Challenge Limus Early Review

The Challenge Limus is a new tread on the scene, aimed squarely at the Dugast Rhino. Challenge made an attempt to produce a worthy mud tread with the Fango, but in my opinion fell well short of the mark. The Fango's knobs were too short and too closely packed to offer any real grip or mud-clearing.

The Dugast has been the king of mud treads, and for good reason. Tall, widely-spaced knobs mixed with a super-supple casing provided great grip. Unfortunately that supple casing was also the achilles heel of the tire, it was prone to rot.

While I wouldn't say Challenge has the most durable casing that's ever made it onto a CX course, mine seem to hold up pretty well for as soft as they are. That more durable casing along with the new Limus tread, is what has me excited about this new tire from Challenge.

Let's get some important info out there: the clincher mounted to a Stan's No Tubes Alpha 340 rim came in at 33.5mm wide. Not good if you plan to run the clincher in a UCI race, but what kind of UCI racer would you be running clinchers? The tubular version mounted on some Reynolds wheels came in at 32.8mm wide, perfect for UCI legality.

This first shot shows a very tall center tread which means it rolls relatively well, but you won't mistake the Limus as a file tread in the straights, that's for sure.

This shot shows the shoulder tread nicely, which seems to bite in very well. The tread is very tall, and even at relatively high clincher pressure the grip is excellent. I haven't had the chance to really get into sloppy mud, but have hit some greasy spots and the tire holds it's line very well.

Most recently I found a spot on the Des Plaines River Trail that was a nice gradual turn with some greasy mud. With a Limus clincher mounted on the front and a Fango clincher mounted on the rear I did my best to test the limits of each tire. When ridden with care both tires gripped relatively well, but as I started to push the corner the rear Fango lost it's grip quickly while the Fango held firm. At the point the Limus started to drift I feel pretty confident any tread would have been at it's limits.

While I rack up more miles in more conditions with this tire, I'm left feeling pretty confident in it's performance so far. Best of all, those who are looking for performance on par with a Dugast Rhino but in clincher form can rejoice. Now, how does it stack up against the Clement PDX?

Giro Aeon Early Review

Let me preface this entire review with one thing: helmets are very personal. Their fit, the way they look, the way they feel.


Now that we have that out of the way, I have to say I am thrilled with this helmet. I rode Giro helmets for the last few years, up until this past summer, when I switched to Lazer. I was drawn away from Giro with the Lazer Helium, which fit great and I loved the look of.

My previous Giro helmets all seemed to be a compromise. The Prolight left much to be desired on the fit, but the weight couldn't be beat. The Atmos fit pretty well, and was pretty light, but sat high on my head. The Ionos didn't fit my head as well as I had hoped, but I fit the weight I was looking for.

With the new Roc Loc 5 is a great retention system which was, for me, a game changer to bring me back to Giro. Being able to lower the Roc Loc adds a level of security and comfort I've been looking for.


Add to these features a weight that's far below the Lazer Helium, 222g for the Aeon vs. 336g for our Helium, and I think I have found a winner.

Time will tell how the durability plays out, but so far I have to give the new Aeon a huge thumbs up.

Independent Fabrication XS with custom paint

When a custom approaches us about having an Independent Fabrication built, inevitably the conversation usually rolls around to paint once the frame is selected, sizing is done, and parts are chosen.

Indy Fab is known for some pretty amazing and exotic paint work, limited primarily to your imagination and how you can translate the idea from your head to their painter.

This particular example was done for a customer who knew what he was looking for, and was able to put that onto paper. IF has taken the idea and transferred it into rolling art. Luckily, underneath the beautiful paint is a North American Handmade Bike Show winner, so he gets the best of both worlds.

From the profile view you can start to appreciate the work that's gone into this bike. A corsa red head tube lug masked off on white carbon tubes and a red carbon seat tube dominate the scheme.The white front and rear ends are set off by red stripes nicely shows the detail Independent is willing and able to provide.The down tube "Independent Fabrication" logo is painted on, no decal here. A touch of class.A true detail shot of the care in masking taken when painted the lugs. The crown details are masked perfectly to allow the small "window" inside the lug to show through.The seat tube XS decal is placed on the titanium lug, just in case you forget what is going on under the beautiful paint.

This particular build consists of a SRAM Red drivetrain, Zipp Vuma Quad crankset, Zipp Service Course SL Short and Shallow bar and Service Course stem, Thomson Masterpiece seatpost, and Chris King headset. The build is capped off with ENVE 68 rims laced to a DT Swiss 240s front hub and PowerTap SL+ rear hub, all black.

