Indholdsfortegnelse for June 2015 i Bicycling

“It’s a fact. Bike races are sometimes won by the height of a tire,” says John Murphy, reigning US National Criterium Champion who rides for the UnitedHealthcare Pro Cycling Team. “In a perfect world, your teammate would drop you off at 150 meters to go, and you would power yourself to victory clearly ahead of your opponents. But a sprint finish is total chaos. The bike throw is usually your last-ditch effort to hit the line first.” Learning to time a good bike throw takes practice. “Too soon or too late can be the difference in winning or losing,” Murphy says. Practice on your own initially, using road signs or other landmarks as finish lines. Once you’re comfortable throwing your bike safely, use the town-line sprints on group rides to…

LUMBER DOWN RUTTED TRAILS, ration multiple days of water, ford waist-deep streams with a loaded bike. Tour operator Gabriel Amadeus Tiller makes riding across Oregon’s vast, arid interior sound like an unforgettable—if grueling—adventure. The region, which spans the state from Washington to California, contains hundreds of miles of primitive roads, which makes it ideal for multiday bikepacking trips. The scenery changes practically every mile. “You think of Oregon as being coastline and lush, wet forest,” he says, “but you also travel through basins that are extremely dry and rugged, like the eroded volcanic cones in Fort Rock and canyons like the Crooked River Canyon out of Prineville.” Sound enticing? Amtrak offers service from Portland to the route’s start in Klamath Falls on the state’s southern edge. Find detailed “Oregon Outback”…

For the last couple of years I’ve been adding socks to shopping carts all over the Internet. ¶ There were the purple prismic La Galaxies from The Athletic. A grey-and-black House Industries pair with the Richard Sachs logo. Plus the entire La Girafe Sportive nine-pair combo pack from Tenspeed Hero. ¶ But I couldn’t justify buying them when my dresser already overflowed with socks I’d gotten at events or on sale, ones that were serviceable enough, but said nothing about me. ¶ Then one day last year, I couldn’t resist any longer. While I’d been deferring to practicality, socks had blown up. Instagram friends were posting gleeful pictures of their purchases with multiple sock-related hashtags and captions like, “When I get stressed, I buy socks!” My collection was lame and…

THE LEAST COSTLY OF THE THREE VERSIONS OF THE SUPERSIX EVO CARBON FRAME IS STILL STIFF, CRISP, AND HAS A SMOOT H-SHIFTING SRAM RIVAL DRIVETRAIN PRICE $2,710 WEIGHT 17.6 LB (54CM) I BOUGHT MY FIRST mountain bike in 1993. I didn’t do my homework, and I knew nothing about riding trails, but the moment I walked into the bike shop, I knew that the deep-purple, $500 Cannondale was the one I wanted—for no other reason than how it looked. I’ve had a thing for Cannondales ever since, so it didn’t surprise me when my eyes looked past the pile of Editors’ Choice bikes and right to the SuperSix, with its beautiful blue and purple paint and no-frills appearance. Then I rode it, and beneath the paint was a gutsy, sturdy,…

A TOUR DE FRANCE–WINNING RACE PLAT FORM IN ITS EIGHTH—AND BEST —INCARNATION PRICE $5,750 frameset WEIGHT 15.8 LB as tested (53CM) You know what? I don’t think I need to explain this bike to anyone. I’ve ridden it—as fast as I can—through the Dolomites for several days, and I’m confident that everyone who rides it will see why I think this deserves to be an Editors’ Choice selection.— MATT PHILLIPS MATT WAS RIGHT The F8—Team Sky’s ride of choice—got six out of six “yes” votes from its testing panel. This was another revelation for me in this week of testing. I expected the F8 to be stiff and extremely fast, but what I didn’t see coming was refined ride quality to go with it. I nicknamed it the Velvet Hammer.…

THE ONLY THING THAT’S ENTRY-LEVEL ABOUT THIS ALUMINUM ENDURANCE MODEL IS THE PRICE AND SOME PARTS—IT’LL BE PLENTY OF BIKE FOR YEARS TO COME PRICE $950 WEIGHT 20.5 LB (M) MEET THE TESTERS Bill STRICKLAND THE ENTHUSIAST Happy on two wheels, no matter if they’re rolling on a $700 cruiser or a $10,000 carbon dream bike The Sora components (and the wheels) let you know right away this isn’t an expensive bike. But the ride makes you forget that. Sitting in with the lead group on a long, flat stretch, spinning along as easily as those on $10,000 bikes, responding to potholes or gravel with little flicks of the bike to either side, trimming speed to stay on pace, and dropping back to pull two other riders up to the…

