What is SHIMANO LINKGLIDE?New LINKGLIDE Technology for Smoother Shifting and More Durable ComponentsTo fully
Ultimate Bike Protection from GtechniqWith over 20 years of experience protecting high-end vehicles in the automotive and marine industries, Gtechniq has become a trusted leader in surface protection. Now, Gtechniq brings its renowned smart surface technology to the cycling world, offering the same level of care and precision to bicycles. Developed in-house at Gtechniq's global headquarters in Northamptonshire, this range is tailored specifically for cyclists seeking to protect and maintain their bikes. Gtechniq’s bike care line includes:
Introducing M Part's New Front Pannier Racks: Tour AVS and Explorer Low RiderM Part has expanded its range of front pannier racks with two exciting new options: the Tour AVS Front Pannier Rack and the Explorer Low Rider Front Pannier Rack. Both racks are designed to meet the needs of cyclists, whether for commuting, touring, or everyday
Saracen Levarg - NOT Your Average Gravel Bike.Inspired by Saracen’s Mountain Bike heritage, the Levarg range brings a bit of that trail shredding spirit into the gravel world. Designed for fun and adventure, this gravel beast isn’t just for cruising dirt roads—it’s built to get gnarly when the going gets tough. The Saracen team took the same technical expertise that produced the World Cup-winning
Supporting the Lloyds Bank Tour of Britain: Freewheel.co.uk's Commitment to Neutral SupportAt Freewheel.co.uk, we’re passionate about all things cycling. From providing top-quality gear to supporting local clubs and events, we’ve always been dedicated to helping cyclists at every level. This year, we’re proud to take our commitment to the sport one step further by supporting the Lloyds Bank Tour of Britain through the Neutral Support service. Why We’re Supporting the Lloyds Bank Tour of Britain
We are thrilled to welcome the Nevis Range to the Freewheel network, as Saracen become official bike supplier. In a significant move for the brand, Saracen will be the exclusive hire bike supplier for the Nevis Range giving 500,000 visitors a year the chance to ride a Myst or Ariel at arguably the most well-known MTB destination in the country. Not only can riders take on the famous Fort William World Cup track but there are over 80km of world class MTB trails at the Nevis Range, with everything from green to orange to cater for riders of all abilities.
As a sponsor of multiple World Tour road cycling teams, Finish Line knows a thing or two about bike cleaning and lubrication. The company has been at the cutting edge of lubcrication innovation for nearly 40 years, and their first product was the groundbreaking Finish Line Dry Bike Lube with Teflon that changed the game when it came to drivetrain lubcrication. Fast forward nearly 40 years and Finish Line is still at the top of the game, as shown by their latest and greatest product: Halo. The Halo range has three products: a wax lubricant for improved cleanliness, a wet lubricant for durability and water-resistance and a hot wax melt for ultimate chain lubrication in all conditions. All three are powered by elite-grade ingredients including patented Spherical Tungsten. That Spherical Tungsten is what gives the lube its magic, reducing vibrational friction caused by high-torque pedalling. You wont be suprised to learn that those micron-sized particles are spherical in shape
How to Install Shimano SPD-SL CleatsStep for installing cleats
Let's take a look at the Shimano-sponsored teams, the equipment they will be riding, and the Neutral Service each WorldTour team can count on—not just those riding Shimano—every mile of the way. Learn more here - https://road.shimano.com/stories/shimanos-24-road-cycling-season
Five top tips for making sure you’re ready for your next big ride If you fail to prepare, then you should prepare to fail. Okay, that might be a bit extreme in the context of bike riding but the principle does ring true. If you have a big ride or event coming up then the best thing you can do to have a fun and stress-free experience is make sure you have everything you need. There will always be things that happen that are out of your control but if you follow our five tips below, you’ll have the best chance of navigating any mishaps
With the weather finally starting to look up and cyclists everywhere casting furtive glances at their summer bikes, Madison Clothing is back and ready for SS24. This new range puts the focus back on drop-bar riding with the Flux and Roam lines containing pieces for performance and adventure cyclists no matter what their budget. Heading up the SS24 lineup is the Flux short sleeve road jersey. Focused on performance and made from lightweight material, it’s a smart jersey at a killer price point (£39.99) that pairs up with last season’s Flux EIT bib shorts to make a top performing, wallet-friendly combination. In tandem with that goes the
If you're not familiar with Steve Peat, it's fair to say that there aren't many former Downhill World Champions that are treasured quite like the man from Sheffield. After finishing fourth in the Downhill World Champs on four separate occasions, Peaty finally won the big one in 2009 - although he'd already been World Cup Series Champ three times. Add that to 17 wins on on the DH World Cup circuit and it's fair to say there aren't many people better placed to give out off-road riding advice. So Shimano quite sensibly drafted him in to lead the below video, where he showcases the full variety of different E-MTB skills and explains them all for you to watch from the comfort of wherever you are with your video-viewing device. Enjoy.
