Saddle Safari Cycles located at the top of Marlow High Street.

Open Monday to Saturday 9am – 5:30pm
Sundays 11am – 4pm.

In our shop we stock enough to kit out the whole family, the racer, the mountain biker, tourer and the commuter.
Inner tubes, maps, clothing, lights, spare parts and accessories.

Advice and servicing available in our workshop.

Bring your bike for repair or upgrade and get a guaranteed cost and collection time.

Saddle Safari Cycles in Marlow

Crown lane – off Spittal Street, Marlow,
Buckinghamshire, SL7 3HL  01628 477020
Click here for a map to find us!  

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Saddle Safari - The Bike Shop in Marlow for Bikes, Accessories Clothing and Servicing

Saddle Safari Cycles have produced several guide books showing off the local area to recreational, touring and family cyclists.
To purchase the books pop in to our store and ask a member of staff.

Some of the routes are available here, on the website with maps, directions and downloadable files for your GPS or navigational device such as the latest range of Garmin units which will be availble in store soon.

Road Routes

View all Road Routes in and around the Chilterns click here … or click on an individual route from the choice below …

• Marlow: Bucks, Berks & Oxon loop 30 miles
• Marlow: From the River to the Ridgeway loop 41 miles
• Marlow: Hambleden Vally quick loop 16 miles
• Wycombe: Chequers loop 24 miles
• Beaconsfield: Gerrards Cross Burnham Beeches loop 24 miles
• Beaconsfield: Little Missenden & the Chalfonts loop 23 miles
• Henley: Wallingford loop 31 miles
• Henley: Sonning to White Waltham loop 26 miles
• Maidenhead: Windsor Great Park loop 28 miles
• Maidenhead: Fulmer loop 24 miles

Off Road Routes

To see all the off-road routes click here… or select an individual route from the selection below….

• West Wycombe / Radnage – 15 miles
• Wendover Forest & Bracknell Forest
• Marlow, Cookham Dean, Burchetts Green, Hurley – 18 miles
• Marlow, Chrisbridge Cross, Booker and Marlow Bottom – 12 miles
• Frieth, Southend and Ibstone – Length: 13 miles

Family Rides

• For family rides and traffic free routes click here

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Saddle Safari - The Bike Shop in Marlow for Bikes, Accessories Clothing and Servicing

This is a recent article from BikeRadar.com

Treks race department is heavily tasked. This six-man team must support the company’s professional race teams and individual athletes, and use those programs to test new products and make existing products better – because at Trek, they race what they sell, and sell what they’ve raced.

The team, who are a mix of engineers, ex-racers and mechanics, work out of a 3,000sq ft corner of Trek’s massive 205,000sq ft headquarters in Waterloo, Wisconsin. Every single one of the company’s sponsored bikes runs through this ‘Race Shop’, from those used by K-Swiss triathletes, the C3 gravity program, Trek World Racing and the new RadioShack-Nissan-Trek road squad, to privateer athletes and outfits, like the new ODI-Trek squad.

Between them, these teams require roughly 1,000 frames per season, which range from the new carbon fiber Session 9.9 downhill bike to the super-fast Speed Concept triathlon and time trial machine, and everything in between.

The Race Shop was founded due to pressure from Lance Armstrong for better products during his Tour de France reign. “The starting point was theLance rise, and what we needed to do to support that,” said Mark Andrews, the department’s road and triathlon engineer. “Having dedicated resources to support teams became a huge asset.”

For years the race department was part of the Advanced Concept Group (ACG) and run entirely by Andrews and Scott Daubert, who then served as Trek’s ‘Lance liaison’. The ‘shop’ was just a small corner in Trek’s prototype lab. Then, when Trek took on full equipment support of Astana in 2008, the department grew and the true Race Shop space was created.

“We’ve always been best-in-class, with dedicated outdoor support and dedicated indoor support [for our race teams] that’s superior to our competitors,” said Ben Coates, Trek’s former road team liaison and current road product manager. “It shows, at least to us, in the support and happiness of our athletes.

“In 2008, we signed up for Astana, and we were full clothing, full bike, everything, and it was a huge undertaking. At the end of that year John [Burke] and Joe V [Vadeboncoeur, Trek's vice president] talked about expanding our racing presence. We spent a bunch of time identifying what would limit us from doing it properly, and the dedicated space and people were the two hurdles that we had to overcome.”

While the department was founded to support Trek’s headline road team, its directive – to be on-time and on-target with race team support that’s second to none – transfers to all of the company’s sponsored teams and athletes. The expansion of the Race Shop allowed Trek to take on Martin Whiteley’s Trek World Racing outfit and the C3 gravity program in 2010, and in 2011 asecond top-tier European professional road team, in the form of Leopard-Trek.

