LOOK’s new fork and headset setup for their track bikes has bled into the triathlon market (the 496). Luke Bell has been riding it for a while and I always wondered a bit about it. It’s been kicking around for a number of months/years but I saw it for the first time being ridden by a an amateur (Well someone who wasn’t obviously sponsored) in a photo taken just a month ago (end of January 2007). It had been making appearances here and there as a prototype since Athens in 2004 but I hadn’t seen anybody riding one except for sponsored athletes. I know they did a 2006 model of it but who knows exactly when that started distribution, apparently their 2007 version is different paint on the 2006 frame. That indicates to me that it was likely a “second half” of 2006 release.

Take a look at the photo, the front fork doesn’t connect to the frame via a standard headset as every other bike on the planet does. The fork stem come up in front of the frame instead of going through it. My guess is that this might make the bike a bit squirrelly to handle especially considering riding any bike with a shorter wheelbase and steeper seat-tube is that way already. For a track bike I guessed it was a decent trade off for aerodynamics, but couldn’t imagine (and still can’t) that it was going to make a big splash in bike construction.

I checked out the Look website and got no really clue as to when they started actual distribution of this bike to the real world paying customer market but in my travels did read that it claims the headset design improves stability. Now that sounds kinda bogus to me. If this headset design solves the problem of instability in the aero position shouldn’t every manufacturer of tri bikes have started building this? we’ve seen it since August 2004. Isn’t it a bit odd to believe that a company like LOOK which sells a traditional geometry frame (486) as a triathlon bike would be the company to figure out how to solve a problem that no-one else has solved? Companies like Kuota, Cervelo and Orbea are building superb tri geometry but all are still using the traditional headset configuration.

Look makes great $4000 frames that work superbly for draft legal ITU-triathletes, but to imagine that they fix the stability problem on one of their first attempts into steep seat triathlon geometry is a bit suspect to me. My guess is that this probably does allow you to cut weight and it may even improve lateral stiffness but its not going to make your bike ride rock solid when you’re splayed out on the aero bars. It’s not the lack of stiffness of the fork that makes your adrenaline rush when things get crazy it’s the geometry of the setup.