Steve Peat's 'Spitfire' Santa Cruz V10 | Vintage Superbike

So in this video today we're going to go into the details of this Spitfire bike and just show you how it's so unique. Yes, so the Spitfire bike was dedicated to my 2016, the year that I retired from World Cup, after about 23 years of racing World Cups. That year I designed three different bikes. There was one for Fort Bill, one for Lenzerheide and then this one for Andorra, which was World Cup finals. I took all the bikes to Ali at Fat Creations and he put some of his input into it and I came up with the concept and the main idea. We had helmets to match, clothing to match and when you actually dig into this and get into some of those close-ups you'll see all those cool little bits that Ali added into this sort of paint job. So the theme, that year I had to pick three different themes for three different races and this was the final one. It was just the Spitfire. I always liked the idea of like the Spitfire being British and doing a bike to kind of represent that. So yeah, I got my head together with, I think Nick Bayliss helped me, who's the designer for Royal Racing and a friend of mine for a long time. So we all sort of chucked all these different ideas in and yeah, a few of us got our heads together, came up with this design, got Santa Cruz to ship blank frames straight down to Ali at Fat Creations and he went to town on it. So this thing is loaded with features and details when you get deep into it. I mean the rims are painted, the spring is even painted with the SP44 on it and the Spitfire logo. The downtube has got all my previous so-called kills. It's got the bombs like it used to have on the airplane and it's got the 17 World Cup wins, three World Cup overalls, European champs, national champs and then down the bottom here it's got my 2009 World Championship victory out in Canberra. So those kills are on there, that's a really cool part of the bike. The stem is painted, the rings on the grips are actually custom coloured, forks are painted. Yeah, we went to town on it and I think it came out really well. Obviously I had to race this bike in Andorra and this bike is really set up just like any of my bikes were that year. It's a full-on race bike. Last time I rode it was in Andorra and it's a size XL frame, 27.5 wheels and all the sort of standard stuff that I was sponsored with that year and used as a race bike. It's bang on and could be raced downhill again today. So for that year for me on this bike I ended up running a Saint rear brake and an XTR front brake. The reason for that is the way that I brake, I get on my brakes really hard and quite late coming into a corner so I kind of jab on them quite quick and the Saint brake on the front was actually a little bit too powerful for me and it would lock the front up a little bit and move on sort of the dry dust in Andorra. So I chose to kind of detune the front brake a little bit just for my preference and ended up with an XTR on the front and a Saint on the rear. I think if I had to ride this bike today it would probably feel quite small for me because the new bike's a 29-inch. Suspension would just need refreshing a little bit. I'd be similar settings to what I was back then, maybe a little stiffer these days, it's been a few years. Yeah I think in general I'm not too fussy about bikes. Once I get them set up kind of sometimes pre-season I always feel like it's then my job to get to know that bike and get to ride it the best I can. I think one of the bigger things for me is PSI in the tyre. If my PSI goes down like one click then I notice it straight away. I end up rolling tyres in turns and stuff like that so yeah PSI is a big thing that I'm kind of fussy about and I would know exactly where they're at. I tend to ride harder tyre pressures than other people as well. I think just the way that I turn I get on the edge of the tyres so that's why I notice it so much. But yeah in general I'm not too fussy so long as I've got it set up it feels good. Bars and levers once I've got them set I just leave them and that's it. So yeah PSI in the tyres is probably the most thing I'll play with. Yeah Andorra was pretty amazing that year. It was really dry, sun was shining. Obviously it was my last race so for me it was kind of emotional. I'd got Andy Kiffin there who'd been my mechanic previously, came out for that race, helped me that year actually be my final year. Rob Roskopp was at the race and the guy that got me on the syndicate in the first place and I came over the finish line just floods of emotion. Big cuddles with everyone, they played a video up on screen and everybody just sort of thanked me for my career and being around for so long and yeah very emotional. I can't actually remember how my race run went, I don't think it was that good because I was all over the place like emotional wise but yeah it was a good weekend. When Santa Cruz are designing a new V10 they like to come to the riders and ask all their thoughts on the current bike that we're riding at the time and what things we might need going forward. There's also obviously trends and new technologies and things like that that kick in but really the designers and the engineers in Santa Cruz get all that sort of stuff smoothed out before they bring a bit of a concept to us as riders. I would say that downhill riders, world cup riders always put their bikes through way more than your average people so we'll come up with little problems that your normal person wouldn't really encounter or even realize that they've got on a bike so there's a lot of that, a lot of back and forth and asking for the best bike ever. There's a hell of a lot of difference between this Spitfire bike and my current V10, the current downhill bike of Santa Cruz. It's a totally new bike, it's a total new geometry, total new sort of suspension curve and linkage and all that sort of stuff so it's night and day difference but you could still go fast on this beast. Yes I do spend a lot of time on an e-bike these days just because my local trails are kind of short, steep, I can get up them quicker, I have more fun doing the downhill stuff so it gets me to the top quicker and does all that stuff but the current V10 would definitely be my bike of choice for any sort of bike park laps, any tech, any downhill stuff. I'm definitely faster on the V10 than I am on the e-bike. I mean I've always loved having like custom bikes and doing things it's like going to town and making a bike look really cool. I've got lots of ideas for the future for different bikes and stuff like that and things pop into my head all the time and I really enjoy that sort of process and designing it. I have got an idea for a bike coming up but I can't tell anyone because someone might copy it but I also like to like bring it out and surprise everybody and you never know what the finished thing is going to look like so I think it's better to keep that concept to myself until I've got it out there and done. We're just about to get into the season, it's only a few weeks away now until Poland, first World Cup of the year and we had a week in Maribor last week, training with the team and I'm pretty excited about it, we've got really good crew on the team and the couple of new junior riders bring a different aspect to like the senior riders helping them out on the hill and stuff like that so I'm pretty excited about this year. We had a British National at the weekend and Laurie won, Felix was going really fast but unfortunately had a crash in his run. He's all good though and we're just preparing for the season getting ready to go smash it. So there you go guys that's the Spitfire bike that I raced in Andorra, goodbye from the Spitfire and also cheers from me.