“It was very soon after the Barcelona Olympics, in early 1993, Richard said, ‘Hey, these guys from USA Cycling are going to come up and look at the place. GT founder Richard Long wanted to change that, and felt a high-visibility appearance at the Olympics would go a long way towards establishing a reputation in the road world. Although road cycling was a potentially lucrative segment, the company had virtually no credibility away from the dirt. GT Bicycles was an industry icon in the mid-1990s, but only in the realms of mountain biking and BMX.
The integrated seatmasts were essentially non-adjustable, too, and whatever minute changes were possible were arduous and slow.īut the bike was fast. Component partner Mavic developed special wheels and cranks to match the frameset’s ultra-narrow profile, and every cockpit was a bespoke creation for each individual rider. Virtually everything had to be custom-built specifically for the project. Such wholesale abandonment of convention required a systemic approach to the rest of the bike as well. Everything about the GT Superbike 2 is incredibly narrow. The bike was also impossibly narrow from tip to tail, as well as curiously low and short, with a conventional 700c rear wheel but a tiny 24in front wheel that allowed team riders to follow each other more closely and enhance drafting effects. To more efficiently slice through the air, the futuristic carbon fiber composite frame used airfoil cross-sections throughout, and the top tube and seatstays were omitted completely.
Gt bike half wing pattern full#
Born from the idea of making the fastest bike in the world, its makers were free from the restrictions of any technical regulations, and they took full liberty with the freedom that provided.
But while the engineers were looking to the future, the UCI was more interested in tradition, and the course of bicycle engineering from that point forward would be forever altered.īy any stretch of the imagination, the Project ’96 GT Superbike was an incredible design. The so-called GT Superbike was a wild departure from conventional design of the time - a full-blown ground-up rethink of what a bike could be. The 1992 Olympic Games had just finished, and USA Cycling, together with a group of top industry partners, embarked on an ambitious mission to provide its track athletes with the fastest bike in the world in time for the 1996 Atlanta Games.
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