Pinarello, 2011 edition Part I

As most of you know, we just got back from two weeks in Italy and Switzerland. One of the main reasons for the trip was to see the new bikes from Pinarello for 2011. Quite a few changes this year, but thankfully, the Dogma is still top of the heap in their range with the only changes being in the finish. A bit less glitter and a little better design in our opinion. The KOBH is a very nice looking bike and I like what it offers on paper. Taking into account the victories the bike has been ridden to this year, I doubt it will disappoint on the road. Here is part I of the show...



First, the man who started it all, Giovanni Pinarello. Still working in the shop and as friendly as ever.



Couple of the pieces of history that Giovanni had a hand in developing for a pretty good cyclist from Spain...



And then the newer generation TT bike, the Graal. Some love the looks, some hate it, but I have two things to say, one, in person it looks amazing and fast and two, it was developed by the British Cycling Federation in conjunction w/ Pinarello, and if you know what we do about their bike development programs, this IS a FAST bike. They don't leave any stone unturned and have the results to prove it. We are very excited to get our hands on this bike...



The KOBH, pronounced 'cob' or short for cobblestone. Little longer head tube, slightly compact frame, more rake in the fork, and different geometry. Wasn't sure about this bike at first look, but I really like it and feel it has a place in the line for sure. Team Sky is my favorite of the three finishes, the other two are nice but the standard red, white and black...



A my way Dogma. Like the dark blue/light blue finish...



A few Dogmas awaiting paint...



Another 'My Way' Dogma. LOVED this one, BRIGHT orange for sure, kind of Tony the Tiger, but really, really cool...



The are still doing a lot of the same colors, but the graphics changed a bit and there is a bit less glitter, though it's still there. Since I love the bike so much I'm very happy they did not change the frame one bit, but again, since Pinarello is working so close with the British Cycling Federation, I expect something new for the top range maybe even as soon as next year. But it will be hard to improve on this platform, so we'll see...



The brand new Pinarello Paris. This is Fausto's personal bike with his trademark flo yellow...
Will have more on this in part II...

Pegoretti Responsorium in "Catch the Spider"

While Kalara and I were off in Italy and Switzerland, Woody and Kris built this incredible Pegoretti for a customer in NY. It is by far, the nicest example of the 'Catch the Spider' paint scheme we've done yet if I may say so. I'd be super bummed that I didn't see it in person, but luckily we have another one (not the same, but close) going out soon that I'll get to drool over for a bit before we ship it out... Enjoy the photo's that Dean kindly took for us!



50cm Responsorium frameset, WR 30.0 post, Campagnolo Super Record brake calipers and Lightweight Standards with the 20 spoke front wheel. Have been using the Continental tubulars for a bit now, these are the GP4000 model...



Speedplay pedals, stainless axle. Color is about as perfect as you can get here. 170mm Super Record cranks round off the rest of Campagnolo's top of the line group.



Custom painted Edge 1.0 fork. This blue was very hard to match, but they did a great job. Chris King headset works perfectly here. Down tube shift lever mounts add a touch of class.



We were planning on running a black saddle, but were out of the Fizik Antares OO, so put this on for the meantime, may not take it off!



The end result... give us a call for any questions or to get on one yourself!
Thanks for reading...

Where we are now...

Here is a quick update on our Italy/Switzerland trip so far. We'll cover each of these events in much more detail soon, or as long as there is wireless access and not too many other amazing things to do, like eat, drink good wine, ride on beautiful roads etc... We arrived in Venice last Friday and drove to Treviso, home of Pinarello. I immediately picked up my new Dogma, Di2 and all. No wheels as I could not part w/ the Lightweights and brought a pair from the shop back home... Incredible bike, though not sure about the bar and stem graphics in conjunction with the Team Sky colors! Not bad when that's the only negative we can come up with...


Next up was the Saturday ride w/ other dealers and friends of Pinarello. Pretty short ride that done in the HOT and muggy Treviso weather (that would change shortly, but that's for another post). We stopped by the Pinarello factory just outside of the city walls for a few minutes. Not sure why it was so hard to get a Dogma this past year as there were plenty waiting for paint here, but when every one is spoken for I can understand... The factory is huge and very impressive.



Met up with friends on this part of the trip as well. This is Raul, a long time former pro from Portugal and good friends of Joao. We spent a lot of time with him on our last visit there, though didn't ride with him as he only rides in warm weather now! He proved to be pretty damn fast the following day. Met up with a lot of other great folks there as well, of course Fausto and Luciano from Pinarello, all the awesome Gita guys and girls, the new manager from a certain new pro team from Luxemburg and the Bicycling Magazine crew among others...



Later on Saturday we had the presentation for Pinarello's 2011 line. Two new road models which are sooo nice, the new TT bike pictured here (looks great and we already know it's fast) and another pretty huge new bike that we'll cover shortly. The Dogma is still top of the heap for the road thankfully and comes in a few new colors...







After the grand fondo on Sunday (which was incredible!), we had a great dinner with everyone and then slept in on Monday. Then we drove north to Caldonazzo to visit Dario. I wish we could have stayed for a day or two. re-visited the shop, not too much has changed which is a good thing, besides a few new models and paint schemes. Dario is always working on stretching the limits on metal bikes though so keep your eyes here for a few small changes here and there for the future! Then we drove to Lugano, Switzerland where we are now (I should be packing), and getting ready for a longish drive south to Chianti for some R&R and riding, and eating, etc. Oh, not to forget, Tony is just a couple hours north of us in Grenchen, CH riding some great roads on the new BMC's and will be giving us some reports from the road as well, hopefully more than I have up to this point...

