Thursday, January 12, 2017

Fighting Over Scraps

In the cutthroat world of Fred bike marketing, every lump and dimple is prized.  So you can bet when one of these boils or recesses appears on another company's bike a real slap fight ensues:

On Tuesday Velocite CEO Victor Major pointed the finger at Pinarello after the Italian brand unveiled the new Dogma F10 frame that has a concaved down tube to improve aerodynamics around the bottle-cage area. The new bike will be used by Team Sky during the 2017 season. Major claimed in a blog post on the Velocite website that he has patented that design idea in China and Taiwan and that “with the new Dogma F10 your use of our intellectual property is deliberate.”

I love the idea that a "concaved down tube to improve aerodynamics around the bottle-cage area" even matters.  As if bike tech and not abusing the TUE system is what's going to win Sky the Tour de France.  Please.

Pinarello has hit back, giving their side of the story and suggesting that it is Velocite who has refused to provide ‘essential information’ to back up their claims. Pinarello also pointed out that aerodynamic frames have been sold for many years.

“Cicli Pinarello SpA, as a leading company in the cycling sector, obviously takes Intellectual Property issues with the utmost seriousness, Pinarello itself being a patent holder,” Pinarello said it its statement.

It's true, Pinarello is absolutely "a leading company in the cycling sector," especially when it comes to stealing ideas.  You know, like when they took that rear suspension idea from Moots:


(A bike rider attempting to understand a thing he is looking at.)

To wit:


(Moots YBB)

It's almost like these legacy Italian bike companies are out of ideas.  That would certainly explain 3T's aero gravel bike:


Designed by Gerard Vroomen, it's the answer to the question nobody has ever asked, namely: "What would happen if a Cervélo fucked a cyclocross bike?"

One area in which Italian bike companies remain unmatched however is in creating websites that will kill your computer with Flash animation.  This is why you should never, ever, ever visit one, regardless of how tempting it may be:


Yes, the Cipollini universe is one in which size still very much matters:


As does fluidity:


Something Cipollini and our President-elect share in common.

I have to say that life in the Cipollini factory is not quite how I imagined it:


I'd pictured it more like this:


Though there does seem to be plenty of rhythmic thrusting:


And it's hard not to read too deeply into the lengthy process of stroking and boring to which the gaping bottom bracket shell is subjected:


Coincidentally, 14 hours of work is also how much time an unfinished Mario Cipollini requires:


(Cipo switching hands again at around hour seven.)

And this quote pretty much sums up the entire road bike industry:


Making things simple should be the easy part, but when a machine is as simple as a bike you really do have to employ all manner of design gimmickry to make one stand apart from the other.  However, even the gimmickry soon becomes indistinguishable, which is why all the Fred bikes look like this now:
I like when they make a big deal about how a pro is "testing" a new bike so they can make a big deal about how it measured up to his exacting standards, when in reality a rider like Sagan would probably race and win on a Bikesdirect special without noticing.

Can't wait to see who accuses who of stealing the hot new "t-boned a car" downtube look:


I'm sure if you paired that with a "concaved down tube to improve aerodynamics around the bottle-cage area" and a bottom bracket shell that's been lovingly rubbed by an Italian for 14 hours you'd get a bike so fast it would defy time and space.

In other news, as I type this the city's greatest minds are working to solve one of the most perplexing problems of our age:
Call me crazy, but I'd start by moving the cars and parking them someplace else.

Yeah, I know, I'll never get a city job with that attitude.  Making simple things complicated is even more vital to municipal politics than it is to designing plastic bicycles.  I'm sure after commissioning an expensive six-year study at taxpayer expense they'll end up deciding to give the bike lane another coat of paint.  Meanwhile, the Google street view reveals a total shitshow, and they've even got a Dumpster in there:


Not to mention a banged-up unmarked car and a marked one blocking two crosswalks at the same time just because:


This is basically the situation at every precinct in the city, and you'd think with all the money we spend on America's largest police force we could figure out a place for them to put their cars.  Honestly, as a cyclist I'd even be glad to give them the whole goddamn bike lane if it meant they'd finally get their all their shit off the fucking sidewalk.  Maybe for the price of a few feet of bike lane here and there the police wouldn't be so hard on cyclists and the pedestrians could actually walk.

Just a thought.

62 comments:

Seattle lone wolf said...

Marge!

Lieutenant Oblivious said...

Second Scranus, bitches!

Lieutenant Oblivious said...

"I can take about an hour on the tower of power, as long as I get a little golden shower" - Frank Zappa

Goldengate? More like Orangegate!

cyclejerk said...

Yeeeee Hawwwww!

Unknown said...

200. Until the industrial system has been thoroughly wrecked, the destruction of that system must be the revolutionaries’ ONLY goal. Other goals would distract attention and energy from the main goal. More importantly, if the revolutionaries permit themselves to have any other goal than the destruction of technology, they will be tempted to use technology as a tool for reaching that other goal. If they give in to that temptation, they will fall right back into the technological trap, because modern technology is a unified, tightly organized system, so that, in order to retain SOME technology, one finds oneself obliged to retain MOST technology, hence one ends up sacrificing only token amounts of technology.

