Steelman Cycles may no longer be in business, but Brent Steelman and his frame building shop were once based out of Redwood City, California. This custom-built Steelman Cycles cyclocross bike was the first bike to win the first Dirty Kanza, with Dan Hughes providing the power and navigation.
The inaugural Dirty Kanza 200 took place in 2006 with 34 entrants lining up. 2019 marked the 14th running of the DK200, so much has changed since those early formative years, particularly with bike design and technology.
The first bike to win the first Dirty Kanza 200 race is proof a cyclocross bike with cantilever brakes can get the job done.
Here are the basic details:
- Frame and Fork: Steelman Cycles custom cyclocross, Deda ZeroUno tubing
- Wheels: Mavic Ksyrium SSC SL with Bruce Gordon Rock & Road Tyres (assuming a tubed setup)
- Shifters: Campagnolo Record Carbon 10-Speed Ergopower
- Handlebars: Deda 215 Aluminium
- Stem: Deda Newton
- Front Derailleur: Shimano 600 Series 8-Speed
- Rear Derailleur: Campagnolo Record Carbon 10-Speed
- Crankset: Shimano Dura-Ace 7410 with an unknown brand 50T chainring, 39T small chainring, square taper
- Bottom Bracket: Phil Wood Titanium (the video is incorrect)
- Cassette: Campagnolo Record / Chorus 12-25 10-Speed
- Chain: Campagnolo Hollow-Pin
- Saddle: Fizik (unknown model)
- Seatpost: Unknown
- Update since the post was made – see Dan Hughes’ comments below that provide some history of this beautiful bike.
The bike can be seen in person at Sunflower Outdoor and Bike in Lawrence, Kansas.
Additional Photos
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Sorry I missed you at the shop! Cool video on the cool bike!
If you’re interested, here’s a little more backstory to the machine and why it’s using such a strange mix of parts. At the time it was built, Brent Steelman made two different cyclocross frames: the Euro-cross, and the Psycho-cross. The former was a traditional horizontal top tube cross bike, designed for cross gearing. The latter was a dropped top-tube frame that was supposed to use mountain bike gearing (smaller rings) so that the stays and the fork could accommodate those big BG tires. This frame is a combination of the two, as I wanted a traditional main frame but the clearance for big tires. Brent built me a Euro-cross main frame with Psycho-cross stays and fork. This was perfect (and a strong precursor to what we Ride today) but with the snappy short chainstays (425mm?) there were some difficulties. Because the stays flared out quickly to get the clearance for the rear tire (and thank goodness Brent built his stays without a bridge), that meant any chainring bigger than a 46T was going to hit the stay. So I scrounged around and found the D/A crank (the last of its kind to be relatively straight and not swoop in towards the BB) and mated it to a Phil Wood BB with a custom offset to the titanium spindle. The result was that the ring BARELY cleared the stay and because the crank was slightly outboard, the chainline sucked and shifting wasn’t ideal.
But it got me across the finish line a few times! Next time you’re through I’ll dig up the winning bike from 2011 & 2012…it’s in the office I think! 🙂
Dan, thanks so much for the background info on the bike! And yes to the 2011 and 2012 bikes!