Fresh Goods Friday

It’s Friday! It’s Fresh Goods! And as we’re about to shut up shop for Christmas, this is your last dose of comedy clothing models, random foodstuffs and paparazzi bike shots for 2011. Prime your browser for January and plot a course for 2012…

Trek Lush SL

Trek’s brand new female-specific suspension bike was unveiled at their press launch in July. We were desperate to ride it then but with no production models available in Mayrhofen, we’ve had to be patient and wait til now. Fittingly it’s arrived just in time for us to rip the wrapping off like the excited five year olds we all are inside (we stopped short of playing in the box, though).

This isn’t ‘just’ a tweaked Fuel EX (although those were plenty good). Though there are plenty of features which the two platforms share, the Lush has been designed from the ground up for female riders, so as well as the, by now familiar, frame details like the sculpted E2 headtube, internal cable routing and Bontrager’s female-specific contact points, there’s also masses of standover clearance and a refreshingly roomy top tube. The SL is the top-end alloy version, and carbon’s on its way, too.

Both fork and shock are Fox DRCV, and this is probably one of the bits of the Lush we’re most excited about – we rode the DRCV-equipped Fuels and Remedys back in the summer and were thoroughly won over by them, so it’s double ace to see them on Trek’s new WSD bikes as well.

We’ll have an exclusive first ride up shortly after Christmas – because a week out of the office is, obviously, a week in which lots of riding has got to be done…

Price: £2,300
From: www.trekbikes.com

Planet-X winter roadie bits

Bargaintastic warm things from Doncaster for our Matthew, who still insists that he’s not a roadie really (but doesn’t it go fast when you pedal it hard…?!). Neoprene overshoes:

…and windproof gloves:

…to keep him warm whilst he’s smashing hill reps up Cragg shredding the gnar.

Price: overshoes £10, gloves £5 overshoes
From:

Kontact saddle

Saddle science is a serious business, as Mark is demonstrating. This saddle is from Kontact via the lovely Will at Hubjub, purveyor of all things nichely beautiful. It’s loaded with ‘the science bit’; has ti, carbon and leather on its spec list; sports a mysterious damper to isolate chassis from rails; weighs not very much at all.

Price: £79.00
From: Hubub, www.hubjub.co.uk

Osprey Syncro 15 backpack

New daypack from Osprey. It’s a curious mix of bike-specific hydration pack vs. faux-rugged man sac: LidLock helmet carrier/semi-rigid airy back system/lightweight perforated harness/rain cover vs. removable waist belt/massive organiser pocket/reflective bits & light loop/subtle urban-friendly black. We like.

Price: £65.00
From: Osprey, www.ospreypacks.com

Holidays!

Lastly, a big thank you to everyone that’s sent us Christmas goodies. We’ve spent the week getting fat on cakes, mince pies, chocolates, port, cheese, pasties – you name it, we’ve vanished it (and left the evidence all over the office for the dogs to tidy up…). Don’t bother waiting for us at the top of the hill in January, we’ll be some way off the back.

* All 750,000 of you might be hard to see at one time though…

 

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