As built:

Independent Fabrication XS Frameset w/ custom paint
ENVE 1.0 carbon fork
SRAM Red shifters
SRAM Red derailleurs
SRAM Red brakes
ENVE 68 rims laced to DT Swiss 240s front and PowerTap SL+ rear hubs
Vittoria EVO CX 25c tires
Fizik Cyrano seatpost
Zipp Service Course SL handlebar
Zipp Service Course stem
Lizard Skinz tape
Fizik Aliante saddle

Total price as built: $17,500

Cyclocross season is here!

Here at Iron Cycles we're nuts about CX. We love riding until we bleed from our eyeballs turning ourselves inside out on grass and in mud. We love a good hand-up and live for the next great heckle.

But in the end, CX has as much to do with the event as it does the gear. We love gear. Especially CX gear. Handmade tires, carbon wheels, race frames, it all gets us jazzed.

We put Ben on assignment this time when he hit the studio, not to get some killer shots of one particular build that we just completed, rather some of the really cool CX gear we have around the shop. There's more to come in the CX world of goodies from us, but here's a sample of what's kicking around right now.

First up comes a custom CX frame from Boo. Nick Frey, the founder of Boo, hand delivered this frame to the shop for us to test out. It's got plenty of road miles, a good number of miles in the grass, and some ugly winter rides under it's belt. It was originally built with some heavy training wheels and SRAM Rival, and weighed a respectable 19lbs. Once loaded with SRAM Red and some Zipp 303's with Dugast Rhino tires it came down to 16.5lbs.

Pictured here with a Ridley Python fork and Chris King headset:


The bike is made tube-to-tube with bamboo grown under the control of Nick. The tubes are cut and mitered to fit just for you, then the joints are wrapped with carbon.


The rear end is also made of bamboo, which provides an amazing feel. Very steel-like in it's comfort, the frame is very stiff and always willing to sprint.


Up next comes a frame that brings a lot of emotion with it. Not necessarily because of the paint or design, but more because it's limited in production and gears. Raleigh has now done a few limited edition runs of SSCX frames, this being one of them.

Team Iron Cycles will have a handful of guys tearing up the SSCX scene in the Midwest this year, and this frame will be the most popular.


Aluminum frame, Easton EC90x fork, horizontal dropouts. If you want no-frills, this is it. Pedal hard to go fast. Pedal harder to go faster.


Mix in a link to some beer and you have a real winner in a group of CX racers.

Last, and certainly not least, is a project that we're very proud of. A little work with Francois from FMB and we were able to land some custom FMB Grippo XL, SSC, and SSC Sprint tires with IRON CYCLES stamped on the side. No, we didn't add these aftermarket, these were made special for Iron Cycles by Francois.

Mounted up to a set of Zipp 202's, you're looking at a soft and supple, yet super-light and stiff race wheelset. Mounted to a carbon CX bike with SRAM Red and we were looking at 15lbs even.


So sick. Thank you Francois for your help on this project. Maybe some road tires for next year as well?

Again, this is just a sample of what we do. And a sample of what we can do for you. Cyclocross exists entirely for racing, but doesn't mean you have to be a pro to participate.

Want to try out some nice tubulars but don't want to spend $3k on some wheels, how about some hand-built alloy-tubular wheels in the $500 range. 90% of the benefit at about 15% of the price of the carbon wheels.

Get in touch with us to build you dream CX bike or your first CX bike, they both excite us the same!

2011 Yeti ASR-5 with SRAM X.0 and Fox

This bike was a commission from a very good friend of the shop. He came in with an idea of what he wanted the bike to be, where he wanted to go with it. We were then asked for opinions, and given a pretty loose leash to create something more fun to ride than look at.

At Iron Cycles we have a tough time creating custom rides like this one while ignoring the aesthetics, but this bike is function over form. It doesn't hurt that it's hot though.

Fox supplied the suspension, SRAM the transmission and brakes, King did the hubs and headset.

SRAM X.0 might have lost some of it's swagger with XX out and about, but without XX stealing the spotlight no one would hesitate to label X.0 as one of the best mountain groups out there. Setup is always flawless and simple, capped off by brakes that modulate well, stop incredibly, and have tons of adjustment.


RockShox Reverb seatpost comes in handy during the rough descents this bike will see in California. This is a rare part for us, very few long descents around here. But again the setup was simple and the bleed couldn't have been easier.

King headset, nothing but the best. 1-1/8" upper, 1.5" lower. Perfect fit, an industry-best warranty, and made in the USA. Can't be beat.

Kashima Coat on the RP23. This new coating makes the shock move much more smoothly, something immediately noticeable.

