Gerald's FS Eriksen

The latest in Gerald's wonderful fleet
A custom Kent Eriksen MTB with tubeless wheels, XT/XTR parts and a Yeti carbon rear end
Lovely !

Introducing Ben Hallam

Ben is the newest member of the Bespoke family and I am thrilled to have him
He runs the Performance Lab here (Bike fit studio, treatment room and our Assessment room)

Being born into a cycling family, Ben was always destined to race bikes. His uncle, Ian Hallam, was 3 times Commonwealth champion on the track and Ben followed in his footsteps, winning the junior national pursuit championships as well as representing Great Britain at 2 Junior World Championships and 2 Under 23 European Championships. Ben also applied his pursuiting prowess to win multiple junior and under 23 time trial titles. While chasing the professional cycling dream, Ben spent 4 years living and racing on the road in France and Belgium which culminated in completing the Tour of Britain.

Looking for ways to use the sporting experience, Ben completed a degree in BSc Sports Rehabilitation and Injury Prevention in 2010. The degree focuses on the assessment and treatment on musculoskeletal injury through electrotherapy, soft tissue treatment and therapeutic exercise prescription.

Ben has developed his bike fitting philosophy based on the principles that he learnt from the degree. The core principle to Ben’s bike fitting comes from Burke (1988) who said that the key thing to remember when setting a bike up is that “the body is adaptable and the bike is adjustable”. This means that:
A) The body will adapt to a bad position (compromising posture and core stability) and consider this to be “normal”.

B) The body and the bike must be assessed and adjusted simultaneously. Adjusting the bike to a poor posture will reinforce the poor posture and cap the performance potential of the rider.

C) Through treatment and corrective exercise, body has potential to adapt towards maintaining a good posture and position. Therefore, bike fitting often has to be a progressive process where the bike is adjusted as the body adapts.
Therefore, during the Retul bike fitting sessions, Ben will identify areas of tightness and weakness in the body that can cause incorrect movement patterns, decreasing performance and increasing the susceptibility to injury. Ben can then address these issues in a one to one to one clinical session.

Sidas custom footbeds are here

When we hired Ben Hallam to run the bike fit studio/Performance lab I was delighted. He came with very high recommendations and little demands!
One thing he was insistent on was the Sidas footbed system as he has had great success with using it in the past
It arrived on Monday, and we have already had lots of bookings for footbeds - I think it will be a a great addition to the list of services we offer here

Look 695 (tester)

In the UK Look and Zipp are imported by the same company
We do alot of Look pedals and Zipp wheels and our rep has been trying to get us to stock Look frames as well
It helps in that he has an ally in Ben, who used to race a Look track bike when he was with the GB U-23 squad....

I relented an said I was keen to have a look as I have heard great things on the 695 - but a test ride period would be vital !

Here is our tester - please feel free to come and borrow it (if you can grab it off of Ben!)





This thing will NOT flex
It also has a very clever system whereby you can change the angle of the stem - limiting spacers and increasing front end stiffness





The crank is sold as part of the fuselage and is a real star. Its super stiff and you can change the effective crank length (so you can experiment with 170 vs 175 for instance). It also takes both compact and standard chain-ring sizes, so you can change over for the marmotte and then keep the 53/39 when you are doing some racing.....

Wish you were here?

Just got sent this from my mate Robert who has a place down near Kerry
I am super jealous !

Torque wrench review...

We are seeing alot more demand for torque wrench - I really do think its a tool everyone should invest in. Its not cheap, but then neither are your bikes !

Here is a great review from Pezcyclingnews

http://www.pezcyclingnews.com/?pg=fullstory&id=9519&status=True&catname=Tech%20News

Drinking the Trek Kool-aid

Greetings from Mayrhofen, a beautiful Ski resort in Austria where I have been a guest of Trek World
When I told Tom from Parlee I was going we engaged in some good natured banter and he warned me I would come back with orders for 50 pairs of Bontrager shoes, loads of town bikes etc etc !!

Its not been like that at all, but you will be seeing more Trek bikes at Bespoke going forward. Simply put they are amazing....






I spent half my demo rides on this bike - the top of the range 6.9 SSL
It only had a 39/25 on the back, and the climbs round here are epic steep (and its at altitude, and there have been plenty of evening refreshments). Excuses over, the bike climbed like a dream
I have been on Di2 alot recently, but I have forgotten how buttery smooth mechanical Dura Ace is




We have done alot of Speed Concept bikes in the last year, but to my shame I have not put a great deal of time on one myself (that will change as I have one coming very soon). However that was put right on this trip, and I loved it
It fit like a glove from the off, and I really like the 'wrist relief' aero extensions - it puts your hands in a great position.
This bike had the new Bontrager Aura wheels - they are being hyped as a 'Mavic carbone killer' as they test alot quicker in the wind tunnel. For under £900 I cannot think of a more aero wheelset - carbon wheels for every day rides!

Coolest bikes at the show were the new Andy and Fabian Team bikes they have just done for the boys at the Tour
The Andy bike looks so much better in the flesh than in the pics (and it matches our team kit perfectly!)








It will take a brave man, with very big legs to get one of these - but I hope one of you chaps do. Its absolutely jaw dropping in the flesh



How cool is that to look at!
Would certainly encourage you to dig that bit harder when you were starting to get tired !



Both team bikes are sporting the new D3 range of carbon wheels - they adopt the wider profile that has been popularized by HED and Zipp. Us mortals cannot get them until the start of the new year which is a nightmare as I would have bought them then and there if I could. For £50 you can choose white spokes and/or a choice of 12 decal colours. Perfect for you bike tarts !!