The organisers of Eurobike – the leading international bike industry show, which takes place in Friedrichshafen, Germany, from 28-31 August – have posed an open question as to which bike trends will take centre stage in the year ahead…
Because a certain lead time is needed before innovations are presented at trade fairs, initial details often come out in advance of Eurobike. Discussions have recently centred on developments in the e-bike segment, currently one of the leading themes in the bicycle market.
Eurobike also notes that the racing/road bike market is proving to be very vigorous. The reason: in many Asian countries, bicycle racing is booming as a hot new sport. In China, it is reported that sales of high-quality racing bikes have recently almost tripled within the space of a year.
The cycling industry’s innovations will also be shown at asia bike, China’s ’little sister to Eurobike’, which takes place from 10-13 October 2013, in Nanjing.
The US road bike market is also reported to be waking up from a period of forced hibernation caused by the economic crisis. This is strong motivation for the Asian and American components industries to put more effort into developing new products for racing bikes – which should also benefit European roadies.
Disc brakes are meanwhile rapidly becoming an exciting trend, and can be found more and more often on narrow tyre road bikes. There is a wide variation among the technical approaches used to combine a road bikes’ complex brake levers with the hydraulically-operated disc brakes.
The Taiwanese brake manufacturer Tektro has announced an interesting solution to this problem for 2014. Its new disc brakes for road bikes are operated using a classic cable system, with force translated by a hydraulic cylinder into pressure that moves the brake calipers.
The American components supplier SRAM is taking things a step further and in 2014 plans to introduce a new generation of brakes for road bikes in which both disc and rim brakes are controlled hydraulically from the brake lever.
Meanwhile, 11-geared racing bikes are not exactly a new trend, but Eurobike notes that these will become firmly established as a new market standard in 2014, at least among industry leaders. After Japan’s Shimano and Italy’s Campagnolo, US components supplier SRAM has also announced that it will switch its road bike componentry to 11 sprockets. Depending on whether the crankset employs a double or triple chain ring, this then results in a bike with 22 or 33 speeds.
Another important development riding into this year’s Eurobike represents an aesthetic development rather than a technical one. Following the last few years in which the bicycle industry has pursued a ‘Henry Ford-like design policy of everything is possible, as long as it’s black’, in 2014 it looks as though the trend is back towards more colour.
Eurobike notes that, instead of predominantly charcoal-colour highlights on black frames, next year brighter colours will be seen on the new mountain and road bike models.
The Eurobike international cycling trade show will be open to industry visitors only from Wednesday, 28 August to Friday 30 August , 08:30 to 18:30 CET. The show is open to the general public from 09:00 to 18:00 on Saturday 31 August. The Eurobike DemoDay will take place on Tuesday 27 August, from 10:00 to 17:00 in the Allgäu community of Argenbühl.
