Brompton World Championships, originally uploaded by cRckls.

Brompton has just announced that all 2009 bikes have been allocated. On Wednesday they will announce new pricing for 2010. Be warned: Brown’s cheap pound policy will have an effect. Here is their press release (our emphasis):

You will see on Wednesday that our prices have risen fairly substantially over those for the current year, reflecting:

• some substantial improvements to the basic specification of our bikes;
• rising material costs across the board, due in no small part to currency volatility;
• the fact that we did not follow the industry in raising prices by 25% – 35% last year.

The specs have been improved as follows:

• The Brompton saddle will now come fitted with hollow rails as standard, saving 45g in weight;
• Kevlar tyres (a configurable upgrade in previous years) will be fitted as standard;
  On 3-speed models, the new BSR hub will replace the old hub, saving 80g;
  On M Types, the grips have been improved to be both more ergonomic and lighter, saving 36g;
• The lighting offering has been improved by the move away from a tyre dynamo to a second hub dynamo option, and the improvement of our existing hub dynamo package:
  1. The Shimano front hub dynamo option weighs c. 80g more than the old tyre dynamo package but offers far better performance (including a Busch & Müller front lamp) and reliability;
  2. The SON hub dynamo offering has been improved markedly by the adoption of an LED front lamp with standlight functionality (the Busch & Müller Lumotec IQ Cyo R Senso Plus)

An of course the new Kojak tyres are already available. We have a good supply of them, handy for this Sunday’s World Championship.

Full list of 2010 upgrades