EF Pro Cycling's Rapha-made, Palace-inspired Giro d'Italia cycling kit divides opinion but causes resale prices to boom
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A limited-edition EF Pro Cycling x Palace jersey on eBay(Image credit: eBay / wockachocka)
The back of the jersey features Palace’s logo with the addition of the Rapha name...(Image credit: eBay / wockachocka)
... while Rapha’s familiar logo enjoys a Palace version (Image credit: eBay / wockachocka)
EF Pro Cycling's Ruben Guerreiro celebrates his victory on stage 9 of the 2020 Giro d'Italia(Image credit: Bettini Photo)
Where do you stand on EF Pro Cycling's special Palace 'alternate jersey' for this year's Giro d'Italia? The Rapha-made multi-coloured dream kit – ostensibly designed in order to prevent any clash or confusion between EF's usual predominantly pink kit and the Giro's famous pink leader's jersey – has divided opinions when it comes to its design, but demand for the limited-edition range has seen the resale value of items such as the jersey reach asking prices of up to £600 on sites like eBay.
There are plenty of other items of EF Pro Cycling Rapha x Palace clothing out there, including this size XL jersey and this women's edition of the jersey in an XL, but this size medium Rapha Pro Team Aero Jersey is one of the priciest ones currently available on eBay, at £440 (US$570), with the number of bids on it approaching 20 at the time of writing, with two days of the sale left, which means it could yet reach, or even surpass, that £600 mark.
When they became available earlier this month, the retail price for a jersey on Rapha's UK website, for example, was £145, and the clothing was only initially made available to members of the Rapha Cycling Club (RCC), while it was available to everyone on the Palace website, although the complete range very quickly sold out.
Besides the outrageous jersey design, the range included casual clothing, caps, socks and some somewhat more conservative, predominantly black shorts, as well as an ever-so-slightly less loud training jersey – similar to the race jersey, but without Palace's duck-character logo (apparently called Jeremy) on the front – one of which we also found available on eBay, here.
EF Pro Cycling's initiative has had the effect of elevating cycling clothing into the kind of resale stratosphere that's more normally the domain of sneakerheads buying and selling hard-to-find footwear.
This week, Belgian designer Stijn Dossche – operating under the Stycle Design name – came up with his own fantasy WorldTour collaboration team jerseys, which could serve to open the door to more, real-life collaborations between some 'cooler' brands and the established cycling teams, which would be no bad thing when you consider the attention that the EF Pro Cycling x Palace collection has garnered – and the demand for the kit that has been created.
EF Pro Cycling's Ruben Guerreiro celebrates his victory on stage 9 of the 2020 Giro d'Italia (Image credit: Bettini Photo)
We're constantly on the lookout for unique and rare cycling relics on eBay. If you have any suggestions or leads, please send them to cyclingnews@cyclingnews.com with 'eBay Finds' in the subject line.
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