2014 Interbike Best of Show: SOMEC

Rather than wait, save the Best of Show, for the final post from this years' Interbike, I decided to throw it somewhere in the middle. Maybe I will beat everyone else to the punch. Then again, maybe everyone else was focused on this years lightest, or the most recent technological advancement that they forgot to look at anything that hinted at tradition.

It is not every year you see a leather wrapped bike, heck I don't believe I have ever seen one. But, then this is not simply any year's model, it is a special creation for SOMEC's 40th Anniversary. How many bikes have you seen that come finished with a hand-stitched leather wrap? I am not talking about a wrap for the bars, no, this wrap covers the tubes - top, seat, head, and down. The dark leather merges seamlessly with the lugs and is accented, and complimented, by the decorative stitching. If that isn't enough, the build comes fully outfitted with pantographed Campagnolo components - stem, seat post, brake calipers, crank arms, and chain rings all come impressed with the SOMEC name and stars and bars, and highlighted in the red, white and green colors of Italy.

This is a bike you buy for its looks, and treat with all the pampering it deserves. Just don't forget to ride it, it is first and foremost a bicycle which, after all, is the reason SOMEC does what they do.

Somec, is a family-owned Italian manufacturer of bicycles in the Romagna region of the country. Company founder, Oliviero Gallegati, began to produce his custom frames in 1973 chosing the name SOMEC, an acronym of the Societa Mecchanica. Signore Gallegati's SOMEC lays claim to several design developments over the years. Among them a new seat collar design integrating the seat stays and binder bolt behind the seat post, an arched rear brake bridge paralleling the arch of the brake caliper, and internal routing for brake and derailleur cables. The company made their name building custom bikes of steel, aluminum, and titanium. Numerous teams have ridden SOMEC bikes over the years, and in 1988 Monica Bandini won the World Team Time Trial Championships on a SOMEC. Since 2007 the company has also offered custom carbon fiber models.

I show this not just for the company logo,

but for the bike as well - that is the frame hidden under the leather wrap.

If you are in SoCal, Gary is the local SOMEC agent extraordinaire.

I got him to pose with his 25th Anniversary SOMEC.