Nothing like a thru-axle to stiffen up steering. Combine that with a tapered steerer tube and this bikes just where you point it. Hand-built wheels are a great solution to a custom build, and this bike is no exception. A King ISO Disc rear hub laced to a Stan's ZTR Flow rim made for a relatively light and really stiff wheel. In the front the King thru-axle hub laced to the same Stan's ZTR Flow rim made for a bomber front wheel ready for anything.

In the end, this bike will pedal it's way up wherever it's pointed, and bomb down just about any line. We were asked for a do-it-all mountain bike, and when riding all over the country, we think we've accomplished what we set out for.

2011 Cielo Sportif with Shimano Ultegra

When building this bike, we knew we had a unique opportunity to create a completely modern yet retro bike. Starting with a hand-made steel frame and fork, we knew we were going for a thoroughly classic look. Yet, I knew before we started we wanted to include all of the great modern technology that has forever changed cycling.


STI shifting, clincher tires, and shallow-drop bars have changed cycling, and while we knew we wanted to incorporate all of these, we had to remain true to the classic lines of quality steel.

Ultegra 6700 seemed like a great choice to us based on it's flawless performance and satin-gray finish. It "hides" pretty well on the Cielo's Transit Gray finish.


Silver Thomson stem and post were simple choices because of their classic look and perfect performance. A bit more difficult to decide on were the Ritchey Classic bars, the finish was perfect though there was a debate on the reach and drop.

A Brooks saddle seemed like a choice that was perfect and had to be made to fit the motif we were working toward. The bar tape was up for debate for quite some time before we settled on Deda in an off-white color that matched the outline of the Cielo font perfectly.


Last on the list are the rolling stock, which took some time. But, once we found H+Son TB14 rims we knew we had a winner. With the classic look of an Ambrosio but the ability to use clincher tires we feel we found a perfect balance. Laced 3-cross to Shimano hubs with Challenge Parigi-Roubaix 700x27c tires we feel we have created a very modern yet classic bike.


Chris King has been in the bike game for a long time. Everyone knows about his headsets, and now their bottom brackets, but not everyone knows that Chris started way back in the day making frames. Now that Cielo and Chris King are back in the frame business, Iron Cycles is lucky enough to be one of only a few select dealers throughout the country.

Very few small manufacturers can get you a hand-made steel frame in as little as a few weeks, but Cielo can do just that. And at just $1900 for frame and fork, it's tough to beat. Custom touches like stainless steel fork ends and rear dropouts, engraves seat stays and machined headtube collars.

Available in 6 colors, it's also possible to customize the color of the logos as well if you fancy something a bit different. All "paint" is done in powdercoat, including the logos, no decals to be found here.

Looking to go a bit further? Cielo has a stainless steel version coming as well as a Sportif Racer version with a, surprise, racier gemoetry. Cyclocross as well as a Cyclocross Racer, and a 29er version are also available.

As built:

Cielo Sportif Frameset
Cielo Steel Fork
Shimano Ultegra 6700 Shifters
Shimano Ultegra 6700 Derailleurs
H+Son TB14 rims laced 3-cross to Shimano 105 hubs
Challenge Parigi-Roubaix Tires, 700x27c
Thomson Stem and Post
Ritchey Classic bars
Deda Tape
Brooks Swift Saddle

Total price as built: $3900

2011 Felt FA with SRAM Force and HED Wheels

Another quick update with a very interesting build. When working with a set budget, how does one allocate the funds?

Felt has done a great job of designing their new FA frame, and at roughly half the price of the FC, a great argument can be made for it. A tapered steerer tube/head tube (1-1/8" to 1-1/2"), BB30 bottom bracket, and full carbon fork for $850 goes a long way to giving you an excellent base for a race bike.


Going to the FA frame afforded this build some excellent component choices. This particular build went with SRAM Force which has almost all of the same feel and performance of Red, with only a very slight weight penalty. That slight weight penalty leaves a ton of extra cash in your pocket versus Red.
Another excellent choice this customer made was HED wheels. The C2 rim shape has become a favorite of everyone at the shop. We have a set of demo 2010 Bastogne wheels that have 6+ months of CX training and racing and 12+ months of road miles that includes tons of city streets, snow, mud, rain, and sand. The wheels still spin true and free while that wide rim shape makes them handle like they are on rails.


This build is something we're really proud of because it is yet another of those builds we would consider "signature". SRAM, HED, and Felt make for a great combination and one that many guys from our shop are currently riding on.

As built:

Felt FA Frame
Felt full-carbon 1-1/8" to 1-1/2" Taper Control Fork
SRAM Force Shifters
SRAM Force Derailleurs
HED Kermesse Wheels
Michelin Pro3Race Tires
FSA Stem and Post
FSA Omega Compact Bars
Fizik Tape
Fizik Antares Saddle

Total price as built: $3400