Review: Euro Road Bikes: Cramerotti Maverick M-3

Cramerotti Maverick M-3

Components: Campagnolo Super Record 11

Wheels: Fast Forward F6R

Sizes: Fully custom (46 cm and up)

MSRP: $7,900

A Ferrari-red racing bike clad in Campagnolo Super Record 11 parts and matching red grip tape and tires. Style like this can only come from one place: Italy.

They may have a Canadian head office, but Cramerotti Custom Racing bicycles are as Italian as they come. With a history dating back to the 1920s, Cramerotti has been around for a while, but the bikes they make are both modern and authentically Italian.

The company has a full range of custom road, time trial, cyclocross, track and touring bikes available in carbon, steel and aluminum. All are custom-built to your sizing and geometry requests in Italy.

Company founder Tullio Cramerotti was a friend and occasional racing opponent of Tullio Campagnolo. In 1945, Cramerotti opened his own shop in Rovereto, Italy and eventually he handed the reigns over to his son, Guiseppe. This second-generation bike builder moved to Canada in 1984, and now runs the company with his son, Will, but the bikes are still being completely hand built and painted in Veneto, Italy.

The bike we tested was a 2010 Cramerotti Maverick M-3, which is one of the prettiest bikes we’ve tested and yet rode as good as it looked. The bike was super stiff at the bottom bracket and performed flawlessly under heavy accelerations and climbing. Handling was crisp and predictable, especially at speed, which is where the Maverick seemed most comfortable. The Selle SMP Forme saddle doesn’t look particularly comfortable, but it was surprisingly gentle on the important parts, even after hours on the road.

Appropriately, the Cramerotti was equipped with Campagnolo’s top-end Super Record group, which gorgeous both in form and function. Having an 11-speed drivetrain meant there always seemed to be a right gear to be in and the system worked both quietly and without issues. Other components included a Deda seat post, handlebar and stem, which is a beautiful bike component on its own.

One complaint was the supplied Fast Forward F6R wheels, which were wrapped in Vredestein tires. Yes the F6R wheels looked great and matched the bike’s colour scheme well, but for a bike of this level, they may not have been the best choice. At 1,830 grams, these 58mm deep wheels were too heavy to be a good match. They performed wheel, especially on solo efforts, but when building this bike we would recommend either upping the ante and going with full carbon deep-dish tubulars, or with one of Fast Forward’s lighter and shallower clincher options. To their credit, Cramerotti said typically this bike would be spec’ed with lighter-weight tubulars. Even with the F6Rs, the bike came in at an impressive just over seven kilograms (15.5 pounds).

Price-wise, before knowing the MSRP, we guessed this bike came in at between $10,000 and $11,000. To our surprise, it was a significantly better value than we could have imagined, especially for a fully-custom ride with Campy’s top-end road group.

The Cramerotti Maverick M-3 is a true Italian masterpiece. And like a Ferrari, it goes fast and looks great in red.