“The additional teams were only possible, and successful, because we set this place up to support them,” Coates told BikeRadar. “You hear about a lot of teams having the disaster of not getting enough bikes fast enough, or new paint schemes, or new product, or stuff like that, and we really don’t have those problems.

“Mark has a great connection with the manufacturing group and this room really operates as a leverage point. Ray [Waxham, mountain bike teams technician], Vance [McCaw, C3 technician], Matt [Shriver, team liaison] and Scott [Daubert] can walk up to anyone in the building and say, ‘I need something’, and then use their resources in this room to leverage our external [to the Race Shop but still within Trek] resources to supply and fulfill all those needs.”

Making all of this possible are Trek’s on-site engineering, product management and ‘halo’ product production teams. Without that last resource – the on-site carbon factory and custom metal production – Trek’s race team support could never be as successful. Managing a similar Asia-based program would be harder, and infinitely slower. “In the event that we have an issue, it’s not just four guys back here in a room trying to solve it,” said Coates. “It’s a ‘four guys who have the run of the company’ kind of deal.”

Of course, it’s not all about custom products. There’s plenty of more menial work to be done, too. “Simply putting the bikes in boxes can be a huge challenge,” said Coates. “Making sure they’re all painted properly, sized, have headsets in them [or any other parts], screws, nuts and bolts, and all that, is really what this place does; it makes sure that we deliver on time, on target, and that the support is second to none.”

Case in point: the day BikeRadar visited the Race Shop, Matt Opperman and Jon Rourke, the head mechanic and team manager from Subaru-Trek, were there to pack and ship all of their team’s equipment for the first UCI World Cup mountain bike race of2012 inSouth Africa.

The fun stuff

It’s not all spinning wrenches and packing cardboard, though. The Race Shop facilitates all kinds of special team projects. It’s a playful environment and you can tell Andrews, Waxham and McCaw have a fair amount of fun doing their jobs. Recently, Waxham made some custom horizontal dropouts so he could build Frank and Andy Schleck a pair of fixed-gear Madone training bikes.

“They [dropouts] are actually from our T1000 track bike,” he said. “And it allows them [the Schlecks] to have a bike that fits just like their race bike, but have a fixed-gear training tool. We did two 58cm bikes for them in the same team colors; they were kind of cool looking once they were built up. Those are the little side things and little tweaks that we’ll do to production stuff, if there’s a request.”

The engineers also build their own custom projects just to stay sharp and creative. Andrews is known for his custom bikes for his two girls, and Waxham has become interested in the fixie scene. “It’s great to be able to have stuff at your fingertips,” said Andrews. “Ray has been doing a lot with fixies and belt drives. I like the kids’ bikes. It’s just, ‘I want to try this’ [type projects]. Anyone can make a regular bike but [we like] taking it to the next level. Like, we did a bike for Shaun Bradley, who’s 7ft 6in, a few years ago.”

Other projects can range from prototyping shock linkages for the gravity teams – Ross Schnell needs these because he runs RockShox rear shocks instead of the stock Fox dampers – to playing with different derailleur hanger materials. Recently, the Race Shop played a part in the Madone 6.9 SSL’s swap from an alloy to carbon front derailleur boss, as well as other odds and ends like this.

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Saddle Safari - The Bike Shop in Marlow for Bikes, Accessories Clothing and Servicing

Trek Marlin WSD 29er 2012

29ers are versatile enough to serve XC and trail riders, and their unbeatable efficiency and momentum make them the ultimate singlespeed weapon.

FRAME Alpha Gold Aluminum, butted & hydroformed tubing, cold-forged dropouts & bottom bracket, G2 Geometry

FRONT SUSPENSION SR Suntour XCM w/mechanical lockout, preload, custom G2 Geometry, 51mm offset, 14.5″ 80mm travel; 15.5″, 17.5″ 100mm travel

REAR SUSPENSION  Fox Performance Series Float RP-2 w/DRCV, ProPedal, rebound; 6.75×1.75″, tuned by Trek inCalifornia

WHEELS Formula DC20 alloy front hub, Shimano M475 alloy rear hub; Bontrager AT-850 disc 29 32-hole rims

CRANK Shimano Altus M311, 42/32/22

BRAKESET Tektro Novela mechanical disc brakes, 6-bolt, 160mm rotors

REAR DERAILLEUR SRAM X4

SIZES 14.5, 15.5, 17.5″

COLOUR Seafoam

PRICE £525

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Saddle Safari - The Bike Shop in Marlow for Bikes, Accessories Clothing and Servicing

Trek Lush S 2012

 Designed to offer a comfortable, high performance trail bike for the female rider, the Trek Lush S 2012 – Ladies Full Suspension Mountain Bike combines a durable aluminium frame with a Fox RP2 shock and a host of trusted brand components to create the ideal mountain bike for under £2000.

