Weight of pro kit

sonny73

Bit of a saddo trainspotter question this, but whilst turboing tonight I watched a recording of last year’s Verbier sage in the Tour, where I noticed that several of the riders had standard black and white £10ish Elite custom race bottle cages on their bikes (spotted as I have a pair).
Now I know the black and white in that exact form don't come in carbon and so I was quite surprised to see teams running these especially on a mountain stage.

So my question is why? I would have thought keeping everything as light as possible within the rules was the name of game, or when you are talking the difference between a 40grm cage or a 25grm cage it's a final detail not worth the worry for most teams compared to a reliable cage?

ninjaslim

They could well be looking to make up weight and therefore not bothered by using standard / rugged & reliable stuff.
I rode that Verbier stage late August and it was 45 degrees plus on the mountain, there were people jumping in the fountain half way up. I'd want very secure bottle cages on a stage like that and whats 15 grams, a couple of mouthfuls of water.

cougie

There is a minimum weight limit on the bikes and as they say - the weight between a decent bottle cage and a fancy carbon one is bugger all. I know lotto were using the cheap tackx tao cages a few years back. I think its only amateurs that bother with carbon fibre cages.

moray_gub

cougie wrote:

I think its only amateurs that bother with carbon fibre cages.

Maybe but not always

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7O1yMRYSQo

LangerDan

Last Summer, one of the French cycling mags did a feature on TdF bikes and had a table showing the weights of selected riders bikes in 2008 and 2009. Very few we close on the UCI limit and several were comfortably over 7 kg.

If riders are happy with bikes that may be 200 - 300 grams (and probably more in some cases) over the limit, why spend all that extra money on trying to attain the unnecessary, possibly at the expense of longevity.

Kléber

Some bikes won't come close to the weight limit but others will get close to the 6.8kg minimum weight, so in this case you might as well have rock-solid bottle cages. Riders want stiff bikes, something that is light is meaningless to a pro, it has to be stiff and sure-handling before it is light.

But personally I've found carbon cages are a better grip on the bottle than alloy cages, although it depends on the model.

phil s

Moray Gub wrote:

cougie wrote:

I think its only amateurs that bother with carbon fibre cages.

Maybe but not always

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7O1yMRYSQo

I think he was referring to the carbon on the frame. the cage in the clip is a standard tacx tao

cougie

I have the standard plastic cages -baggage handlers broke one but theyre so cheap anyway

barrybridges

I think the way they look at it is that the difference between a carbon bottlecage and an alumninium bottle cage is about the same as a mouthful of water, so it's not worth the hassle.

sonny73

barrybridges wrote:

I think the way they look at it is that the difference between a carbon bottlecage and an alumninium bottle cage is about the same as a mouthful of water, so it's not worth the hassle.

Makes sense when you put it that way.

andyrr

1 point maybe is that unless the bike is needing all possible weight trimmed for it to reach the lowest weight possible the teams prefer sturdier cages since they can withstand all the transportation that the bikes put up with ?
Metal cage = £5, carbon = £30+, on rough roads you don't want to lose a bidon, metal cage can be tweeked to hold the bidon that bit tighter.

Eau Rouge

I doubt too many of the teams are paying for their bottle cages. At best they would be free, some teams might even be paid to use certain ones.
That moves the question to the marketing depts of the manufactuers. Why do they supply lower-level cages instead of their expensive models?