Club kit update
A worker produces face masks in the Santini factory
Our club kit is made by Santini Cycle Wear, who currently supply kit to pro teams such as Boels Dolmans and Trek-Segafredo, as well as the UCI World Championships. If you put an order in, you may have noticed that it’s running late, but it’s running late for a really good reason and we wanted to tell the story behind this.
Santini are based in the northern Italian city of Bergamo, about 40km northeast of Milan. Before the pandemic, Bergamo was known as a centre of manufacturing, farming and industry with a strong work ethic. It is also known for cycling, with the villages around the city producing a number of notable Italian riders.
Unfortunately, it is now also known as the epicentre of the coronavirus epidemic in Italy. Ravaged by the virus, the obituary pages of the local newspaper, L'Eco di Bergamo, became a grim symbol of the scale of the crisis.
But it’s not all bad news. During the height of the pandemic in Italy, Santini turned much of their production over to surgical masks.
“We started to create face masks since the beginning of this emergency because we wanted to help our Country” – explains Paola Santini, Marketing Manager at Santini Cycling Wear. “We did some prototypes, and one of them passed all the tests for the certification as surgical single-use face mask.”
While Santini is now back up to full scale apparel production, they have also turned their attention to creating masks for use by the public.
“We also wanted to create a mask for the public which can be re-used and washed, so we launched the Barrier Mask SPCV02.”, says Paola. “In that way, we want to offer a mask which can be reused many times without losing its protective features.”
“And to support and help UK frontline services, Santini will donate 10% of this Barrier Mask SPCV02 sales to NHS Charities Together”.
We’re expecting our club kit to arrive in the next few weeks and we’re sure that you will agree that - especially given the circumstances - it will be worth the wait.
