The best cycling products spotted at the 2017 Cycle Show. Highlights include Boardman, Look, Shimano, Mason, Vitus, Kinesis, Zipp, Canyon, Tifosi and many, many more.
I had a good look around last weekends cycle show and spotted a bunch of products that I thought were interesting and here they are for your interest in no particular order…. I’m a big fan of the Cycle Show and I thought this year’s event was a particularly good edition.
New Boardman ASR 8.9 Winter bike:
This looks terrific for £1299.99. Featuring a Reynolds 725 steel frame, carbon tapered fork, flat mount Shimano hydraulic disc brakes and a 105 groupset and includes mudguards. I reckon this could be a perfect winter, commuting or training bike for lots of people & seems terrific value. I’ll ask Boardman nicely and see if they might let me review one?
Pirelli P-Zero Bike tyres:
I think it’s great the Pirelli have jumped into the market, so it was good to check out the tyres in person. The early reviews I’ve seen have been very good unsurprisingly.
Reynolds ATR Gravel/Adventure carbon wheelset
This is the second generation of the Reynolds ATR wheelset. For the new version they’ve gone deeper section with a much wider rim and a new hub that’s supposed to be tougher and nicer to ride. They sell for £1299.99 a pair and can be bought in 700c or 650b sizes. Nice! These might be the ultimate gravel bike wheelset.
New 2018 Cannondale Synapse
I think the new Synapse is an exciting product – part of the disc brake bikes really coming of age (in my view) and so it was great to see the top of the range model on display. I’d love to have a ride on one of these too. I’ve written about this bike here
Zipp 303 NSW Disc wheels
The NSW line are Zipp’s premium wheels (and their most expensive). They represent the cutting edge of Zipp’s design and manufacturing expertise, so it was great to see lots of them on display at the Cycle Show. For fans of more affordable Zipp wheels, there was also a new Mason Definition Through Axle version built up with a set of 302 Disc wheels, which looked really nice and complemented the Mason Definition well.
Look 785 HUEZ RS
It’s great to see Look produce a bike like the 785 HUEZ RS – a lightweight climbers bike that features a geometry that’s not too extreme for the average middle aged rider (like myself!) I spent some time with the guys from Look and it was clear that they’re really excited about this bike. It’s not a brand you see in every shop, so it was great that there was a strong range of Look bikes at the Cycle Show.
Canyon
A highlight of the show was the Canyon Kraftwerk bike – a very exclusive limited edition bike that was great to get a good close up of – it seemed to be very popular (but then, the Canyon stand normally is).
It was also good to get a look at a new 2018 spec, Endurace CF SLX Disc – this version above featuring both the top of the range Dura Ace Di2 Disc groupset and a pair of DT Swiss carbon wheels (which annoyingly I’ve forgotten the model number of but I think it’s the DT Swiss ERC 1100 Dicut Disc, which are a £2000 pair of wheels). The retail for this particular build will be north of £5,000 (but less than £6,000).
For those with more “real world” budgetary challenges, it was also nice to see the Endurace AL Disc – the alloy version of the Endurace Disc. These sold out in 2017 model year – particularly the Ultegra build which seemed to sell fast. It’s a great choice for less cash than the carbon versions and according to the reports I’ve read is a great ride.
I’m generally a big fan of anything Canyon make these days but I have to say I think the new Inflite CF SLX isn’t attractive. Striking yes, attractive no. I’m sure it rides well but I’m not keen on the look of it and I can’t imagine owning one. That might make me shallow but none of us are perfect 🙂
Condor Cycles
London’s Condor Cycles always have a big stand and I’ve swooned over this top of the range Acciaio Stainless frameset – a snip at £3,200 but it looks fantastic and I love the colour. I can’t imagine ever buying one (especially when there are a number of more affordable versions of the Acciaio) but it’s a thing of beauty nonetheless.
Also on the Condor stand turning heads was this fantastic one off custom painted Lavoro track bike – it’s really looked terrific and the paint job is genuinely a work of art.
Garmin
It was my first chance to eyeball the new Garmin Vector 3 power pedals, which now look like they could be the perfect power meter for those of us with more than one bike. I’ll write more on them shortly.
Also on display was the new range topping Garmin Edge 1030, which was getting lots of interest each time I passed the Garmin stand. I’ve been a big fan of the Edge 1000, so if the 1030 moves the game on it should be very good indeed as they’ve made a number of improvements such as larger and more responsive screen.
Genesis Fugio
Genesis’s new adventure bike the Fugio is now real and into production. I saw the prototype at IceBike earlier this year. I guess the simplest way to think of the Fugio is it’s probably what the Croix de Fer would be if it was designed from scratch today – it’s compatible with electronic or mechanical groupsets, it’s got flat mount brakes and through axles, dynamo wiring and comes with 50c tyres on 650b wheels. It looks great to be honest and slots nicely into Genesis’s range of bikes to have adventures on.
Elite Direto
I think the new Elite Direto is the most exciting smart trainer of this coming winter season. It brings almost all of the performance and benefits of a £1,000 smart trainer down to a £750 price point. On the Elite stand it was connected up to Zwift and people seemed to be enjoying trying it out. In person the noise levels were pleasingly low too – I saw one guy doing over 600 Watts on it and it was still very quiet. I think this is going to be a big hit as I’ve written about here
Shimano
One exciting new product (of many) on the Shimano stand was the new and soon to be released Dura Ace power meter – you could even try it out on the display bike! It’s very discreet as you can see in the photo above. I’m not convinced it’ll be a big seller but for those going for a Dura Ace groupset – it’s a nice option to have.
