In part four of our ongoing series, three Cyclist staff members show off the bikes they own and ride – when they’re not testing other bikes, of course
James’s Swift ‘classic’ racer Disc brakes, internal routing and electric gears? No thanks
As a child James spent most evenings taking his bike apart in his parents’ hallway for no other reason than to put it back together again. The result was a lot of leftover bolts, which presumably weren’t that important as the brakes rarely failed.
Photography Joseph Branston
I first clapped eyes on this bike waaaaaay back. It arrived in the Cyclist office just like me – brand new, unproven and some months before we’d even sent the first issue of Cyclist to the printers. It was a pre-production frameset for a bike that would become a stalwart of the SwiftCarbon range: the Ultravox. The bloke who brought it in and sat me down to explain it was Swift’s founder, Mark Blewett, a South African ex-pro who had upped sticks to China to live by the factory that was making his frames.
Blewett was my baptism into the ways of Far East manufacturing, opening my eyes to the fact that behind most bike brands stood a slew of ‘gun for hire’ Chinese factories. These ‘vendors’ produced overseas designs using expertise, materials and machines that the West could only dream of. Blewett’s rationale of being so close to the action was to exploit such talents while ensuring quality control and quick decisions.
This frame was one of the first results and bore all the hallmarks of cutting-edge 2012 design: boxy down tube and chainstays for stiffness, skinny seatstays for comfort, bladed fork for aero gains, 28mm absolute max tyre clearance and a racer’s geometry. Hinting at its pre-production ways, it also had a bonded alloy sleeve in the PF30 BB instead of moulded carbon, and graphics that didn’t quite line up. Look at this bike’s head tube and fork and you’ll see it’s actually the Swiift.
Big day out
At Blewett’s invitation I built the Ultravox frameset up with a Sram Red groupset and some Reynolds R32 wheels to ride it at the Cape Rouleur sportive in his native South Africa.
By today’s standards a mechanical rim brake groupset and a pair of skinny carbon wheels (the R32’s internal width was a mere 17mm) sound positively antique, but at the time my mind was blown. And 12 years on I feel the Ultravox’s first spec sheet still compares favourably.
Sure, the Sram Red ‘only’ had 22 gears and br
