One thing led to another, as it so often does …summers in this town. The spring and early summer of 2008 brought its stories of success and a whole lot of bikes. It’s all been a whirlwind.

Martin’s still has some 2008 stock left. Several of the models on our sales floor from Trek and Specialized are no longer available in Canada. Everything in stock is currently discounted. Swing by, ring us on the phone, or visit our Catalog for a peak at some of what’s still in stock.

Saturday morning in St-Lambert, Erin Burns swam, biked and ran her way to a first place finish in her age-group by a massive margin of 6:31.  Not finished at that, she also took honours as the first overall women finisher, 18 seconds ahead of her closest rival.  This race marks another accomplishment in a fantastic season that could see her win the Quebec Cup if she keeps putting time on the competition like this.  It goes without saying Erin: everyone at the shop is proud of your hard work!

Other notable achievements at the St-Lambert race include Patrick Fontaine standing on the podium in second place, as well as Annie Reumont.

-Patrick Russell

Building up any Santa Cruz frame is a pleasant task to take on; kinda like having cake and eating it too.

This Nomad build-up was a particularly sweet one. All of the best component-classics came out of the woodwork, including an XTR drivetrain and King hubset.

Eric started with a headset install that caught everyone’s attention in the shop:

Chris King Link
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After 57km on the streets of St-George-de-Beauce, the Canadian National 40+ womans champion was crowned. Adorned in the blue and white of Martin Swiss Cycles, Joanne Breau was standing atop the winners podium to claim the title of National Champion for the second year in a row. Congratulations on the victory Joanne!

Bromont DH:

After much steed tweaking, the boys on the Martin’s DH team were ready for the downhill race in Bromont, Qc. The event was a success in many respects; Fred and Christophe both enjoyed a 3rd place position on the podium in their respective categories, and the riding conditions were so ideal that ex-racers currently working in Beijing came out of the wood-work with comments:

More stories about the Martin’s DH team will follow soon, including the return of Fred Bélanger and a profile on Andrew’s scandalously light Santa Cruz V10.

Granby TT:

Rolling up to Thule Canada in Granby, one question was in mind: starting with a slight downhill and aided by a tailwind, should we drill it like crazy off the buzzer to capitalize on the tailwind and suffer the consequences?, or go out conservatively, saving energy to battle the headwind that would be sure to punish us on the long back straight? In any event, there was lots of time to warm up on the trainer and mull it over. I’m not sure what the consensus was, but the headwind was brutal down the back straight. A beautiful early summers day added to the generally pleasant atmosphere that received us for a day of cycling and, hell, any excuse to wear an aero-helmet is good enough for me to get out and ride.

Pat Russell, Martin’s Swiss Team Manager

The guys and girls at Martin’s Swiss Cycle do a shop ride every week on Saturday at 8am and Tuesday at 5:30pm. Anyone is welcome to join. It’s a road ride, so, the use of a road bike is certainly recommended. Helmets and a safely-tuned bicycle are mandatory. Ride intensity and destinations vary from ride to ride.

There’re a list of fantastic new bikes in Martin’s road shop this spring. Some of the new members of our concise “sales program” include: the very aggressively priced
Cervelo RS, the beautiful new Litespeed Archon and Icon, and the gorgeous and very affordable Specialized Tarmac Elite.

Martin’s Swiss is also very pleased to announce the arrival of Capo Forma apparel. Capo is another fantastic brand that Martin’s is proud to boast among the many fine brands that grace our sales floor.

Swing by the shop and check out all the new models while they’re still available! We also have all the new 2008 models that brought us success in 2007.

The Shimano line-up is very important to us at Martin’s Swiss. However, this YouTube clip is an excellent example of why more and more of the Specialized and Santa Cruz bikes in our mountain shop are coming equipped with Sram components. …Sram’s road component groups have also claimed quite a bit of success amidst our Shimano-dominant road shop.

SRAM Link

Two bikes that can’t really be compared. So… we shouldn’t compare them then.

The Specialized Demo 7 and Santa Cruz Blur LT seem quite different, and they are, but they actually exist together at opposing extremes of a market that has changed again and again and has been sold under many names.

This’ll be the first of a Martin’s website series on “Trail Bikes”: dual suspension mountain bikes that’re versatile enough to escape “XC” or “DH” classification. These bikes have recently benefited from incredible developments technologically and somehow, are still confused in a labyrinth of marketing jargon. In this series we’ll discuss what we’ve been throwing a leg over and seek out the best bikes for a variety of trail-riding applications. Though we’ve already been distracted by what’s new for the ‘08 season, we’re gonna start off this series with what has already defined what trail bikes are for us at Martin’s Swiss Cycle. Read the rest of this entry »