Colnago can do restraint with the paintbox, but it hasn’t been easy and they certainly haven’t quite been able to kick the habit of writing all over their frames – at least Ernesto Colnago has elegant handwriting. Here’s a few tasty treats from their stand. First up the CLX – not top of he range but a very nifty piece of kit nonetheless, interesting to see it sporting Shimano 105 – a good groupset, but maybe not one you’d expect to see on a carbon Colnago. It’s also available with my favourite groupset, if I was spending my own money, Shimano Ultegra… although that new Chorus 11-spd is pretty tasty too.
This is more like it. The CX1 gets Dura Ace and a nice pair of Fulcrum Racing Zeros, and an FSA integrated bar and stem…
And for the EPS it’s Campag Super Record, Bora Ultra wheels, and classic lines. Interestingly Colnago’s top bike appears technically less advanced than the CLX and the CX1 that sit below it. Both those machines are moulded carbon – the mainframe at least, the backends are lugged – Whereas the EPS is an all carbon-lugged affair. This is the classic way of building a custom carbon bike so maybe that’s the reason.
Last one from the Colnago stand is the Flight, their TT machine. Again, you wouldn’t kick it out of the bike rack (not if you liked going fast against clock anyway) on purely aesthetic grounds but the Pinarello FM1 looks a lot crisper with that really tight rear wheel clearance (on second thoughts, not sure how practical such a tight clearance would be on Britain’s crap strewn roads – you wouldn’t want to get a twig stuck in there, or an acorn). Either way it’d be good to know how the Colnago and Pinarello stack up against each other in the wind tunnel – with a rider on.
Whatever, any time trial machine boasting Super Record, a Fulcrum Pro Disc on the back, and a set of FSA Vision bars is a highly desirable item and this one’s got the extra advantage in the desirability stakes of being a Colnago.