Fort Bill Overflow: Lapierre Zesty Carbon vs Orange Strange

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So I woke up on Sunday AM and hit the race venue as usual. First stop was the press tent to upload some photos of the previous day’s 4X. I should have done it the night of the race but the Wideopen crew were hammering me to go for a beer so it never happened. After getting that all online (and feeling like a school kid that’d forgotten to do his homework) I had a cruise round the pits to say ‘ello to a few people and see what was the next big thing for 2010.

First stop was the Hotlines/Lapierre stand to meet up with Wideopen’s Scottish correspondent Pete “Wee man” Scullion.  Pete and the Hotlines team were grabbing everyone with a camera and forcing them to photo this gorgeous new Lapierre Zesty Carbon

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Fort Bill was the first time Pete and co. had even clapped eyes on the new Zesty so info is pretty scarce at the moment. The only info they’ve got so far has come straight from Cyril Lagneau (Lapierre SaabSolomon team manager) saying:  “2010 model, due for general sale Sept/Oct 2009, has a full carbon frame and replaceable shock mount to change travel/geometry”. Stay tuned for more when we got it!

Pete was also disturbingly excited about his new super exclusive, rarer than rocking horse dung MTBCut Straitline pedals.  The MTBCut team are riding these this season and Pete managed to bag a pair for his steed. Lucky boy!

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Next stop was the Orange stand to harass Cathro and Hutch before their runs and see what the boys from Halifax had been working on. Remember our exclusive look at Rowan Sorrell’s proto Orange Strange? Well – here’s the next incarnation. Very similar bike with some minor tweaks to the linkage. Expect the final bike to look something – but not exactly – like this. 

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As you can see, Steve did the important car park test and Hutch showed how well the new bikes can be used as moustaches. One of the fellas from Orange also had a chat with us and was pretty excited that the new linkage means that the sag on the bikes always stays constant regardless of rider weight or shock. 

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That’s that for now. I’ll save the rest of my random junks from the pits for the mag.

Tell us what you think of the new bikes in the comments below.


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