Just one week away from the next stop on the World Cup DH race circuit, next weekend, the world’s fastest will meet in Loudenvielle, France. And there will be another unique prototype bike on the pro downhill circuit, this time from Antidote Solutions with their AS05 automatic gearbox DH bike.
And, yeah, the bike is a little funky. Dare we say, “weird.” Antidote Solutions team rider, Gaëtan Vigé, had this to say about the AS05:
“When I first saw the AS05, I was impressed. It’s so different from anything we’re used to. It really gives you the feeling that you’re on a proper race machine. And once out on track for the first tests, I was honestly blown away. I was immediately able to ride fast while still feeling in control and confident. It almost feels like the bike is doing part of the job for us, it’s incredible.”
Antidote Solutions prototype AS05 DH race bike
The team at Antidote Solutions says the entire development and design process was in-house, except for some industrial manufacturing support.
Dialing the AS05 to the rider’s preference was one of the team’s top priorities. The chassis and suspension adjust independently of one another within five minutes. Riders can easily adapt the AS05 to their preferences, with Antidote Solutions providing more than 1,000 setup combinations.
The AS05 consists of a bonded carbon and aluminum front triangle and a 7075-T6 aluminum rear. The bonded front triangle allows Antidote Solutions to quickly make changes to the rider’s preferences while modulating stiffness. The AS05 accommodates both a 29” or 27.5” rear wheel, and an interchangeable bridge system at the rear triangle offers six different stiffness options.
Under all that pizzazz is an automatic gearbox fully developed by the team at Antidote Solutions. The team designed the gearbox to “deliver significant gains at the start and during pedaling phases” of the race. The concept of an intuitive gearbox that can choose the correct gear and shift automatically seems like an obvious advantage in a DH race, when the racers attention is intensely focused on picking lines and maintaining control.
To be clear, Antidote Solutions says that the gearbox is still very much under development.
“The initial tests have completely met our expectations. The bike is already incredibly fast and performing brilliantly, even though development is only beginning.”
So, what is the AS05, really?
Well, obviously, it is a prototype DH bike. And we can see that there’s some form of high-pivot suspension design with an idler pulley going on.
And Antidote calls it a gearbox bike. But clearly there’s also still a rear derailleur, and what appears to be a tightly-spaced DH cassette, right? Well, for sure, it’s not a belt-drive gearbox bike that would make it eligible for the Gates €100K Purse.
As far as the nitty-gritty details, it seems that Antidote Solutions is keeping its cards close. We know that the team consists of “18 experts,” with nearly all development done in-house.
But what about things like component choice and some “how” questions? I guess we’ll need to just pore over these photos we could rustle up from the team.
No geo chart, no leverage charts. The claim that front- and rear-triangle stiffness is adjustable trackside? That’s likely via the six interchangeable bridges on the rear triangle, but what about the front? Your guess is as good as ours on that front.
Or does that have something to do with those presumably carbon body panels / fairings we see on the front? Color us intrigued.
Weight? Who knows?
Components? Well, I see some Mavic wheels and Schwalbe tires (although not the latest Pro models), so it is unclear if those brands partnered with Antidote Solutions.
Suspension? The body panels of the race-ready bikes hide the rear shock well. We can see that the inverted fork looks like EXT’s Vaia. But there aren’t any logos on the race bikes, so maybe there’s some prototype action or in-house team modification, too? However, in other pictures without the body panels, we see an EXT Arma V4 coil shock and that Vaia fork.
Again, it isn’t clear what brands, if any, partnered with Antidote Solutions. We also don’t know what components will be on the bike at the next World Cups. But we’ll be keeping our eyes open – especially on May 28th!