SOMETIMES YOU JUST need to stand up midride to give your—ahem—“fleshy bits” a break. But beyond restoring blood flow, there are performance advantages to letting your butt take five. Getting out of the saddle shifts your weight farther forward over the pedals, giving you more leverage on a climb, says Frank Overton, founder of FasCat Coaching and Performance Center in Boulder, Colorado. “It also helps you maintain a higher rhythm, and therefore, power output.” His rule: If your cadence while seated drops to the point at which you’re grinding along at a 1990s slow-jam pace, it’s better to stand. You’ll need to train this ability, because pedaling out of the saddle engages your upper body and taxes your quads more than when you’re seated, says exercise physiologist Stephen McGregor, PhD.…

THIS WOMEN’S AERO ROAD BIKE NAILS THE DETAILS PRICE $8,300 WEIGHT 15.2 LB (S) I don’t freak out over bikes. But this one had me freaking out. I couldn’t wait to get on it, so much so that I rode it in Pennsylvania’s single-digit winter temps, and was showing everyone pictures of it all the time. At the end of one ride with some good climbing and sprinting, I said, “I don’t think I knew love until I met this bike.” I usually have trouble getting comfortable and aerodynamic in the drops, but it was so easy on the Envie. I had great control everywhere on the handlebar, and I liked the flat top of the bar, too; it’s a great place to rest your hands when you’re just rolling.…

WE CONSIDER THE TARMAC ONE OF THE BEST RACE BIKES EVER BUILT , AND THE S-WORKS VERSION HAS THE BEST SHIFTING (DURA-ACE DI2) AND THE BEST BRAKES (SHIMANO 785 HYDRAULIC DISC ) AVAILABLE FOR ROAD BIKES. HOT DAMN. PRICE $9,500 WEIGHT 15.4 LB (54CM) It’s everything we loved about the Tarmac SL4, just more. It feels like it got even faster and even stiffer, yet the ride is more refined. It’s as if, after so many metamorphoses over the years, it has finally become a butterfly. —Matt Phillips It was so pleasurable to go fast on this bike that I’d let myself fall behind a few more times on this ride—to take a drink, or take off my jacket—just for the joy of being able to chase back on.—Gloria Liu…

THE CAAD10 IS A PREVIOUS EDITORS’ CHOICE WINNER—AND THE WOMEN’S VERSION PAC KS THE SAME RAC Y PUNCH PRICE $2,060 WEIGHT 16.7 LB (48CM) I DIDN’T EXPECT to like this bike. I never loved aluminum. But the CAAD10 changed my mind about the material. I actually thought at first that I was on a carbon bike. At this price, this bike is a great find. Even though it has a slightly taller head tube, I could still get plenty aero. All of my rides on this bike were in groups, so I had lots of chances to volley back for slower riders and sprint ahead to hook back on to the group. The bike had really nice acceleration on the flat stretches, and the cornering was spot-on, even at high…

CANCELLARA’S RACE BIKE. ’NUFF SAID. PRICE $11,950 as tested WEIGHT 16.1 LB (54CM) “BRAKING FEELS AKIN TO AN INSULT TO THIS BIKE.” — BILLSTRICKLAND This bike is a knife fight in a phone booth. It should scare you a little at how raw its aggression is. At the top of the descent on Ballard I was fairly salivating at the prospect of throwing it downhill, and I did, savagely falling through the switchbacks, hacking them apart. It motors on the flats. My left knee had been a little dodgy lately, but I didn’t care: I put the Domane in probably too big of a gear and mashed along. The IsoSpeed decoupler provided exactly the kind of front-back balance for handling and road feel that I love. The short head tube…

THIS LOWER-COST VERSION BENEFITS FROM SPECIALIZED’S STIFF FAC T 10R CARBON FRAME (ONE STEP DOWN FROM THE S-WORKS MODEL), AND SMOOTH ULTEGRA SHIFTING. PRICE $3,800 WEIGHT 16.1 LB (48CM) I didn’t know what a good bike was until I owned and raced this bike. I had always been a little hesitant in corners, descents, and gravel, but the Amira handles so well that I’ve overcome a lot of those fears and become a much better rider for it. It feels light up the climbs, steady on the descents, and sturdy when it’s being bounced around in a crit.—Elspeth Huyett The Amira is an incredibly well-balanced bike that I’d recommend to pretty much anyone, for pretty much anything. Its handling is intuitive—responsive but never twitchy, reasonably quick for sudden maneuvers, yet…

