california

BERKELEY, CA (BRAIN) Feb 22, 10:55 MT— Northern California’s high school mountain bike league has grown to its limits and may have to be split in two next season to accommodate its growth.

Specialized came relatively late to the big-wheeled party but no-one could accuse the California-based company of not making up for lost time. They now make 26in- and 29in-wheeled versions of most of their key models. Tested here is the�entry-level Camber 29, which comes in under the magic £2k mark with a decent-looking spec list.�

The Camber has impressed us in the past, in both 26in and 29in versions, and it continues to do so here. The Camber 29 is a bit heavy next to the competition but the superb handling and wallet-friendly price make up for that. For an affordable entry into big-wheeled full-suspension it’s hard to beat. It’s won over some hardened sceptics, so if you’re unsure, book a test ride.�

Ride & handling:�Thoroughly�sorted 29er handling in�a great value and easy-to-live-with package

Our earliest experience of a big-wheeled Camber was a ride on a pre-production carbon version. We came away impressed with its versatility in a whole variety of trail conditions. It combines the kind of race-bred athleticism that’s capable of demolishing tough climbs with a sure-footed nimbleness on descents that’s normally the preserve of quicker-handling 26in-wheeled bikes.

The good news is that the entry-level model preserves almost all of the carbon version’s winning attributes. Of all the 29ers we’ve ridden, the Camber is one of relatively few that comes close to mimicking a 26in bike in terms of both high- and low-speed handling, with a front end that all but eliminates any sense of big wheel inertia. Pedal, point, go.�

This sure-footed nimbleness makes it instantly likeable, while the big wheels’ ability to roll up and over the kind of stutter bumps that’ll halt a smaller wheeled bike in its tracks helps to compensate for the bike’s slightly oversize waistline. In fact, although we grumbled inwardly every time we had to manhandle the Camber 29 (on and off a bike rack, or over a gate), when it came to pedal power it never seemed to be an issue.

�It lacks the sprightly skip of lighter (and more expensive) competitors but for long-haul epics that’s not necessarily a bad thing. It wouldn’t be our first choice for a potential podium finish but for all-round trail duties with fun along the way, its combination of value and performance is hard to argue against.

Frame & equipment: Budget-squeezing�component choices�have pushed weight up

While the�26in-wheeled Cambers�have 120mm of travel, the 29ers have 110mm… except this one, which has 100mm. It’s down to the fact that this base model uses the M4 aluminium frame of the original 2010 Camber 29 instead of the updated M5 frame used on the pricier Camber Comp 29. It wasn’t possible to adapt the older frame to accommodate more bounce, and it also has standard 135mm dropouts instead of the 142mm+ dropouts used throughout the rest of the 2012 range.

Specialized put great effort into reconciling the engineering and aesthetic components of their frame designs, so that the result both looks right and performs well.�The Camber 29’s smooth, flowing lines and inline shock, seatstays and top tube are no coincidence. The curved down tube helps distribute stress away from the head tube area without the need for a gusset, while the inline stuff is all about improving small bump response and reducing frame weight by making each tube as short as possible.

There’s no doubt that Specialized’s designers have performed a minor miracle shoehorning all the important stuff into a big-wheeled bike and making it ride so well. But you can tell they live and ride in southern California. The Camber 29’s mud clearance at both ends is on the tight side of minimal and, although we had no issues, it’d be a concern for regular use in muddy conditions. All-up weight is another point of contention. The Camber is on the wrong side of 30lb and although it has a price advantage over some of its competition, it could certainly do with losing a few grams.

Bump munching duties are taken care of by a pair of RockShox air springs – an Ario shock at the rear and a Recon Gold fork up front. They’re well matched, although the Ario’s lack of adjustable compression damping might have some riders reaching for the lockout lever on long, smooth climbs. Specialized’s in-house kit takes care of most of the ancillary components, including a saddle that should prove comfortable for long days out.