FRAME WSD Alpha Platinum Aluminum w/ABP Convert, Full Floater, E2 tapered head tube, aluminium EVO Link, replaceable derailleur hanger, 120mm travel

FRONT SUSPENSION RockShox Reba RL w/Dual Air spring, Motion Control lockout, E2 tapered steerer, 15mm thru axle, 120mm travel

REAR SUSPENSION  Fox Performance Series Float RP-2 w/DRCV, ProPedal, rebound; 6.75×1.75″, tuned by Trek inCalifornia

WHEELS Shimano M475 alloy hubs; Bontrager AT-850 disc 32-hole rims

CRANK FSA Comet, 42/32/24

BRAKESET Shimano M446 hydraulic disc brakes

REAR DERAILLEUR Shimano Deore M593 Shadow

SIZES 14.5, 15.5, 16.5, 17.5″

COLOUR Crystal Pearl White

PRICE £2000

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Saddle Safari - The Bike Shop in Marlow for Bikes, Accessories Clothing and Servicing

Trek Lush 2012

Designed to offer the ultimate trail ride for female riders, the Trek Lush 2012 – Ladies Full Suspension Mountain Bike combines a durable aluminium frame with RockShox & Fox suspension and a host of trusted brand components to offer amazing value for money.

FRAME WSD Alpha Platinum Aluminum w/ABP Convert, Full Floater, E2 tapered head tube, aluminium EVO Link, replaceable derailleur hanger, 120mm travel

FRONT SUSPENSION RockShox Recon Gold TK w/Solo Air spring, preload, rebound, TurnKey lockout, alloy steerer, 120mm travel

REAR SUSPENSION  Fox Performance Series Float RP-2 w/DRCV, ProPedal, rebound; 6.75×1.75″, tuned by Trek inCalifornia

WHEELS Shimano M475 alloy hubs; Bontrager AT-850 disc 32-hole rims

CRANK FSA Comet, 42/32/24

BRAKESET Shimano M446 hydraulic disc brakes

REAR DERAILLEUR Shimano Deore M593 Shadow

SIZES 14.5, 15.5, 16.5, 17.5″

COLOUR BlackPearl

PRICE £1800

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Saddle Safari - The Bike Shop in Marlow for Bikes, Accessories Clothing and Servicing

Trek 6700 WSD 2012

Designed to offer a high performance cross country race bike crafted for the female rider, the Trek 6700 WSD 2012 – Ladies Mountain Bike combines a durable aluminium frame with an XT crankset and trusted brand components.

FRAME  WSD Alpha Gold Aluminum w/semi-integrated head tube, twin taper down tube w/integrated gusset, formed butted top tube, bridgeless seatstay, forged dropouts w/rack & fender mounts, replaceable derailleur hanger

FRONT SUSPENSION RockShox Reba RL w/Dual Air spring, remote lockout, rebound, alloy steerer, 14.5″ 80mm travel; 15.5″, 16.5″, 17.5″ 100mm travel

WHEELS Shimano SLX M665 alloy hubs; Bontrager AT-850 disc 32-hole rims

CRANK Shimano Deore XT M780, 42/32/24

BRAKESET Shimano M596 hydraulic disc brakes

REAR DERAILLEUR Shimano Deore XT M780 Shadow

SIZES 14.5, 15.5, 16.5, 17.5″

COLOUR Matte Black/Matte Trek White

PRICE £1200

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Saddle Safari - The Bike Shop in Marlow for Bikes, Accessories Clothing and Servicing

Trek Fuel EX9 2012

The Trek Fuel EX 9 2012 Full Suspension Mountain Bike is the race day to all day trail bike that is lightweight and agile, yet commanding and capable with ABP Convert active suspension, DRCV fork and shock and an all-new trail geometry.

FRAME  Alpha Platinum Aluminum w/ABP Convert, Full Floater, E2 tapered head tube, internal front derailleur cable routing, magnesium EVO Link, replaceable derailleur hanger, 120mm travel

FRONT SUSPENSION Fox 32 Float FIT RLC, Trek DRCV air spring, Kashima coat, compression, lockout, rebound, E2 tapered steerer, 15QR thru axle, 120mm travel, tuned by Trek inCalifornia

REAR SUSPENSION  Fox Performance Series Float RP-3 w/DRCV, Boost Valve, 3-position Climb-Ride-Descend ProPedal, rebound; 7.25×2.0″, tuned by Trek in California

WHEELS Bontrager Rhythm Elite TLR Disc wheel system, 15mm front hub, 142x12mm rear hub, 28 hole, Tubeless Ready

CRANK Shimano Deore XT M780, 42/32/24

BRAKESET Avid Elixir 3 hydraulic disc brakes

REAR DERAILLEUR Shimano Deore XT M785 hydraulic disc brakes

SIZES 15.5, 17.5, 18.5, 19.5, 21.5″

COLOUR Raw Tint Dark

PRICE £2800

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Saddle Safari - The Bike Shop in Marlow for Bikes, Accessories Clothing and Servicing

Trek Fuel EX7 2012

The Trek Fuel EX 7 2012 Full Suspension Mountain Bike is light and agile, yet commanding and highly capable, with an Alpha Platinum Aluminium frame, ABP active suspension, Full Floater and DRCV rear shock.