Wrench Monkey said...

I'm just fighting over scraps, here.

Visegripmikey said...

I'm starting a new trend. I'm just saying "PASSING" from now on. Any fucker who thinks I'm passing on the right is an idiot. Saying "ON YOUR LEFT" doesn't mean shit. Like I'm going to just ride beside you. Sheesh.

Unknown said...

vsk said ...

In the Tennus !

I like the Garbanzo Bean / Chick Pea joke ... shows at least a little creativity.

just sayin.

vsk

Anonymous said...

So are all the pee jokes used up yet?

recumbent conspiracy theorist said...

Top 10. Scranus.

N/A said...

If I had an Italian lovingly rubbing my downtube for 14 hours, I'd probably be pretty chafed.

N/A said...

Aww man, Snobs said "bottom bracket" not "downtube". Well that renders my last post quite bereft of its intended humor. DAMNIT.

Unknown said...

vsk said ...

Patented in China ... that's funny rat there.




vsk

Lieutenant Oblivious said...

Sometimes when my wife makes chili I eat like a slob and get garbanzo bean on my face.

Freddy Murcks said...

While today's post is short on the words, it is long on Mario Cipollini. Do you think that there might be some connection between Cipo's hyper-masculinity and the fact that his last name literally translates to 'the little onion'? It seems like the sort of thing that he might feel the need to overcompensate for.

cdinvb said...

Better put a coke-bottle shape on 'em for when they go trans-sonic?

Anonymous said...

Does Cipo have a "concaved down tube"?

Serial Retrogrouch said...

...there's an easier way to solve the parking shitshow at the corner of Dekalb and Classon (88th precinct): make them copper ride their bikes to work. The parking is exacerbated because all them copper ride their cars from Long Island, and park it on the sidewalk AND the bike lane. Of course, a precinct's gotta have copper cars that need to be parked too.

Anonymous said...

Snobby, you missed the great irony of Pinarello (who I'm no fan of, but ya gotta respect the marketing-mojo of guys who can take what is a rather ordinary plastic bike and sell the whole shootin' match to Louis Vuitton for piles o' cash) being accused by the CHINESE, the suppliers of Chinarello and knock-off Colnago, S-Works and gawd-knows-what-else, of stealing their patented idea!!! As The Simpson's Seymour Skinner would say, "My world has gone topsy-turvy!"

Grump said...

Stop making fun of President 3 way. (There WILL be reeducation camps)

Unknown said...

NYPD could fit their cars alongside the bike lane if they used Smart Cars.

BikeSnobNYC said...

Unknown,

They do.

--Wildcat Etc.

Drock said...

My sled tested positive again, my braze on water bottle threads defy all and it was produced in 87'. Guess they call it super sport for good reason.

boys on the hoods said...

When the Cervello fucked the 'cross bike was it at least vertically stiff and laterally compliant??

Dave said...

I defy Time and Space every day. Too bad they just ignore me, and I get nowhere. "From hell's heart I stab the thee, Time and Space!" See? Nothing.

1904 Cadardi said...

"As if bike tech and not abusing the TUE system is what's going to win Sky the Tour de France. " - WCRM

"I don’t think the public have any need to lose trust in Team Sky" - Dave Brailsford

Who should you believe? (hint, it's our friend and loyal author Snob)

janinedm said...

Sometimes in traffic where you can end up on the left side of the road, I pass on the right. I think that whoever is passing should do so on the side with the cars.

bad boy of the north said...

perhaps someone will engineer aerodynamics on the next citibike iteration.

Chazu said...

Yeah but, as far as I know, space and time are not distinct entities. The are combined in what the physics Freds call "spacetime."

A concentration of mass such as a planet or star actually distorts spacetime and creates gravity.Even a tomato distorts spacetime to so extent, but it isn't noticeable or even measurable. The physics Freds proved last year that gravity waves travel across spacetime (the LIGO experiments). If you spend a bit of time near a supermassive object, (black hole) the distortion in spacetime is so profound that time will actually slow down for you.

All that to say, perhaps the mass of all those vehicles in the bike lanes are keeping us a bit younger as we ride past.

Old Steel Frame Fuji said...

"Pinarello has hit back"

A left and a right and Schmeling is down.

Dooth said...

If I catch a Cervélo trying to fuck my bike...I'll cut its ball bearings off.

Putin on the Ritz said...

Grump@255: Hey, give the guy a break, all he did was watch two prostitutes pee on each other. It's a standard room service at Russian hotels.

Sounds exactly like the kind of entertainment a swamp denizen would enjoy whacking off to.

PS Putin has watched the the video a thousand times. Laughs his ass off every time he sees it. Sure beats watching The Apprentice.

anonymous said...

Enough with the bashing of our President Elect. I don't come here for politics. Come to think of it, I'm not sure why I come here at all. But shitcan the snowflake whining or we are done forever. You will not be warned again.

wishiwasmerckx said...

