I’m due to go to a talk tomorrow in Coventry hosted by Mike Burrows:

… And I was wondering if you could ask him one question what would it be and why ?

The event is part of the Coventry Festival of Cycling, loads going on spread the word if your local.

COVENTRY FESTIVAL OF CYCLING LINK

“Who are you?”

Because I don’t know who he is.

“Who are you?”

Because I don’t know who he is.

He designed this amongst a few other things…

Chris Boardmans Bike

Where can I buy a speedy?

Bike designer, known for his recumbents, such as the Windcheater, and also for designing Broadman’s Lotus on which he won the Olympic pursuit gold.

A few years on, how does he feel about UCI interference/control on bike design. Should bike designers have complete freedom for tour and track bike design or is the balance about right now?

Are recumbents the future for everyday bike transport?

What was it like working with a large and fairly conservative multinational such as Giant on a radical new concept?

Are there any huge step changes in bike design left or is it just tinkering around the edges?

Has he ever designed or felt passionate about the design of anything else other than bikes?

He’s also credited with ushering in compact road frames with the original Giant TCR.

He’s also credited with ushering in compact road frames with the original Giant TCR.

One of the first ones of which that did the rounds of the cycling magazines for reviews is currently languishing in my shed 8)

Who is he?

… I will ask him if he is a politically correct person and/or if he wishes to be a celebrity … 🙄

Are there any huge step changes in bike design left or is it just tinkering around the edges?

good Question, I might just ask that 🙂

Coyote – Member
“Who are you?”

Because I don’t know who he is.Not just me then!

coyote – I suspect that marks out out as just “someone who rides a bike” and not a cyclist.

Would be worth asking him what he thinks of Obree’s human-powered record attempt.

“How often do you weigh yourself?”

Ask him if he can make me a front wheel drive Ratcatcher – last time I asked, he said he’d got bored of making them 🙂

Mike is probably the smartest bike designer I know of…

One of the first ones of which that did the rounds of the cycling magazines for reviews is currently languishing in my shed

Does it have those carbon-spoked wheels on it?

One of the first ones of which that did the rounds of the cycling magazines for reviews is currently languishing in my shed
Does it have those carbon-spoked wheels on it?

…Or any bits of a washing machine ? !

Ask him if he remembers me?
18 years ago I did my A level Art & Design project based on bike design and I wrote Mike for advice. He wrote back inviting me to come and talk to him at the factory. He had just taken the job with Giant and was selling his share in the business he had (I think it was making money counting machines).
I remember him being a top bloke but have no idea what questions I asked, although you can be pretty sure that they were stupid ones.

‘What tyres for….?’

Does it have those carbon-spoked wheels on it?

Used to – I killed them off long ago. They were flipping heavy – not the best feature on the bike. It is now a sorry sight dressed up in cast offs and purporting to be me wife’s hand-me-down road bike & unridden in about 5 years 😥

It’s got a few little manufacture touches that didn’t make it into full production version but you can see on all the mag photos – quite cool to look at and know they were unique and sitting in my shed! I’ve also got one of the first composite TCRs in shed too – an unsed spare from the ONCE team with the wrong graphics on for the year (they used the graphics to suit the bikes out at the time though in fact it didn’t make the market for 12 months). That too has a few little touches that didn’t make it into production. It is now my turbo bike!

You could ask him what he things about developments in MTB suspension since I recall he seemed to think that the Giant NRS (?) system had “nailed it” (it was a fellow designer’s design not his)

Renault NRS.

Edit to add:

à la branche développement de Renault Sport et à Pascal Tribotté,

Does he think marketing has a place in modern society? This is taking into account that it has been proven to be wholly ineffective.

Oh and a question:

“Is the patent system strangling bicycle innovation? Being able to patent various unequal quadrangles is perhaps preventing MTB designers from producing bikes with the optimum pivot points for example, your thoughts?”

Druid, just a noob.

OP – Did you go to this yet?

Interesting?

Jack,

Yes I did he was a really nice fella, a little bit eccentric.

He loves the fact he made a name for himself with the lotus bike, but was constrained by lotus cost cutting on the bike when it was made etc…. They had a lotus bike there, its 20 years old now, and still looked AMAZING !

Mike was very anti UCI as they hated his innovations so changed the rules to make his bikes illegal! and also seemed to resent giant as they stifled his designers flair for innovation, but he did say he was on good money £50,000 a year in the 80’s ! And he enjoyed being a ” jet set superstar bike designer” which made me laugh as he kinda looks like a eccentric art teacher ( all be it a very clever one)

He is now MAD for recumbent bikes… And that rat catcher is a mental bit of kit… He made soo many versions to get to the bike he has now. And the steering on it is mental! Obrees now races with him in the recumbent racing he does.

I asked him about wheel sizes he said bigger is better on the rough stuff, if you make it light.

Asked about Obrees 100 record attempt, that started a interesting conversation on speed v’s aero performance and rider ” power” he basically said Obrees new bike had wheels that where too small but he knew Obrees was the ” Van goh” of the bike world so would try it anyway.

Loads of questions where asked and it was a really interesting night.

I went out on my 92 Look KG 196 with the roadie club tonight. It’s the first time they’d seen it and one thought it was Look’s latest bike! The Lotus bike was only any good for what it was designed for and perhaps not great at that given the bikes that have followed. The roadie ones were an expensive failure.

Burrows has designed some great bikes but is most famous for a blind alley in bike design. Just my opinion… . The TCR, speedy, the aero recumbant things and his cargo bikes, now they are the future.

Agree on the lotus thing but 20 years ago it was über cutting edge…. Apparently only 8 where made and they sold 3 to wealthy people for £15,000 each, then sold 1 to a newspaper as a competition prize for £7,500 but then resold it to the science museum. That’s the one he had last night, as it going into a new exhibition that’s opening in the museum soon.

The tcr was good, but he slated the 2012 model as it uses ” square” tubes…. For reasons he ant work out as its not as strong, aero etc.

The recumbents are awesome, he was telling us that one of his buddy’s averaged 37 mph in a hour long race on his retracer style bike, and the bloke riding it was 52 years old!

I now want a recumbent ! A bad ass super low carbon one 🙂

Burrows was already more interested in utility bikes and recumbents when he designed the lotus bike, he became famous for it because it won a gold medal not because he thought it was his most important design.