Innehållsförteckning för October 13, 2022 från Cycling Weekly

British Cycling has signed a long-term partnership with the multinational oil and gas giant Shell, that will bring in “wide-ranging support and investment”. The eight-year deal makes Shell UK an “Official Partner” of British Cycling, which has previously been sponsored by Sky and HSBC. Since the end of 2021, BC has been without a top-level sponsor but Shell will take a lower role than lead sponsor in the deal, which runs until 2030. In a press release sent out on Monday, BC said that the partnership will see a shared commitment to “supporting Great Britain’s cyclists and para-cyclists through the sharing of world-class innovation and expertise; accelerating British Cycling’s path to net zero; and helping more – and wider groups of – people to ride, including ways to make cycling…

Thirteen months ago, Metheven Bond had never raced a bike. But on Sunday he lined up against a star-studded field, headlined by Mathieu van der Poel, at the Gravel World Championships in Veneto, Italy. Speaking before the race, Bond couldn’t help but chuckle at the prospect. “It’s funny when you say things like that,” he said. “I don’t know how to feel; it’s daunting, but at the same time it’s amazing.” Most days, Bond cycles the fivemile round trip from his home in Clitheroe, Lancashire, to Ribble’s flagship bike showroom, where he spends his days as a sales assistant. Bond chose the 2021 British Gravel Championships as his first competition, placing 19th in a field of almost 300 riders. From that moment, he was hooked. In June, he got his…

Andrew Feather landed a psychological blow in his bid for a third National Hill-Climb Championship title with victory over reigning champion Tom Bell at Rutland CC’s climb of Mam Nick on Saturday morning. A time of 5:40.7 helped Hunt-BikeWheels.com rider Feather to an emphatic win, with Bell (High North Performance) eight seconds slower over the 1.3-mile course near Edale in Derbyshire. The National Championship, to be held in Denbighshire on 30 October, will pit Bell against 2018 and 2020 winner Feather on a similar course. On his victory, Feather said: “It was good to have a head-to-head with Tom and I thought I faced him quite well and rode to my plan. “I came away with victory here, which is nice for confidence, but it is the Nationals people will…

The Triban 120 Gravel Bike is one of the very cheapest gravel bikes on the market – which makes it quite an interesting proposition for a wide range of people. From those who are at the very start of their cycling lives to those looking to expand their stable, gravel bikes are highly versatile, so there’s generally an excuse for one. Now, for all bikes other than those at the very top of the price spectrum, every comment gets qualified with ‘for the price’. For instance, it’s not a downside that a £1,000 model comes without an electronic groupset – but for £5,000 I’d strongly raise an eyebrow if it was still using cables (barring Campagnolo’s Ekar groupset of course). With the Triban 120 Gravel Bike, this is especially the…

Belgian rider Maurice Blomme puts some air in his rear tyre ahead of stage nine from Niort to Bordeaux in the 1950 Tour de France. Up to that point his Tour had been without success, but three days later he would win the stage to Perpignan – his first and last Tour stage victory and one of the biggest wins of his career. He would add to that later on in the season by winning the Grand Prix des Nations time trial. In contrast to the figure holding his bike, who wouldn’t look out of place today, Blomme’s appearance, and the task he is immersed in, is so far removed from modern pro cycling that it feels almost impossible to reconcile the two. The woollen period kit with cap and…

Ineos Grenadiers performance engineer Dan Bigham, who held the Hour record until Saturday afternoon, is convinced new unified Hour record holder Filippo Ganna can go much further. The Italian smashed Bigham’s record with a distance of 56.792km at the Tissot Velodrome in Grenchen, Switzerland, adding 1.244km to the Brit’s effort. It was far enough to take him past Chris Boardman’s 26-year-old ‘best human effort’ record of 56.375km. Bigham, who was an instrumental part of the team behind Ganna’s record, brushed off commentators saying the record had been shelved for the foreseeable future. “I find that really frustrating, actually that people think that this is knocking it out the park,” he told Cycling Weekly. Commitment “It’s just that, yes, he’s made a step forward. But he’s one of 10 people, I…

FRED WRIGHT How Monopoly helped us at the World Championships My body was a bit of a wreck after the Vuelta a España but this made the travel and jet lag on arrival in Australia for the Worlds less of an issue; I could nap/sleep whenever I wanted. We landed late evening so I was more than ready to go to bed after a full day of flying. The GB team were staying quite a way out of Wollongong; there wasn’t too much to see in the small town of Bowral we were nearest too but the training roads were solid. The first easy training rides were spent on kangaroo watch. We all got excited when we saw the first one but it disappeared almost immediately. Only Ethan [Hayter] got…

The first time many people became aware of Elisa Balsamo was when she emerged from her Italian teammate’s wheel to win the World Championship road race in Belgium last September. But Chiara Consonni remembers her friend winning another rainbow jersey five years earlier. “We had new bikes; I had one in blue and she had one in white,” Consonni recalls of the 2016 Junior Worlds in Doha. “We knew that Elisa was supergood in the sprint because she also won the junior Ghent-Wevelgem. I was the last girl in Elisa’s train and she was just so scared because she thought that something was wrong. “I remember that she told me, ‘Chiara, I am not ready, I don’t want to do the sprint!’ and I shouted at her, ‘No! Now you…