Fitting a bigger profile tyre on the front isn’t a new idea – Kona did it a lot in the ‘90s. We don’t see it so often now, though, so the Camber 29’s big volume Purgatory front tyre is a novelty. It works well, giving the front of the bike extra bite in the corners and helping the big wheel reduce the fork’s workload in the rough stuff.

The only obvious area of cost-cutting in the Camber 29’s spec is in the transmission, with a downgrade to nine-speed. Although many riders will expect 10-speed at this price, in functional terms there’s nothing to choose between them. A Deore XT rear mech adds showroom appeal and the Shadow design helps keep it out the way of rocks.

This article was originally published in What Mountain Bike magazine.

MONTEREY, CA (BRAIN) Jan 30, 04:13 MT — Joselyns Bicycles, a presence in Monterey, California, since the 1940s, closed on Jan. 15

SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO, CA (BRAIN) Jan 26, 10:53 MT— Registration has opened for Interbike’s IBD Summit, to be held at April 17-20 in Monterey, California, in conjunction with the Sea Otter Classic. The IBD Summit will feature speaker-led sessions on topics including current consumer behavioral trends, tools for improving profitability and insights on how progressive retailers can reach beyond their current enthusiast customer base to find the next bicycle consumer.

HONG KONG (BRAIN) Jan 26, 16:21 MT— Pryde Group, the parent company of Neil Pryde bikes, announced this week its acquisition of Imagine Surf, a player in the stand-up-paddle industry. The two companies had been working together over the past 18 months with Pryde Group eventually taking over distribution for the much smaller Southern California-based Imagine

SANTA BARBARA, CA (BRAIN) Jan 25, 08:37 MT— After three years in business, “urban mobility” specialty retailer Wheelhouse Bikes is closing Jan. 31. Erik Wright, who co-owns the shop with partner Evan Minogue, said several factors prompted the closure, including the sale of Wheelhouse’s building to a new owner, prompting a rent increase, and the high cost of living in Santa Barbara.

The London Bike Show opened its doors yesterday and we’ve been there getting the lowdown on some of the exciting new bikes and kit on display, as well as running our own Training Hub. We’ve already brought you a mountain bike round-up and today Cycling Plus’s Warren Rossiter brings you his road bike highlights…

Dedacciai Super Cross

The Italians have got behind the movement towards disc brakes for cyclo-cross with their latest top-end carbon fibre ‘cross bike. The all-new Super Cross is based around a 1,050g frameset that uses Deda’s AWP (Anti Wrinkle Process) carbon. The material is laid up in a mould and compressed so that�no imperfections or creases can compromise the integrity of the carbon-resin bond.�This frame is matched to a dedicated disc-only fork that weighs 420g.

The potential for a super-light ‘cross rig is plain to see when this combo tips the scales at under 1.5kg. The head tube is tapered (1-1/8 x 1-1/2in), with the bottom bracket shell designed for a 92mm press-fit unit. All cable routing is internal but the frame has external routing for hydraulic hoses, making it future-proof. The frame and fork combo is available now for £1,599.99, from�www.chickencycles.co.uk.

Neil Pryde Bayamo

We gave you the lowdown on the new Bayamo time trial bike from Neil Pryde in our coverage from Interbike�and now you can see the development prototype of this great looking machine at the London Bike Show. It’s scheduled to make its racing debut at the Tour of California with UnitedHealthcare, who’ll also be racing in this year’s Tour of Britain.

Trek Project One

Trek are present at the London Bike Show to showcase their Project One customisation programme. The wall of colour swatches to fine-tune your bike’s finish is hugely impressive. We had a soft spot for the Madone 6.9 SSL Leopard-Trek Spartacus finish�– yours for ‘just’ £6,105.

Zullo bikes

London’s Mosquito Bikes can always be relied on to provide something a little different, and always quite beautiful. Their stand at the London Bike Show is no exception. Zullo bikes are the brainchild of ex-racer Tiziano Zullo, who’s been creating beautifully crafted steel machines in Italy since the Seventies. Legendary climber Robert Millar rode a Zullo in his TVM days and we were hugely taken with the Vergine. Made from Columbus XCR stainless steel and custom painted, this is a frame that we’d sell our mothers to own.

