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Spoon Customs, known for its handmade bikes and high standards of design and finish, was commissioned by Babble to build a top-spec road bike for the epic ultra-endurance relay, All Roads Lead to Rome.
Raising money for the My Name’5 Doddie Foundation.
The bike has been designed and built for Matt Parker, chief executive of leading UK cloud solutions provider, Babble, for use in the event.
Parker and his team – featuring Ultra-Endurance racer James Golding – will join event creator Rob Wainwright at the start line for an extraordinary endurance fundraiser, which departs from Murrayfield and concludes in Rome 1,800 miles away on Friday, March 9 – just in time for the Scotland vs Italy game, in the penultimate round of the Six Nations rugby tournament.
A Specialized S-Works Aethos frame forms the canvas for the outstandingly technical design which features ‘tartan paint’ in colours made famous by charity founder and ex-Scotland international Doddie Weir, who was diagnosed with motor neurone disease (MND) in 2017, and who started the My Name’5 Doddie Foundation, before tragically passing away from the disease in 2022.
The specification and design of the bike were led by custom bike experts, Spoon Customs then painstakingly applied by Jack Kingston over two gruelling weeks of marking out, masking and painting the incredibly detailed tartan which covers more than 50% of the frame as well as the entirety of the fork.
The tartan wraps around perfectly, with the joins meeting in a geometric challenge that cannot be met by just any paint team and has to be seen to be believed. Kingston has added a woollen effect to the super matte finish which makes the tartan pattern look even more like the famous fabric.
The rest of the bike is just as high specification as the paint, and the outstanding wheel build features ultra-reliable Chris King hubs, in matching anodised blue built by Ben Sharp of Spoon Customs. The wheel rims feature custom-made decals, produced by ENVE’s approved supplier Slik Graphics in Sweden and turned around in just 24 hours.
Doddie Weir passed away in 2022, but his memory lives on his outstanding legacy which sees 50,000 people taking part in Doddie events every year, raising money to raise awareness of MND and find a cure for the deadly disease.
All Roads Lead to Rome will see teams of amateur cyclists depart from Murrayfield, setting off on an epic 1,800-mile unsupported road ride, finishing at the Stadio Olimpico in Rome on 9th March.
Babble’s chief executive Matt Parker is leading out a team of three, including Rob Duffin and James Golding who will each take turns riding in two and four-hour stints, until they reach their destination in Italy just in time for the game.
No strangers to distance riding, Parker has cycled the length of Britain no less than eight times, whilst James Golding is also famous for his ultra endurance riding and participation in RAAM (Ride Across America), one of the most gruelling cycling events on the planet. The final member of the team is Rob Duffin also has a close connection to the challenge having lost his wife to MND.
To help support the team, visit their Just Giving page at: www.justgiving.com/campaign/teambabble2024
