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5/10/2023



the story behind reepha


By: Shannon Baker





Years ago, Kim and I, were intrigued to see a small company called Rapha pop up. The logo looked very familiar to the Saint-Raphael cycling teams, which existed from 1954 to 1964. From 1959 to 1961, a sister team existed called, Rapha-Gitane-Dunlop. Sure enough, it would appear Rapha had pinched Saint-Raphael's logo.

Kim and I, found this incredibly funny. We too, have been guilty of

this from time to time.





We watched with interest as they started to grow and put out these beautifully produced videos. Our favorite was a group of nine or so riders who climbed to the top of a hill and shared a bottle of wine. This was funny shit to us. One bottle between nine riders! We each agreed that their videos were a bit pompous and began discussions on making our own video to mock them. Was this a bit childish on our part? Of course! It just so happens we have the sense of humor of a 13 year old boy. The first one we did was titled, Reepha: The Lonesome Loser. It was everything Rapha was not. Rough around the edges, piss poor videography and a penchant for risque behavior. We thought we were geniuses. So, we're sitting around talking nonsense one day with our team rider, Matt Slowey. We mention this silly idea we had to make a video about smoking before the Tour De France. Believe it or not, they used to do such a thing. We lay the premise of the video out there and Slowey was in. Because, we didn't feel two riders were enough, we got another team rider, Scott Bowen, to join us. In the Tour De France, there are several different jerseys given for different categories. Yellow is awarded to the overall leader green is for sprinting and the polka dot jersey is for the King of the Mountain. That's when we knew we had to create one of our own, the Highest Climber jersey a white jersey with green pot leaves. Over the course of a couple of weeks, we sketched out a script and tried to enlist some help. We were able to talk a few peeps into taking on the roles of spectators.





The jist of the story was, back in the 1930's, the year before the illegalization of marijuana, there used was a leg of the Tour called the Smoker's segment. The winner of this leg would receive the right to wear the coveted Leafy Green jersey for another year. Unfortunately, because of they knew that leg of the Tour was doomed with the new illegalization, it was cut from the race. The video goes on to document the last three riders who desperately wanted that jersey. We tied it all together with an old movie filter and a soundtrack that resembled something from the Little Rascal's. It is probably the best video we've made to date. Recently, when our boy, Slowey, decided to race the annual Hollenbeck's Spring Classic in Virgil, NY, we thought, how funny would it be to wear the coveted leafy green jersey during the race? Would anyone notice? The answer was no! It just looked like another Rapha jersey on the route. We found this hilarious! We put stuff out all the time that is so subtle hardly anyone realizes what they're looking at, i.e. our THC tee shirt that's a knock off of the Honda Racing Corp. It's like hiding something in plain sight! Even after Slowey crossed the finish line and we dubbed him the Highest Climber, only a handful of people knew what was going on. We consider it one of our finest moments. Lol. More than likely, this won't be our last video under the guise of Reepha. We've got new ideas currently in the works. And, even though, Rapha riders may be faster and better than we are on the bike, one thing is for certain, we can smoke them up the hills. You can check the video out for yourself, it's called Reepha: The Highest Climber Fight For The Leafy Green Jersey on our Youtube channel. Give it a glance and let us know what you think.