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STAGE 5: KIM KIRCHEN'S TEAM COLUMBIA GIANT TT PROTOTYPE
Road Bike Action
July 8, 2008
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Giant Bicycle's Team Technical Mananger Andy Wollny had the most radical new bike at the Tour De France hidden behind the Team Columbia bus but we coaxed out old friend to roll out Giant's new super TT rig for a sneak peak. We had 10 minutes until Kim Kirchen headed out for a warm-up so we snapped a few pics while Andy filled us in. Bert Grabsch had already won the German TT championship on the Giant TT proto and later that day, Kirchen was 2nd on the Stage 4 ITT.
"This new bike was the result of close teamwork and we are really proud of the result at Giant", explained Wollny. Simon Smart, a top aerodynamic engineer who has done a lot in F1 worked closely with us, as well as Lars Teutenberg, the Team Columbia Technical Manager. We also had a top engineer from Giant Taiwan and Tom Davies, Giant's Sports Marketing manager."
Giant threw out all the old ideas and started from scratch late last year to develop this new TT proto.
Wollny explanined "We went to the wind tunnel with our old TT bike and then did some testing. We all sat down with a blank sheet of paper and added elements that we thought were effective and worked up a preliminary design. From there, we built a plastic mockup that went back in the wind tunnel for preliminary
testing, then refinement."
Road Bike Action asked Wollny if Giant was concerned about UCI regulations and he said "Of course but the new design was created to push the limits but not go beyond UCI rules." The full carbon composite frame is a mix of T-700, T-800 and other fibres with various 1K & 3K weaves all laid up in the optimum manner to
provide maximum rigidity and performance for Giant's new prototype.
For now, Giant's new speed machine is just a prototype and there are no plans for production. Yet.
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