Video: Eurobike faves – Museeuw MF-XX

The Museeuw MF-XX is a real team favourite from this year's Eurobike a bike that manages to be both different and innovative while also being understated and classy.

There's a lot going on here, there's also an asymmetrical seat tube and a BB30 bottom bracket and check out the positioning of the front and rear brakes. Mounting front brakes behind the fork is common practice on time trial bikes - it gets that messy brake out of the air flow, but you don't see it so often on road bikes - given the rise of the aero road bike and that the same advantages apply it's strange that fewer manufacturers haven't gone down this route. Other advantages? While it  puts the brake in a more protected position from much and spray we can't see any other advantages  that would neccesarily improve braking or handling on a road bike. Of course, that doesn't mean there aren't any.

The "XX" in the bike's name refers to the combination of high modulus unidirectional carbon fibre and flax fibre that the frame is made from. Museeuw has long be associated with the use of flax fibres in its bikes, they are also researching other fibre sources too and are looking at less noxious alternatives to the resin used to bond the fibres too. Like most of their top end bikes the flax on the MF-XX is used in the rear stays to add a bit of vertical flex - the front fork also contains flax fibres too.

With the flax fibre rear stays Museeuw have taken things to their logical conclusion by moving the brake down from the seat stay and locating it inboard behind the bottom bracket. That makes sense for two reasons, it means that the bike can have a much thinner seat stay allowing the flax to flex to its full potential without having to add bracing materiall to compensate for the braking forces that would otherwise be put through the stays. And, say Museeuw it makes for stronger braking performance because the brake is braced against the stiffest part of the bike. Neat. 

The braking system on the Museeuw looks to be a refinment of something similar we saw on the Mr Control stand in the Taiwanese Pavillion - check that out in or Components gallery. Inboard mounted brakes will crop up again in our Eurobike faves and we liked the Museeuw so much that we'll be back with a more in-depth techncial look at the bike with Museeuw's head of production Roberto Billato. The MF-XX comes built up with Campagnolo Super Record and Lightweight wheels with a euro price tag of €10,495… the price includes a bike box too.