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2002 Pro Bikes

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Laurent Dufaux's Alessio De Rosa King

King carbon
Photo ©:Chris Henry/Cyclingnews

50 Years of innovation

The King in action
Photo ©: C. Henry

Since turning professional in 1991, Laurent Dufaux has ridden a number of bikes for a number of teams. With Alessio, his trusty machine is the compact De Rosa King, a full carbon frame with a sloping top tube and lugged construction.

Carbon is the name of the game for Dufaux and the Alessio team's setup. In addition to the all carbon frame, Dufaux's bike features Campagnolo's carbon Record crankset, as well as a Bora rear wheel and carbon seat post.

As Cristiano De Rosa mentioned in our De Rosa factory visit, "This downtube has a unique shape that was the result of over a year of development here in Italy, and in cooperation with Mizuno in Japan, the world's number one company for development of carbon fibre for sporting goods applications."

Unique design
Photo ©: C. Henry

De Rosa's carbon is a proprietary material, with a much finer weave than most manufacturers. De Rosa also takes pride in doing all of the work for its carbon frames rather than using subcontractors for certain components.

"Before we launched the King frame, we did a lot of testing to understand just how to derive the best combination of carbon fibre composition and shape. Not only do we have our crew of road testers, but this custom built test bed machine really enabled us to refine the King."

A unique feature of Dufaux's King (which is in fact a Cinquanta frame) is the construction around the seat tube cluster. Rather than using a traditional lug to join the top tube, seat tube, and rear stays, De Rosa featuers a top tube which extends to the rear past the seat tube, through which the seat tube is inserted. This is designed to strengthen the critical junction and place the bond to the rear stays behind the joint.

Alessio uses Fi'zi:k saddles. The handlebar and stem combination is Dedaccai, with the Newton combo as Alessio's choice.

The King and I
Photo ©: C. Henry

For the Zurich World Cup race, Dufaux chose a mixed wheelset, with a Campagnolo Hyperon front wheel coupled with a deep carbon Bora rim in the back using seven sets of three spokes grouped together.

New for 2004

With De Rosa gearing up to celebrate its 50th anniversary, a new edition of the King will be on offer, along with a standard (non-compact) frame to compliment the current geometry. De Rosa also released a special 50th anniversary bike; the De Rosa Cinquanta.

Photos

Images by Chris Henry/Cyclingnews

Full specification

Frame: De Rosa King carbon fibre (1,050g)
Fork: De Rosa carbon
Colour: Black

Cranks: Campagnolo Record
Bottom bracket: Campagnolo Record

Chain: Campagnolo Record
Front derailleur: Campagnolo Record
Rear derailleur: Campagnolo Record
Brakes: Campagnolo Record
Levers: Campagnolo Record
Rear sprockets: Campagnolo Record

 

Wheels: Campagnolo Hyperon (front) and Bora (rear)

Stem: Deda Newton
Headset: Campagnolo Record
Bar: Deda Newton

Pedals: LOOK
Saddle: Fi'zi:k
Seatpost: Record carbon
Bottle cages: Elite