IT STARTED with a missed lunch ride. In the office later that day I vented to my coworker, Taylor. In the hectic time before New Year’s, I was working too much, and fitting in even a short ride felt like a major achievement. “We should give ourselves gold stars for every day we get out for a ride,” I said. A few days later, a sheet of metallic stickers appeared on my desk, and Taylor and I started putting one on a calendar for every day that we rode. She christened the system “Star-va.” It’s a far cry from the way I tracked my riding when I worked at TrainingPeaks, a developer of power-analysis software. Back then, I had a power meter, a heartrate monitor, and a coach. Every ride…

THE WRENCH ADORED THE JUNKIE’S CALVES. A tragedy launched by innocence and good intentions. He had heard about her calves, about her, but still. They were magnificent. The wrench had never seen such noble calves. “You must be the triathlete,” the wrench said. Men had always liked her. Good guys, not-sogood guys. Some no-question-about-it awful guys. She had never been so great at telling them apart. Still, she tried. This guy? Soft eyes. Wolfish smile. A deep voice that made something in her chest hurt. Shit. “You must be Dominic,” she said. Women had always liked him. Nearly every one of the wrench’s girlfriends (he was seldom without one) had blossomed into a fiancée not too long before she shriveled into an ex. A former bodybuilder, former break dancer, and…

A MODERN, CARBON INTERPRETATION OF A ’70S LUGGED-STEEL RACING BIKE, FROM A LEGENDARY BUILDER PRICE $6,200 f rameset WEIGHT 15.1 LB (SIZE 50S) Climbing is a dream on this bike. It’s not effortless—it never is on any bike—but the C60 felt responsive, and eager. If I’d been in better shape, I’d have kept going up Happy Canyon and just climbed, and climbed, and climbed.”—JOE LINDSEY I thought I had a favorite bike—then I rode the Colnago. I’d never ridden one before, and I expected it to be unforgiving, too stiff for my taste. I was wrong. I forgot I was riding an “Italian race bike” a mile in. It amazed me with every pedal stroke—it felt otherworldly. Almost like I was riding superlight steel rather than carbon. Now I am…

A SMOOTH-RIDING CLASSICS BIKE WITH HYDRAULIC DISC BRAKES, DURA-ACE DI2, CLEARANCE FOR WIDE TIRES, AND ABILITY TO TAKE FENDERS. BOOYAH. PRICE $8,300 WEIGHT 16.5 LB (54CM) You hardly have to think on this bike; just pedal. It shifts with little effort and has amazing brakes. Plus, it’s a smooth bike—the IsoSpeed decoupler (bendy seat tube) really seems to work. I rode it after testing a bike that fatigued me, and I finished my ride on the Domane Disc feeling fresher and more energized than I started. It’s also the best descending road bike I’ve ever been on—it will tear through corners accurately and at a frightening velocity. But the precise and predictable handling will bail out a less-skilled or very tired rider, too. I RODE UP AND OVER THE 4,300-FOOT…

CERVÉLO SAYS THAT AT 40 KPH, THE NEW S5 SAVES 21.3 WATTS—4.4 OF WHICH COME FROM THE NEWLY DESIGNED AERO HANDLEBAR PRICE $10,000 WEIGHT 15.6 LB (54CM) I dislike riding most traditional aero road bikes—but I liked this one. It’s the only aero bike I’ve ridden and not wanted to get right off of, one that makes few of the compromises inherent to the category. The ride is race-bike firm, but there’s a pleasant hollowness to the feel over rough pavement. Stiffness is good enough for predictable handling, and power transfer through the drivetrain is great. Aesthetics have improved with this new iteration, too. I hate the handlebar—but I know it’s important for cutting through air. —RON KOCH MEET THE TESTERS GREGKAPLAN THE TRIATHLETE BICYCLING’s resident multisporter is ever dedicated…

BUILT IN COLORADO FOR LONG DAYS IN THE SADDLE, DECKED WITH DI2 AND DISC BRAKES PRICE $9,900 WEIGHT 17.5 LB (54CM) It’s been a few years since I’ve ridden a titanium bike, so rolling down the first stretch of road on the Vamoots felt like saying hello to a long-lost friend. And I really was, because I owned a Vamoots years ago. The feel of ti is unlike any carbon bike, and the frequency at which this one transmits road vibrations is in a unique range: The sweet spot is while riding at a tempo pace, 17 mph or so. The bike just seems to float across the road. —RON KOCH MEET THE TESTERS JENNIFER SHERRY THE SEEKER Strava, Schmava— let’s go see something new I felt pretty special riding the…