Vincero Design bottle cage

Vincero Design have reinvented the lightweight bottle cage. The ‘cage’ is actually a 16g diamond-shaped composite housing for a metal button, which attaches to your frame via the normal bosses.�The dedicated bottle features a female cutout of the mount containing a high-powered magnet. The bottle slots into place and the magnet holds it with more than enough force to keep it there.�

The bottle has a soft feel and is plenty ‘squeezable’, and the hydration-pack-like silicone mouthpiece makes drinking a cinch. What we like best about the Vincero design, though, is the price. The mount and a 20oz (591ml) bottle retail for just £33.99�– that’s cheaper than most brands’ lightweight carbon cages.

The bottle is also available in a larger 24oz (710ml) size for an extra pound. We’ll have a sample soon for an exclusive test, as it’s set to launch by the end of the month. The Vincero bottle and cage will be available exclusively through�Ison Distribution�in the UK.�

Bianchi Oltre gets EPS

Bianchi’s brilliant Oltre is amongst the very first bikes to be available with Campagnolo’s new EPS electronic transmissions.�The matt black finished Oltre complete with full Record EPS will hit stores in February priced at £8,000. There’ll also be a model with the rarefied Super Record EPS�group for £1,100 more.

Rose Xenon

The great thing about shows is being able to see in the flesh the bikes you might want to buy, and that’s especially true of brands that operate on the internet only. For us, the highlight of the online-only bikes at the London show was this fantastic value Rose Xenon CRS.�

With a sub-kilo carbon frameset, full Campagnolo Chorus carbon 11-speed group, quality carbon finishing kit, Prologo saddle, custom Schwalbe tyres and colour coded Mavic Cosmic wheels, it has an all-up claimed weight of just 7.4kg (16.3lb, 57cm size). At a frankly unbelievable £2,454, this could be one of the bargains of 2012.

London Bike Show ticket offer

The�London Bike Show�runs until Sunday, 15 January. It’s held alongside the Boat Show, the Action Travel Show and the Outdoors Show, with a single ticket granting entry to all four.�You can�buy discounted tickets by entering the code ‘radar’ at checkout. Entry with the code costs £15 compared to an on-the-door price of £20. While you’re there, why not check out the�BikeRadar�Training Hub?

SAN JOSE, CA (BRAIN)—Specialized and Volagi lawyers expected to rest their cases Wednesday afternoon in the breach of contract and trade secrets case playing out in Santa Clara Superior Court here. Specialized is suing Volagi, a road bike brand, and its co-founders, Robert Choi and Barley Forsman, charging that the two launched Volagi while still employed by the Morgan Hill company

Sherwood Gisbon has been hand-building bikes in the Ventana mountains of Big Sur, California since 1988. He’s not the most pushy and pro-active character in terms of hype – the news section of his website hasn’t been updated since 2006 – but his bikes have always been quietly cutting-edge.

There are loads of good 6in-travel all-rounder bikes out there and the El Ciclon ticks all the must-have boxes for easy, accurate control and big hit capability in a crisp, pedal friendly character. What really sets it apart is the rare US heritage and handmade build quality at a price that beats a lot of Taiwanese-made machines.

Ride & handling: Now faster and tighter, both up and down technical trails

The El Ciclon has a new look and revised suspension architecture for 2012. The tapered head tube is half a degree slacker, giving a head angle of 67.8 or 67.4 degrees with a 150mm fork, depending on what rear travel you run. Rather than pushing the seat angle forward to compensate for the front wheel moving forward, Sherwood has pushed it back by over a degree. The bottom bracket also drops 10mm, although with the new suspension sitting higher in the stroke most of the time the on-trail difference is negligible.

The old El Ciclon was a real stealth bike. It didn’t feel anything special at first, but would calmly make a mockery of other bikes trying to follow it when the going got techy. The new bike is in a very similar vein. The new suspension layout sits higher in its travel, with a firmer, more pedal-related character. This makes it a bit chattery over small stuff even with the Adaptive Logic lever on the super-plush Kashima-coated Fox shock set to minimum compression.

