Sarto Antonio is a custom Italian builder that works in carbon fiber for both road and mountain bikes, that latter offered in hardtail and full suspension designs. For this year’s show, he brought his new Gravel TA Wave road bike that upgrades prior road bike designs to use thru axles and his “Wave” seatstays.
Check those and the other details, plus some of the shapeliest custom carbon out there from Alchemy and Formigli, below…
The soft-tail like design provides just 3mm compression at the wave, but they say that’s enough to take the edge off by the time those bumps would have reached your own soft tail. It’s available on any of their road bikes, not just the gravel grinder.
Tooled thru axles, beefy derailleur hangers and flat mount disc brakes give the bike a very modern, very good look.
A hardened downtube protector keeps all that gravel from chewing up your frame…
…and a leather top tube wrap keep the bar from biting into it if you wreck.
Further aiding the rear’s micro suspension is their own saddle, which has a small amount of squish at the nose, where the bolt for the rail’s frame attaches it to the shell.
Clearance for larger tires is the final assault against discomfort.
Their Campagnolo contest entry had a simple yet gorgeous paint scheme.
Their other Campy custom bike entry was even shinier!
FORMIGLI
Formigli debuted The One road race bike in 2013, but this is a new color for 2016.
He’s able to do these big, shapely tubes in custom geometries by using a tube to tube construction. So, even though it looks like a big monocoque structure, they’re laying up each tube custom to the rider, then wrapping them together at the right angles.
Check out our pre-show interview with Renzo Formigli here. And his website is here.
ALCHEMY & ETHIC PAINTWORKS
Alchemy had been releasing new models prior to the show (here and here), so their focus was to simply share what they had rather than debut a new model. That didn’t stop them from winning the People’s Choice and Best Mountain Bike awards with the Arktos full suspension shredder.
The Chiron titanium cyclocross bike isn’t new, but they had it built up with big touring tires to show an alternate use.
Made in the USA.
The bigger emphasis in their booth was showing off the capabilities of their new in-house paint studio, Ethic Paintworks. In addition to the Arktos up top, they had detail matching frame and fork on one of their hardtails (and the components, check the cockpit).
Work isn’t limited to their own frames, either. Have something special you want on your own bike? Give ’em a shout…this Specialized Roubaix looked stunning!
Check them out at AlchemyBicycle.com and Ethic Paintworks here.
