A mate of mine just built up this ludicrous machine. It’s completely over the top. A Specialized Venge with Lightweight clinchers, Di2, Quarq powermeter. There’s not much to upgrade except for an internal battery kit (and the McLaren frame - the first one arrives to Australia this week). Only a few people will be able to pull off the McLaren without getting flak for it.
I know what some of you are thinking, “Ah..c’mon… you gotta earn a bike like this! All these newbie cyclists riding these squillion dollar bikes is nonsense!” I don’t know why people get bent out of shape over this. You can’t own the same F1 car as Webber or Schumacher, but it’s not completely out of reach to have the same bike as Cav or Gossy. If you’ve got the money, why not?
By my calculations this bike is worth about $20k. Worth it?
Note: I cannot disclose the identity of the bike’s owner as his wife will either a) divorce him if she found out the price, or b) want a vacation worth an equal amount.
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- Left: If Andy Schleck had one of these chain catchers the 2010 TdF may have been very different. All the Venges come with these now. Right: I’m not sure what the intent is behind the headtube design is but it’s quite unique
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- Unfortunately a second bottle cage on the downtube will not fit on because of the battery. A new internal battery kit will be installed on this bike next week. Rumoured to only need charging every 6 months (Google Icarus or Calfee internal Di2 batteries).
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- C’mon mate, what do you need a powermeter for!?
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- A clever design for the saddle adjustment on all the S-Works seatposts
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- The carbon tied spokes of the Lightweights make them extremely stiff but still nice to ride
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- Just a shade under 7kg’s. Not weight weenie light, but pretty darn good.
If you have or know of a ridiculously beautiful bike that you’d like to feature, please drop me a line. It doesn’t need to be expensive, but it does need to be interesting. If it has a story that goes along with it, even better.