Custom is a bad word, not like the ones that get a ten-year-old sent to the principle’s office, but one that can mean too many things, or not enough. The common perception is that a custom bike has custom tube lengths and angles, that a good fit is the primary benefit. But we do so much more to personalize a bike for a Seven rider. Maybe the most important custom element in a Seven is the rider-specific tubeset.
We have riders who are 6 feet tall and weigh 150lbs, and we have riders who are the same height and weigh 250lbs. Each of them wants a comfortable ride that performs well. To achieve similar ride characteristics for each rider we pick a tubeset that accounts for their differences. This seems obvious to us. A custom bike should fit perfectly, of course, but it should also feel perfect, and that means selecting the right tubes for wall thickness and diameter.
With our double and ultra-butted frames, we can go even further in personalizing ride feel for the individual, refining the tubes to make them more compliant and lighter. This is three steps of refinement beyond geometry, and we feel these steps are integral to delivering a real custom bike. Rider-specific is core to our philosophy, an extension of what we wrote about last week regarding women’s specific bikes.