Whyte Bikes Welcomes Chris Akrigg
Whyte Bikes is really pleased to welcome one of the world’s leading trials riders, Chris Akrigg, to the family for 2023 and beyond.
Chris is a former 6x British Bike Trials champion and one of the most technical bike riders on the planet who’s well-known for his jaw-dropping riding videos, such as Five, As It Lies, A Hill In Spain and many more. He has the ability to jump on pretty much any bike – be they hardtails, road and gravel bikes, BMXs, rigid trials bikes, trail full-suspension, fixies, DH rigs and many more – and make them sing to his unique tune.
PUSHING LIMITS
Whyte has been engineering award-winning bikes that perform without compromise and, much like Chris, doing things differently since the day we started some 22 years ago. Their first breakthrough bike (the PRST-1) rewrote the rules. And the brand continues in that spirit; relentlessly seeking and developing the next big performance and reliability advantages with pioneering innovations that push the limits.
Take the innovative tilted motor and low centre of gravity concept on Whyte’s award-winning E-160 RSX e-MTB, just one of the bikes that Chris is riding. By rotating the motor, the battery slid down further towards the bottom bracket to lower the bike’s centre of gravity as much as possible. Coupled with Whyte’s geometry, this makes the bike more agile, capable and confidence inspiring.
DOING WHAT OTHERS CAN’T
“E-bikes are one of the most exciting things,” Chris explains of his passion for embracing electric. ”Once I jumped on one for the first time, I was like ‘Wow! They’re really good fun.’ But then you get to, ‘Right, what can this help me do? How can I make this my own? And how can I push it and make my bike do what other people can’t?’”
MORE THAN JUST ELECTRIC
Alongside the E-160 RSX, Chris is also riding the award-winning 29er trail hardtail, the 629, the versatile T-140 29 RS full suspension trail bike, and Whyte’s progressive rough gravel bike, the Gisburn, so expect to see them all being fully Akrigg-ed soon.
“Getting onto Whyte this year has been the single most rejuvenating thing I’ve done for a long time,” explains Chris on joining Whyte. “I’m really excited about being a part of a British company that I’ve been a fan of since I was working in a bike shop back in the day. I’m really looking forward to helping get more people’s sights set on Whyte.”
Whyte’s Chief Marketing Officer, Chris Sartori, said: “We are so excited to welcome Chris to the Whyte family. As a British brand that’s all about thinking outside the box, he’s a great fit for us: he’s always stood out from the crowd and done things his way, riding at the cutting edge and forging his own path. Now we’re really excited about what we can do to push even more boundaries together.”