FRAME Alpha Platinum Aluminum w/ABP Convert, Full Floater, E2 tapered head tube, internal front derailleur cable routing, magnesium EVO Link, replaceable derailleur hanger, 120mm travel

FRONT SUSPENSION Fox Evolution Series 32 Float RL, air spring, lockout, rebound, 15QR thru axle, 120mm travel

REAR SUSPENSION  Fox Performance Series Float RP-2 w/DRCV, ProPedal, rebound; 7.25×2.0″, tuned by Trek inCalifornia

WHEELS Formula DC51 15mm alloy front hub, Shimano M525 alloy rear hub; Bontrager Duster Disc 32-hole rims, Tubeless Ready

CRANK Shimano M552, 42/32/24

BRAKESET Avid Elixir 3 hydraulic disc brakes

REAR DERAILLEUR Shimano SLX M663 Shadow

SIZES 15.5, 17.5, 18.5, 19.5, 21.5″

COLOUR Crystal Pearl White or Matte Black/True Blue

PRICE £2000

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Saddle Safari - The Bike Shop in Marlow for Bikes, Accessories Clothing and Servicing

Trek 8500 Disc 2012

The pinnacle of the eight series, the Trek 8500 2012 – Mountain Bike combines a high performance aluminium frame with a Shimano XT groupset, Fox fork and a range of trusted brand components to create the ideal race bike.

FRAME Alpha Platinum Aluminum w/semi-integrated head tube, butted & formed top tube, hydroformed down tube w/integrated gusset, bridgeless seatstay, forged race dropouts & replaceable derailleur hanger

FRONT SUSPENSION Fox Evolution Series 32 Float RL, air spring, lockout, rebound, 15QR thru axle, 100mm travel

BRAKES Shimano Deore XT M785 hydraulic disc brakes

WHEELS Bontrager Race Lite Pro TLR Disc wheel system, 15mm front hub, 135x5mm rear hub, 28 hole, center lock, Tubeless Ready

REAR DERAILLEUR Shimano Deore XT M780 Shadow

SIZES 15.5, 17.5, 18.5, 19.5, 21.5″

COLOUR Chi Red/Metallic Black

PRICE £2000

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Saddle Safari - The Bike Shop in Marlow for Bikes, Accessories Clothing and Servicing

Trek 8000 Disc 2012

Offering the combination between Trek’s ultimate aluminium frameset and a host of high end components including a fox fork and XT groupset the Trek 8000 2012 – Mountain Bike is the ideal race bike for any level of athlete

FRAME Alpha Platinum Aluminum w/semi-integrated head tube, butted & formed top tube, hydroformed down tube w/integrated gusset, bridgeless seatstay, forged race dropouts & replaceable derailleur hanger

FRONT SUSPENSION Fox Evolution Series 32 Float RL, air spring, lockout, rebound, 100mm travel

BRAKES Shimano SLX M666 hydraulic disc brakes

WHEELS Shimano Deore XT M785 alloy hubs; Bontrager AT-850 disc 32-hole rims

REAR DERAILLEUR Shimano Deore XT M780 Shadow

SIZES 15.5, 17.5, 18.5, 19.5, 21.5″

COLOUR Crystal Pearl White/Metallic Black/Signature Green

PRICE £1600

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Saddle Safari - The Bike Shop in Marlow for Bikes, Accessories Clothing and Servicing

Trek 6900 Disc 2012

The pinnacle of the six series, the Trek 6900 Disc 2012 – Mountain Bike combines a durable and lightweight aluminium frame with a high performance Shimano drivetrain and RockShox Reba RL fork to offer the ideal race bike at an affordable price.

FRAME Alpha Gold Aluminum w/semi-integrated head tube, formed down tube w/integrated gusset, formed top tube, monostay seatstay, forged dropouts w/rack & fender mounts, replaceable derailleur hanger.

FRONT SUSPENSION RockShox Reba RL w/Dual Air spring, remote lockout, rebound, alloy steerer, 100mm travel

BRAKES Shimano SLX M666 hydraulic disc brakes

WHEELS Shimano Deore XT M785 alloy hubs; Bontrager AT-850 disc 32-hole rims

REAR DERAILLEUR Shimano Deore XT M708 Shadow

SIZES 15.5, 17.5, 18.5, 19.5, 21.5″

COLOUR Crystal Pearl White/Metallic Black/Red

PRICE £1400

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Saddle Safari - The Bike Shop in Marlow for Bikes, Accessories Clothing and Servicing