Luisa Grappone hails from the motherland of cycling, pink jerseys and big mountain climbing (aka Italy), but made the move to Sussex to further strengthen the Hunt wheel development team as our full time in-house wheel engineer.

With an MSc in Aerospace Enigneering Luisa has a wealth of experience in the bicycle industry and materials engineering, with many years misspent sweating over hot CAD drawings, carbon fibre lay-ups and crunching wind tunnel data, hard work but someone's gotta do it and we're delighted Luisa is doing for all HUNT riders from now on.

Working previously for 3T components then moving to Campagnolo/Fulcrum as a senior R&D engineer, Luisa has extensive knowledge of composite technology and wheel design. Luisa has also worked as a stress analyst for the 787 Boeing program. Luisa's career has included working with Movistar, Garmin Cervelo Test Team, Top Sport Vlaanderen and the BMC team as a liaison engineer for aerodynamic testing in the wind tunnel.

Luisa’s extensive knowledge will be put to the test pushing wheel development even further helping you go further faster and have more fun doing it.

Chris came to The Rider Firm with a mostly roadie background having represented the University of Exeter for Duathlon and with a hankering for any uphill gradient. Over recent years he has explored more of what the countryside has to offer in terrain and, the bikes to conquer them. Testing his skills off-road, he has enjoyed racing gravel and XC bikes and is always looking for the next challenge and adventure having ridden the NC500 and Ridgeway Trail most recently - he has his sights set on the South Downs Way challenge next.

Studying Mechanical Engineering at the University of Exeter he specialised in Computational Fluid Dynamic (CFD) analysis techniques, including investigating aerofoil optimisation using a Genetic Algorithm in his Master's dissertation. Joining HUNT early in his career as their Research and Development Engineer, Chris has been given the opportunity to forward the teams testing methodology to optimise products capability and performance.. Further he has successfully applied his CFD experience to develop and implement a bespoke CFD analysis model in which the aerodynamic performance of bicycle wheels can be accurately simulated, enjoying the hours spent in the wind tunnel validating his findings.

Paddy came to The Rider Firm first as rider for our local race team while at studying at the University of Sussex (Mechanical engineering Meng), riding mainly road and track as a reasonably handy second cat, with a bit of an appetite for testing himself on big mostly single day rides. With the big goals for 2022 being a top 10 in a Nat B road race, seeing how close to the record time for the South downs way double he can get and riding as many different types of bike as fast and sketchily as he can manage!

Paddy’s specialism at University was tribology studying the effect that loading axially loading a thrust ball bearing had on both on the losses due to friction as well as the slip characteristics of the bearings, using both a physical test ring and computational analysis (FEA). With contact mechanics and an FEA back ground Paddy has established a protocol for structural computational analysis of Hubs and Alloy rims, to mimic the physical tests that the wheels are put through.

Allowing more variations to be tested in a quicker and more cost effective manner, to make sure that the best product is being delivered to the rider out on the road or trail!

Luisa Grappone hails from the motherland of cycling, pink jerseys and big mountain climbing (aka Italy), but made the move to Sussex to further strengthen the Hunt wheel development team as our full time in-house wheel engineer.

With an MSc in Aerospace Enigneering Luisa has a wealth of experience in the bicycle industry and materials engineering, with many years misspent sweating over hot CAD drawings, carbon fibre lay-ups and crunching wind tunnel data, hard work but someone's gotta do it and we're delighted Luisa is doing for all HUNT riders from now on.

Working previously for 3T components then moving to Campagnolo/Fulcrum as a senior R&D engineer, Luisa has extensive knowledge of composite technology and wheel design. Luisa has also worked as a stress analyst for the 787 Boeing program. Luisa's career has included working with Movistar, Garmin Cervelo Test Team, Top Sport Vlaanderen and the BMC team as a liaison engineer for aerodynamic testing in the wind tunnel.

Luisa’s extensive knowledge will be put to the test pushing wheel development even further helping you go further faster and have more fun doing it.

Chris came to The Rider Firm with a mostly roadie background having represented the University of Exeter for Duathlon and with a hankering for any uphill gradient. Over recent years he has explored more of what the countryside has to offer in terrain and, the bikes to conquer them. Testing his skills off-road, he has enjoyed racing gravel and XC bikes and is always looking for the next challenge and adventure having ridden the NC500 and Ridgeway Trail most recently - he has his sights set on the South Downs Way challenge next.

Studying Mechanical Engineering at the University of Exeter he specialised in Computational Fluid Dynamic (CFD) analysis techniques, including investigating aerofoil optimisation using a Genetic Algorithm in his Master's dissertation. Joining HUNT early in his career as their Research and Development Engineer, Chris has been given the opportunity to forward the teams testing methodology to optimise products capability and performance.. Further he has successfully applied his CFD experience to develop and implement a bespoke CFD analysis model in which the aerodynamic performance of bicycle wheels can be accurately simulated, enjoying the hours spent in the wind tunnel validating his findings.

Through Chris’s growing industry experience and mechanical grounding he is ever endeavoring to engineer the next cycling innovation.