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Looking back at the reports for the Bicycle Design Amazon store, it is clear that the book Bicycling Science is the best seller of the items I have listed. I am glad to see that, because it is definitely the first book that I would recommend to anyone interested in the design and engineering of bicycles (followed by Archibald Sharpe’s 1896 Bicycles and Tricycles). Originally published in 1982 by The MIT Press, Bicycling Science by Frank Rowland Whitt and David Gordon Wilson is now in its 3^rd edition. Richard Ballantine called it, “the ultimate fundamentals book in cycle science” and went on to say, “for anyone with a deep interest in cycling science and human power, this book is simply essential.”

Cleaning my office this week, I found an extra copy of the book (the 2^nd edition printed in 1988). Since I don’t really need two copies, I am going to give it away one to a Bicycle Design reader. All you have to do is follow Bicycle Design on Twitter or like the Facebook page then just mention this post in either place. I will pick a random winner one week from today (Thursday, July 1^st at 12:00pm EST) and ship my extra copy of the book to that person. Some of you may be thinking, “great…a used 20 year old paperback. What is that, like a 2 dollar value?” Well, don’t worry, I found a couple other old (um…I mean classic) books, during my cleanup, so I’ll throw in at least one other book as well. Sure it is not as good as a free bike, but I do think the books will interest any of you who read this blog on a regular basis. Good luck!

Update 7/1: Brian Potstra (@bpotstra on Twitter) was the randomly selected winner and will receive the copy of Bicycling Science as well as a 1976 copy of ‘Winning Bicycle Racing’ by Jack Simes. Congrats to Brian!

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Santa Cruz Syndicate's Greg Minnaar (SRAM/RockShox) shows that he can win on any track as he puts his strengths to the test and wins here in Leogang, Austria at the 3rd UCI World Cup Downhill. Steve Peat is back on track narrowly missing the podium by .05 seconds and placing 6th, bumping him up to 12th overall in the series, and Josh Bryceland had a horrible crash hitting a tree and stunned himself on his race run.



The week started out warm and pleasant in the breathtakingly beautiful village of Leogang, Austria. We celebrated Steve's 36th birthday at a nearby restaurant that served Tatar's Hat, a treat we only find in Austria where you place raw meat on a special cooker on your table, with a little moat around it filled with shredded vegetables and broth, which you drizzle over the sizzling meat. The owner of the restaurant was pleased to have us in the house and showed us her best hospitality by dancing and the table and from the rafters. It was unforgettable!



The summer weather quickly disappeared and the cold rain arrived making the course a muddy mess. Maxxis Wet Screams were in order in these conditions. As it was the course was dangerous and the mud had riders crashing all over the place in the qualifier. Greg was first man down and posted a 4:03, which held up for 2nd place. Steve and Josh both had muddy crashes in their qualifiers and placed 34th and 24th respectively and they both hoped to turn things around for the final.



The night before the race Steve commented that every time he wore the World Champs jersey he crashed. Ricky Bobby had a solution and suggested he crash before the start to get it over with. Race day Steve took it to heart and Ricky says,

"Steve did the Dead Turtle before the start and threw himself into the bushes, through the fence, into someone's front garden, pulling up flowers and rolling around in the mud to get the jersey dirty." Apparently the strategy worked and Steve had a great run, upright, and crossed the line in 4:11.82 and held the hotseat for over a half hour while creeping into the top ten. It looked like the podium was in reach until Cameron Cole came across the line just .05 seconds faster. "Now I know how Greg felt at World's," said Steve.



Fifteen minutes later Josh was on course and after the first split he slipped in the greasy conditions and was sent sideways in the air and his head and shoulders took a direct hit into a tree at quite high speed. Concussed, he stood up, walked off the track and sat for a bit before cruising down the side of the course, not to finish the race. He felt as though he may have separated his shoulder and was still in shock at the bottom. Josh said, "The weekend was good and I found my pace again, but I am devastated to crash out like that. It's not where I want to be in the overall, but I'm ready now to prepare for Champery and Val Di Sole."



