This here’s a tale of two new sunglasses that aren’t even on the same continent. Literally and figuratively.

Assos new Zegho shades, shown above, are designed in their Switzerland offices and made nearby in Italy using Carl Zeiss lenses. They’re very expensive.

Jet Black is an import from Australia that Hawley has just starting bringing to the states and they’re meant to be a value option with quality and styling to compare with Tifosi.

Click through to see details and more images on both…

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• Registration for the 2012 6 Hours of Warrior Creek opens at 12:01 am on 10/31.  Use HEADWATERS1 for a 20% discount on registration.  The coupon code is good for the first 100 entries.  The 6WC inbox is filling up with random questions so we know there’s interest.  It’s going to sell out fast!
• The League of American Bicyclists needs our help to stop an amendment that would kill cycling and pedestrian transportation funding. Click on the link above and contact your Senator today, as this amendment goes forward Nov. 1st!
• Lynskey Performance Cycles is teaming up with SORBA-Chattanooga to help raise funds to expand the TVA Raccoon Mountain Trail System in Chatanooga, TN. Between now and the upcoming fundraiser “Ales for the Trails” on November 5th, anyone donating $10 or more will recieve a trail supporters bumper sticker and automatically be entered for a chance to win a Lynskey Pro29VF titanium frame in your size! Saweeet!
• Hill Killer Apparel Will be giving away 5 “Ride of the Dead” Zombie Cycling jerseys this coming Monday/Halloween: “Randomly throughout the day we will be releasing a special coupon code on our twitter page @thehillkiller. All you have to do it be the first to enter the coupon code on the website on the checkout page(and checkout) and you have yourself a free jersey!”
• Franco Bicycles is now taking pre-orders for their California Kit through Nov. 1st. Kit’s are available in your choice of blue, red, or pink, with the signature California bear emblem and Franco Bicycle logo, and are proudly made in Los Angeles by Endo Customs.
• This beta website is offering to compare bike rental deals (and other stuff) throughout the US. It only has San Francisco up and running at the moment, but if your shop offers bike rentals you might want to give it a look.
• Urban Kreation’s jeans may look like a normal pair of jeans, but they are reinforced at the bum, knee and ankle with a super thin fabric that’s stronger than Kevlar that will protect your lower half in the event of a fall. Great for BMX or urban cycling. You can find them online here, or have your LBS contact Sidewall Distribution.

Joshua Tree has just released three new, all organic embrocations with varying heat levels. Perhaps even better than the organic nature of the product is the hands-free application…no more burning fingers, then eyes, then privates. They are:

Eucalyptus No Heat Embrocation uses peppermint and eucalyptus essential oils to create an invigorating protective balm on the skin. The thick waterproof barrier is great for shedding mud and snow while riding during inclement weather. Peppermint relieves skin irritation and itchiness and also helps to reduce skin redness where inflammation is present while at the same time having a cooling action. Eucalyptus helps heal wounds, ulcers, burns, cuts, abrasions, sores and insect bites and stings.

Spiced Mid Heat Embrocation uses essential oils from cloves and capsaicin to produce a mild heating sensation. Clove essential oils increase heat in the body, while capsaicin, the active component of chili peppers, warms when applied to skin.

Citrus Full Heat Embrocation combines essential oils from grapefruit and capsaicin for a hot sensation. Capsaicin provides the heat and grapefruit essential oil offers a refreshing, slightly energizing sensation.

Check the PR and ingredients lists after the break…

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Video by Oliver Townsend of the 2011 Knog Muddy Hell Cyclocross Race. (btw, what is that purple thing?… is it a teletubby?)

Cannondale-CyclocrossWorld.com director Stu Thorne leaked this image of a prototype disc brake equipped Cannondale Super-X ‘cross bike that team rider Tim Johnson will be racing this weekend in Boulder, CO.

There aren’t a lot of details yet, but the basics are:

• 135mm rear spacing
• Direct mount disc brake tabs set for 140mm rotors front and rear
• All-new disc-specific fork

BikeRadar’s reporting the bike definitely has a reinforced rear triangle and that the post mounts for the rear brake are pretty much embedded right in the frame. The fork looks to be a completely new offering made just for this bike with a claimed weight of 450g.

What’s just as interesting as the bike is the fact that it’s running what must be 135mm disc wheels from Zipp, which is not currently a catalog item. Zipp is owned by SRAM, which further supports the rumor that a certain major manufacturer will soon release a full-on road bike disc brake group. Our money’s on hydraulics since, you know, they already make mechanicals and that just wouldn’t be news, now would it?

UPDATE: The wheels are currently built on White Industries The One 24-hole hubs while Zipp develops it’s own hubs for this application. Their running on the Firecrest 303 tubular rims, but Zipp PR manager David Ripley says the wheels will be available in both clincher and tubular when they are official.