The next guy to check into Trump's hotel room was told by staff that a couple of Russian call girls had pissed all over the bed, and the guy earnestly asked, "And how much extra is that?

1904 Cadardi said...

@Rebeccah Bell has a point.

Don't burn out too early making fun of Hair Trumpf right now. Leave something in the tank for all the ensuing wacky hijinks over next four years. Otherwise you'll have to invent new words to describe the bat shit crazy things you just know he's going to do. (Tweeting the names of US spies? Snorting coke with Kim Jong Un? WW3?)

Some guy from upstate said...

Wow, I got the T-boned a car down tube look on my 1972 Raleigh Grand Prix frame recently. I hope Mike Sinyard's lawyers don't come after me

leroy said...

Dear Mr. BSNYC - Speaking of NYC sidewalks, my dog took this picture this AM. He says it's a circle of life thing.

Dear Ms. Rebeccah Bell @ 5:30pm - My dog asked me to send you a link to the following picture; he hopes it lifts your spirits because you seem a wee bit pissed off.

He and I both agree it's impolite and a tad un-American to tell someone what they can talk about on their blog.

BikeSnobNYC said...

Bye Rebeccah!

--Wildcat Etc.

bad boy of the north said...

Perhaps they have it all wrong.maybe DJP is a Beatles fan and he said he likes "golden slumbers".

bad boy of the north said...

Darn it!Meant DJT....Eh,you know whom!

Olle Nilsson said...

I'm sure if you paired that with a "concaved down tube to improve aerodynamics around the bottle-cage area" and a bottom bracket shell that's been lovingly rubbed by an Italian for 14 hours you'd get a bike so fast it would defy time and space.

Not to mention you'd get Mike Sinyard all up in your sphincter over stealing his T-bTTT™*

*T-bone Top Tube Technology™

Bogusboy said...

The Great Lob is telling you to get the fuck out of NYC.

Chechnya is now our problem too said...

Bash away I say. How relentlessly and shamelessly he trolled O for his birth certificate. Now, will someone rich and powerful please dog Golden Shower Hair for his tax returns? Yuge amount of debt to the Russian mob, it will show. We're to blame for his erection, tiny as it may be.

Eric the Infrequent said...

Thank you.

Sax Huret said...

My favorite thing about that Pinarello story is that they also "stole" the "skip a number in your series of numbered models" thing by going from F8 to F10. Cannondale and Bianchi have already done that OTTOMH.

biorider said...

My frame bending experience is not a T-bone but rear ending a parked car. I screamed Scranus.

P.S. 'Rebeccah' is a robot.

Anonymous said...

That Special-ed downtube serves as an intergrated half-fender. Will it fit a 28C Pasela?

Stop at Nothing said...

Last time I crashed into something immobile, the frame remained true but it was the forks that bent backwards, the bike was a mid 70's Raleigh Record. It was hard to ride home because the front wheel had interference with the downtube.

Shammie Jewse said...

This!

babble on said...

And the last time I crashed into something I was the one with a bent frame. I think that was the one with the cracked tailbone. Or maybe the bruised spinal cord...? Or was it another of those damned concussions?? Can't remember. Dain Bramage.

Wish I were made of Ti, like my bike. Imagine the healthcare savings! Nope. Just a royal fucking mutard here, at your service. But if I were Ti, my doc would still be bored like he was before, diagnosing ear infections and UTI's, and I'd not have such an astounding number of points in my favour for ... who knew? The Paralympics. Yep. Imagine that.

Prolly a prime candidate for the special olympics, too, come to think of it. :-/

N/A said...

I bet you wear a helmet 24/7.

Die free said...

Get their chit off the sidewalk?

That will never happen because as you know, they are the law! And you won't fuck around no more.

TaddyMason said...

@rebbecah bell

As soon as I hear the word "whining" my hearing shuts down

TaddyMason said...

@BikeSnobNYC

Lately I've been riding helmetless, just a beanie protecting my delicate egg, the feeling is intoxicating!

SuperDave said...

B'Snob, your ignorance really has no limits. Bike tech winning the Tour? Like in '89? As if the bicycle industry started around the time you took your training wheels off. ca. 1910: http://www.nostalgic.net/arc/bicycles/thumbs/1910piercechainlesscl3.jpg

N/A said...

Haha, my comment at 10:16 was directed to Rebbecah Bell, I thought I had addressed it. *makes drinky drinky motion*
The fact that it's right after Ms. Babble makes it look like I was talking about her. Though, let's face it, she should probably be wearing a helmet most of the day, too.

The Olympics on Crutches Could Be Next said...

Babble at 10:13 "The Paralympics. Yep."

To our Canadian heroine, who we love for her frankness on many subjects (OK, mainly on the environment and sex). Humm, Paralympics, won't that involve lots of training, which in turn could lead to even more adventures in socialized medicine?

JLRB said...

Rebeccah - If you are looking for Donald, he was spotted eating at McDonalds - he came for the golden arches

Wesley Bellairs said...

Victor Major? Wasn't he in Airplane!?

alicetaylor said...

I would like to thank you for your nicely written post

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Tony M. said...

Good post.

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