Eurobike 2013
Canyon urban concept bike
In a show awash with e-bikes, it was reassuring to see that Canyon still believe that future urban dwellers will still be capable of pedalling. Everything that could be integrated was: lights, rack, mudguards, lock. It should be in production soon.
Elite Muin Turbo
Last year LeMond launched the Revolution, this year Elite followed suit with a direct-drive trainer of their own, the Muin. You take out the rear wheel and attach the drivetrain to the trainer, which has its own cassette. It’s wireless and has Ant+ connectivity, and its fluid-resistance unit makes it very quiet. It accepts 130 or 135mm spacings and is compatible with Shimano, SRAM and Campagnolo cassettes.
Giro clothing
Better known for their helmets and latterly shoes, Giro have a new clothing range aimed at urban cyclists. It’s the sort of stuff you can wear off the bike too. It includes the Mechanic jacket, the Merino Polo, an eye-scorching orange waterproof jacket, and the Civila shoes for women.
Recon Jet HUD glasses
Don’t want to look down at a bike computer? These glasses provide a head-up display with: ride data from GPS and on-board sensors; smartphone connectivity (you can make and dismiss calls); and a camera with microphone and speaker. The display is at the bottom of the glasses so you generally look over it.
http://jet.reconinstruments.com and www.madison.co.uk
De Rosa 60th Anniversary bikes
This year marked the 60th year of one of Italy’s most prestigious bike makers, De Rosa. To celebrate, the Italian company produced the limited edition Sessauta range of bikes, one in each of the four usual frame materials: steel, titanium, aluminium, and carbon.
Orbea Avant
Disc braked road bikes came in many flavours this year. The Avant is pitched as a do-it-all performance bike for long rides. It’s carbon, with internal cable routing and hidden mounts for a rack and mudguards. Rear dropouts can be adjusted to either 130 or 135mm. The show bike featured SRAM’s Red 22 hydraulic-braked groupset.
Sidi overshoes
So you’ve got your fancy Sidi road shoes. You don’t want to get them dirty, so you want some shoe covers… but you do want people to know you can afford a pair of Sidis. It’s a dilemma. Help is at hand (foot) in the shape of these overshoes from Sidi, printed to look exactly like a pair of Sidi’s top of the range Wire shoes. Phew!
Koga Beach Racer
Beach racing is another niche, something they do in Holland and Belgium. But the bike itself, a kind of 29er mountain bike/cyclo-cross hybrid, is an interesting drop-bar off-road bike. It has fat tyres, flared drops, a single chainring, and TRP Spyre mechanical discs.
Giant Revolt
The Revolt is a cyclo-cross style bike range designed for longer rides on dirt roads and unpaved mountain passes. In America, it’s a ‘gravel racer’; here, it’s a rough-stuff bike. The aluminium frame has room for 50mm tyres and is fitted with a down-tube mudguard, although it won’t readily take conventional frame-fit guards or a rack.
Brooks Cambium
Among the acres of leather on display at the Brooks stand, it was their non-leather Cambium saddle that stole the show: it won a Eurobike Gold Design Award. It’s is made from a vulcanised rubber mix, topped off with waterproofed cotton. There are two designs: the C17 and the C17s for women.
Shimano direct mount brakes
One of the trends this year was direct-mounted brakes – callipers fitting to the fork and behind the bottom bracket without the usual centre brake bolt. The claimed benefits are better modulation and feedback, and improved aerodynamics.
Tout Terrain X-Over
A low-maintenance, all-weather, go-anywhere bike, the X-Over has a steel frame with an Shimano Alfine 11 hub gear, integrated levers, hub dynamo lighting, and mounts for mudguards and disc brakes (hydraulic or mechanical). The show bike had a Gates CenterTrack Carbon belt drive. There is a chain-drive option, plus an urban version, The City 2.
This was first published in the December 2013 / January 2014 edition of Cycle magazine.