In case you didn’t know it, Shimano have released new second generation endurance road shoes. I reviewed the first generation and they became my favourite shoe (and still are). The new ones felt demonstrably lighter and sleeker in my hand at the show and now feature a Boa closure system (part of the weight reduction). I think these will probably be great for anyone who doesn’t need the stiffest racing platform (Shimano have the S-Phyre shoes for that)
While BMC sadly didn’t have a stand at the show, Shimano had this new Teammachine SLR01 Disc complete with the new R8000 Ultegra. This could well be my perfect road bike right now. I loved the BMC Teammachine I reviewed not long ago and this new version is supposedly even better!
It was also good to be able to a take closer look at the new Ultegra components. I think this is the most exciting groupset on the market offer a huge range of options and fantastic performance at a more affordable price point and I look forward to trying it out before too long.
Kinesis
Kinesis have launched a new improved Aithein, called the Aithein Evo and the metallic candy red paint job is just beautiful and my photo doesn’t come close to doing it justice. It now boasts internal cabling which required a new downtube, which in turn pushed up the weight a bit. Kinesis told me they had so much positive feedback on the slightly slacker head angle on the Aithein Disc that they brought that to the new Evo too.
Another new Kinesis frame is the new CX1 cyclocross bike launched at the show. In what I think is a really smart move it’s been designed to run as either a canti or disc brake bike. My son has just started cyclocross racing and I’m surprised at just how many people still have canti based setups – it’s a big hit on your budget to switch so having a frame you can build either way seems smart to me.
FSA Wireless groupset
It wasn’t the first time I’ve seen FSA’s interesting wireless groupset but it was good to take another look. It’s another interesting option for electronic shifting – perhaps particularly if you ride an Italian bike. I’ve not had the pleasure of trying it but I know it’s had a huge amount of development and several teams raced it in this years Tour de France.
Ed Shoote
As well as the big name celebrities at the show, I was pleased to see Ed Shoote speaking about the amazing adventures he and his wife Marion undertake. Ed’s a great photographer too and a really nice bloke, so it’s always worth checking him out. Ed’s blog is well worth a visit (and bookmark) at http://welovemountains.net/
Lezyne
I’ve been running the Lezyne Super GPS on my bike for nearly a year now and think it’s a terrific product for the money. It’s had constant software updates which have helped it keep improving too. Lezyne have now released some different colour versions too. You might find that interesting but I can’t see the point of moving from simple black to be honest. If it matches your bike though or your favourite kit go for it. The basic black version though is very good for the money and has excellent battery life.
Mason Cycles
Mason weren’t an exhibitor but had cunningly hooked up with Zipp and had both the new version 2 Definition (now with 12 mm through axles front & rear) and also a titanium Bokeh on display. I had a good chat with Dom who told me how hard he’d worked to make the switch to through axles a good one as they can change the ride quality. Dom explained that he’d worked particularly hard on getting the read disc mounts and axle just right and was very happy with how it had turned out.
Whyte Bikes
Another 650b gravel option is the new Whyte Glencoe, that comes built with a 1x groupset. It’s a competitor for the new Genesis Fugio shown earlier in the post and shows how much competition is hotting up in this sector. Kinesis also had their Tripster AT frameset which can be built to run either 650b or 700c wheels – so there’s lot of great products to choose from.
Whyte’s highly regarded Wessex is now available with new Ultegra Di2, which should complement it well. It’s been getting lots of great reviews over the last year or so.
Cube
This Cube eBike was one of the most normal roadbike looking ebikes I’ve ever seen if that makes sense. Cube had a massive stand with loads of new bikes, including adventure and endurance bikes.
Reilly Cycleworks
It was nice to see Mark Reilly of Reilly Cycleworks manning the stand at the show. Mark’s a good guy who’s been making great bikes in Sussex for many years and he had some very nice looking builds on display. Interestingly he said his gravel bike is his biggest selling model!
Campagnolo
It was good to see new Campag disc brakes in person, they’ve been long awaited and be all accounts are very nice to use. It was one of those products that I was starting to wonder if it was real – but they are!
Tifosi
This sub 5kg Tifosi Mons was very funny to see people pick up – it was there in pride of place and the look of disbelief on most people’s face as they picked up was good fun. Good on Tifosi for building and bringing it to the show. In fact Tifosi had their strongest range of bikes I’ve ever seen, they’ve obviously been working hard to increase the quality and range of Tifosi frames and bikes. They all seemed sensibly priced too.
A good example of the broadening of the range were the pair of colourful new Tifosi SS26 – available in either disc or caliper brakes.
Cinelli
Cinelli had lots of nice bikes on display and although I probably shouldn’t, I really liked these bars! Not sure they’d go on my bike but they were some great Italian bling!
Vitus
Vitus launched their 2018 range at the Cycle Show with lots of aggressively priced bikes including this one. It’s the new ZX1 Team Aero Disc brake bike featuring a Dura Ace R9100 groupset and DT Swiss ARC 1100 Dicut DB wheelset and the complete bike retails for £3999, which seems a very attractive price – when you consider the cost of the wheels and groupset alone.
Wattbike Atom
Bizarrely, I’ve checked and I don’t have any good photos from the Wattbike booth at the Cycle Show but it was heaving the whole time. There is a lot of interest in the new Wattbike Atom and I’m not at all surprised about that as I outlined here recently. Hopefully I’ll have more on this soon.
If you’ve made it this far through the post – well done and thanks for reading. Any questions, leave a comment.
Thanks for reading
