An “eco-friendly” product designer wins an award for a commuter helmet design.
The Helmet uses a less aerodynamic design that will appeal to non-racer types. The commuter would now get a more rounded helmet with integrated lights. Some of the designs on the Zanic site show other ideas such as an integrated visor or other accessories. One feature that helmet designers have not pursued is the idea of integrated accessories. Life would be easier if a light was integrated into the helmet especially now that LED lights have become popular. Just imagine being able to integrate a flashing LED light to the back of your Giro ATMOS. It would increase safety through visibility.
tuttobiciweb.com points out a gaff on the UCI website. They list a Laurent Jalabert born in 1968 as a rider on the Agritubel Cycling Team. The link can be seen on the Agritubel Team Roster Page. The rider that should be listed is Nicolas Jalabert born in 1973 as can be seen on the Agritubel Cycling Team Website. Maybe a Frenchman was daydreaming when they were filling out the roster and put in Laurent’s name instead. For Nicolas this must be tough living in the shadow of a famous big brother. This is much like a teacher calling you by your older sibling’s name.
Good news! Velochimp.com is now part of the 9Rules Network. The site now joins one of top blog communities on the web. For those not familiar with 9Rules here is some info:
9rules is a community of the best weblogs in the world on a variety of topics. We started 9rules to give passionate writers more exposure and to help readers find great blogs on their favorite subjects. It’s difficult to find sites worth returning to, so 9rules brings together the very best of the independent web all under one roof.
Great news overall. 2007 promises to feature some great content:
New Team
I will switch to new team called MaxPowerCycling.com (I am finishing up the team site as we speak so no direct link just yet). The team is made up of a great core of guys that won several races under the Colavita-Spokepost.com team. This year we are taking over as our own sponsors since most of the members have businesses they would like to promote anyway.
Syracuse Race Weekend Promoter
This year I am running the Syracuse Race Weekend bike race. This is a huge event thank Chuck Dominick has run for over ten years. I will have help with Sam Sampere and a few other folks. Sam and I are the main promotors and this is the first race that we have ever run. We will be learning the ropes of running a race in Upstate New York and hope to have an eye to make it a much larger event in the future.
New Training Site Coming
I am also hard at work on a very exciting new project called 400watts.com. More info will be available very soon, but this will hopefully be a very cool site for anyone training for racing or fitness. Watch this space.
2007 will be a fun year for velochimp.com to say the least.
Black appears to be the new blue for 2007. Team kit designs for the pro peloton seem to follow common trends as each team has their own variation on a popular theme. The previoulsy trend was a blue team kit that started getting popular in the 1990s when cyclist realized they did not always have to wear black shorts. For a while it seemed as though just about every team sported a mostly blue colored team kit. It was tough to tell some teams apart. The most confusing moment came in the 2005 Paris-Roubaix when Juan Antonio Flecha (Fassa Bortolo), George Hincapie (Discovery Channel) and Tom Boonen (Quick-Step) where in a final break away. Their respective team kits looked so similar that it was tough to tell the riders apart from the helicopter. Now the team kit designers love affair with blue has come to an end as black seems to be the new popular color.
With Caisse D’Epargne and Team CSC daring to sport the almost all black look, many teams are following through and going dark too.
Perhaps to get speculation of a butt-ugly team kit out of the way. The Predictor Lotto or Lotto-Predictor team as I would like to call them released the team kit design for 2007. The salmon pink and blue that everyone feared would replace one of the nicer jerseys in the peloton has been given a nice treatment. Yes there is lots of pink, but offset with the black, gray and dark red it still retains a manly look. So the stylist for the Lotto team should be thanks for pulling this design out from what could have been a complete disaster.
The team kit is modeled by Dominique Cornu (left) e Bjorn Leukemans.
I wish I could watch the full length movie of this trailer somehow. The Japanese version of Quicksilver. The plot line seems to go like this. Rich spoiled girl hits bike messenger. Bike messenger is out of commission, so rich girl has to take over her job for some reason. She is introduced to the world of Japanese bike messengers and the rigors of the job. Girl falls in love with bike messenger guy, but then has to battle the Japanese mob who ride on motorcycles.
Thanks to cyclelicio.us for leading up to this video. cyclelicio.us has a video on an NYC bike messenger. Not as crazy as the Lucas Brunelle videos, this is more of a profile of one bike messenger.
The Holiday cheer is missing in the cycling world. The Grinch has stolen all of the good cheer from anyone related to pro cycling. Sure Discovery Channel, CSC and Tinkoff among many others have already met for their first training camps for the 2007 season. Discovery Channel played paint ball in Texas while CSC was training to go to fight in Iraq in South Africa. Lampre can be happy that they locked up the services of Il Princippe (Damiano Cunego) until 2009.
A cold wind started blowing way back in the spring time when Spanish Guardia Civil started leaking info on a new investigation that was to bust open the world of doping in cycling. 200 or 59 or 8 cyclist in all were implicated in the press. Now we approach the end of 2006 and no one rider is implicated and pretty much anyone whose name has been associated with Operation Puerto has been cleared. Read the rest of this entry »
According to tuttobiciweb.com Jose Rujano has signed for Unibet.com. The deal was struck yesterday afternoon at the Malpensa airport terminal. All details are complete for the deal that will see the tiny climber return to the peloton after being dumped by Quick-Step.
Rujano looked to be a breakout climbing star after the 2005 Giro where he almost stole the victory in the final mountain stage. Since then Rujano has suffered from an overinflated ego and sense of entitlement. He had a falling out with Gianni Savio of Selle-iItalia. He was basically a no-show form-wise in the Giro. He dropped out unceremoniously during stage 13 from Alessandria to La Thuile. In the stage Rujano launched a few attacks, but then dropped out of the race only one kilometer from the finish.
Rujano then moved to Quick-Step where he was set to ride the Tour de France. The race did not go so well for Rujano and neither did the rest of the season.
Perhaps to get speculation of a butt-ugly team kit out of the way. The Predictor Lotto or Lotto-Predictor team as I would like to call them released the team kit design for 2007. The salmon pink and blue that everyone feared would replace one of the nicer jerseys in the peloton has been given a nice treatment. Yes there is lots of pink, but offset with the black, gray and dark red it still retains a manly look. So the stylist for the Lotto team should be thanks for pulling this design out from what could have been a complete disaster.
