A lovely wheelset featuring two of our favourite components – ENVE Composite 45mm carbon clincher rims and Chris King R45 hubs. Good looking, these 1415g wheels are stiff and are make great all rounders for UK sportifs and Tri events. Call us for a quote on your new wheels to day on 01903 750040.
Here are a pair of Ambrosio Excellight rims with Goldtec Road hubs we built for a classic looking durable wheelset for a customer in Aberdeen. A good balance between weight and durability these nice looking hand built wheels will last for many seasons of use.
Tom from Gloucestershire ordered a pair A23 rims with DT Swiss 240 hubs for his Cervelo – here is his report and photo.
“It’s a bit late but here are a couple of pics from a trip to the Alps I took last August bank holiday with my wife and some friends. We stopped near Courchevel and clocked up 24hrs of riding over a long weekend. We rode a load of Cols including La Madeleine & Roseland. Aside from a quick spin around the block at home it was the first run out for my new wheels – A23 rims on DT Swiss 240s, 20h/24h Sapim spokes. In the past when I’ve ridden in the Alps I’ve used my Zipp 303 tubs which are awesome but with the tubs the threat of a puncture always looms over you. The A23s rode really nicely, not quite as nice as the tubs but as near as dammit and with lightweight inner tubes and tyres my new wheelset was only 250 grams heavier than my Zipps with tubs!! The A23s were faultless, no flex, really good ride and the braking (especially in the wet) was much more consistent than the Zipps. The wheels & posh bike are locked away for the winter but they’ve been spot on and the Zipps have been sold!!”
Thomas from Denmark ordered a pair of ENVE 29er XC wheels with a DT Swiss 240 rear and Cannondale Lefty front hub. They weighed 655g for the front and 796g on the rear (1451g total). Here are his comments and photos.
“Hi Jonathan. Here are some pictures of bike and wheels. Its an Flash 29″ mounted with Racing Ralph 2,4 rear and 2,25 front. The ride is amazing. The stiffness of these wheels are exceptional. Super snappy on the trail and the feel of my SuperSix on the paved parts. Energy througput out of the saddle is without comparison. [Next] I am going to put them on the Scalpel 29″. Best regards. Thomas.”
We have been working on a 29er for Tom to race on the Xterra (off road triathlon) circuit this year after being on show at the London Bike this week. Here is a photo of the bike in the spray booth after receiving it’s last coat of silk over coat. More on the components and build to follow in this blog.
We were delighted to receive a fantastic 4 stars and Editor’s Choice award in the January 2012 (issue 257) of Cycling Plus magazine. The review on page 77 pitched our Strada A23 wheelset against the Mavic Ksyrium Elite. The tester noted the Strada A23s spin up quickly and climb well. You can find the A23s with plenty of hub choices in the shop or click on the photo to read the review in full.
Darren has a background riding trials including 3 years on the GB team competing in Europe and part of a display team. Darren is still riding for fun and the odd competition too. He recently built a pair of Trials wheels for his friend Paul from Bognor. The rims have holes to reduce the weight and riders use clear vinyl packing tape like a huge rim tape to prevent the inner tube from blowing through. The rims are ground down using an angle grinder from new for maximum friction. Darren used to fluro spokes to match the bike colour scheme.
These rims are built to withstand heavy use and abuse as the photo below illustrates (photo by Freester on Flickr).
Guy is a Brit who has settled in SW France. After explaining he was after strong road wheels for his daily ride we settled on comfy A23 rims with classy Dura-Ace hubs, Sapim Race double butted spokes and brass nipples for his Enigma Ethos. Guy emailed me a review and some photos but this was in the email and I did not want to miss this “I am really pleased with the wheels, so thanks very much – it has made a nice bike a brilliant bike.“ Here is Guy’s full review.
“Why should the race bike get all the good kit? I ride three times more miles in a year on the commuter – pretty much every day, come rain or shine. The roads here vary from just laid lovely stuff, to neglected potholed gravel strewn paths through a wood, so wheels get a bit of a battering.
After having some trouble with my old, and increasingly knackered, wheels I was looking about for some wheels that would be comfy, durable, serviceable and quiet. I called Strada, and spoke to Jonathan; we had a very nice chat about what I was looking for, what I was going to use the wheels for and so on. By the end of the call we had specified a set A23’s on Dura-Ace hubs with lots and lots of Sapim race spokes. A few weeks later they arrived, very well packaged and with a nice message in the box.
I have now ridden about 200km on these wheels, mostly on my commute and I am enjoying them more and more as the mileage goes up. They have changed the way the bike feels, accelerates and rolls; all for the better. The hubs are very smooth and essentially silent, and the freewheel is very quiet too, which I love.
