Hello Vital MTB Visitor,
We’re conducting a survey and would appreciate your input. Your answers will help Vital and the MTB industry better understand what riders like you want. Survey results will be used to recognize top brands. Make your voice heard!
Five lucky people will be selected at random to win a Vital MTB t-shirt.
Thanks in advance,
The Vital MTB Crew
https://www.pinkbike.com/news/from-the-top-ohlins-racing-ceo-henrik-joh…
"What is your approach to sponsorship? I had heard you don’t sponsor teams or riders in terms of money or product?
We never sponsor anything I would say… Apart from maybe a charity. For our race teams, our racing partners, they would always pay the cost for the product and service they like to use. Then it’s not a profitable business, but we try to get back our cost. The idea is to have a plus and minus zero situation for all racing. Some years we succeed, some years maybe not.
Does that hold true for mountain biking as well? It’s probably a very different approach to any other sport…
In mountain biking it’s special for us to start with because we have exactly one customer. We have an exclusivity agreement with Specialized, so in part of the contract with them we are not allowed to race with other brands, and we will not race with other brands. It’s part of the overall contract. They get exclusivity with us, and we obviously get other things from them."
https://www.pinkbike.com/news/specialized-ohlins-suspension-team-2017.h…
"In any case, the 'no free stuff' ethos isn't how it works in mountain biking. In fact, it's the polar opposite - companies pay, be it financial support or by supplying product, for racers and teams to use their gear and the exposure that comes from that, not the other way around.
That begs the question that has an obvious answer: are the Specialized Gravity and EWS teams actually paying to use Öhlins suspension? No, of course not. Graves, Bruni, Miller, and the rest being on Öhlins suspension is part of the big-picture OEM deal that sees the exclusive spec of Öhlins forks and shocks on Specialized's production bikes. ''This is an extension of our ongoing partnership to develop innovative suspension together,'' Dan Hugo, Head of Sports Marketing at Specialized, explained when asked how the arrangement works. ''We believe that rider feedback from riders like Bruni, Graves, and Keene will help push forward development. So, too, this racing sponsorship allows interaction with the extensive testing experience that Laurent Delorme and Jack Roure have.''"
Plus motorsport mostly sells the car/bike brand first and foremost and then the head sponsors (usually from outside the industry) with minor components (suspension, exhausts, wheels and the like) almost hidden away and left to be recognized by the most diehard fans. With mountainbikes the component spec is much more clear and thus a stronger bargaining chip. And the components are visible. You don't see the dampers on a Le Mans prototype racer, yet I have a wallpaper of an LMP2 prototype with the rear deck taken off, showing Ohlins dampers. You wouldn't know it without taking the cover off. Let alone F1 and their customized damper units (heave dampers, third springs, rotary dampers, inerters, FRIC suspension, etc.). You can't market that as well as you can MTB suspension products.
Jolanda out for at least 3 months to recover from her crash: https://racing.trekbikes.com/stories/tfr-cross-country/jolanda-neff-on-…
I'll stay with my bet on Öhlins main sponsor of the new Commençal/any brand here.
Buick and Robby to Canyon.
Morgane Charre off Juliana.
I think the issues combined with the oem exclusivity agreement they had coming to an end, made it easy to part ways. From what I know, part of their deal was specialized distributing a certain amount of ohlins products, which seems to have come to an end as well.
Back to team rumours though. Hannah Finchamp and Haley Batten both left the Clif team and Erin Huck left her team (construction zone). I can see Erin going to Stans Pivot to replace SGV.
Specialized new team member:
Monika Mixova, 30 years old from Czech.
Based on Speciaized IG stories.
More intell on the mystery bike from Gamux we saw a few weeks back
https://www.instagram.com/p/B6_Pym5i1T5/?igshid=gdzsqh83j6l8
https://www.instagram.com/p/B6_POazCQte/
Post a reply to: 2020 Mountain Bike Team Rumors