well obviously because the thing looks cool as hell.

...i must admit, whenever i see somebody like b. lindquist aboard her s3 (non-"aero") steel waterford or, now, lieto on this outside of the box choice i have to smile. i am funny that way. :)

"well obviously because the thing looks cool as hell."

Looks like yet another Mike Burrows (TCR) copy.

not to pick nits with cerveloguy, but come on now... :) the bowed stays - the omission of the kinda unattractive seat-tube mast - the inclusion of a standard headset vs an extended headtube hiddenset - all add up to a quite different profile than a giant. not to mention, mike burrows??? giant??? for what, the sloping tt? ahhh no. nothing new there i'm afraid. in addition to the obvious mt bike precedent there are sloping tt road bikes all thru cycling predating burrows - more recently under such notable and high profile guys as bontrager.

In addition to the cool factor, Lieto has been on a road geometry bike all this time(Kestrel 300 EMS), it obviously works for him, so why change???

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Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

Hopefully he rides it because it fits. It will be interesting to see what his effective seat tube angle orientation is when the bike is built and fitted. I wonder if he will be somewhere around 76 degrees effectively?

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Tom Demerly
The Tri Shop.com

wouldn't he have to have a custom built bike to accomplish that angle with the sloping top tube? Why not just use the Saber?--customized!

What is so funny is when Giant and Burrows first put that frame design out, everybody bad mouthed the hell out of it. And now? After Giant makes the market penetration, almost every bike maker has their own version. Yes, Burrows set that all in motion. Litespeed may have added a few signature touches, but that is, as are all of the manufactured compact frames, a Burrows knockoff. And yes, it does look cool as hell.

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"Remember: a bicycle is an elegant and efficient tool designed for seeking out and defeating people who aren't as good as you."

--BikeSnobNYC

it wasn't the sloping tt everybody had a problem with, it was the "three sizes fits all" thing. thankfully that aspect of mr burrow's (sp) genius has not been overly pursued, at least. as for the sloping tt look itself... come on. that has been around for a very long time, and was on nearly every mt bike before giant even badged its own bikes here in the u.s. at least. you saw them on any number of road bikes also - most notably bontager's and other mtn builders cranking out sweet road frames in recent times - again well before the giant/burrows hookup. if you want to give anybody credit give it to the bmx guys, from whom brodie and rocky mtn and other early mtn builders took their lead. as for giant - well they do deserve some credit for taking the risk of bringing the concept to the large mass produced stage to some degree ( tho let us not forget the ridiculous aforementioned sizing gimmick that came too) B-U-T then again it is not tlike they had anything to lose, either. quick - name me one pre-tcr giant road bike ! you can't, can you? that is beacause giant had virtually no road legitimacy back then - tho they had triied. they really had nothing to lose, and you could say they got lucky as easy as you could say they were visionary.

Giant sold for a few years under their other name Cadex. The sold one hell of a carbon fiber lugged road bike, under Cadex and Giant. They stopped selling the carbon bike in the US, but continued in Europe. They were the first company that I can recall that broke the $600 price barrier for an aluminum road bike. They are the company that put out the MCR, which the UCI outlawed, and which helped lead to the compact frame. I sold bunches of Giants road bike before they ever came out with the TCR/OCR.

Don't you feel stupid now?

I doubt Burrows had anything to do with the size issue, that would be Giant, and manufacturing reasons. Initially they tried to hold the costs down so they could make market penetration, which they did.

Giant had a lot to lose, millions and millions of dollars. The liked the design even though it bucked convention, yet they went with it. They took the risk and it paid off. They are the ones that everybody else copied.

They were the ones who were successful. Bontager? Oh yeah, there is a real successful road bike company.

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"Remember: a bicycle is an elegant and efficient tool designed for seeking out and defeating people who aren't as good as you."

--BikeSnobNYC

Oh, the $600 aluminum road bike was the Kronos.

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"Remember: a bicycle is an elegant and efficient tool designed for seeking out and defeating people who aren't as good as you."

--BikeSnobNYC

well no, GT, i don't. the cadex, and its sister bike the spec allez were ok, bikes. i had a spec myself. they both did ok, and i would wager the spec did better than the cadex. the cadex was also a tad on the unattractive side, as were all early giant efforts. and it did lack credibility and a hard core market share. it is nice that you remember, but i would again wager most riders today do not. giant is a big company, capable of making bikes as good as anybodies but they needed to shed an image of a "cheap" builder of others designs/engineering/conceptual plans to do so. there a LOT to be gained, but relatively little to lose from their position as mostly a untapped self branded marque. they needed a kick in the pants - the mtn biky sloping top tube was a look and concept which helped them acheive this - but they hardly invented it.

bontrager was an example of a high profile, influential builder using the design before the man you claim invented it did so. his bike company was small, but highly influential as his status today indicates. there were many others in recent history - as i said many (again very influential) american mtn builders were doing it and the pacific rim companies were watching. back in the weight loss craze of the 70's it was not unknown, either. your man was in a position to bring the concept to a mass produced stage - it was not his design or invention at all, and the bikes which have followed reflect other builders responding to market demand and not "copying" anything other than a look from the largest section of the market (mtn bikes) which has found its time among some buyers in a smaller section (high end road).

finally, a sloping top tube bike is really just that. apart from a few issues relating to the gauges of the shorter tubes a ss tt bike is a horizontal t bike with the tt erased and an angled one drawn in. the rest of the "concept" of a "compact" bike is mostly marketing garbage from giant related to the bogus sizing deal. it is funny that you give burrows (sp) credit for a design concept already in widespread use among influential people, and yet you speculatively withdraw him from the part of design which WAS new, and negatively received. are you related? :) to give giant some credit for their desparate gamble - it could be said truthfully that the look of the ghisallo seeks to capitalize on the potential market the sloping giants exposed. that was a lucky break - otherwise we would all be riding around an carbon bikes bonded to fake aluminum lugs still. or call it a very well researched market analysis brought to fruition at the right time if you like. just don't call it what it is not - a burrows design or burrows innovation. it it neither.

It wasnt mass produced but Tom kellogg had a Ti version a few yrs before the TCR line, not exactly sure but get more info on his site (spectrum cycles)

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Simple Simon
Where's the Fried Chicken??

I don't have time to read your lengthy post. On a skim it seems to be a lot of crap. Giant came out with a road bike design that nobody else had, made great marketing penetration, and now has one of the best selling roadbike line which has been copied by almost every bike manufacturer out other.

You keep pushing Bontrager, a very small MTB company that most people have never heard of. I have never actually seen a person riding one of their bikes, much less another company copying them. I assume that you have some emotional reason for this.

Let me know when Bontrager has one tenth of the market share Giant has, or even when they successfully market and idea that nobody has successfully marketed before.

Again, Giant developed that road bike when nobody else was selling it, weathered the bad mouthing, and have a very successful and copied bike now. Bontrager has no market share, but just you runing around screaming they are "influential." Remember all they did was to copy the double diamond bike frame for MTB that everybody else had been using for years. Your poor argument slights them more than it does Ginat.

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"Remember: a bicycle is an elegant and efficient tool designed for seeking out and defeating people who aren't as good as you."

--BikeSnobNYC

the defence rests. have a nice day.

Glad you gave up!

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"Remember: a bicycle is an elegant and efficient tool designed for seeking out and defeating people who aren't as good as you."

--BikeSnobNYC

I'm not sure and don't have time to look it up, but doesn't this frame weigh only slightly less than a half-filled water bottle? Maybe Lieto has some hilly races planned...

Sweet looking ride.

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