Friday, May 13, 2011

Viking Bikes Do They have A Spot In Competitve Cycling

By Alex Hirst


The Competitive sport of road race cycling is a sport with lots of history and tradition, within continental Europe it is one of the major sports and thousands line the streets to cheer their favourite racers. For most of road race cycling's history it has relied on most of its support from the cycling industry to produce teams and support riders. Bicycle makes such as Raleigh, Bianchi, Trek and Specialized play a big part in supporting top level road racing especially during economic hardship. Many Cycling Brands sponsor existing independent teams and in turn for financial support the riders must ride their particular brand. However in recent years there have been a number of teams such as the Cervelo test team that have created their own team in which the riders also become testers and aid Research & Development.

Treks first Tour De France win with Lance Armstrong is a good example of sponsorship of a tour de France champion rocketing Credibility and Sales within Road Cycling. Now Trek is now established at the top of the sport and has won the Tour de France more times than any other Viking bikes manufacturer since 1997 when Lance Armstrong won his first Tour de France.

Specialized Bike Company also improved the reputation within the European road cycling market by supplying professional Road racers and teams with bicycles. Specialized have also won the Tour de France in recent years with Alberto Contador, Both American Companies Extended their range into Europe by sponsoring top level athletes creating awareness of their brands and the quality of their machines .

This Technique on a smaller scale is also being used by English bike manufacturer Raleigh with the Establishment on their own cycling team with the lofty ambitions to ride the Tour de France by 2014. Raleigh were once held in the best regard by cyclists throughout Europe and even won the Tour de France in the eighties with its team TI-Raleigh. However in the late 80s Raleigh ceased sponsorship of the team and has only just returned to high quality racing bicycles with the advent of team Raleigh after many years of creating value minded child and leisure bikes. Raleigh's reputation has been diminished however the new team will help improve the brands image as quality bike manufactures.

By helping fund the teams within cycle racing bike brands receive exposure and even more importantly are considered high quality brand as the professional riders will simply ride good quality equipment elevating the brands status.




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