Inhaltsverzeichnis für February 2019 in Cyclist

New Year, New You! That’s what all the adverts for gyms and weight loss shakes tell us as we emerge bleary-eyed from the fug of the Christmas break. Usually I find that I’m not in the market for a new me. The old me will do fine – I just need to find him beneath the layer of flab that magically appeared some time between the first beer of the office Christmas party and the last champagne of the New Year’s Eve bash. The trick to finding the old me is simple: I have to get back on my bike. I need to get in some serious distance (apparently it takes about 200km just to burn off Christmas dinner), but the short days and cold weather don’t do anything for…

£1,000, extrauk.co.uk If these cranks seem familiar, that’s because a very early version existed in the 1990s called ‘Sweet Wings’. They were made of steel, were highly coveted and were manufactured by Sweet Parts and designed by Craig Edwards – the same man who created the 170g-a-pair eeBrakes rim callipers. Edwards’ eeCycleworks has since gained the backing of Cane Creek, and together they have resurrected the Sweet Wings hollow metal crank concept, only this time around they’re made of titanium, and they are even more magnificent to gaze upon. Cane Creek’s Luke Bukoski claims their benefit is more than purely aesthetic: ‘The eeWings have a trifecta of light weight, stiffness and durability. The idea of using titanium came from the fact mountain bike riders were breaking their very expensive carbon…

£129.99, yellow-limited.com For a sad period of history, it seemed as if the trend for enormous sunglasses was dead. Over the last few years, though, we’ve seen a welcome return to the vast, window-like lenses made famous by the iconic Oakley Eyeshade. Rudy Project’s Defender is its biggest set of bins to date, offering an exceptionally wide field of vision. Almost every part of the Defender can be changed in the event of a crash, or simply to mix up the colours, including the lenses, bumpers, temple tips and even the Rudy Project logo. And big lenses means big vents – it would take a sweat of tsunami proportions to fog these up.…

There aren’t many bike races that were instigated by the exploits of a 14-year-old boy from Skipton, Yorkshire, but the Three Peaks Cyclocross race is one such example. A talented cross-country runner and long distance cyclist, Kevin Watson decided to ride his bike over the pre-existing ‘Three Peaks’ hiking trail, which summits three local hills: Ingleborough, Whernside and Pen-y-Ghent. He covered the route in six hours and 45 minutes. ‘At the time, late September 1959, the feat was deemed so unlikely it caused quite the stir in the local press,’ says Mark Richmond, the current organiser of the race. This prompted three riders from Leeds CTC to have a go a short time after, and one of them bettered Watson’s time, completing it in six hours 30 minutes. ‘By this…

1 MUCOFF INDOOR TRAINING SERIES From £9.99, muc-off.com Labracadabradors are magical dogs, and Muc-Off’s new range of indoor training-specific wares is pretty magical stuff too. The Antibacterial Equipment Cleaner does exactly what it says on the spray tin, while the Sweat Protect forms a non-drying, anti-corrosion barrier against sweat on turbo trainers, bike parts and your partner when you hug them after winning a Zwift race. 2 RENOLD VELO CT CHAIN £250, velo.renold.com Itcorp.com is the oldest website in the world, registered in 1986 and comprising just one page that states, ‘This Web page exists primarily to satisfy the needs of those who expect every domain to have a Web presence.’ Similarly, Renold is the oldest chain manufacturer in the world, whose namesake, Hans Renold, invented the roller chain in…

To download this route, go to cyclist.co.uk/83croatia. After a brief stretch south on the 60 road out of Imotski the route turns east, just past a bridge over the River Matica. Stay on this road through Zmijavci and Runović and it will brush the Bosnia and Herzegovina border before bending southwest and climbing up to the town of Slivno. Follow the road until it meets the 76 then head for Zagvozd. Take the turning left just past the town’s church on to the 62 road, which you stay on all the way to Kozica. Turn right to climb and pick up the 512, a high-altitude coastal road. Follow that down to the entrance to the Natural Park Biokovo. From there it’s a 46km out-and-back climb to the peak of Sveti…

Professional cycling is in a parlous state. At the time of writing, Quick-Step Floors tops the UCI WorldTour rankings by a huge 3,604 points over nearest rivals Team Sky, having racked up an incredible 73 wins in 2018. Yet their permatanned, snow-haired general manager, Patrick Lefevere, spent the summer armed with a metaphorical begging bowl in search of a main sponsor for next season. ‘Even without a new title sponsor for 2019 we will go on,’ laments Lefevere. To rein in costs, Quick-Step has had to lose Niki Terpstra (who won both Paris Roubaix and the Tour of Flanders for the team) to Direct Energie, and sprinter Fernando Gaviria (responsible for 11 wins in 2018) to UAE Team Emirates. ‘I’m worried most days,’ Lefevere tails off. Thankfully, they still have…

Make sure you give yourself time to pause at the top of Monte Grappa. Once you’ve got your breath back, pressed stop on your computer and had a swig from the remains of your water bottle, go for a walk. The temptation might be to throw yourself into the descent before your muscles get cold, but don’t. Instead, follow the steps out of the car park and climb up a little further to the summit proper. Why? Because this mountain and its history are much, much bigger than cycling. That’s not to belittle the exploits of Merckx, Quintana et al, but it would be inappropriate to talk about their suffering on these slopes given the scenes of conflict that this mountain has witnessed. It was Italy’s resistance on the slopes…