Correctly tightening different parts of the bike is very important for two sort of corresponding reasons. Firstly, you want to make sure things are tight enough so that they dont work loose while you're riding. The flip side of that is that you also don't want to tighten parts of the bike up too much and end up damaging anything. Basically, there's a fine balance between not tight enough and too tight, and that's where torque wrenches come in. Torque is a twisting force (technically a measure of the force causing something to rotate round an axis), and it's what you measure when you're tightening any bolts on your bike. You will (or should) have noticed that every bolt on a bike has a torque rating that the manufacturer recommends and it's important to make sure that those bolts are tightened to within that range. For example, Shimano Hollowtech II cranksets have two fixing bolts on the non-drive side, and those are meant to be between 12-14Nm (that's Newton metres).
Ask any artist and they'll tell you that while creating something great is very hard, following it up is arguably more difficult. There's an entire cultural wasteland of poor second albums and disappointing film sequels that failed to live up to the shadow cast by their predecessors. In a similar vein, Lazer knew that following up its iconic Z1 helmet was going to be a difficult task as the original was so popular among pro and amatuer road riders. But the revamped version - the Z1 Kineticore - honestly not only lives up to the expectation but manages to exceed it, both visually and functionally. The headline feature of this new Z1 is, as the name suggests, Kineticore. If you're not familiar with Kineticore, it's Lazer's own anti-rotational impact technology, designed to protect your brain from damaging forces during a crash. That's the main benefit - and it's an important one - but the even better thing about Kineticore is that it comes with other benefits that make a helmet
If you had to pick one thing that the guys and girls from Park Tool are pretty good at, it would probably be building bikes. A bike tool brand being good with bikes is as expected as water being wet. But still, it's always very satisfying to watch someone who's really good at what they do doing it really well. That someone here is Truman from Park Tool, who's building a very nice gravel bike in what looks like a very nice workshop. It also includes a bit of head tube and bottom bracket facing, which definitely isn't something you see every day now that the vast majority of mid- to high-end bikes are carbon. So sit back, relax and watch as a build comes together...
Sitting here in January with the temperature hovering around freezing, it's definitely the hardest part of the year to muster up the motivation to get out and ride your bike. So while we're all waiting for Spring, we've posted a couple of great videos from Shimano's YouTube channel below that just make us want to get out and ride our bikes. You can even watch them while you're on the indoor trainer if you want. The first video is about riding in and around Beijing on bikes made right there in the Chinese capital. . We'd never really thought of Beijing as a two-wheeled destination before, but after watching the below Made In: Beijing video we're now extremely jealous of the hugely varied terrain that's on offer. So now we're going to have to book a riding holiday there, which will be expensive. Wonderful.
