February 2009 - Carvalho Custom

New self-guided cycling tours in Portugal

For anyone interested in doing a cycling tour, you should consider a2z Adventures – they are one of the leading cycling tour companies in Europe and offer mountain bike and hybrid tours for varying abilities. Pedro, who is the boss, has been a great friend of our company, so we are more than happy to give them a plug on our blog!

They have just started new self-guided cycling tours in Portugal, which offer luggage transport between hotels, detailed route guides and emergency back up support and of course you can save a fair amount by not having to pay for a guide. It also makes smaller groups more viable.

a2z will take you to some really undiscovered corners of Portugal and have many years of experience running cycling holidays, so you will be in great hands.

Custom rashguards for surfing

We are just launching a range of custom rashguards for surfers. You can have long-sleeve, short-sleeve or sleeveless and we can produce any design that you require. Unlike many rashguards which use that nasty scratchy printing for logos that cracks and peels off after a few washes, we use the same sublimation printing that we use for cycling and triathlon kit, so the fabric is actually dyed with your design.

For our custom rashguards we use exactly the same ‘Power’ lycra that we use for our tri suits, which means that it is extremely hardwearing and gives a firm fit to avoid it going baggy in the water. It also holds colours well so that your designs come up really sharp.

You can design literally anything you like and we will reproduce it for you. There is a minimum order of 10 of each top to avoid paying surcharges. There is also a one off design fee of EUR140, which is what we charge to set up your template. You would not be charged this fee on any subsequent reorders of course. The prices are EUR26.65 for the long-sleeve, EUR25.15 for the short sleeve and EUR24.80 for the sleeveless.

Semi-Custom Cycling Jerseys

We have had a lot of requests for a semi-custom service and so here it is! So rather than full custom jerseys, where we can produce any design you require, for semi-custom cycling clothing, we have three base designs that you can choose from. You can then specify any colour combinations that you require for the base of the kit and then you can have your club name or whatever text you require in all the places it says “your name here” on the template. You can also add logos to the design and position them where you wish, but this costs extra. We will produce a digital version of your design for you to approve. You can also design your own cycling jersey online here using our templates. Choose your colours, text and logos and then download a jpeg of the design.

The cost is €90 per design (as opposed to €150 for fully custom designs), which allows you to have any colour combinations and any text in any font in the positions shown. Then for each logo there will be an additional charge of €25. Once you have paid this design fee you can order any items from our cycling range (jerseys, bib shorts, arm warmers, mitts, jackets etc), but a 50% surcharge applies if you order less than 5 of an item – unless your total order is worth more than €1500 in which case there are no surcharges.

option 1

option 2

option 3

You can download our 3 options for semi-custom designs here if you would like to have a go at the artwork yourself or you can just explain the colours and text (and logos) that you would like to see and we will produce your design from your description.

Click Here to Download semi-custom 1 design template Illustrator

Click Here to Download semi-custom 1 design template JPEG

Click Here to Download semi-custom 2 design template Illustrator

Click Here to Download semi-custom 2 design template JPEG

Click Here to Download semi-custom 3 design template Illustrator

Click Here to Download semi-custom 3 design template JPEG

Seeds Cycling

We have supplied Seeds Cycling for a couple of years now with custom cycling kit. They are based near Dartford and are a smallclub of 36 members, but judging by the amount of kit they buy, they are growing rapidly!

They do regular club training runs at different levels and they have a growing race scene as well as organising trips to sportives (they are doing the Marmotte this year for example – 13.8 kms at an average of 7.9% and 21 hairpins: I bet you wish you were back in Dartford when you get to the bottom of Alpe d’Huez!).

Anyway our sincere thanks to Seeds Cycling and I hope you all have a great 2009 on the bike.

The TCR show

Last weekend (7th and 8th of February) we had a stand at the TCR show in Esher and we will definitely be back next year. Probably the best thing about it was the chance to speak to clients we have been supplying for years and only every spoken to on the phone or by email – so many thanks for coming to say hello to Dunmow Tri, Tri Force, Barracuda Tri, NTri, TriLife and everyone else who turned up.

We managed to generate a fair bit of interest in some of the new kit we have available, mainly the new tri suits shown above, but also the new fabrics we have for the cycling jackets which are more stretchy, more breathable and softer to the touch.

Looks like our next show will be the Cycle Show in London this October and maybe the London Triathlon also in August. If you happen to see us there, please come and say hello.

Our new tri suits

We launched our new custom tri suits at the TCR show in London – in new male and female versions they feature a more contoured fit than our previous tri suit, to give a more waisted feel to them and more grip on the legs, which means that there is no loose fabric on the midriff and thighs when you come out of the water. We have also shifted lycra to Power Lycra, which gives more compression and a more figure hugging look.

our new custom tri suits

Finally there is a seamless front panel to minimise drag in the water and to make sure there is no friction from seams on the front torso. If you would like to see for yourself, why not ask to see some samples!