£400, upgradebikes.co.uk ISM’s PN 3.0 Carbon saddle attempts to balance the trickiest of acts: providing the light weight of a full carbon design without the crotch-numbing discomfort that’s usually associated with an unpadded shell. ISM says the key is in the PN’s unique shape. Instead of compressing soft tissue like regular saddles can, the company says the PN 3.0 Carbon contacts the pubic bone, freeing space in between for regular bloodflow. If nothing else, ISM has definitely achieved one part of the equation. The PN 3.0 Carbon is virtually half the weight of its non-carbon equivalent: 131g versus 260g.…

£275, saddleback.co.uk The saying ‘buy cheap, buy twice’ is particularly pertinent when it comes to track pumps, so by that logic buying a Silca floor pump should be a once-in-a-lifetime purchase. There’s no doubt its latest offering, the SuperPista Digital, is pricy, but for that £275 you do get an accurate-to-0.5psi digital gauge, aluminium body and base, lathe-turned ash handle and, Silca claims, an exceptionally smooth pumping action. That’s thanks to the pump being built like a suspension fork rather than in the conventional piston-and-valve design. The SuperPista Digital includes Silca’s Hiro chuck too, which is well regarded for its assured valve grip up to ultra-high track tyre pressures.…

Tom Dumoulin  Age: 28 Nationality: Dutch Honours Giro d’Italia 1st, 2017 2nd, 2018 4 stage wins (2016-18) Tour de France 2nd, 2018 3 stage wins (2016, 2018) Vuelta a España 6th, 2015 2 stage wins (2015) World Championships 1st, 2017 Time-trial 1st, 2017 Team time-trial Olympic Games 2nd, 2016 Time-trial Dutch National Championships 1st, 2014, 2016, 2017 Time-trial Cyclist: You’ve had a great few years at the Grand Tours since winning the Giro in 2017, and the Tour de France was within your reach last year. Will you be targeting it again in 2019? Tom Dumoulin: Yes. Probably. I’m excited about the challenge, definitely, although I’m not sure the course suits me, so this far away we still can’t be 100% sure I’ll go to the Tour. If I…

Dear Frank Are e-bikes acceptable in any circumstances? Name withheld Dear Name withheld, I have to say I understand why you withheld your name. If I asked a question like that, I’d make sure my identity was kept private too. I’ve loved this sport unconditionally for 35 years, warts and all. Cheating has been a part of cycling since its earliest days. The second edition of the Tour de France saw 12 riders – including the top four finishers overall as well as every one of the stage winners – disqualified by the French Velocipede Union (!) for taking trains rather than actually riding their bikes. I do have some sympathy for the cheaters, given that the race covered more than 2,400km in just six stages for an average stage…

On big days out it’s always prudent to opt for a bike that’s a little less aggressive and more centred on keeping you comfortable. In that respect Trek’s Domane fitted the bill perfectly. It looks pleasingly similar to the racy Émonda, but the Domane’s stack is a little higher and reach a little shorter, which puts the rider in a more sustainable position for racking up the kilometres. While it’s a bit portlier than most race frames, neat design features such as its clearance for wide tyres and Isospeed Decoupler in the seat tube meant the bike soaked up the worst of Croatia’s occasionally broken roads. It also meant that after several hours in the saddle my hands, back and posterior all felt a lot fresher than they had any…

‘If you can follow me, I am never square and logical – I go for successive waves.’ So says Antonio Colombo, sovereign-ringed fingers making the gesture of rippling water while his bright blue Nike Air Max bounce under the table. ‘I do not want to be a museum curator, but next year is 100 years, so a sort of bicycle museum has to surround us.’ He’s referring not to the bike brand of which he is president, but to sister brand Columbus Tubi, a subsidiary of the AL Colombo steel tubing company founded in 1919 by his father, Angelo Luigi, and which Colombo junior united with fellow Milanese operation Cinelli in 1978. The story of events leading up to this merger could fill a book on its own, involving seaplanes,…

Swift has been around since 2012, founded by ex-pro Mark Blewett under the auspices of the ‘I looked around and couldn’t see any bikes that really impressed me, so I decided to make my own’ narrative. Last year the brand changed hands and was bought by Swift’s distributor in Brazil, the Lagoa Participações group, but according to Swift’s Pedro Dias, ‘The strategy and vision are the same, just a new owner, more energy, more investment.’ That ‘vision’ was to create race-orientated bikes using the sub-contractor/vendor model of having Swift’s designs made by a Chinese factory. Only instead of just working hard on getting into the best vendor’s factory, Blewett decided to install himself alongside a vendor, upping sticks to China so he could take a more hands-on role to hopefully…

