What a mixture of product. Some direct from Sea Otter, some from a monkey milking farm in France, and items not even in the office but in a far off land known as Australia, a wondrous place famous for the Kula Bula and Billa Wonga. Continue and be amazed by the bottled sauce, Giant shoes, and French rubber fancy.
2020 Fox Factory 34
- Price: TBC
- From: Silverfish
These are the super new 2020 versions of the Fox 34 Factory forks with new and improved Fit 4 damper that promises improved damping performance. The set we have received have a 120mm of travel, 44mm offset and are for 27.5in wheels. We’ve even plonked them on the scales for you which give a confirmed weight of 1.8kg/3.98lbs with an uncut steerer.
Monkey Sauce Bicycle Shampoo
- Price: €10.83 1L
- From: Monkey Sauce
Do you struggle with a dry and difficult to manage bike? Are your spokes splitting at the ends? Do you need some help adding bounce back to your suspension? What you need is Monkey Sauce Bicycle Shampoo! It revives your tired, dirty bike, making it look alive and youthful once again.
Monkey Sauce Tire Sealant
- Price: €7.49 150ml
- From: Monkey Sauce
Milked from real monkeys? We don’t know, but what we do know is Monkey Sauce sealant is a low-viscosity latex sauce that has an immediate sealing action. We’ll be pumping our tyres full of this white monkey goo soon to see if the claims are true.
Monkey Sauce wet and dry lube
- Price: €8.25 90ml
- From: Monkey Sauce
After a good shampoo, your drivetrain will be in dire need of a good lubing and once again French brand Monkey Sauce has the answers. Dry Monkey lube for summer conditions, and wet Monkey lube the UK.
Giant Shuttle Flat Shoes
- Price: TBC
- From: Giant
New flat shoes direct from Sea Otter! Despite the name, at only a size 44 they are not giant, and nor are they a reusable form of space transportation, they are great looking shoes for flat pedal riders though. This is the first time Giant has made a flat shoe and to make a splash on the market they’ve teamed up with XC/Enduro racer Adam Craig. Full details of the Giant Shuttle Flat shoe and the rest of the 2019 Giant shoe range is here.
Blackburn Dayblazer
- Price: £84.99
- From: Zyro
Other than sounding like some sort of knock-off version of Knight Rider, the Blackburn Dayblazer is a front and rear light combo designed to ensure you’re seen both day and night. Yup, daylight running lights have come to the humble bicycle. The Dayblazer set comes with a 65 lumens rear light weighing 43g and an 1100 lumens front light, both of which are charged via a micro USB.
Michelin Wild Enduro
- Price: £44.99
- From: Silverfish
Do often find yourself Enduro-ing in mixed/soft terrain? Finding traction a PITA? Tell us about it. Have you tried a Michelin Wild Enduro Grip+ tyre with GUM-X3D technology and Gravity Shield technology (yes, 2 technologies in 1 tyre)? Neither have we, but we have one in the office and Ross it itching to wrap it around his rear wheel and let us know how well performs. Watch this space.
Bontrager Ion Pro RT Front Bike Light
- Price: $169.99 AUD / £99.99
- From: Trek Bikes
The days might be getting longer in the northern hemisphere, but Down Under the sun is becoming a little more shy. And that my friends, calls for night lights!
Here we’ve got Bontrager’s most powerful head light, the Ion Pro RT, which comes loaded with 1300 Lumens of power. The 5-mode light has a USB rechargeable battery, and can either be run on the bars with the included bracket, or on the helmet via Bontrager’s Blendr mount, or a separate universal helmet mount.
Bontrager Flare RT Rear Bike Light
- Price: $79.99 AUD / £49.99
- From: Trek Bikes
Watching your back is the Flare RT – a powerful tail light from Bontrager. This new version comes in quite a bit smaller than the previous Flare, though it’s packing more Lumens – 90 of them to be exact. There are night time and day time-specific flash & steady modes, and you’ll get up to 15-hours of run time before it needs charging via the included Micro USB cable. Perhaps most neat is its wireless capability, which brings us to…
Bontrager Transmittr Wireless Remote
- Price: $69.99 AUD / £44.99
- From: Trek Bikes
…this guy – the Transmittr wireless remote. Designed to bolt onto your bars, the Transmittr pairs wirelessly with the Ion Pro RT front light and the Flare RT rear light for easy activation. The remote speaks to the lights via ANT+ wireless communication, and has the capability of being paired up with 7 devices at the one time – or just controlling both a helmet and bar light simultaneously.
Bontrager Blaze WaveCel Mountain Bike Helmet
- Price: $349.99 AUD / £199.99
- From: Trek Bikes
Arriving to much fanfare and with some rather outlandish claims (“Cycling’s most important change in 30 years” apparently) Bontrager’s new WaveCel helmet technology was only announced last month, but helmets have started rolling through already. That includes the top-end Blaze model we’ve got here, which is an all-new trail specific design.
