Bottecchia 2016 first look: Emme 695, T2 Doppia Corsa, T1 Tourmalet and 8avio Evo

Italian brand Bottecchia has unveiled its 2016 road bike range ahead of the first UK showing at the Cycle Show at the end of the month. The new range includes a disc-equipped carbon fibre road bike and stunning Emme 695 with a, yes you guessed it, 695g frame. Here are the highlights of range.

Bottecchia isn’t the best known of the Italian bike brands here the UK, but is has plenty of heritage - Ottavio Bottecchia was the first Italian to win the Tour de France in 1924, wearing the yellow jersey from the first to the last stage. Today, the brand produces a range of good looking bikes, from super light to aero to disc-equipped models, and with a new distributor in recent years the brand is starting to elevate its profile in the UK.

No bike brand can claim to offer a complete range of models these days if it doesn’t offer a disc brake road bike, and so Bottecchia offers the T2 Doppia Corsa for 2016. It features a full carbon fibre frame and fork, and the claimed frame weight is 1,200g, along with a 360g fork. There are thru-axles front and rear. The Doppia Corsa is also available with direct-mount brakes.

The cables for the Shimano drivetrain and hydraulic hoses for the disc brakes are routed inside the frame and fork, providing a clean appearance. The frame has a streamlined appearance, with an aero profiled down tube and integrated seatpost clamp lending it a sleek look.

Claimed bike weight is 8.4kg, pretty much on a par with most similarly specced carbon disc bikes we’ve so far tested here at road.cc.

- 2016 Disc Road Bikes from Ritchey, Cube, Merckx, Koga, Bottecchia and Cipollini

If weight is a concern, then the Emme 695 will interest you. It’s the company’s range-topping model and has been designed for competition, so the geometry is definitely race focused. Long top tubes and short head tubes and very short chainstays are the order of the day here.

The frame is handmade in Italy using a tube-to-tube process and it’s packing the latest features. It has a pressfit 86 bottom bracket and tapered head tube with a 1 1/2in lower bearing diameter. The Ultra Slim Rear Stay (USRS) seatstays are very slim, in order to reduce weight and impart some comfort into the ride experience.

The dropouts are CNC-machined aluminium. All cables are internally routed and the seat tube accommodates a 27.2mm seatpost. The bike is offered in four builds, all top-end as you’d expect of such a high grade frame, starting with Shimano Dura-Ace mechanical all the way up to Campagnolo Super Record EPS.

Bottecchia also does aerodynamics. This is the T1 Tourmalet, which is unmistakably an aero road bike. The tube profiles are shaped to decrease drag, the seatstays are short and form a small rear triangle, and the aero seatpost is secured in place with a clamp concealed in the top tube. Naturally there is internal cable routing and the rear brake has been positioned underneath the chainstays.

The 8avio Evo is the company’s most affordable carbon fibre offering. You can get it with an Ultegra groupset for £1,699, and the range tops out at £3,199 if you go for a Campagnolo Athena groupset.

- Review: Bottecchia Unica Reparto Corse

Bottecchia will be exhibiting at the upcoming Cycle Show and you can find out more at www.bottecchia.com/en/categoria/corsa-en-en and we'll have more indepth details on these new bikes after the show.