£340, mavic.com Talking about the Cosmic Ultimate SL, former pro Frank Schleck once told Cyclist, ‘In the last 15 years I have never been more happy with a shoe.’ Well, he would say that. Schleck played a part in designing Mavic’s top-end shoe and, in keeping with the Luxembourger’s climbing prowess, the Cosmic Ultimate SL comes in at an astoundingly light 199g for a size 42. Impressively, Mavic has added rather than removed features, the most distinctive being the inclusion of a set of Boa dials. This is the first time the company has deviated from its own closure system, the Ergo Dial. Mavic still claims the system to be every bit as good as Boa, but admits it is a little less alluring on the spec sheet. The shoe…

£130 (£150 with Mips), madison.co.uk Aerodynamics and ventilation are always at odds in helmet design. Laser, though, has developed a simple yet effective solution in its latest helmet, the Century. Using a system it calls Twist Cap, the central portion of the helmet shell can be quickly and easily switched around, essentially changing the front aspect of the design. To prioritise aerodynamics, the vents can be covered to give a smoothed, slick look and save a few watts. To improve ventilation, the vents can be opened to gulp in 11% more air. On top of that, the Century can also be used with the Twist Cap removed completely, maximising airflow and shaving off a few more grams (not that it’s heavy in the first place, at a claimed 277g, size…

Trends come and trends go, but like the progress of the tides each receding wave leaves behind a residue. Individually those residues fade, but collectively they create a lasting impression on their environment. So it is with bicycles. The ‘one to rule them all’ mantra has been chanted for donkey’s years (incidentally Suzy, from New Mexico, is officially recognised as the oldest ever donkey at 54), and until recently a garage of one looked an unlikely goal. N+1 ruled. Then came gravel bikes. Specifically, one gravel bike, whose makers probably don’t even want to use the term. ‘This whole category of bikes was probably triggered by the Open,’ says Condor’s head of design, Ben Spurrier. ‘These are bikes where ultimately your frame becomes a platform for you to do whatever…

Croatia is a country of contrasts. The cities have the lively hustle of Turkey, but the people have the relaxed attitude of the Italians. The modern infrastructure feels like western Europe, but the food and culture are of the Middle East. Look in one direction and you could be on the beaches of the French Riviera; look in the other and it’s like you’ve been transported to the barren mountains of the Pyrenees. According to my ride partner for the day, a strapping gentleman by the name of Ivo Piljic who runs bespoke holiday business More Hvar, even Croatia’s bike riders are a contradiction in terms. ‘We look like bouncers but climb like Colombians,’ he tells me with a wink as we review today’s route over breakfast in our start…

TRAVEL Split’s airport is best situated to access Nature Park Biokovo. We flew from London Gatwick with Easyjet, which cost around £250 return. If you don’t want to pay to take a bike, you can hire one from trektravel.com. From Split it’s around 85km to our start town of Imotski, which isn’t much more than hour’s drive down the E65 highway toll road. If you prefer to do a loop, the Sveti Jure can be easily tackled from our finish town of Makarska. ACCOMMODATION Cyclist stayed at Hotel Venezia in Imotski (hotelvenezia.hr) and Hotel Park in Makarska (parkhotel. hr). While Hotel Park is modern and Hotel Venezia more traditional, both offered spacious rooms, bike storage and delicious, locally sourced food. THANKS Firstly to Luka Kolovrat and Hloverka Novak Srzic of…

The tiny town of Valloire in the Savoie region of France is home to a lot of churches. Little chapels and private shrines sprout on every corner, as do crosses and effigies of the Virgin Mary. Chief among these is the fabulous Rococo-style Notre Dame de l’Assomption in the town centre, which is far grander than the small community would seem to require. But when you live somewhere as remote and exposed as this high mountain town, you probably want all the divine assistance you can muster. In only a few turns it feels as if we’ve been folded into the mountains On the morning of the Grand Trophée Supergranfondo Galibier-Izoard, a crowd of cyclists gathers near the church, almost doubling the commune’s population. At this altitude we are already…

Intriguingly, Cannondale hasn’t produced an aero road bike since the days when its top-end race frames were made from aluminium. While all the other big brands have been busy refining tube shapes to shave off wind drag, Cannondale has defiantly stuck by its traditional-looking SuperSix Evo. Until now. Biding its time, though, has allowed the company to keep track of developments during years of rapid advancement in aerodynamics, especially since the arrival of disc brakes. And with the SystemSix it clearly believes it has entered the market right at the top, declaring it to be nothing less than the fastest road bike in the world. The brains The man making this bold claim is Australian aerospace engineer Nathan Barry. When I attended the SystemSix’s launch in Girona earlier this year,…

Don’t call this a gravel bike. Factor is adamant that its new Vista is an ‘all-road’ bike, which it insists is not the same thing at all. The difference, it seems, lies in the design and geometry. Factor’s design director, Iñigo Gisbert, says, ‘For the Vista we chose the term all-road because we wanted to avoid the use of the word “gravel”, which has come to define some sort of drop-bar bike capable of fitting large [up to 45mm] knobbly tyres. ‘A gravel bike is a bit like a fully rigid mountain bike from the early 1990s, which we feel falls short on paved and unpaved roads when compared to a lighter, nimbler bike equipped with 30-35mm tyres. Equally it cannot compete with a proper mountain bike in terms of…