Innehållsförteckning för December 29, 2022 från Cycling Weekly

There are moments in design history when something is developed which changes the face of technology as we know it. There are cars like the Volkswagen Beetle or the Mini, and planes like Concorde or the Boeing 747, which stretched the boundaries of what these methods of transport could be. Bikes are no different. Ever since the early days of bicycles, especially once they began to be raced, there have been design moments when a huge change has occurred, and evolution has given way to evolution. There was the Legano Team Bike ridden by Gino Bartali in the 1940s, the first to be fitted with a derailleur. After this, there were incremental changes, with different materials being employed, aluminium and carbon-fibre being the biggest differences, but bikes were largely the…

Every now and then a piece of tech comes along that’s so polarising some people condemn it as outrageously unnecessary, while others can’t live without it. Technology, for instance, like Huub’s Heated Trouser II that costs £400. The idea is that they keep your legs warm between your warm-up and your race. And it’s a simple one. Why spend all that effort lugging your turbo trainer or rollers around with you in order to warm up if you’re just going to get cold again before you race? The first question anyone quite rightly asks is, how much difference will heated trousers make to me? Muscle temperature plays a pivotal role in the amount of power we are able to produce while cycling. Depending on the event, the time difference between…

Tacx Flow £299 Weight 9.4kg The Tacx Flow is a versatile way to connect up to the popular indoor training apps. The wheel-on design keeps the price low, yet you’ll be able to ride with power and ‘feel’ gradients up to 6%. The Flow is also very light at under 10kg, making it an ideal trainer to bring to events for warm-ups, though using it without a power source will mean you don’t get the power reading functionality. Set-up is a simple case of folding the legs out, attaching the resistance unit for 700c wheels, or 650b wheels. Then you fit the dedicated QR skewer to your rear wheel (thru-axle adaptors aren’t included and are sold separately for £34.99) and clamp it in. All that’s left is getting the resistance…

Fun and games for the cameras at the Tour de France are usually reserved for the final stage into Paris. But in 1989 that was a 24.5km time trial to the Champs-Élysées, so the messing around instead took place early on stage 20, from Aix-les-Bains to L’Isle-d’Abeau near Lyon. Leader Laurent Fignon appears to be so confident of the GC win in Paris the following day that he’s happy to momentarily swap the maillot jaune for Teun van Vliet’s Panasonic jersey as his Super U team-mates laugh behind. What happened the next day is now part of Tour de France folklore as American Greg LeMond, using his Scott tri-bar extensions, did actually take that yellow jersey off Fignon by overturning a 50-second deficit in the TT. There were no smiles…

On the road again Pre-Christmas training camps are a little more relaxed than those in the new year and are often the first time new signings meet their team-mates, which can have interesting outcomes. Geraint Thomas took to Twitter with a video showing the destruction of his room caused by fellow Welshman, 18-year-old Josh Tarling. Panning round the room, one side was neat and tidy with a well-made bed, the other was like a suitcase had exploded. Room-mate etiquette is a crucial lesson for a life spent on the road.…

I’ve been looking at pro bikes lately and for 2023 one of the changes I have seen in some pro teams is a switch away from conventional sponsored equipment to instead just using the equipment they believe is the best. This isn’t a huge surprise: when you have title sponsors putting in hundred of millions, why would you risk compromising performance for a subpar sponsor that provided equipment and a few thousand euros? Obviously it’s not cheap for bike sponsors to provide 300+ £12,000 bikes plus the money they put in, but tyres, helmets and sunglasses are pretty replaceable for the bigger budget teams. If anything it’s more of a surprise this hasn’t been commonplace before. It seems a result of chasing the slightly broken cycling model of taking anything…

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Cycling Weekly readers were quick to get in touch with their love for the bike. Todd McDowell wrote: “It’s just a super-fun and beautiful bike that has elicited many compliments. I love how the top tube gently slopes and gracefully transitions into the seatstays. That sweeping radius on top of the seat tube is just masterful. “So many have copied this design feature. On the ride side, I find that it carries a lot of speed and offers a blend of compliance and efficiency.” “When I saw the ONCE team on their sloping tubed bikes in 1998 I knew that I wanted one – partially to emulate Jalabert but also because they were so radical,” Ian Sutherland said. “Even on a low budget I was able to build something that…

