London Bike Show 2017

Last weekend, Adam and I took ourselves off to the London Bike Show at the ExCel to get some much needed inspiration for our training. While we were obviously most interested in the road aspect of cycling, I think we both came back with dreams of taking up mountain biking and BMX’ing too! There were some beautiful bikes on show as well as some very famous ones.

Cervelo S5 MTN Ltd Edition – £8,499…. with a 20% discount!

It was great to see so many UK based bike manufacturers at the show, we really seem to have some talented and innovative frame builders and designers in this country.

I fell in love with UK based Dolan’s DR1

A lot of the 2017 season bikes were on show, not least the Pinarello Dogma F10 which really blew us away with its smooth lines. It was on show in both Team Wiggins and Team Sky colours.

A pair of Pinarello Dogma F10’s

As I mentioned earlier there were also some pretty famous bikes on show. Famous enough was the Brownlee brothers’ Rio 2016 bike….

The Brownlees’ Rio Bike

….but then we saw this, Chris Boardman’s Lotus Olympic bike from Barcelona 1992

We had to have a photo with this massive piece of UK cycling history

It’s amazing to think that this bike is 25 years old this year, a fantastic piece of history.

We also made it round a lot of the clothing stands, we were most taken with the Chapeau! and Fat Lad At The Back stands. Adam bought a fetching pink number at the latter while I went for a more reserved blue number (ordered online because they didn’t have my size). Our sensible purchasing was almost undone by the appearance of an Um Bongo vest however….

They drink it in the Congo, apparently

I was most impressed with (and purchased) a multitool from Altum, a magnetic and modular system that combines the tools you need in your seat pack into one device. Very clever and I was happy to support them with a purchase.

As I said at the top of the post we could’ve quite easily come back converted into mountain bikers or BMX’ers, there some very enticing machines on show.

With the stands, bikes and the MTB air show it was well worth a visit however I would’ve liked to see more workshop stands (tools, cleaners and components) and advice. I was looking for a new saddle and was hoping to find someone at the show that could point me in the right direction but that wasn’t possible. All said we still had a good day out and a big thanks to Peter for my Manhattan Portage drawstring bag, it has come in very handy!

IAIN