President’s letter

Welcome to the latest issue of the IBFI's magazine, International Bike Fitter. After a difficult few years for many, it feels like fitting seems to be returning to normal in most parts of the world, which is great.

But being busy can sometimes slow down progress on other projects and that's why this issue of our "quarterly" magazine has been delayed — a delay that’s been down to me. This summer has seen several work trips, another international house move and five weeks in Australia training with Steve Hogg — something I’ve wanted to do for almost a decade, and was a fantastic opportunity to continue my own personal and professional development.

You'll see later in the magazine that we've taken on a couple of great volunteers to help with future issues, which will hopefully prevent my hectic work schedule from delaying future publications. As ever, this magazine is written and put together entirely by volunteers, so if you have ideas for articles you’d like to write, or content you’d like to read, we’d love to hear your ideas.

In this issue you'll be able to read about some of the new faces joining the IBFI ranks to help the organisation continue to develop, as well as a fresh take on some old topics, including KOPS and static anthropometric measurements.

We also look at symmetry in fitting and whether it should always be the goal of a fit session, and our usual segments looking at new products and interesting tech for fitters.

One of the most exciting announcements though is our recent work to become an official charity. It's something we've considered for a long time and a huge step in cementing our notfor-profit values into the corporate structure of the IBFI.

Charitable status will allow us to accept donations and ensure that your membership fees are spent on promoting bike fitting and the broader industry.

Whilst we’ve always operated as a not-forprofit, it has been out of choice. By becoming a charity this choice becomes a permanent element of the IBFI and removes any doubt from potential members about how we’re run and what membership fees are used for. You can read all about the process on page XX and we look forward to making this long-held dream a reality.

As we announced in the last issue, our transition over to the new common syllabus is taking shape and the e-learning platform to help support the delivery of the online modules from our recognised providers has taken a big step forwards. We should see the first courses promoted on there in the coming weeks.

And many of you will be pleased to know that our searchable find-a-fitter map will be relaunched in the coming weeks too. We know that it is a valuable tool for many fitters, and we’ve heard from many of you who have been disappointed that it disappeared.

However, due to the IBFI website being attacked by malicious software at the start of the year we were forced to rebuild the site from the ground up, which turned out to be a bigger job than we first thought.

The original website was several years old and the IBFI has grown rapidly in that time, so the new site will better serve your needs and ensure membership services run more smoothly in the future.

We thank you for your on-going patience and support and look forward to these new website systems helping the IBFI run more smoothly in the future.

Andy Brooke

IBFI President

International Bike Fitter is published by the International Bike Fitting Institute (IBFI) Unit 9, Hatton Technology Park, Dark Lane, Warwickshire, CV35 8XB, England

Contacts: Andy Brooke (IBFI President): andy@ibfi-certification.com Lee Prescott (IBFI Vice President): lee@ibfi-certification.com