Great Britain riders could be set to compete on a new bike for the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris, with details emerging of a 3D printed frame that costs £55,000.
The bike appears almost identical to the striking Hope x Lotus HBT track bike used by Team GB since the last Olympics in 2021. However, the design and manufacturing have come in-house under the technical experts at the UK Sports Institute (UKSI), with the frame dubbed the UKSI-BC1.
As for any equipment that is going to be used at the Olympics, it needs to be commercially available and have been used in competition in order for it to be registered by the UCI. This appears to have occurred at the 2023 Track World Championships in August, when Will Tidball rode it on his way to the rainbow bands in the scratch race.
This is the first time that British Cycling has strayed away from its partnership with Hope, which began in the lead-up to the 2021 Tokyo Olympics. A spokesperson for the English company confirmed to Cycling Weekly that it was not involved in the UKSI-BC1 bike due to constraints on its 3D printing capabilities. Lotus still provides the fork that's included with the UKSI-BC1 frameset, and would still provide the handlebar system of any full build.
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