Got a project that has been taking up too much room in the garage for too long, and trolling eBay for good condition vintage saddle squeezes one solitary little tear out of your wallet?

Selle Royal has got your back.

Since they are owned by the same parent company as Fizik, they don’t need to worry about making the lightest, carbonest, raciest little saddle to top off your $300 seatpost. Focusing mostly on saddles for recreational bikes, like cruisers and hybrids, Selle Royal is getting back to its roots and recreating the 1972 Contour saddle.

Read about their Origins line, plus a mini-review, after the break.
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• Can’t get enough of Angry Birds? Check out the bike above – recently listed on ebay for $2,500 starting bid. It’s a 2011 Men’s Giant TCR, size Large. Bidding ends Saturday, Oct. 22nd.
• Pedalfest happens this Saturday from 10am – 5pm at Jack London Square in Oakland, CA. It will have all things cycling – handmade and vintage bike show, vendors, beer garden, kids zone, live music, bmx and dirt track entertainment, and the Whiskey Drome! It’s FREE and so is the ride on the SF Bay Ferry if you have your bike with you.
• The first issue of Switchback hits newsstands Nov. 1st. or, you can click here to subscribe.
• Over The Top Travel has just been launched to offer you the cycling tour of a lifetime. Designed for active cyclists, the tours are in premium cycling destinations with fine dining and boutique hotel accommodations.

More cycling goodness after the break…

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Zipp Speed Weaponry has just unveiled their new Platinum Pro all conditions brake pads for carbon rims.

Developed with SwissStop, the silver brake pads were designed to offer reliable stopping power in super dry and soaking wet conditions. The compound also handles heat well under heavy braking on hot days.

They have no abrasives to damage the rim surface and promise not to discolor your rim, either.

Full PR after the break…

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PRESS RELEASE: Cannondale Bicycles and Junk Food Clothing have teamed up to design two unique bikes for Antenna Magazine’s upcoming ReMix Lab. The inaugural ReMix Lab is an art, music, fashion, film and culture festival that will hit five cities –New York, Las Vegas, Chicago, Miami and Los Angeles – from October 19th through December 11th. The ReMix Lab consists of a gallery installation, live performances, film premieres and discussion panels, all of which celebrate the creators and thought leaders whose works are at the forefront of modern culture. With a Cannondale Bad Boy bicycle as their canvas, artists from Junk Food Clothing incorporated alternative graphic designs and accessories to give the urban bike a new twist.

“Our inspiration came from the name Bad Boy,” said Mike Palermo, Creative Director, Junk Food Clothing. “The vintage motorcycle clubs were always the original ‘Bad Boys’ so we figured what better way to start than to create the Bad Boy Riders cycle club? From there, we were able to pull a stripped back vintage color palette and add amazing custom vintage leather, a Junk Food tool bag and a frame bag.”

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Fairdale Bikes has a new rack available for dogs…or skateboards. But wait, there’s ‘more’!

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Glory Cycles just posted this along with some photos of various bottom bracket sizes on frames from several manufacturers (shown after the break), and we thought it was worth sharing. It shows which common crankset spindle diameters and bottom brackets work with which standards either directly or with adapters.

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Sampson’s new Stratics SL carbon fiber road pedals have been in development and testing for quite some time. We first saw prototypes in January. They’re finally ready. The body is made of long-strand carbon fibers and has an ultra wide 66mm wide platform with reinforcing steel plate. Not only does the plate provide a solid, durable platform for the cleats, it also adds structural rigidity to the pedal.

Jump through for full specs, weights and another pic, plus his new steel cassette…

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AWL is a French carbon fiber rim manufacturer that’s been building carbon aerospace components for years before turning some attention to cycling in 2008.

Not only do they design their own rims (which are fairly unique as you’ll see after the break), but they manufacture their own tooling and molds…and the molds are carbon fiber, too! Their manufacturing process yields perfectly smooth interior walls and leaves nothing other than the carbon and resin in the finished product on the road wheels thanks to a removable inflatable bladder. The mountain bike wheels, which are new and available in 26″ and 29er, add Kevlar into the construction for additional durability.

We also photo’d a collection of interesting component ideas from Reverse and probably the hottest women’s skin suit ever from Maloja…

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Campagnolo has declared their electronic drivetrain will officially launch on November 7.

Shown at Eurobike in what appeared to be final form factor, the group was closer to production than anyone could have guessed. That said, November apparently marks the first time press and bicycle manufacturers will get to see the final products, meaning it won’t be spec’d as OEM until 2013 models start getting announced next summer.

The system has been in development since they filed their original patents in 1994 and has been raced under sponsored Pro Tour teams in recent years.

More as we get it.

Disc brakes for road bikes seems a foregone conclusion ever since the UCI’s rule change for cyclocross bikes, and we’ll get to that in a minute.

What is surprising is the rumor that Shimano is adding a cog to the rear end and bringing an 11-speed group to market for 2013. Bikeradar’s sources are saying it won’t be shown to OEM buyers until the middle of next year. Word is they’ll offer 11-speed for both mechanical Dura-Ace and Di2 at the top levels, introducing it much the same way as Campagnolo did on their premium groups first. It’ll trickle down from there, no doubt. Most likely, the cog spacing and chain will get squeezed to fit the additional gear on existing freehubs.

Other updates coming for Dura-Ace Di2 are a bit more obvious. It’ll get the revised (ie. improved) wiring layout as the Ultregra Di2, which in theory means you’ll be able to swap parts and you’ll be seeing Ultegra/Dura-Ace Di2 blends on OEM bikes to compete at various price levels. It will also most likely be moving the brains of the operation to the module on the upper section of the front derailleur, just like on Ultegra Di2.

Why? Hmmm….

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The 2012 Cannondale Slice RS prototype has been spotted here and there, but it saw some track time at the Ironman World Championships in Kona recently under Michael Weiss. His race bike is shown here and shows off some of the unique -and triathlon specific- features. Notice there’s virtually no cables visible anywhere on the bike? Internal cables aren’t new, but Cannondale’s approach is novel…

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Though they get relatively little attention in a time of freakishly light aluminum and freakishly expensive carbon fiber wheelsets, Mavic really do deserve a look when shopping for mountain wheels. Why? The company that practically invented the factory-built wheelset category (to say nothing of standardizing the tubeless interface) has a long track record of building darn solid wheels. Yes, the company’s freehub bushings have had a tendency to wear quickly in dusty conditions, but with a bit of hub love we know a number of riders who’ve been riding the same Mavic trail wheelsets for the past six or seven years.

This June, we were sent early samples of Mavic’s revised-for-2012 trail wheelset: the Crossmax ST. Beyond the de rigeur annual weight reduction (to an actual 1,605g in a 15QR front / 135mm rear configuration), Mavic have redesigned their freehub to wear better over time and engage more quickly. Five months later and with the STs now hitting stores, how have they fared? Hit the jump to find out!

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