Aside from the WaveCel business, this lid is packed with other goodies including a FidLock magnetic buckle, AgION anti-bacterial padding, a BOA-equipped adjustable harness, and an integrated Blendr mount for fitting a GoPro or headlight.
The Blaze comes in numerous colours and three different sizes: Small (51-57cm), Medium (54-60cm), and Large (58-63cm). The Blendr mount is included with the helmet, and spare pads come with it too. Oh, and if you stack it and write-off your new lid within the first year of ownership, Bontrager will replace it free of charge under the Crash Replacement Guarantee. Hopefully we don’t have to utilise that service…
Syncros Fraser iC SL 740mm
- Price: £299
- From: Scott Sports
Are you an appreciator of lightweight carbon things? Then you’ll want to get a load of these trick-and-also-bizarre Fraser iC bars from Syncros.
Using a single monocoque carbon fibre construction, this 740mm wide handlebar integrates the stem into the same structure. You can get the Fraser iC SL with a ‘virtual’ stem length of 60, 70, 80 or 90mm. Claimed weight for the 740x70mm handlebar is a scant 220g – that’s lighter than most handlebars on their own!
The integrated design was first shown on the Syncros Hixon handlebars, which come as stock equipment on Scott’s flagship Genius and Ransom 900 Tuned models. Whereas the Hixon is designed for trail and enduro use though, the Fraser shown here is for XC applications. Hence the narrower 740mm width and the low weight figure.
According to Syncros, the dimensions of the Fraser iC SL bar simulate an 8° stem drop (so that’s -8°), while the wing tips get a 6° upsweep and 9° backsweep. Need moar dropz? There’s a Nino version with a -25° angle if your spine can handle it.
These bars are going on the front of Wil’s Santa Cruz Blur longterm test bike. They’ve replaced a 760mm wide Renthal Carbon Fatbar Lite handlebar and a 50mm long Apex stem. That combo weighed 321g, so that’s dropped over 100g going to the Syncros Fraser iC SL setup. As to how they perform? Stay tuned for the review.
Syncros Silicone Grips
- Price: £20.99
- From: Scott Sports
Now if you’re going to drop 300 quid on integrated carbon bar/stem thingo, you probably want to be looking to other areas to save weight too. Like grips.
For minimum grammage, Syncros offer the Silicone Grip, which is claimed to weigh just 55g for the pair. Aside from being light, they’re also squishier, which is of particular interest to XC riders and marathon racers wanting as much vibration damping as possible.
Syncros Pro Lock-On
- Price: £17.99
- From: Scott Sports
The Pro Lock-On is a more conventional mountain bike grip, which uses a single locking clamp on the inside of the grip. These grips have a 30mm diameter, and are made from a “super tacky, yet durable elastomeric polyurethane material“. We’ll assume that ‘super tacky’ means the good kind in this case.
Bike Box Roller
- Price: $85 AUD (approx £46) plus shipping
- From: Bike Box Rollers
Designed and manufactured in Australia, the Bike Box Roller is a compact alloy carrier that’s designed to fit onto any cardboard bike box and turn it into a travel case on wheels.
The kit features two wide-profile skateboard wheels for stability, an adjustable tray for accommodating 20-30cm wide boxes, and full-length adjustable straps. At less than a kilo, it won’t infringe too much on your baggage allowance either. Stay tuned for a detailed first look of this clever little device soon!
Sock Guy Compression Socks
- Price: TBC
- From: Sock Guy
Gloves for your feet featuring carvings of Ross’ face. They also say “Stone Cold” on the sole which kicked off a conversation in the office about WWE wrestlers, and American Wrestling Trivia. What an amazing pair of socks.
Friday Tunes & #themtbchain
Here’s our regular playlist of the week to go along with our Fresh Goods. Each track is picked by a staff member here in the office and added to their individual playlist over on our Spotify page. Head over there to identify exactly who is responsible for each choice.
The Singletrack MTB Chain
If you’ve been using the hashtag #themtbchain to suggest you addition to our MTB themed playlist then now is the time to find out if you’ve won a Singletrack t-shirt. If we like your suggested tune and your reason for adding it then it will be included in the playlist.
This week we’ve somewhat reluctantly decided that Steve Williams is our winner with this classic tune (Chipps is very pleased in particular with this choice). Reluctant only in so far as our normal rules of entry require a good explanation, which Steve hasn’t provided. However, is an explanation really needed here? And so, Steve? Get in touch with James at despatch@singletrackworld.com and he’ll check that’s it really you and then send you a Singletrack t-shirt of your choice.
Last week we added Drive by Apocalyptica and asked what the mtb connection was. Maybe it was too specialist a connection because no one figured it out. It was on the sound track to one of the first ever trials DVDs from Ryan Leech – Manifesto. Still well worth a watch now.
Check out our MTB Chain page here to keep up on the additions and to try out more of our Singletrack playlists. This week’s featured staffer is Andi Sykes,