Just in: £600 Bottecchia Unica arrives for review

Italian company Bottecchia isn’t the most well known bicycle brand in the UK but it has a lot of heritage, in fact it is named after Ottavio Bottecchia, the first Italian Tour de France winner. This £600 Unica is their most affordable offering and features a 6061 aluminum frame with a carbon fibre fork and equipped with a Shimano Claris 8-speed groupset. 

The Unica is available in just this £600 build centering around a Shimano Claris groupset. It’s not quite a full Claris groupset though, there’s the company’s own-brand compact chainset in place of the Claris item, and R340 brake calipers. That’s typical on bikes at this price as the budget is squeezed very tightly and concessions have to be made.

The bike is finished with a Deda RHM EL aluminium handlebar with a RAXE Alu stem, and a matching RAXE Alu 27.2mm seatpost with a Bottecchia Eagle Flow saddle. It’s all smart looking kit. You get a 50/34 chainset with a wide spread 11-30t cassette, which should help on the hills. 

The company has finished the bike with its own Bottecchia Racing wheels with CST/VRB 23mm tyres, with a cut tread design. We’re getting used to see 25mm tyres fitted to road bikes this year, even on entry-level offerings, so it’ll be interesting to see how the 23mm tyres fare.

The company claims a medium frame weight of 1,720g, and the whole bike weighs 10.96kg (24.16lb). The gear and brake cables are externally routed and there are two bottle cage mounts. The frame has eyelets for a rear rack, but no provision for mudguards.

The Unica is offered in just five sizes, we’ve got the 54 in for test. It has a 555mm top tube with a 160mm head tube, 405mm chainstays and parallel 73.5 degree seat and head angles. The stack is 558 and the reach is 390. Those numbers point at a bike that is fairly traditional in its shape and size, with a reasonably low front-end and stretched out top tube.

The Unica joins a competitive price point, a fact illustrated by our buyer’s guide for £500 to £750 road bikes, which gives an idea of the spread of choice available at this price point. Most bikes in this price range feature an aluminum frame just like the Unica and Shimano’s Claris is a popular sight on these bikes.

The Unica is being pounded out in the lanes at the moment so stay tuned for a full review soon to see if it delivers a performance to match the potential it offers on paper.

Find out more at www.bottecchia.com/en/modelli/unica or contact sales [at] bottecchia.co.uk (subject: interest%20from%20road.cc) .