DURATEC wins award for innovation. The weekend saw the seventh year of the prestigious annual bike show Bespoked 2017, which brings together smaller bike makers focusing exclusively on custom frame builders. The show is held in Bristol, England, in the former railway station Brunel's Old Station, the architecture and fantastic environment of which underline the handcrafting that we could admire at the show.
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The Czech firm Duratec participated in the show for the first time and presented its brand new item - the Phantom carbon road racing frame - to the entire world. The frame was introduced in the Czech Republic this February and thanks to its uniqueness it drew the attention of competitors, cyclists and, primarily, the expert community. It is made using a completely new and innovative technology, also developed in the firm Duratec. The entire composite frame is woven in a single piece without any joins, which is technically unique or even incomprehensible for experts from the field of composite manufacturing. But this technical process gives the bike wholly unique handling. The frame has been inspected by, amongst others, the International Cyclists' Union (UCI), which checked its technical construction and confirmed that it meets the criteria for professional use. And so Duratec has become the first Czech manufacturer to be included on the prestigious UCI list of frames. |
The quality of the DURATEC Phantom frame and its exceptional crafting were assessed in Bristol by an expert panel that awarded the firm Duratec the "Steve Worland Innovation Award". This award is presented every year to firms introducing new manufacturing techniques for racing bike frames. The award was accepted by Kateřina Duchková, the manager of the firm Duratec presenting the product at the show.
"The panel was anonymous, and it appraised all the exhibitors during the first day of the show, which was extremely demanding for us. A large number of people were interested in absolutely all the details that we presented on the stand. They were interested not only in the Phantom, but in the moulds, the fibres, and their processing. I was surprised at the expert level of the questions asked during the course of the day. For us the award has great value and prestige because we were presenting not only our own product, but a product developed and manufactured in the Czech Republic," said Kateřina Duchková.
At the end of the show the firm Duratec was described as the largest global player in the field of bespoke bike construction because its annual production is significantly higher than that of the other firms presenting their products.