Eurobike 2011: Cyclocross

With discs, without, carbon, aluminium, even steel. There were a few cyclocross bikes on show at Eurobike. Here’s a few that caught our eye (OK, Chipps’ eye then…)

OK, not a ‘cross bike to start with, but just look at all those starlings on the crane!

 

There were a fair amount of cyclocross bikes on show at Eurobike, with most big companies showing them. They mainly tended to be of the pure racing sort, though there were a few fun looking bikes that would be good for commuting and general messing around. Many folks expected to see disc brakes on lots of top end race bikes, but until Shimano and/or SRAM comes out with a hydraulic lever, many manufacturers are sitting back and waiting.

After all, until you see something that the racers will use, general takeup won’t be super quick. Besides, which hub spacing do you design for? 130mm to match regular ‘cross bikes – in which case where do you get 130mm disc hubs from? Or do you do 135mm and use mountain bike hubs, but force a wholesale swapover of wheels. And then there’s the rotor size – do you go 140mm, as many have done? Or will one of the big S companies come out with a neat 100mm rotor? It’s all up in the air until we see a combined shifter/brake lever that powers a ‘cross or road specific caliper and rotor – probably via hydraulics, but you never know. Certainly we’ll be keeping an eye on what the pros are using this winter…

Anyway, back to ‘cross bikes in the real world. As previously covered in our Demo Day story, here’s a tubeless Vittoria setup. We’ve still not found out if that’s road tubeless or mountain bike style tubeless though. Anyone know?

 

Fluoro is back! This Berner ‘cross bike even had matching Lightweight wheels painted to match (which surely won’t make them as light…)

Shimano’s CX70 components should be out about now…

 

Close ratio chainset for ‘crossers

We don’t know how James from Charge got there, but is that a disc-only ‘cross bike in the background?

 

Specialized showed three new ‘cross treads for dry, intermediate and mud, in 33mm – both clincher and tubular.

Specialized is also distancing the Tri-cross from, er ‘cross and making it more of a disc commuter, while the ‘proper’ ‘cross bike comes with discs.

And without…

 

Cielo bikes from Chris King. Made of steel in Portland…

Plenty of room to chop down the post on this Lapierre. Measure twice though!

An alloy Colnago. This bike has full disc mounts – but no discs. Perhaps Colnago is waiting to see what Avid and Shimano bring out, ‘cross wise…

 

There were a few team bikes on show at Eurobike. Here’s one of the Giant/Rabobank bikes. Here’s Lars Van Der Haar’s…

OK, not a ‘cross bike, but still one of the prettiest…

Focus had several ‘cross bikes on show, we quite like the understated looks of this one…

Again, not a ‘cross bike, but not understated either. We’d hoped to glimpse Ridley’s rumoured ‘cross bike with discs, but couldn’t see it…

Well, it’s individual – and loaded with carbon ENVE bits…

This Stevens had a big ‘Prototype only’ sticker on it, but expect to see a couple of racers on them this winter.

Post mount front and rear.

 

 

And white Challenge Grifo tyres – not just because they match, surely?

 

 

We did see a few 29er race bikes with Dugast 45mm tubulars on…

Nice looking cheap and cheerful Univega. Bet we don’t get to see them in the UK…

That Colnago again – your discs of choice goes here…

 

 

 

 

 

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