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“FIXIKA&HC100” by ■hugeblocks■■. Check out Hugeblocks’ website for cycling accessories and clothing and links to it’s team and photo gallery–all in Japanese.
To see more Pics of the Day, click here, and to submit your own photo to be shown to the world, go here.
Cooper Bikes’ first production batch of T100 Monza and Sebring (shown) bikes are now complete and starting to ship. They’re available for order through their website, and you can check out our prior post on them for more details and photos.
PRESS RELEASE: Trips for Kids (TFK) recently received an unexpected donation of $7,500 and bicycle products from CST tire company. This is CST’s first monetary donation to TFK after several years of donating bike tires to TFK’s local chapters.
“We are so grateful that CST approached us with this amazing, unexpected gift, especially since spontaneous donations of this size are so rare,” said Marilyn Price, TFK founder and director. “We are proud of this new partnership and to add the CST logo to the Trips for Kids pro bono ads generously donated by various bike publications.”
TFK will use this funding in 2010 to continue supporting its chapters’ mountain biking rides that take disadvantaged youth outside of their urban environments to participate in fun and healthy recreational activity.
PRESS RELEASE: World Champion Greg Minnaar is teaming up with Gene Hamilton of BetterRide for a three day downhill mountain bike camp at Bootleg Canyon in Boulder City, NV. This is an amazing opportunity to learn from one of the most experienced coaches in the sport and one of the fastest racers in the world, Greg Minnaar. Sign up soon as this camp limited to 12 riders to ensure the optimal athlete coach ratio and the Minnaar camp in Bootleg last year sold out in 6 days!
Designed for downhill racers and riders, this Downhill Camp focuses on the core skills that the pros BetterRide coached pros use, mental preparation and FUN.
When: April 2-4, 2010
Where: Bootleg Canyon, Boulder City, NV
Who: 12 lucky racers
Cost: $749.00 (the best investment you will ever make in your riding/racing)
About Greg Minnaar: Hailing from Pietermaritzburg, South Africa Greg is simply one of the best downhill racers in the world. Greg is the 2003 UCI World Champion and has won the World Cup Overall Downhill title in 2001, 2005 and 2008. He has been coaching his own “Big Air” Downhill Camps since 2002 and this is his fifth camp working with
BetterRide.
R.E.Load is currently testing their new double loop pedal strap with fixie hipsters and messengers on the streets of Philly, working their way to a near-term launch. Like their bags and other accessories, it’ll be totally customizable for color, striping, reflective bits and more. Official words:
“We’re in the final design and testing stages for our new fixed gear foot straps. You’ll be able to choose your own colors for the strap itself as well as the surrounding trim. Further customization will be available through reflective stripes, trim stripes, and decorative stitching.”
Thanks to Surlyrider for the tip!
NAHBS 2010 - Unlike the modern-retro mix of Cherubim’s blue and chrome Steelmaster (see this post, updated with more photos), their other bike was this thoroughly modern Speedmaster, a slick Di2 bike with excellent hidden cable routing and plenty of subtle little lug details.
Starting with a steel frame built with modern features like an integrated seatmast and Shimano’s electric Dura-Ace Di2 shifting and deep-rim wheels, Cherubim applied their trademark style throughout. All the photos and details you could ever want, after the break…
NAHBS 2010 - Eric Sampson had his full array of eponymous components on display, including a few brand new goodies coming out in April.
The most eyecatching was this gold-colored full alloy cassette that’s machined out just like the SRAM Red Powerdome into a one-piece, rock solid set of 7000-series aluminum cogs. It weighs in at a mere 109g! MSRP? A cool $179, which makes it 51g lighter and $51 cheaper, plus the bling quotient is off the charts. Sampson said the tooth profile is cut sharp and it actually will shift better with a bit of wear, but it’s intended only for races and important illustrations of your climbing prowess. Expected life is about 1,500 to 2,000 miles depending on care and conditions.
Check out all the new, lightweight goodies just after the break…
NAHBS 2010 - Looking at Sylvan Cycle’s wood composite bike, I can’t help but think of the mandatory #2 pencils from school tests and the name makes me think of Sylvan Learning Centers, leading to an very scholastic feeling about the brand. And there’s some eco smarts behind the construction, so the feeling’s not entirely misplaced.
Sylvan harvests sustainable wood, primarily hard maple, ash and adirondack spruce, and they source locally from their Amherst, MA, headquarters. Soon, they’ll be able to tell a customer where each tree was grown, when and how it was harvested and more…sort of like a birth certificate for each bike. On top of that, they can (and have) use family heirloom or antique found wood that a customer may have in the form of useless furniture, ship masts, etc., and turn it into something useful…a bicycle!
Sylvan Cycle’s Sam Kelley says each type of wood has its own characteristics, and the frames combine layers of different woods in their tubes to achieve the desired ride feel…and the inside of the “tube” isn’t what you might expect. Check out a cross section and more photos of the killer lugs and details after the jump…
“Fire Mountain” by Nate Kay. Check out his photography blog.
