Super Squadra

Dear Mr. Serotta,

Ian Dille here. I’m the former Kodak Gallery-Sierra Nevada pro for whom you built a custom Ottrott ST in 2005. You might remember that bike. It was an amazing blend of carbon fiber and Colorado Concept titanium tubing. It also had a custom green and yellow paint job with bright red Serotta decals. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to ride that bike much. I spent most of that year battling knee problems and was relegated to promotional duties rather than racing.



That’s how I ended up at your Serotta open house in Saratoga Springs, New York. I met hundreds of die-hard Serotta owners there. I heard Davis Phinney and Ron Keifel talk about their glory days back in the1980s, winning Tour de France stages on the initial steel creations you built for 7-Eleven. I helped lead a 62-mile ride through the Appalachian foothills past some of your previous factories, and I toured your current shop—a bustling warehouse of precision CNC machinery and artisan-like frame builders.

Now that the knee problems have cleared up and I’m racing again, somehow I was lucky enough to find myself riding one of your latest creations, the HSG. The name, which stands for High Speed Geometery, may lack the imagery of your custom models such as the MeiVici—but it couldn’t be more fitting for how we ride our bikes. Fast.

This year we’ve raced our bikes in the mountains of west Texas, across choppy chip and seal roads cutting across the wind blown plains, and at blistering crit speeds through corners riddled with potholes. In every instance, the bike has excelled.



The thing I enjoy most about your bikes, Ben, is the ride quality. Whether it’s a five-hour training ride or 90-mile road race, the HSG soaks up road chatter better than a double thick chamois—keeping my back, shoulders, hands, and feet feeling fresh. The compliant RoadMax seat stays slope gently from the seat tube to the rear wheel, while the S-Bend chainstays, developed in 1984 specifically for Davis Phinney, America’s most prolific sprinter, maintain rear end stiffness.

In fact, the HSG is one of the stiffest and lightest bikes you’ve ever built. It laughs in the face of the torsional forces put out during mass gallops to the line or while rocketing up 15-percent grades. Because your company manufacturers its own carbon fiber, rather than outsourcing to factories over seas, you’re able to maintain stringent control over the design and production process. The TC2 Torsion Core tubing used in the HSG is some of the strongest and most durable carbon fiber you’ve ever used on a Serotta bicycle.

Ben, I’m sure people tell you your bikes are amazing all the time. I’m also sure you never tire of hearing it. Simply put, we absolutely love our sleds. I know racers tend to say this about whichever bike is currently underneath them, but this is without a doubt the best bike I’ve ever ridden.

Thanks for sponsoring our team.

This entry was posted on Saturday, August 2nd, 2008 at 9:26 pm and is filed under Product Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.