Quote:
Originally Posted by gavingould
... Shimano is pushing even harder for teams to use their full lineup (wheels, PRO bars/stems/posts, maybe even saddles?) and it seems Di2 is pretty well-liked.
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I don't know how Shimano works now but in the old(er) days a team got a "credit" of sorts, like, say, 1000 points (making numbers up out of thin air). An Ultegra group would be 10 points, a DA group 25 points, pedals 2 points, Ult crank 2 points, DA crank 4.5 points, etc (again, points are totally made up, I wasn't privy to that level of detail). The team would decide what to get and that would be that.
This led to training bikes getting Ultegra or 105, some unusual parts downgrades on the race bikes, and other interesting things.
It would be interesting to see the team side of things as far as sponsorship goes, parts, money, etc.
I remember seeing a sponsorship agreement between a big cycling parts company "BCPC" and a ProTour team. I was surprised at what the BCPC had to provide - it wasn't just their parts, it was vehicles, leases, lots of stuff BCPC didn't make, the things that you associate with Service Course garages and such. On two continents no less. Plus a lot of cash.
And here I was thinking that they just give them a whole lotta parts, some money, and a bunch of polo shirts with their logo on them. The agreement was very eye opening.