CT Blog: Trent Carman Velocite Magnus

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For this blog I thought it would be a good opportunity to take the time and write about my training partner, my own bicycle the Velocite Magnus. One of the most common questions I get asked when I’m out ridding on the road is what bike is that? Its understandable that most people are unfamiliar with the Velocite brand due to the fact that they are relatively new on the market, only forming in 2008. With this Velocite like to state that because they are new on the scene they have no heritage and therefore no legacy to hold them back, and no traditions to satisfy. With this in mind you can see that their 2011 range is very impressive and includes not one but 3 well designed carbon road bikes to take on any riders needs. The Geos is perfect for long and hilly days in the saddle. The Magnus is designed to be one of the stiffest bikes on the planet with only a small weight penalty on the Geos and the 3rd bike, the newest inclusion to the Velocite family, is the Helios Aero. 



With 3 awesome bikes on offer I had the hard choice to pick just one and after long discussions it was the Magnus that finally won and for the last 6months I have racked up a few k’s with the Magnus. Now when a bicycle brand clams that they are one of, if not the stiffest bikes in the world the first thought that pops into mind is in what sacrifice has been taken to achieve this goal. The general rule is, as you increase the frames stiffness you lose a lot of comfort . This is why a bicycle company does not set out to create the stiffest bike in the world but more so the complete package of how well the frame absorbs road buzz vs stiffness and to create this without adding to much weight to the frame. That was my only worry and I was hoping that Velocite had not just set out to create a bike far superior than any other company in terms of how stiff the frame is and just threw everything else out the window. But it didn’t take long for me to realise that Velocite had managed to build a bike that was really comfortable to ride and was on par with my old bike (a Trek Madone). 



Now its time to talk about the bikes main feature, how well it can accelerate. Now I am not just saying this because I am a sponsored rider of Velocite, this is a completely honest review. If I had ever felt the bike was not up to my standards I would say so, but I can’t and for one simple reason - this frame is the fastest bike I have ever owned or ridden. When you kick, it just goes, its not sluggish in the acceleration,. Some bikes I have ridden in the past felt like the rear end is moving and twisting when you jump out of the saddle but not this one. When you race up a hill its rock solid and just goes where you want it to go. With my old bikes you could always feel the rear stays flexing when doing strength endurance efforts in the 53 - 11 but not this bike, its solid. 

It’s now time to talk about the weight of the bike. This is one of the easy things to test, all you need to do is put the frame on some scales and all your questions are answered. At 1080 grams for a medium frame it is not a super light weight bike, but it all so doesn’t fall in the heavy weight category. Now days 1080 grams is average for a top end road bike but you still need to keep in mind that the Magnus is not the lightest frame in the Velocite range. Over all I think the Magnus is a great bike from how stable it is when you are flying around a corner to how well it takes off when you kick back out of the corner. Its obvious that a lot of time and effort has been put in to the design process of the frame to get an all round package and if you were after just one bike to tackle the fast crits and the hilly road races I think this is your bike. On top off all that Velocite have even managed to take a few lessons learnt from the Helios aero and if you look at the rear end of the bike you will see that aero dynamics was in the back of there mind when they took the Magnus to the drawing board. I hope this review has given you some information on a bicycle that is not so common at the local races, but I feel that this will change in the next few years.

If you wont to read an independent review bikerumor did a review on the 2010 Magnus and you can see it herehttp://www.bikerumor.com/2010/11/20/review-velocite-magnus-carbon-fiber-road-bike/ 

Trent