Bottecchia Reparto Corse Duello

If you want a slammed, stretched-out and responsive entry-level race machine but you still want a forgiving ride you should take a serious look at the Reparto Corse Duello from Italian brand Bottecchia. Whether you're racing competitively or just out for a spin on the club run, the Duello is a blast to ride.

We love a metal frame here at road.cc; although some think carbon fibre has taken over, this Duello is an example of just how good aluminium frames have become.

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First there is the comfort. The Duello easily puts to bed all of those myths about finger tingling and bone shaking rides and feedback. It doesn't crash through potholes or resonate over rough surfaces, it's smooth and even rather plush. That's with the 25mm wide Vittoria Zaffiro tyres pumped up north of 100psi too.

The tubes are triple butted, as in the wall thicknesses are three different depths along the length of the tube: thicker at the ends for strength and welding, and getting thinner towards the centre. Not only does it drop a little bit of weight, it allows the tube to flex a little without affecting the overall stiffness of the frame.

This is just enough to absorb the road buzz and vibration, meaning much less physical fatigue for the rider. I did a couple of four-hour rides on the Duello and I could barely tell the difference between that and the carbon-framed Merida I was also testing.

The internal cable routing is nice to see, giving the whole bike a more expensive and clean look. The top tube is curved and creates quite a compact frame shape, which in turn means you have a lot of seatpost exposed, adding comfort and flex.

That doesn't make it a soft option, the Bottecchia will lay the power down when you ask it to in a very precise manner. It's not as sharp as, say, the Cannondale CAAD10, now sadly confined to the history books, or the Bowmans Palace frameset, but it's efficient, and you never feel like you're wasting any energy.

Traditional and modern

Bottecchia has kept things pretty traditional at the bottom bracket area, with threaded outboard bearing cups retaining the shell's standard diameter and width.

It's a capable sprinter or climber, responding to your input with a bit of a surge as you stamp on the pedals. The only thing stopping the Duello from reaching its full potential is the wheelset. A common theme on bikes around the grand mark, but the Fulcrum Racing Sport's 1.9kg weight just takes the edge off the performance.

I swapped out the Fulcrums for a set of Mavic Ksyrium Elites, dropping around 350g of revolving weight, and what a difference that made. The Duello felt much more responsive and alive. That'll be your first upgrade then.

Up front Bottecchia has gone down the tapered steerer route with a 1 1/8in diameter at the top expanding to 1 1/2in at the crown. The increased surface area adds stiffness to the front end to handle cornering loads.

With a 73-degree head angle, the steering is quick but composed, making it ideal for a whole range of rider capabilities. It feels composed on the road and descending at speed never gets scary or twitchy. It's not quite an eyeballs-out, seat-of-your-pants thrill-fest in the bends – the Duello doesn't quite have the directness right at the limit as the other two bikes I mentioned, but it's marginal and you'd have to be hanging it all out to notice the difference.

In the mix

This build is specific to the UK, and it's a bit of a mixture of brands to hit the budget, again something we see a lot of at this price point.

Specifying Shimano 5800 105 shifters, front and rear derailleur is a good start. Shimano's entry to 11-speed is hard to beat on a performance to value budget, so it's great to see on a sub-£1,000 bike with such a good frameset.

The gear changes are as snappy as ever, with plenty of feel at the levers for both shifting and braking. The Duello uses an FSA Omega chainset in place of a 105 version, and shifting isn't quite as crisp when going from the big to the little chainring, especially under load. It's also good to see Bottecchia spec a 52/36 setup paired with an 11-28 cassette to give a slightly higher gear ratio for speed work than a more common 50/34 compact does.

Rather than 105 brakes, the Duello uses a set of Tektro dual callipers. They are pretty basic but I have to say I was pretty impressed with how well they stopped on such basic moulded pads.

Apart from the Deda RHM handlebar, which just so happens to be super-stiff and comfortable for a budget bar, the rest of the kit is Bottecchia's in-house brand Raxe. It's basic stuff but does the job, although I did find the stem slightly short for a bike of this size, so I swapped it out for a 110mm model.

> Check out the best road bikes of 2015/16 we've tested here

The saddle, Bottecchia's own Eagle Flow, is quite highly padded but I didn't find it uncomfortable, even for long rides. It was a little squidgy, though, so personally I'd change it for something a little less plush for really hard efforts.

Conclusion

Overall, the Duello is a really capable bike that is fun to ride hard and fast, like the majority of aluminium race bikes. But its masterstroke is how well it smooths out that ride to give a near carbon feedback, so you can continue to ride it hard and fast for longer.

With a claimed weight of 1320g, the Duello is right in the ball park for an entry-level performance race frame, and an upgrade to those wheels, as I said earlier, will really make it shine.

If you want a race bike but with enough comfort that you can go long, and you don't need or want to go down the whole endurance bike route, the Duello is ideal.

Verdict

Excellent alloy frame draped in functional components and ideal for racing or just blasting about