Soon Gee Atherton came through the finish with a time of 4:06.39, a staggering 5 seconds faster than Cameron Cole and Steve, each on 4:11. This looked to be a lofty goal to reach, but Greg was up to the task and put .74 seconds into Gee with a 4:05.65 at the finish after being down on Gee 2.22 seconds at the first split. With fastest qualifier Sam Blenkinsop last he was flying down the track, but was getting out of shape at the bottom. He also finished on 4:11, dashing Steve's hope for a podium, but it secured Greg's win (in front of some of the PMB oneLife crew in attendance), for his 2nd World Cup win this season. It was his 13th UCI Downhill career win, with 8 of those wins on Santa Cruz, 2 of which were on the Carbon V-10 and Edge wheels. This was also his 45th World Cup podium, which ties Nico Voilleuz record, and is 5 behind Steve's 50 career podiums.



Steve was happy and said, "It's nice to be back up there and I was pretty solid. I didn't rip any trees up and kept my speed up through the muddy sections. I feel better about myself now. I came into the weekend to have fun and get up to speed. I felt better riding my Santa Cruz Carbon V-10 and Greg dragged me back up to speed. Thanks Greg! Jon Cancellier from SRAM/RockShox had my bike dialed and thanks to Ricky Bobby for the mint bike. I'm enjoying my riding again."



Greg was very happy, and surprised to win with the run he had. Greg says, "It was an amazing weekend with a 2nd in qualifier and 1st in the race. The race was really hard and conditions made it hard to stay on line and even on the track. I made a few big mistakes on the top. I wanted to be smooth and carry speed and work hard on the pedaling, but it didn't really happen that way and I was all over the place and taking dabs with my gangly legs. Thanks to Doug for having my bike perfect!"



We now have half of the World Cup season under our belt and Greg is still in the leaders jersey, 73 points ahead of Gee Atherton. With 4 weeks until the next World Cup, this week we will be competing at the Pro GRT race in Northstar at Lake Tahoe, California. Josh may sit this one out depending on the doctor's report on his shoulder.



Pro Men's Downhill Results:



1st: GREG MINNAAR (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 4:05.65

2nd: Gee Atherton 4:06.39

3rd: Aaron Gwin 4:10.09

4th: Sam Blenkinsop 4:11.17

5th: Cameron Cole 4:11.77

6th: STEVE PEAT (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 4:11.82

7th: Bendan Fairclough 4:12.61

8th: Justin Leov 4:12.93

9th: Matti Lehikoinen 4:13.25

10th: Matt Simmonds 4:13.82

DNF: Josh Bryceland



Pro Men's Overall Standings:



1st: GREG MINNAAR (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 660

2ND: Gee Atherton 587

3rd: Aaron Gwin 410

4th: Cameron Cole 404

5th: Sam Blenkinsop 394

6th: Brendan Fairclough 345

7th: Justin Leov 274

8th: Matti Lehikoinen 265

9th: Fabien Pedemanaud 257

10th: Marc Beaumont 232

12th: STEVE PEAT (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 222

30TH: JOSH BRYCELAND (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 138

Thanks to the Syndicate sponsors:

SANTA CRUZ BICYCLES
SRAM, ROCKSHOX, AVID, TRUVATIV
EDGE COMPOSITES
MAXXIS
CLIF BAR
MUC-OFF
LIZARD SKINS
WTB
CRANKBROTHERS
CHRIS KING
TROY LEE DESIGNS
FIVE TEN

Cast: santa cruz bikes

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Stephen Britt is one of three finalists in the UK based Barclays ‘Take One Small Step competition’, where he could win £50,000 to develop his idea into a business. His “Fast Forward” entry, the only cycling related product in the contest, is a pair of electric assist pedals. Stephen explains the idea behind his e-pedals:

“These replace your standard pedals and provide you with assistance to get you up hills, or carry heavy loads. Each pedal incorporates a motor, gearbox, Li-po batteries and a control board. As you pedal the sensors detect your effort and provide assistance. To pedal without assistance, simply flip the pedals over. They unclip and slot into a charger for charging, much like with a power tool. When fully developed they will provide a range of 10 miles and peak power of 200W. They will retail for around £200.”

