Welcome back to Threaded! This week’s edition is a mixed bag of tool-related things seen in use at the Tour Down Under and a dose of New Tools Day. And don’t worry, the next Threaded will return back to the promised theme of bearings!
Ok, so my time at the Tour Down Under didn’t go exactly to plan. I was four days into taking more pictures of pro bikes than I could ever possibly use before I got called home to play nurse. All is OK, but as a result, I missed out on a few tool-related conversations I’d planned to have. However, the good news is that it meant playtime with some new tools awaiting my return.
Mechanic-lite and the Tour Down Under booths
The Tour Down Under presents unique complications for the travelling WorldTour teams. It’s a long way to transport a team’s worth of gear, and oversized baggage hasn’t gotten cheaper as of late. Many more-established teams rely on leaving old work stands, pumps, supplies, and even bulky components in Australia to return to a year later. Many mechanics then pack a simplified set of tools to be stored in a suitcase amongst the team tee-shirts and budgie smugglers.
Indeed tool kits are kept to the bare minimum. Larger tools and mechanical supplies are often sourced locally, as evident by the number of Ryobi and Ozito power tools (the house brand of Australian hardware store monopoly Bunnings). And it’s common to find non-sponsor-correct maintenance products simply due to what’s available nearby.
Once on the ground, the Tour Down Under provides a large gazebo for the mechanics to work in that doubles as a strange zoo-like arena for the public to get up and close with bikes of their favourite pros. Each team is given a small semi-circle patch of working area, just enough room to work on a bike mounted into a race repair stand (bike held by the fork dropout with the front wheel removed). If a team has a second mechanic, you’ll find that person working on the side, often in a walk-way.
However, while most mechanics strive for minimalism, a closer look does reveal a few cool tools in the mix.
Measurements like a pro
Things quickly get tricky because the Tour Down Under is the season's first race. Often there are new riders with new bikes looking to get dialled. Cleat positions are constantly changing, and bike fits are being argued about. The team-issue tools related to this are far from small, and it’s common to see the bigger budget teams coming into town with a bikesettings.com kit protected within a foam-lined rifle case.
Modern bikes also present modern problems. Gone are the days of quickly dropping a headset spacer for a rider to try a slight position tweak, with many bikes now requiring more permanent changes (steerer cutting). And even something as simple as a steerer cut is made harder when the teams don’t have a bench vise handy; heck, they don’t even have a solid bench.
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