 km of compacted sand in Malakoff.

The route crosses 9 towns in the Hauts-de-Seine and Essonne departments and runs past the Parc de Sceaux, designed by André Le Nôtre, and the Vallée-aux-Loups estate.

The return is by RER B or C from Massy-Verrières, and the route is part of the Véloscénie, the Paris to Mont-Saint-Michel cycle route.

The South Paris green corridor, a car-free way out of Paris

The South Paris green corridor, known locally as the Coulée verte du Sud parisien, is officially called the Promenade des Vallons de la Bièvre. It was laid out along the route of the TGV Atlantique high-speed line, which heads south-west from Gare Montparnasse.

Full-suspension or hardtail mountain bike: which to choose?