You can see a video of Stephen explaining his business idea here on the Barclays website. It is not completely clear to me how this system will work based on the description in the video, but it is an interesting project that I would like to see developed further. If you agree, you can vote for Stephen’s idea to between now and July 5th. The R&D funding will go to the idea that gets the most public votes, so I would rather see it go to a cycling project than anything else.

Thanks to Peter from VeloVision and Electric Bike Magazine for the tip.

Update 7/15: Mr.  Britt won the £50,000 prize to develop this product further. Read more at Bike Biz.

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dirt jumping in salt lake city. early morning

Cast: santa cruz bikes

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Cycling out of Poverty is a non-profit foundation that raises money for projects that allow Africans to improve their daily lives through the use of bicycles. Currently, they are running an African Bicycle Design Contest at Wiki-Bike.com. On the website, you can read about the competition and you can upload your own ideas for durable and sustainable bicycles for Africa.

The deadline for the contest is 5 pm on Thursday, September 30th, 2010. At that point, a professional jury will judge all contributions and select 5 winning designs.  Those five winners will be awarded with a design team who will develop the designs / ideas into working prototypes. The design team that delivers the best prototype will win a 10-day trip to Kenya to train and assist a Kenyan team in producing this bicycle. For a little background on the African Bicycle Design project, check out this video featuring a team of four industrial design students from the Delft University of Technology who worked with people in Kenyan last year to develop a street vending bicycle.

I am honored and excited to be serving as one of the jurors for the 2010 competition. It is certainly my hope that we will have many great ideas to choose from, so I encourage all of you to go to the site, register, and submit your ideas for a bike to help the people of Africa. Who knows…maybe your concept will be the one that really makes a difference.

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Santa Cruz Syndicate’s Greg Minnaar (SRAM/RockShox) retains the leader’s jersey in the UCI World Cup Downhill Series with a 3rd place finish today on this dry, dusty, brutal track in Fort William, Scotland. Steve Peat and Josh Bryceland made improvements on their qualifying runs, but still battled to get the flow just right and placed 18th and 26th respectively. As always, the crowd and atmosphere here at Fort William was vibrant with over 7,000 people watching the downhill.

Starting the series with a win in Maribor and coming into Fort William wearing the leaders jersey was a great position for Greg to spring from. In Saturday’s qualifier Greg put together a solid run and clinched the 1st place points towards the individual ranking. Feeling happy with his result he did a few back flips into the airbag in the pits.

Fort William was packed on race day and the riders looked forward to hearing the cheers as they enter the finish arena. The crowd is especially loud for the UK riders and when Steve was on track they were roaring. At the second split we could see he was off the pace, yet the fans gave the reigning World Champ a hearty welcome as he crossed the line. Greg was the last man down with Gee Atherton now in the hotseat. He rode smooth and steady, but was just 1.21 behind Gee at the finish for third, with Cameron Cole in 2nd. “As a result it’s pretty good, but I wanted to win here,” said Greg. Josh had a run that felt solid, yet he finished 11 seconds off the pace.

Steve felt like he had some good moments in his race run but says, “This week I’ve been busy between launching the Steve Peat Syndicate and Steve Peat downhill game app, with practice and racing and I thought I dealt with it good. Today my practice to race time was busy. I usually get to sleep for an hour, but today I was also signing autographs at the Monster booth, and manning the SPS booth. It’s hard not to be around for the fans to sign books and autographs, and its good to see each and every one of the fans.

