You would think that a new bike line would surprise us, but somehow we almost expected this. Don’t get us wrong though, we are still looking forward to seeing Ullrich’s line of three hand-crafted, Italian made, bikes up close. Prices are expected to range from €1,395 ($1,800) to €2,995 ($3,850) – did we mention this is frame only? Each one will bare a name related to a major success in his cycling career.

The Campione – the entry level offering – is named after his 1993 amateur world championship victory. It’s an aluminum frame / carbon rear stay combo, that will be custom manufactured to rider measurements. Next in the product line is the Olymp, which was named after Jan’s Sydney Olympics medals. It will be available in six different sizes and four color combinations. The Olymp should set buyers back €1,895 ($2,450) retail. The grand-daddy of the line will be known as the Grand Route – named after his 1997 Tour victory. Like the Campione it will only be available in custom sizing following a measurement and fitting session. Again, buyers get the choice of four different color variations.

Read - Note: Site in German text only

Posted by David at 2:56 PM | Permalink

Vacation travel can be a bitter sweet proposition for cyclists. Flying with a bike isn’t practical, but without one, you can miss out on a week or two worth of training, and, more importantly, the opportunity to try out some different routes. Thankfully, Colorado based ExperiencePlus heard the market calling. Starting this year, cyclists heading to France and Italy can reserve a road bike, hybrid, or tandem through the company’s European bike rental division - BikeRentalsPlus!. The company will even deliver its bikes - free of charge - to hotels and villas in parts of Southern France and Northern Italy. Additional services they provide include bike fittings, design of local tours, luggage shuttle service (for self guided tours), and rental of roof racks, saddle bags etc.

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Posted by David at 12:04 PM | Permalink

The Kansas City Star has a short article that looks at several fitness monitors on the market today. While it’s not the full expose some might hope for, the article does cover the pros and cons of several major brands.

Among GPS based devices, Garmin gets high praise as it “continues to dominate” its market with both its Forerunner and Edge units. Within the heart-rate monitor segment, the article suggests looking at the “well reviewed” Polar F11. On the other hand if convergence is the motivator, the roughly $10/month BIM Active software, which ties into Sprint/Nextel cell-phones, allows users to track variables like speed, distance, elevation and calories burned. BIM’s website suggests that carrying a phone in a “rear pocket works great” for cyclists, though it’s “best to face the back of the phone away from your body to minimize interference with GPS reception”.

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Posted by David at 2:25 PM | Permalink

During the ‘05 Tour de France, Google-Earth offered up a new and, well, pretty amazing way to check out the route’s detail - you just had to be willing to spend some time finding the towns and roads along each stage. Thanks to a Tour fan who mapped out every stage of the ’06 Tour in Google Earth, searching for the route is a now a thing of the past. In addition to the more obvious points-of-interest – like start and finish lines – each stage also identifies the location of sprints, as well as climbs and their level of difficulty.

While the map feature alone will appeal to most Tour fans, the creator of the route map is encouraging others to join together in a sort of Tour de France social-networking mashup that would integrate geo-tagged photos and movies from the likes of Flicker, YouTube, and Google-Video. He is also hoping that someone – like the racing teams themselves…hint…hint…nudge…nudge – will offer up real time rider telemetry. We've seen some of these features used within Google Earth for things like flight tracking and expanded local detail (like National Geographic's "Africa"). If the Google Earth Tour project reaches its full potential – which we truly hope it does – it could offer up an entirely new way to experience details of the Tour without actually being there. Stay tuned…

Read [via Google Earth Blog]

Posted by David at 4:58 PM | Permalink