So, the die is cast… or it would have been had the judging panel for RCUK’s Trek Project One dream bike competition decided to choose the winner at random.
Instead, inspired by the efforts of all those who entered – thanks everyone and well done for some cracking designs – we decided to do the job properly by looking through the entire thread and making a selection.
The hard part was done by Trek’s Chris Garrison, who whittled nearly 1,000 entries down to a few dozen. Her initial criteria were simple: a preference for those who chose the more costly but also more creative custom colour scheme option at the expense of component specification and, in the case of multiple very similar entries meeting the above, the earliest post went through. Note that only those entries posted in the official competition thread were considered.
With a manageable number to look through, Chris sat down with RCUK’s James Hamilton and Richard Hallett to sort the wheat from the chaff – or something. Regardless of originality, the truly awful, such as one that looked like an inhabitant of a tropical aquarium, went straight in the bin. Many were discarded because the designer had clearly not thought about having to ride the thing afterwards had it won.
From the remainder we eventually found 10 we felt deserved further consideration; with three judges, there is variety in the selection and, we hope, consistent quality. Some were named by their entrants, others we named as we saw fit. The names we have awarded are for descriptive purposes only and are not obligatory.
The winner will be announced at noon on Friday 12 March, when preparations for the build and delivery of the machine will commence.
The competition is now closed to further entries; any further entries posted as new threads will be deleted.
