Cobbles-Tech: Rich’s Paris-Roubaix Challenge Bike

Editors note: Rich is riding the Paris-Roubaix Challenge, a sportive sponsored by the organizer of Paris-Roubaix, ASO. It’s 137km long, and runs over many of the same pavé sectors as the pros will be riding Sunday. We asked Rich to tell us a little about the bike he’s planning on using, and will check back with him afterwards to see how the bike, and he, fared.

What to choose for the demanding parcours of Paris Roubaix challenge? I’ve a few bikes in my shed so I had some ideas, but chatting around to folks on Twitter and veterans of the June...Continue Reading

Tour of Flanders (de Ronde van Vlaanderen): The Contenders

Thanks to last weekend’s racing at E3 Prijs & Gent ~ Wevelgem the two favourites like cream have risen to the top. The way in which they won typically are the only two ways you can win a race, either from a daring breakaway or a bunch gallop.

I figure that Cancellara must be a fan of Jacky Durand as of late as he seems to have perfected the art of the escape artist and fails the pelotons capture. Currently they (the Peloton) don’t really have an answer for when the Swiss train rolls out of the station.

Boonen is a different...Continue Reading

Garmin/Pearl Izumi – Much Ado About a Skinsuit?

So Garmin are in a little bit of hot water with Pearl Izumi as it looks like the now infamous “winged” skinsuit prototypes have not been returned. (I’m bet this was just an error in the laundry department; they are probably “lost in the wash”—no doubt to make a reappearance soon.) Obviously, with the announcement that Castelli will be providing the team with apparel for the next three years, it looks like Pearl Izumi put 2 and 2 together, and—well, you get the picture. It’s a funny chain of events as I know that many clothing manufacturers have recently backwards engineered...Continue Reading