The Biking Hub: Mountain

Events, Industry news, Sneak peeks » Dan

ExpoCycle 2006

There are three seasons in a cyclist’s calendar – riding season, off-season and trade show season. There are hundreds of bike shows across North America each year, but only a handful register on the radars of nearly every rider out there.

With Eurobike already out of the way and Interbike less than two weeks away, the Canadian cycling industry held its annual ExpoCycle trade show in Montreal Sept. 10-12. Most of the 3,000 bike shops across the country sent some sort of representation to the show, which gives dealers and media the chance to see some of the new products that will be on the market for the upcoming riding season. I had a chance to cover the show once again for Pedal Magazine (see the stories at www.pedalmag.com) and it was as bling-blingy and fun as ever.

Where the 2005 shows seemed to be the year of the all-carbon-all-the-time attitude, 2006 seems to have manufacturers classing up their use of carbon with more dramatic and artistic molding, more paint-covered designs and mixing the weave with exotic materials such as carbon and magnesium.

The show this year also showed the increased popularity in triathlons, with dozens of manufacturers making components, bikes or clothing specifically designed for tri events. Triathlons are a fun alternative to just biking, and you’ll read more about these here on TheBikingHub in the future.

Anyway, after hours and hours of walking around the ExpoCycle show at Place Bonaventure in downtown Montreal, I’ve come up with a list of companies with products that really blew me away. Here’s my top 10 list of favourite items found at this year’s show.
These are in no particular order:

SRAM Road

One of the most hotly anticipated bike products in years made its Canadian production debut. The SRAM road grouppos, including the top-end Force and its sibling the Rival were on display. The two are clearly designed to compete directly with the Shimano Dura-Ace and Ultegra lineups, though their technology from the competition differs significantly. At 2,111 grams, the Force grouppo will retail for around $1,800US and has already been tested by numerous professional race teams. One of the highlights of the SRAM display in Montreal was an oversized copy of SRAM’s doubletap shifting system, which gives showgoers a better understanding of how the system works. If SRAM’s Force lineup is as good as the X.0 mountain group, we could be in for some hot competition.

2007 Shimano XTR

Not far from SRAM’s booth was its drivetrain rival Shimano. The Japanese component giant brought its new XTR mountain bike grouppo to Canada for the first time, and like the SRAM road lineup, the anticipation has been huge on the XTR. This marks the first complete rebuild on the XTR line since 2003, and it includes everything from new wheels to a new front derailleur. The new parts are lighter, stiffer and more functional than their predecessors, but the new technology doesn’t come cheap. The XTR crankset with an outboard bearing bottom bracket carries an MSRP of $896 CDN. The dual-control shift/brake levers with hydraulic brakes are $679.

Cateye Flex Tight mount

This is one of those odd little items that could easily get lost in the sea of new high-tech and expensive items. Cateye, which is distributed in Canada by cycling giant Cycles Lambert, had a unique display with a darkened tent showing off its updated line of cycling lights. The company has taken major leaps with its LED commuter light technology by increasing the light output by 100% across the board. Cateye also has a new cycling computer called the Strata, which uses a unique setup allowing the entire head unit to act as one large button. But what really caught my attention was the new mount used in both the new lights and computer. The Flex Tight bracket is a plastic mount that can be adjusted to any size of bar and allows the computer or light to swivel, making it easier to mount on a stem if needed.

Crank Bros.

Rarely does an American company offer something only available in Canada, but at the Norco booth Crank Bros. displayed the Acid all-mountain pedal which is only expected to be available north of the border. It’s available in an Alloy version for $165 or a Magnesium/carbon version for $315.

Dakine

Oregon-based Dakine is continuing to expand into Canada. For the first time the company is offering dedicated women’s hydration packs which are shorter, have altered shoulder straps, and a more feminine embroidered logo font. Dakine has redesigned its popular Drafter $100 hydration pack with more room for tools, a 2-litre pack and a quick disconnect hose. The company also has also introduced a $50 Defender freeride/DH glove with composite knuckle protection split down the middle to better fit the hand. For traveling, Dakine has a new $400 bike bag that is designed to hold a heavy downhill bike.

Louis Garneau

Quebec’s Louis Garneau has dozens of new clothing products for 07 including lower prices on all of their road bikes. On the clothing and accessory side, Garneau introduced the Carbon-soled T-Flex MTB shoe, the X-Gel half-finger glove, a new triathlon jersey, new sunglasses, and a women’s specific bib short which was designed in conjunction with Lyne Bessette. On the bike side, prices are significantly lowered by as much as $3,000 on the top-end Sonix 6.5, which is now selling for around $7,000. Louis Garneau shelved it’s small mountain bike segment and is now focusing on its popular kids, hybrid and road lines, which will include a brand new Airstream 8.8 time trial frame for 2007.

Ryders Eyewear

The sunglass maker introduced a number of new models for 2007, but the highlight was the Tangent, full-coverage sport glasses with removable lenses and a unique frame design. The $70 sunglasses have rubberized nose and ear pieces to keep them in place during cycling, running or snowsports.

KHS

On the mountain bike side, KHS is now offering full suspension bikes using the Horst Link design starting at less than $700. But at the top of the line for 2007 is the $4,999 KHS XC 909, which is a Canadian-only XC race team bike designed by Ontario racer Josh Hall. The bike uses the stock Team cross country frame, but with a lightweight package hand-picked by Hall that includes Fox suspension, Spinergy wheels and the complete new XTR grouppo.

Veltec’s A-Lines

Included in the distribution company’s new products for 2007 is the A-Line footbed. Though it has been around for a few years, this will mark the first time the A-Lines are available in Canada. Their selling feature is the fact they straighten the alignment of the foot and leg while using a plastic shoe insert that won’t break down or deteriorate. The $55 insert is custom selected for each rider based on a laser alignment test done at bike shops that carry the A-Lines. The whole fitting process takes about five minutes, but the results are remarkable.

Scott Spark 30

The recent returnee to the North American market continues to impress with its carbon offerings in both the road and mountain bike segments. Drawing some major attention in the Scott booth this year is the Scott Spark 30, a ridiculously lightweight full-carbon all-mountain bike retailing for $4,399. It’s a nice alternatively to far-more-expensive Ransom. Scott also had on display his-and-hers Plasma time trial bikes. There’s the Plasma LTD for him at $8,899 and the Contessa Plasma TT for her at $5,799.

As for Interbike, watch for daily coverage on www.pedalmag.com and follow up stories here on TBH.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 19th, 2006 at 4:49 am and is filed under Events, Industry news, Sneak peeks. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.