Velochimp: Astrochimp on Cycling

The 2008 Team Jersey designs are percolating out. There is a trend and as Michael Jackson says “It don’t matter if your black or white” since every jersey for 2008 seems to be either black or white.

Team CSC have gone from a very cool kit design that was somewhat consitent and evolutionary to a completely different look that is strong on white. The 2008 design is different since the team switched clothing sponsors from Descente to Craft. No, not the processed cheese company with a K, but the Scandonavian company with a C known for some classy clothes.

The new design is based on a concept about teamwork. Team CSC is known for it’s teamwork and cohesion. What better way than to show something of each rider in the design itself. This idea came to the kit designer and the idea basically flowed out.

”The Team CSC 2008 uniform is a tribute to the team itself. A uniform, which represents each rider and at the same time also representing them all as one unit. The idea comes across in the new “signature pattern.” A pattern created from each individual rider’s signature in a graduation from black to white. Where black is a pattern created from all the signatures and white is an open light pattern, which enables you to see the individual signatures. In this way each rider “signs himself on” to the team and at the same time signs his commitment to Team CSC’s beliefs and values,” says Inger Tanderup Klixbull, who has also designed the team’s previous uniforms.

If you look closely below the signatures show up in the detail. Nice touch for a kit to have intricate detail on close view. From TV and far away you see the overall design, but in pictures and closeup view you get some fine details.

I am not expert designer, but I did design Maxpowercycling.com’s team kit last year and I am sending out the 2008 design. As a designer you have to take a step back and do the squint test. See what type of impression the design gives. The signatures with the black lines and random curls give off a hairy look. If you do not notice the signatures up close the design looks like clumps of pink and black hair.

The overall look is like a hairshirt that is neatly cropped.

Maybe the design needs a few more iterations to cut down the hairiness aspect and emphasize the signatures.Until then all I am thinking is that I need to get my back waxed and my legs shaved before spring.

Here is the new kit for the MaxPowerCycling Team. I designed the kit and VO Max is the clothing supplier. The only disappointment is that there is no spot to put a logo on the shoulder, but I am happy with the final product.

The design process was long as I went through almost 10 variations before we finally settled on this design. Originally I wanted a black, red and white scheme to match the 400watts.com logo. But blue turned out to be most popular. I added a fade effect to give the jersey some depth and there are some subtle designs that are influenced by the Saeco team jersey of a couple of years ago.

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The Kazakistan group that is backing Alexandre Vinokourov’s new team will be represented by Borat
Sagdiyev who is Kazakhstani television’s top media personality.

A preview of the new kit was seen in a recent stage of the Dauphine Libere.

The new kit is slowly coming out for 2006. We had Saunier Duval ruin their understated kit by including many chickens.

Next we have Quick Step going for a US Postal style look. They darkened the blue and removed the white sections. Now Casse d’Epargne-Balears (that rolls off the tough does’t it?) released one of their new jerseys. It seems that since Casse D’Epargne and Illes Balears sponsor the team 60/40 repsectively, they have the team wear completely different jerseys depending on where they race. The look of the Casse D’Epargne dominant jersey is above and looks very stylish with black as the dominant color with a carbon like pattern. Nice work. Will the black jersey translate well in the sweltering July heat?

Grande Ciclismo