“A suite of new features includes dual-band GPS” Wahoo has launched the second generation of its flagship GPS bike computer, the Elemnt Roam. The US brand has boosted the Roam’s performance with a suite of new features including dual-band GPS, enhanced navigation, integration with Wahoo X training software, a higher-contrast screen, and upgraded memory capacity. The new version is priced at £349.99, an increase of £50 over the original 2019 model – this seems fair given the extra power the new unit packs, not to mention roaring inflation. At a glance new and old Roam look virtually the same, the only visible difference being in the buttons. The new Roam has convex buttons that bulge outwards rather than concave ones that curve inwards. The criticism of the old ones was…

One of the essential jobs at a traditional UK hill-climb is that of the catcher. This consists of catching exhausted riders at the top of the climb before they fall over. It’s not a complicated job. But there are a few things to bear in mind. First, not everyone will need to be caught. Some slackers arrive at the finish well able to look after themselves. Don’t rugby tackle them to the ground. Not unless you really want to. Second, if they do need help, try very hard to grab them while they’re still upright. That way they’re still on wheels, and you can wheel them out of the way before the next rider flops over the line. If you let them fall over, moving them means a world of…

ooking your own Airbnb, mixing your bottles the night before the race for your partner to hand out at the feed zones, and borrowing a skinsuit from WorldTour pro Fred Wright – no, it’s not the Wobbly Wheelers Road Race, it’s the inaugural UCI World Gravel Championships, with Mathieu van der Poel and Peter Sagan lining up and a bona-fide rainbow jersey for the winner. But with limited British Cycling support, for new British gravel national champion Jacob Vaughan, competing in the event – held last Sunday in Italy’s Veneto region – was a belt and braces affair fraught with logistical complexities. “It was just an incredible experience,” said the former national road champion, who has been riding for Saint Piran this season. “To do an elite World Champs with…

The Saint Piran pairing of Jack Rootkin-Gray and Alex Richardson had a dream ending to their seasons, finishing first and second respectively at the Beaumont Trophy in Northumberland last Sunday. The team-mates had previously placed first and second in the Ryedale Grand Prix in August. But a late puncture for Rootkin-Gray almost ended his chances there, and the youngster had to win a sprint from a chasing group, ruining their finish line moment. They had to work hard for their dream moment in the Beaumont Trophy after two breakaway groups escaped early in the race and the favourites were at risk of watching the victory ride away from them. Double victory Rootkin-Gray was clearly the strongest, riding across to the middle group and then attacking alone on the hills to…

It shows the quality of Boardman’s ride. Over 25 years and his superman position isn’t all that different to Ganna’s. Great ride though, and a good hour spent watching it. Darren Clarke Only beat Chris Boardman’s old one by less than half a klick, which puts both in perspective. Robin Shedden Boardman’s record finally broken. Let’s not forget that Boardman shelved it for ‘many, many years’. Fantastic from Ganna. Nigel Lewin Was worth sitting and watching the full hour. Congratulations and well done Filippo Ganna. Patrick Walker UCI needs to sort out the availability issues of his and some other teams’ equipment. Should follow the old rally rules and a minimum number of bikes should have to be built and verified by the UCI to be called commercially available. Neil…

Elisa Balsamo is one of a string of young Italian riders at the top of the sport, most of whom have graduated from Valcar Travel and Service. The team began as girls’ junior squad, graduating to UCI level in 2017 as the riders matured. Marta Cavalli and Vittoria Guazzini have made a mark at FDJ-SUEZ-Futuroscope, the former finishing second at the Giro Donne, the latter recently winning the U23 time trial in Wollongong, Australia. Of the current roster, Silvia Persico was fifth in the Tour de France Femmes, seventh at the Giro Donne and third at both the road and cyclocross Worlds. Chiara Consonni, Ilaria Sanguineti and Eleonora Gasparrini are all among the team’s cadre of Italian winners, and Canadian recruit Olivia Baril, New Zealander Lizzie Stannard and Pole Karolina…

British wheel brand Parcours has just redesigned its Chrono range, which is aimed at time trial and triathlon, and come up with what it says is the first carbon disc rear wheel that’s truly optimised for wider tyres. The Parcours Disc2 has an internal rim width of 22.5mm, making it the widest disc wheel currently available. Meanwhile, the new Chrono Max is, according to Parcours, the fastest front wheel it has ever produced. Optimised for a 28mm tyre, it has an 83.6mm depth but handles like a much shallower wheel thanks to the rim profile that the brand’s Dov Tate developed in conjunction with Nottingham Trent University’s sports engineering department in a study that involved measuring real-world wind angles by fitting ultrasonic sensors to the front and rear axles of…

It’s no exaggeration to say that a set of shiny new cycling shoes can cost more than a decent set of wheels. However, although the priciest kicks are indeed more expensive than ever, the quality and performance of entry-level models has come on in leaps and bounds over recent years thanks to technology trickling down – and there’s a handful that really stand out as worthy of consideration. The five shoes here are all designed for use with Look-style clipless pedals, the type that use a three-bolt deltashaped cleat. Some are also compatible with a two-bolt Shimano SPD-type cleat for added versatility. We’ve kept the price below £150, with four out of the five models we tested coming in under £100 – and we believe you can give yourself a…