One of the most interesting (read: frustrating) things about being a cyclist is the stuff you get given for Christmas. There are very few other hobbies where people fixate on giving you things that are not directly related to said hobby but have pictures of the hobby on them. Like socks with bikes on. Or t-shirts with bikes on. Or mugs with bikes on. Basically lots of things that depict cycling but 99% of which are not actually usable in the performance of cycling. So to cut to the chase, if you want to get the cyclist in your life something nice (really very nice) that will actually aid in the cycling that person does you should absolutely consider the Knog Oi bell. There are multiple reasons for this: first, it's a bell and you be surprised how many people don't have one on their bike. Second, even if they do there is no way it's nicer than this one unless, in fact, they have an Oi already, in which case we're totally out of ideas. Sorry. There are two types
Winning awards is always a nice thing. But when the award you win is from the UK's best-loved and most respected MTB magazine, then it's even better. We're incredibly happy and proud that Saracen's fantastic Ariel 60 Pro has been chosen as a winner of a Singletrack Editors' Choice award for 2023. They test and ride a huge number of bikes every year, so to be picked as one of the very best is a real testament to the hours of planning and development that went into bringing that bike to fruition. The favourite bike of Madison Saracen DH Race Team's Matt Walker, the Ariel 60 Pro is designed to be Enduro capable while also pedalling well enough that you can be your own uplift if that's what you fancy doing. The steep seattube and efficient suspension design handle the pedalling side, while the 160mm Fox 38 Performance Elite forks and matching
Riding indoors is a world away from what it used to be. Turbo trainers have changed hugely from what they were just a decade ago, and the advent of things like Zwift means that you can virtually ride with other people in groups, compete in races or simply have something more interactive than just staring at a garage wall or your TV screen for hours on end. The flip side, of course, is that while things have become significantly smarter and more interesting the price of indoor training has increased proportionally so that if you really want the most comprehensive setup you can then it's going to cost you. What we have here are three potential indoor training setups at various price points and different levels of interest. So whether you just want to keep the pedals turning in the dry or commit fully to indoor training there's something here for you.
aeroe's rear rack is an incredibly elegant piece of engineering. It's stable, good-looking and perfect for any adventure. But here's the thing: not every ride is an adventure, and not everyone has multiple bikes to use for various different purposes. That's why aeroe has adapted their Spider Rear Rack into the Spider Pannier Rack, for those trips that are a little less adventure, and a little more necessity. That doesn't mean you can't go off-road with the pannier rack, mind you, as the below video demonstrates. The best part is that it's designed to be compatible with any panniers on the market, so you can take any you already have and just clip them straight on. You also dont have to buy a whole new rack if you're using the current Spider Rear Rack, as the receiver on the top simply swaps out so you can leave the rack in place and switch between that and the cradles for the aeroe dry bags. It really is one system for both send and sensible. If you don't believe
Riding outside all winter is the dream. No matter how good indoor riding gets it just can't compare to the fun you have riding in the real world. That's especially true for off-road riding where 95% of the fun doesn't come from the actual pedalling, but from navigating the terrain. But to stay outside for as much of Autumn and Winter as possible, you're going to need kit that'll keep you warm and dry. Warm is the easier of the two as that can be achieved through layering but dry require quality kit that actually keeps the water out properly, not stuff that 'keeps water out as long as it's not raining that much and doesn't keep up for more than about 20mins'. Madison Clothing's DTE collection (which you wont be surprised to find out after reading the headline stands for Defy the Elements) aims to help keep you riding outside for as long as you want. The main pieces - bib trousers, pants and 3-layer waterproof jacket - are serious, heavy duty items of clothing
Call it ambient, atmospheric, ASMR or anything else you fancy, there's no doubt that videos of 'stuff just happening' are very popular right now. Maybe it's because life is so busy that sitting back and watching something relaxing is really fulfilling, or maybe it's just fun to watch interesting things. Probably best not to psychoanalyze it. No matter what the motivation for watchers, DT Swiss is in on the action with a series of seven short videos that shows how their spokes are produced on the incredible machines in their factory. Each individual video is only around 16secs long, but we just can't stop watching them. They're pretty mesmerising and we've been watching them all morning here, especially the one with the machine that forms the J-bend heads onto the spokes, that's our favourite (video number 5, if you're interested). DT Swiss is one of the very few wheel manufacturers that make everything in house, from rims to spokes, hub shells, internals - every
As a bike rider or commuter in winter, there are a few things that just make your heart sink. One is rain, because nothing makes the cold less pleasant quite like getting wet. Another is punctures, because getting cold and wet is one thing but then having to change a tube really is insult on top of injury. The third is getting ready for your ride home only to find that your lights dont have enough charge, thus begins the classic game of 'front light chicken' where they may or may not have enough juice left, so it becomes your legs versus the light battery to see which fails first. What we're trying to say is that a quality front light is an absolutely essential piece of kit for anyone who intends to ride in poor light conditions, whether that be early morning/late evening rides during Spring and Summer, or basically any time of day in the UK in Autumn or Winter. Coming in 600, 900 or 1300-lumen varieties, the real beauty of the Blinder Pro is the battery technology