I have experimented with a few different tyres, all of which are more comfortable on the wider rim than on the 19mm I was using before. 23mm GP4000’s tyres in particular gave astounding feel when cornering. I was slightly taken aback by this as I never felt the bike handled badly, or that the tyres had grip issues, but now the bike felt ‘glued to the ground’ going round sharp corners – more like I was driving a car than on the bike. I have since put my old 25mm Gatorskin tyres back on – the bigger volume is really appreciated from a comfort point of view, and in town there is too much glass on the roads to ride GP4000’s all the time. There are a few rough bits of broken tarmac that I would ride around previously, and now feel quite happy riding on through. OK, it’s not like putting mountain bike tyres on, these are still fast wheels with skinny tyres, I can’t just plough through anything – just a lot more than I could before!
Overall, very smooth, and a significant improvement in comfort and handling feel than 19mm rims, and a very friendly and personable service – Super!”
Thanks Guy and enjoy the commute!
Owner and chief guide Ade at Alpcycles has been riding a pair of standard A23 wheels all season in the Alps, guiding clients over passes week in week out. He kindly wrote a report for us.
“Hi Jonathan, right have finally sat down, bike is in the shed as it is bloody freezing outside!! one more trip to club la santa and I hang the bike up for a month.
Just want to say that the wheels have been fantastic and really put to the test they are fantastic to desend on like being on rails and lovely to climb on with very little side to side movement when climbing out the saddle, they have been ridden every day more or less since I recieved them in July. So they have on average covered 600km with 11000 vertical meteres a week from July til end of September!! they have been up more or less every col in the Alps have taken part in the Alpes open tour 6 day sportive along side Davide Moncutie! Courhevel mountain TT in which they beat Jenie Longo!! so all in all they have been totally used and abused and are still very straight and in one piece.
I don’t really think there is any one who can put your wheels through what we can over here as we are very hard on our equipment because these wheels are work tools to us they go out every in all conditions, we have not got time to have spokes break etc and need to have 100% confidence when you are desending at 90km and hour!!
I will be after maybe up to 3 more pairs for next year as both my guides have ridden mine and bloody love them!!
We have taken over 200 hundred people this season and they are all wearing our jerseys with your logo on and come from all over the world!! and are always asking what we recommend as they know what our bikes and equipment go through each season!!
I can quite honestly say that nobody could put your wheels to the test like us, not even elite athletes if they get out of bed and its pissing down or cold they roll over and go back to sleep we are out what ever as we got to take our guests out be it 2 degrees or 40 degrees, and there is no terrain like the Alps to test rims, freehubs, spokes, etc.
Hope 2011 has been a good season and I think you will do well in the future.
All the best and thanks for all your help, Ade.”
Thanks for your report Ade and if you want to ride the Alps with a friendly, professional and knowledgeable team get in touch with Ade and Shelley at Alpcycles.
Simon from Chipping Norton has sent in this review of his Strada Velocity A23 wheels
“I’ve now done around 250 miles on my new Strada wheels and I can safely say that they are the fastest, lightest and most comfortable wheels I’ve ridden (and I’ve been used to Easton EA90 SLXs). I went for the Sapim CX Ray Spokes because I considered that they were worth the extra cash for the savings on rotating weight. The own brand Strada hubs are excellent, although I think there should be a silver version of these. They look minimal, great in black and are certainly lightweight.
I’d never heard of the Velocity A23 rim, but after some quick research, it quickly becomes apparent that the Australian Velocity rims are highly regarded. I’d already looked into a slightly wider 23mm rim and the buzz is all about comfort AND aerodynamics if running a 23mm tyre as many do. All in, the wheels (minus skewers) weigh in at a wonderful 1420g.
Add some Continental GP4000s tyres, SRAM pg1070 cassette, roads of varying quality from farm tracks to snooker table style tarmac plus finally some long steep hills to go up and down and you have a true all round wheelset ready for all of this without compromise. With Jonathan’s enthusiasm and desire to completely understand my needs, I don’t think I’ll ever buy a set of factory wheels again.
Note about the images: I’ve deliberately not cleaned my bike because too many bike photos are glossy studio affairs – I want to show that these understated wheels still look good a bit dirty.”
Cycling Plus review A23 wheels
We were delighted to receive a fantastic 4 stars and Editor’s Choice award in the January 2012 (issue 257) of Cycling Plus magazine. The review on page 77 pitched our Strada A23 wheelset against the Mavic Ksyrium Elite.
ENVE rims UK | now building with ENVE
We are really pleased to have become a stockist for ENVE rims and components. We will be offering the…read more
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