To see more Pics of the Day, click here, and to submit your own photo to be shown to the world, go here.
Standard ZeroStack Headset on a Pivot
Cane Creek’s newest headset offering is set to do a lot more than just create more standards and part numbers for dealers to keep tabs on. In fact, it’s one of the first headset designs in that I know of that actually doesn’t require a new headtube design, and that’s the beauty of it.
The ZeroStack design was initially created to drastically reduce the stack height on a given mountain or road bike, allowing the stem to be placed lower and lowers the front of the bike as well. It also allows the use of the largest bearing possible, and reduces weight somewhat as well.
These days, tapered (1.5 to 1-1/8th) steerers are all the rage - and for good reason. They allow a larger bearing to be used on the lower half of the headset which takes the most abuse, increase the overall stiffness of the fork, and still allow use of all the 1-1/8th stems on the market. This has left some manufacturers, especially smaller ones, with a tough decision to make. Do they invest in the expensive equipment necessary to form a tapered head tube so they can offer the latest technology, or wait it out? Now that choice isn’t necessary.
New headset schematic and much more after the break!
Astana's Josep Jufre moved into the yellow after Robbie Hunter (Garmin-Transitions) withdrew from the race. Photo by Graham Watson
Day three of the Tour of Murcia finally gave climbers a chance to shine, with a yellow jersey on the line after race leader and two-time stage winner Robbie Hunter left the race after his wife went into labor.
Attacks came early and often, but with strong teams driving the front like RadioShack, Team Sky, and Garmin-Transitions, nothing stuck and a large lead group finished together, as Milram’s Luke Roberts took the final sprint into Alhama.
Early in the race one group of four riders was able to gain eight minutes over the rest of the field, as Michael Kwitakowski (Caja Rural), Nicki Westra (Vacansoleil), Jan Barta (NetApp) and Marcel Barth (German national team) got clear on a counterattack following the first break of the day being caught.
But the climbs were too much, and the group was all but caught around 20km to the finish. Almost all the strong GC contenders stayed at the front, with one final attack coming in the last few kilometers, only to be brought back just 3km from the finish.
This set up a sprint finish among those that were able to survive at the front of the peloton, and Luke Roberts (Team Milram) outkicked Sergey Lagutin (Vacansoleil) for the win.
Astana’s Josep Jufre, who finished third on the day, will move into the leaders jersey going into tomorrow’s important 22km time trial, with over 20 riders within five seconds of the yellow.
Photo credit above goes to Graham Watson, view a full gallery from the third stage of the Tour of Murcia here. Stay tuned to BikeRumor for complete coverage of final two days of the Tour of Murcia.
The first of three Colnago Gran Fondo USA events this year is this weekend, March 7, in San Diego and it’s sold out…but you can still register for the August 8th ride in Philly and October 24th ride in Los Angeles.
Each event features an expo, ride options ranging from 50k to 100 miles, aid stations, KOM awards, mobile tech support and an Italian Style lunch…after all, Gran Fondo is Italian for “Big Ride.”
Each participant also gets a custom bicycle jersey and, likely, some good times and memories.
Their website says they’ll release an additional 150 entries on Tuesday, but that won’t do you much good since the ride will be over with…technically, they could release an addition 1 million entries, or just update their website.
NAHBS 2010 - Crumpton introduced his all new Corsa M full carbon road bike. The only metal on the frame are the cable guides and the cage bolts, everything else is fiber and fully customized to the end user. To illustrate the differences in frame building for a lightweight racer versus a beefy all around rider, the white Corsa M pictured above weighed about 1,200g (61cm) for the frame. By contrast, he had an 826g flyweight (55cm) in nude carbon (shown after the break), too. Same frame, just different tubesets and build characteristics.
On to the photos and details…
OSS Trailer from THEM on Vimeo.
The trailer for the up-coming OSS DVD, ‘Football’, is now online and going by the teaser it looks like the full DVD will contain some epic footage.
The Come Up’s Adam Grandmaison is behind the new brand, which is set to follow the release with a components line. Read an interview with ‘Adam22′ here, where he discusses running the biggest website in BMX and gives a further insight into OSS.
The people who are going to have full parts in the video are Craig Passero, Garrett Reeves, Rory Ellis, Mike Mastroni, Alex Platt, Jake Seeley and Charlie Crumlish.
SRAM has confirmed it’s officially working on drivetrain parts specifically for e-bikes, making it the first mainstream component manufacturer to do so.
BikeEurope will publish an interview with CEO Stan Day at the end of March with more details, but they’ve leaked a few quotes, including Day’s admission that their parts are “getting closer to the finish line.”
At present, SRAM is in discussions with development customers and isn’t ready to unveil any prototypes, but they currently provide an integrated SRAM i-Motion 3-speed hub gear for a BionX e-bike.
Day says, “Despite the fact that we do not produce electric bike drive trains yet, we feel that we as a bike component maker are uniquely equipped for this sector. We understand cyclists and support dealers. We did not want to go to China and just buy parts. We have been studying to understand the technology; to look where we can fit in by integrating components.”