Press the pedals though and it’s got a really clean and responsive feel, with much faster acceleration and speed sustain than you’d expect from a 13.5kg (just under 30lb) bike. Start hitting bigger stuff and the shock gets into its stride, smoothing edges, driving the bike forward and sucking up random rocks and awkward landings. The accuracy of the shock damping let us run a fair amount of sag to soften initial feel without blowing the travel ring off the gold shaft too often.�

The El Ciclon came with a standard seatpost but we soon stuck a dropper post in to make the most of its potential on techy local trails and Stainburn’s black run. If that’s your regular sort of riding we’d be tempted to build it up with a 150 (or even 160mm) fork and the screw-through rear wheel option as the frame can easily take it. Even with a quick-release rear end fitted and considerable frame stiffness, any loss of traction was communicated early enough to save or let it slide.

Despite the slacker seat angle, with the 140mm fork and an inline post plugged in we had no trouble with understeer or front-end vagueness, always losing the rear tyre before the front even under heavy braking. Because it rides high at the rear dropping the adjustable-travel Fox TALAS fork for steep climbs didn’t cause too many grounding issues and clear rear tyre feedback made it a tenacious climber.

Long wheelbase and slack head make it confident and composed at speed. It’s a bike you sit on rather than ‘in’ so prepare to mobilise your weight and maybe reduce tyre pressures if you want to get it down and dirty rather than keep its clean and concise feel. The kit on our sample doesn’t matter when you’re building your own, but we’d stay away from high-rise bars.

Frame: New curved top tube, tapered head tube and revised back end

Sherwood has been building bikes since 1985 and his development path runs right through the early ’90s E-stay and Marble Peak FS days, but he’s one of the few US builders not to try and expand the brand and cut costs by getting his bikes built overseas. All his frames are still hand-built in California using his trademark ‘Electric Sex’ welds and CNC’d sections.

Having loved the previous El Ciclon all-rounder – and knowing Sherwood takes his time producing new designs – we jumped at the chance to spend time on the new bike as soon as Alan at Riverside Cycles in Kent told us he had one ready. The most obvious difference compared to straight-tubed Ventanas of old is the new curved and tapered hydroformed top tube. There’s a neat curved clamshell seat tube buttress instead of the open bottom curved plate on the previous model.

There’s a tapered head tube up front too, hugged into place with Ventana’s signature wraparound extended throat gusset. Gear cables and rear brake hose disappear into teardrop ports on the down tube too, while three cable clips under the top tube can carry a dropper post cable. 30.9mm seat post compatibility syncs with all the major brands and a press-fit bottom bracket bottom brackeet shell gives you a menu of all axle types from conventional to oversize.

The back end may look familiar, but it’s totally new, with shorter chainstays and increased tyre clearance created by new CNC-machined terminals and an asymmetric chainstay design. While the big cartridge bearings above the dropouts stay the same, new rocker linkages change the suspension architecture. Replaceable plates on the chunky CNC-machined dropouts let you switch between quick-release and 142×12mm screw-through axle standards. The ability to switch between 140 and 150mm travel and slacken geometry at the same time remains too.

While the ‘Electric Sex’ welding name harks back to Dayglo ‘Local Motion’ (look it up kids) days there’s no doubting it’s all beautifully made. What’s more of a surprise is that despite its hand-built US credentials this frame costs a reasonable £1,599 including Kashima shock for the standard Cosmic Orange or Super Dust colours. There’s a palette of 200 custom colours if you want to pay a bit extra.

This article was originally published in What Mountain Bike magazine.

WOODLAND HILLS, CA (BRAIN)—Santa Monica Mountains Cyclery is looking to help customers stick to their New Year’s riding resolutions—and sell a few extra bikes in the process. Cyclists who purchase a bike from the Woodland Hills, California, retailer before Jan. 22 will be eligible to earn 10 cents per mile for every mile ridden on that bike in 2012, up to 50 percent of the bicycle’s purchase price.