About Rocket Bicycle Studio

It took a 2,000 mile journey to bring the founders of Rocket Bicycle Studios together, even though they all live within a few miles of each other. In 2008, SBR Coaching owner Jessica Laufenberg traveled to Portland, Oregon to race in the USA Triathlon Age Group National Championship. Heavily on her mind was an offer by GURU Bicycles to become a retailer for their bikes. Laufenberg’s background in exercise physiology and biomechanics was a great fit for the custom frame builder. However, given Jessica’s passion for coaching, additional partners were needed to realize the dream of partnering a retail bicycle store with personalized coaching and bike fitting services. During the 2008 USAT Championship, Jessica began talking with Jeff Collins, a dedicated cyclist who had been racing, maintaining, and building bikes since 1985. Jeff recalls, “Jess was racing and my wife was racing, and we were just hanging out at River City Cycles, just looking at bikes and talking about bikes. I’d always had an idea about opening a bike store. And Jess had some of the same philosophies.” Co-founder Peter Oyen, a recreational and competitive cyclist long devoted to all things bikes, completed the team.

Rocket Bicycle Studio is committed to one-on-one personal service to cyclists. With on-demand bike ordering, there’s never a need to sell existing inventory by attempting to pair bikes and riders of incompatible sizes. At Rocket Bicycle Studio, every decision is driven by each client’s needs: their riding style, their goals, their physique. As bike-crazed fanatics themselves, Peter and Jeff understand the relationship between rider and bicycle. A bike is never just a bike. It’s a key to freedom, to health, to the joy of the outdoors. And a rider is never just a rider. Each client has their own journey, experience, and goals.

The Rocket Bicycle Studio recipe is one part bike + rider matchmaking skill, a heavy dose of mechanical and bike-building experience, an endless capacity to listen, a splash of bike bling, and a continual quest to stay abreast of new trends in the cycling industry. Jeff and Peter work with cyclists and triathletes of all levels, from beginners to pros. The promise? “We’re all about warm, inviting, good, personalized service,” says Jeff.

Find us at 403 Venture Ct. Suite 1, Madison/ Verona, WI 53593 or call 608.239.3837 to schedule an appointment.

Peter Oyen, Owner

Hometown

Potosi, Wis., current population: 711

How I got into cycling

“I’ve always had a passion for bikes. Growing up in the country, most of the time the choice was either to bike or walk. I biked all through college, and was a mountain biker in La Crosse and Kettle Moraine. Since then I’ve done Ironman Wisconsin, the Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon, and lots of other races and rides.”

Earliest bike shop memory

“I tinkered around when I was in grade school and high school. One of my classmate’s dads had a bike shop in downtown Potosi. He basically ran it out of the basement of his house. Technically my first road bike - I don’t even know what it was, just some generic bike - came from there.  The shop owner took a good old can of spray paint to an aluminum frame. It was blue and shiny. It was just neat riding a ‘thin tire bike’, as we called it, down to the river to fish and to baseball practice.”

My favorite bike at the moment

“My LOOK road bike. I just absolutely love, love that bike. I will never get rid of it. That bike means so much to me. I spent months online, researching what wheels I wanted, what parts I wanted, what speed I wanted, what color housing I wanted.”  

If my bike could talk

“If I  was having a bad day, it would say, ‘Let’s go down this road, we’ve never gone here before. You might be hesitant to go down a road that you’ve never tried before, but it’s ok. It’ll be ok.’”

Best cycling experience to date

“The 1999 AIDS ride. I did it on a mountain bike hybrid from Minneapolis to Chicago. It was an all-around unbelievable experience to raise money for AIDS awareness. I met a lot of great friends during that ride.”

Jeff Collins, Technical Advisor

Background

Has raced domestically since 1985, up to the Cat 2 level. Jeff has built and maintained bikes throughout his career, and he continues to race and train.

Most memorable cycling event

“The best thing that ever happened in my cycling career was in 2005. I got to do the entire Tour de France on a team for Destination Cycling that was all for charity. We raised money for the LIVESTRONG foundation and also for the Tyler Hamilton Foundation. We rode one stage ahead of all the [professional] racers - so we did every kilometer of every stage. It was such a phenomenal experience, even more so than just racing the weekend races or anything like that that I’ve ever done.”

What I do when I’m not building or maintaining bikes

“I’ve been a pilot for NetJets for the past 14 years.”

Most meaningful bike building experience

“Building up my old Italian bike, a Tommasini. With the Italian components, you really had to fine-tune. Your bottom bracket, with the fixed-cup bearings, establishing the correct pressure on the bearings, and the headset, and tuning it, and also your wheel bearings - you really had to do a lot more work. So when you would get a bike like that dialed in, it really felt good. At times I needed one wrench, and that one wrench was for that year’s specific components - and it was made in Italy. So you’d wait for it to come in and use it just one time. I love that bike. I still ride it.”

My philosophy of bike maintanence

“Everything I’ve learned over the years has been through being there, watching someone, working on my own stuff. Taking out my own bikes and riding them and saying, ‘That worked, that didn’t work, I like that, I don’t like that’ - purposely making it so that it probably wouldn’t work, just so I could feel and tell what that felt like. And then going back and putting it back together. I’m very feel-oriented person.”

What drives me crazy

“When people get bad advice and end up with something they don’t need or that doesn’t work for them. It’s like, you don’t need to be doing that, or that doesn’t fit, and you just wasted a bunch of money on that. I had a lot of help growing up in cycling, and I want to pay that back.”