Falkenjagd. Rennstahl. Words like forged steel – hard, precise, unmistakably German. It’s the first Sunday of Advent. Ochre-coloured hills are sliding past the windscreen. Pomegranates, pomelos and the Three Wise Men drift by on life-size plastic camels. I glance at the sky. Deep blue. I glance at Andreas. A faded Campagnolo T-shirt, shorts. Not very German for D...

Rim, hub, spokes. With DT Swiss, you would usually expect everything to come from a single source. That’s long been part of the brand’s DNA. With the new ARC 1100 SPLINE CS, however, the Swiss manufacturer is embracing the current trend for carbon spokes and, for the first time, is moving away from steel spokes on one of their wheelsets. So how much real-world pe...

Is it an Aeroad? An Ultimate? Neither. It’s the new Canyon Endurace CFR. Rumours about Van der Poel’s latest Classics weapon started circulating early on. Now it’s here, ready to take on the brutal cobbles of Flanders and Roubaix. We put it through its paces on the Belgian Kasseein in south-west Flanders and bring you our first impressions.

Part secret agent glasses, part action cam, part headphones, all wrapped into a pair of sunglasses. The Oakley Meta Vanguard bring Meta’s smart glasses technology to a sporty silhouette for the first time. While Oakley provide the performance DNA, will they actually deliver for you on a road bike or are they just a gimmick for wannabe spies?

With the new Sliker X3, Thömus are launching a gravel bike that wants to be ready for anything. Race bike? Versatile gravel all-rounder? All-road machine? None of that’s an issue, because Thömus don’tdo compromises, except when it comes to speed. The only thing that really defines this bike is its unstoppable urge to keep pushing forward. It sounds exciting, but ...