This video is shot on a ride along the Basque coast, ending right in the heart of San Sebastian, one of the capital cities of the Basque Country. The video was shot as part of an end of season review on the Cove G-Spot, a bike I have been guiding on all season. Although Cove would probably call he G-Spot a Freeride bike, for me it is what All Mountain bikes should be about. Riding isn’t about heart rates and racing to the top of every hill. Riding in the mountains diefinitely isn’t about mincing down from the summit you have sweated to climb, hindered by your lightweight bike. It should be about fun. It should be about the way back down, the experience, the ride. That’s what the G-Spot is for me. It climbs very well, but there is no getting away from the fact it is on the heavy side and you aren’t going to win any races to the top. Once you are there though the G-Spot is ready to race back down as fast as you dare, without you having to worry about holding back. I am a big believer in one bike to do it all and maybe that’s what the G-Spot has given me.

You can read the full Cove G-Spot review over on: http://www.basquemtb.com/cove-g-spot-review/.

Photo submitted by Amitai Tafla, “Photo taken with a ContourGPS while riding an early morning singletrack in Ben-Shemen, Israel.”

To see more Pics of the Day, click here, and to submit your own photo to be shown to the world, go here.

If you ever happen to find yourself in the mission district of downtown San Francisco, rest assured that a good burrito is very easy to find. However, if you look  a little further you may just find an awesome little shop down an unassuming alley filled with cycling gear and great coffee. Ok, being in the Bay area that doesn’t really narrow it down very much, but I’m of course talking about Mission Workshop.

While in SF recently, I had a chance to stop by the spot MW calls home to check out the bevy of bags, shoes, clothes and even coffee that fills their tiny warehouse.

Jump past the break to check out what’s going on at 40 Rondel Place!

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While we think the wind is blowing toward the 135mm mountain bike spacing for cyclocross disc hubs, White Industries isn’t waiting to see where the fall leaves land. Their new 130mm wide hubset has standard 6-bolt rotor mounts and comes with 28, 32 and 36 hole drilling options.

The official model name is MI6CX, and we’ve got another photo of this shiny beast after the break…

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Garmin has just announced their new Garmin Fit app for the iPhone and Android-based smartphones.

The app is just 99¢ on iTunes and tracks metrics like speed, pace, distance, time and (estimated) calories all on its own. Add their ANT+ dongle ($49.99) and it’ll capture data from their heart rate monitors and speed/cadence sensors. It maps and can automatically upload your ride data to their Garmin Connect.

“Garmin Fit is the ideal solution for users who are new to the fitness tracking landscape and for those looking to stay totally connected,” said Dan Bartel, Garmin’s vice president of worldwide sales. “To be able to utilize Garmin’s powerful fitness accessories with the same device that plays music, makes calls and uploads workouts automatically to share and analyze, makes Garmin Fit a must have app.”

Yep, you can play your music and take a call while the app is doing its business, even text message. It should work even stuffed in a jersey pocket or hydration pack if you’re not keen on sticking a $300 iDevice to your handlebar. That last bit is why it may not totally kill the market for their dedicated (waterproof, durable, compact) GPS cycling computers. That, and there’s no mention of Power Measurement at present. Hopefully that’s just an update away.

Screenshots and more details after the break…

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SRAM launched the SID 29er fork at Sea Otter earlier this year, but it’s only recently been available for aftermarket. We got a quick ride in on some mid-summer on demo bikes from GT and Niner, but you can never really tell how it performs until it’s on your own bike.

With that in mind, I’ve put about 15 hours on a SID 29er now, weighed and photo’d it and, basically, been smitten. The test model is the XX with 100mm travel, X-Loc hydraulic remote, tapered alloy crown and 15mm thru axle. It replaced a Reba XX with straight steerer and 9mm QR.

Skip past the break for weights, photos, comparisons and the initial ride review…

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The 2012 Tran-Sylvania Epic mountain bike stage race brings about a few upgrades for the event’s junior year. Scheduled for May 27 – June 2, 2012, the race covers seven stages in seven days. All but two start and finish at the Boy Scout camp near State College, Pennsylvania. Those two remote stages will get a bit shorter, and the Super-D/Mini-XC stage will likely convert to just an XC format to keep it from dragging out too long. The other, Raystown, will drop about four to six miles to come in around 35 miles total.

Other changes include the addition of singletrack on several pieces of private property near the start/finish, as well as a bit less fire road on other days.

If you really feel like traveling, the 2012 Absa Cape Epic stage race route has been released, too. It’ll cover 781km with 16,300m of climbing from Meerendal Wine Estate in Dubanvilla to Lourensford Wine Estate in Somerset West. All this happens in eight days from March 25 to April 1.

USA Cycling has announced their full 2012 schedule of championships for all disciplines, detailed after the break…

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