In my race I went quicker than my qualifier, but other people when faster too, and I wasn’t happy about that. I felt I did kill sections and in years past I probably could’ve won with a time like that. Guys are fitter these days and pushing even harder. I’ve had a busy winter so I’m not as fit as I could be. I want to make the most out of my World Championship title and I want to support and give back to the sport and the fans. This weekend it’s really kicked in and I’m going to knuckle down and get training. I’m going to ride a lot next week and get back on top of things.”

The next race up is The Wheels of Speed event this week in Willingen, Germany where Greg and Josh will compete.

Learn about the details of the Steve Peat Syndicate here: stevepeatsyndicate.com

Men’s Downhill results:
1st Gee Atherton 4:35.70
2nd Cameron Cole 4:36.18
3rd GREG MINNAAR (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 4:36.91
4th Aaron Gwin 4:37.71
5th Mick Hannah 4:37.75
18th Steve Peat (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 4:44.27
26th Josh Bryceland (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE) 4:46.31

Men’s World Cup Overall Standings:
1st GREG MINNAAR (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE): 420 points
2nd Gee Atherton: 405
3rd Cameron Cole: 282
4th Aaron Gwin: 240
5th Brendan Fairclough: 239
17th Josh Bryceland (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE): 138
25th Steve Peat (SANTA CRUZ SYNDICATE): 127

Thanks to the Syndicate sponsors:

SANTA CRUZ BICYCLES

SRAM, ROCKSHOX, AVID, TRUVATIV

EDGE COMPOSITES

MAXXIS

CLIF BAR

MUC-OFF

LIZARD SKINS

WTB

CRANKBROTHERS

CHRIS KING

TROY LEE DESIGNS

FIVE TEN

Cast: santa cruz bikes

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David Parrott is developing an interesting semi-enclosed recumbent trike for his Master’s thesis in Industrial Design at the University of Cincinnati DAAP. I mentioned his Trimtab 3×3 concept briefly in a previous post, but it is worth a second mention to point out that David is currently building a functional prototype of the design at Losantiville Kunstwerkhaus, a collaborative design/fabrication studio that he started in Cincinnati with a low-impact mobility theme. Take a look at the Trimtab 3×3 Flickr set to see additional renderings of the vehicle and photos of the prototype that is currently under construction. You can also follow the Losantiville Kunstwerkhaus blog for updates on the project as the prototype progresses.

David explained that he designed the Trimtab as a transportation design project created through the lens of “Slow Design”. He points out that, “it’s a 3WD, electric-assisted, lean steered delta trike with seasonal fabric skins & seating (breathable, ripstop nylon for summer; therm-a-rest style inflatable skins for winter), an acrylic aircraft-style canopy, and flatbed storage.”

He went on to mention that his design  “challenges some of the basic dogma of the bike design scene (Rear steer! Yikes!) as well as the “I can draw it but I can’t build it”, styling-driven methodology” that is increasingly common in the Industrial Design field these days. I have heard some very strong criticism of all rear steer bike or trike designs here on the blog, so I am curious to hear what you all think of David’s lean steer concept. Hopefully when the prototype is complete, he will post some video of it in action to prove the concept, so to speak. I am definitely anxious to see the results…and I wish I could ride it to see for myself.

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It is almost the weekend, so I will leave you with a handful of fun links for Friday afternoon. Designboom posted a few bike designs by Peter Varga, including the glossy modern folding penny-farthing concept pictured here. While you are at Designboom, take a look at all the recent posts tagged with ‘bikes”. It has been a popular subject for them lately.

In keeping with the modern penny-farthing theme, here is one that is not quite as polished, but is definitely a head turner. Believe it or not, this monster trike is a fixed gear too (with a very low gear to get that big heavy tire rolling). I don’t know how difficult this thing is to ride, but I would love to try it and find out for myself

The Bicycle is Art is a brand new blog, but they already have a couple of interesting posts. The “aluminum foil faux Porsche pedal car” almost challenges the Monster bike tall trike for sheer outrageousness…almost.

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