Sorry for any miss-spells or run-ons, but in a hurry and need to hit the road! Until then...

What's new? A lot...

We are proud to announce our very first Camp to be held this September 12th through the 17th right here in our back yard, home of some of the best riding in the world. With approximately 325 miles of riding and 30,000' of climbing this is going to be a challenging week. But the beautiful roads and incredible views will help dull the pain, a little. This will be a camp run the way we'd always wanted the camps we went to run. Follow vehicles, full time professional mechanic, massage, super comfortable and beautiful lodging, incredible food and more, all included.
For more information click here. Also, feel free to email the camp coordinator, Paul. Lastly, you can call the shop @ (415) 389-5461. Space is limited, so act fast!


We've been riding a lot of bikes lately and taking a ton of notes. Some of the reviews we have coming up include the Moots RSL, the Pinarello Dogma, BMC Team Machine and both models of Lightweight wheels, the Standard and the Ventoux. These reviews take time as we like to put a lot of miles in every weather and riding condition before we attempt to call ourselves subject matter experts. In the last couple months I've put in over a thousand miles on each of the bikes mentioned above and a pair of Lightweight Standards. They have all been ridden in the cold, the heat and the rain. I've ridden them in the hills, down technical descents on dirt roads, gravel paths and even some pretty crazy single track. This helps confirm what Above Category is about, we ride everything that we sell and in turn, only sell what we like. So, keep your eyes here for more...


This July, in a week and a half to be more precise, Above Category will be making a two pronged attack on Europe. Kalara and I will be heading to Italy for Pinarello's 2011 bike presentation. We are looking forward to a few new additions to the line-up this year and will be posting pictures and news as we get it there. Then I'll be riding the new Grand Fondo Pinarello, a 130mile marathon w/ the ascent of the Mont Grappa, a 25k steep climb that is also timed for a KOM competition. I'm very much looking forward to this ride as last time I did the grand fondo I bonked about as bad as you can trying to follow our good friend Joao up the San Baldo climb. He ended up finishing 20th while I limped home 500 something out of 4,000. Also, our goal is to set up some structure and design a camp for next year aimed at preparing for and riding in the 2011 Grand Fondo Pinarello. Stay tuned for that. BTW, this picture is from the Above Category/Pinarello ride last year starting from AC. That's Fausto Pinarello and I w/ the Bissell team in tow, heading over the ridge on Mt. Tam, part of our camp this September.


Then we'll be heading up north to Lugano Switzerland to visit our friends at Assos. We have a few surprises coming from this trip that we'll let you know about on our return as well. Assos has opened up a new retail store in Lugano which we are looking forward to seeing as well as Assos HQ for the latest in clothing tech and design. Then it's up to St. Moritz to visit Joao at altitude camp for a ride and finally down to Tuscany for some much needed R&R, epic riding and finally to scope out the area for yet another future camp!
And I know, boo hoo and all for us, but believe it or not, we'll be aching to get back to the bay area after all this...



While we are in Italy and Southern Switzerland, we'll be sending Tony to Grenchen, in Central Switzerland for the launch of BMC's 2011 bikes and a behind the scenes look at how the new Impec model is made. This will be our first look at the bike in person. For those of you who have seen it, it is a very polarizing bike, either you like it or you don't. BMC has gone back to it's roots with a much more industrial looking bike. We'll have more photo's and hopefully be able to throw a leg over one for a long ride in the Swiss countryside before they are scheduled to arrive in early fall. Then Tony get's to go visit the last stage of the Tour, VIP style with BMC, and finish up the trip having dinner with the BMC Tour team and finally the post Tour party, we wish him luck. Hopefully Cadel will have had a great Tour and will be in a good mood, we've all seen what he's like with a bad mood!

On the racing front the Above Category Jr. Team has been tearing it up. With a bunch of wins in the last few months, the entire team was invited to the Olympic Training Center in CO. Springs a few weeks ago. For a few of them, this is not the first visit and being that they are all 15-16 years old, they have a long future ahead. Then, at the Road National Championships, the team scored a 4th in the Crit with Alex Howard and just off the podium in the road race with a 6th and 7th placing. Next up, Mountain Bike National Championships where AC Jr. team captain Spence Peterson hopes to reclaim his Stars and Stripes jersey from last years race. On the Elite team side, our sole racer, Kris Lunning scored a super impressive 12th in the Elite National Championship Time Trial and another 12th in the road race! This was right after a strong showing at the Elkhorn Stage Race in Oregon the week prior. Again, as a solo ride, this is a very strong performance.

We have finally received our new batch of Camelbak water bottles, now in the larger size as well as the standard. Call us or come in quick for these as they sell out pretty quickly! Also, just in, as of today, we finally received more AC kit. It is the same as the last order, the all black and white kit. And just like last time it is already running low. We have short and long sleeve jerseys, wind vests and a very limited amount of bibs. We are also getting more of Dario Pegoretti's frames in all the time. They are going fast, but we still have a few examples here. We'll post our stock again soon on these. Stay tuned, much more to come! Thanks for reading...