Weight 342g I put these two-bolt SPD compatible shoes to the test when racing the enduro-style Grinduro event (with timed segments) and then again at the British Gravel Championships – alongside my usual gravel riding. If you’re looking for shoes that you can race in, use for all-day weekend rides too and cost less than £200, I can recommend the Sectors. They feature a one-piece upper, while down below you have a carbon composite sole with a dual-injected rubber outsole that includes tall lug profiles on the edges. Dual Boa L6 dials allow for a fine-tuned fit with clicks at 1mm increments. But if you want to loosen the fit slightly you have to pop the dial and start again. There are higher-end Boa dials (Li2 dials) which give you…

Riding her bike was the key to coping with the trauma of a miscarriage and an ectopic pregnancy, five-time Olympic gold medallist Laura Kenny has told Cycling Weekly. We meet the night before the Track Champions League finale in a far-flung room inside London’s Lee Valley Velodrome. Sat in a matching pink tracksuit, she’s only just arrived, but already she looks at home. “I just love everything about this place,” she smiles. Walking into the building, Kenny explains, everything came flooding back. She wheeled her suitcase through the entrance doors, past a blown-up image of her face and down a long, bending corridor. There, on the walls, she spotted framed photos of some of her biggest career milestones; the 2012 Olympics, where she won her first gold medal; the 2016…

I feel bad for those ambassadors who did not see this coming, and Specialized handled it very poorly from a human angle. For the folks saying “that’s business” or “get a real job”, that’s short-sighted and lacking empathy. Those people had contracts and ‘jobs’ with Specialized. Imagine getting an email with no warning whatsoever saying that your employment was terminated immediately. John Hardisky Ambassadors humanise the brands they represent, tend to be event organisers, trail builders, route makers, writers, photographers and advocates. There are a lot of changes happening at Specialized. The company seems to be increasingly disconnected from its fans and customer base. It’s disappointing to watch this happen. Alex Armstrong I’m sure it’s a bummer for a lot of them, especially the paid ones, but this happens in…

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Following the release of Dura-Ace and Ultegra at the back end of 2021, it maybe shouldn’t have been a surprise as to what was in store for 105. Shimano seemed to have waited a while to get this release out, especially since SRAM has been running its top three road groupsets in both 12-speed and wireless for what feels like some time. Shimano did the inevitable and gave 105 the digital treatment. It does share a lot of the same DNA with its bigger brothers as well as a much higher price compared to its mechanical counterpart. Shimano 105 has always been the go-to option for any leisure rider or someone on a budget, with most only dropping to Tiagra as a cost-cutting exercise or by simply not caring as…

Weight 22g The most striking thing about the EV Zero Blades is the frameless design. My initial fear was that the lack of a frame – though certainly stylish – would result in the glasses having too much flex in them. That was allayed as soon as I flexed the arms. They adjust and bend to the shape of your head, but retain their sturdiness and never once felt flimsy. I tested the clear to black iridium photochromic glasses; lenses that use Oakley’s in-house high definition optics technology that the US brand claims automatically adjusts to changing UV light exposure. I was stunned by just how great the clarity was. I struggled to notice the difference with or without the glasses. But what impressed me most was how they adapted…

LT1 or ‘aerobic threshold’ marks the top of Zone 2 and corresponds to around 1.5mmol/L of blood lactate. Training below this level burns mostly fat and increases mitochondrial density. LT2 or ‘anaerobic threshold’ sits at the top of Zone 4, corresponds to around 2.5mmol/L of blood lactate, and is roughly FTP intensity, sustainable for 30-60 minutes. As an athlete’s aerobic efficiency improves, the lactate curve shifts to the right – they produce more power for a given blood lactate value.…