Scope has risen in prevalence over the last few years, with WorldTour teams opting to use its fish scale inspired Artech wheels ahead of sponsor correct equipment, and Netcompany-Ineos partnering with them for the 2026 season. The Artech 6.A wheels even tested fastest in our 2024 round of wind tunnel wheelset testing.

The Scope R4.G represents the more wallet friendly option in the brand's gravel wheel line-up, which includes this, and the Artech 4.G.

It uses similar technologies and profiles to the Artech, but at a weight cost. A modern, wide internal and external hookless rim is used, making it comparable with several other carbon gravel wheelsets in this price bracket.

Additionally, sealed bearings, a reinforced rim, and no weight limit sets the wheels up nicely to be resilient across rugged gravel terrain, and my impressions from testing them has supported that. The weight is highly competitive with others in this bracket, while the aero performance with 45mm tyres results in very little speed loss versus a road wheelset on tarmac.

My only gripes are the rotors being a nightmare to fit and remove, and the freehub wailing like a banshee, making me feel self-conscious when riding down the residential street at unsociable hours.

But overall, these are a superb set of gravel wheels that offer fantastic value, and truly deserve a place in our buying guide to the best gravel bike wheels. What's more, they would be brilliantly paired with any of the best gravel race bikes, especially better value offerings.

Design and specifications

The Scope R4.G wheels are built using what Scope calls Algorithm Enhanced Aerodynamics (AEA), the same process used to develop the Artech rims. This process runs through different rim profile designs at different wind speeds and angles to devise the fastest solution. Although no fish scale rim profiles are present in the R4.G, many of the technologies from the very fast Artech wheels are applied.

The rim uses a 45mm tall rim with hookless beads, with an internal width of 28mm and external width of 38mm (albeit 27.08mm and 37.04mm measured though on my calipers).

This does place them among the wider offerings on the market and is designed to work best with tyres at 40mm and wider (35-60mm is the claimed width that these wheels can be used with).

The rim has also been specifically reinforced around the spoke holes, adding strength where needed without excessive carbon where it is not required.

Spoke lacing is a 2:1 two-cross at the front on the rotor side, radial on the drive side with 21 spokes total, while the rear is a 2:1 two-cross pattern on the drive side and one-cross on the rotor side, with 24 Sapim CX-ray alloy spokes.

This asymmetric spoke lacing, cross pattern, and number is aimed to balance the wheel against the forces of both braking and also drivetrain torque.

The hubs are Scope’s own R-Series hubs, and use a labyrinth system which essentially aims to block dirt from entering the hubs and bearings thus increasing longevity.

Internally a 36 tooth Diamond Ratchet SL is used. This 10 degree engagement is a bit higher (and thus slower) than some, but there are claims that fewer teeth results in greater ratchet longevity, and when keeping pressure on the pedals it has little impact on performance compared to higher counts.

The diamond carbon like coating is designed to prevent cassette bite into the free-hub body, while also reducing the weight. Claimed weight is 1,436g without tape or valves, while actual weight on my scales was 1,444g with tape and valves, so lighter than claimed.

Two decal options are available, with black or white options. Hub options range across Shimano and Shimano Microspline, SRAM XDR, Campagnolo, and Campagnolo N3W. Tubeless valves and rim tape are provided, but not lock-rings.

Performance

Fitting the tyres to the Scope R4.G was a nicel and simple affair. The 45mm Panaracer GravelKing ZX I use for gravel wheel tests can be a little tough to fit, but in this situation were able to be fitted without the need for levers. Given the wide and hookless rim, this was easier than I have found on similar gravel rims, while the tyres seated easily enough as well.

One area worth highlighting however was that the rotors are a pain to fit. The same system is used as on the Artech wheels, a lighter weight spline for the rotors, but it almost appeared slightly misaligned making them harder to fit than would be considered normal.

Getting out on the wheels, there are two things that are apparent pretty quickly when riding them; the ratchet engagement is a little sluggish by comparison to high tooth competitors, and the freehub is the loudest one I have ever used.

The ratchet uses a 36-tooth engagement, meaning it takes at most 10° of pedalling to engage the freehub. Hunt for example uses a 54-tooth ratchet, which means faster engagement. It’s only really noticeable when riding in scenarios where you are on and off the power regularly, so more techy terrain with lots of non-pedalling corners. Once rolling at speed, it makes little difference, and the Diamond Star ratchet Scope uses is extremely solid. I have tested a lot of Scope wheels, and the ratchet has never displayed any form of slip, and has proven to be very resilient.

The freehub noise is an interesting point. For early morning rides as I approach the end of my street, I found myself choosing to pedal while braking to avoid waking the entire street.

On the flip side, when riding shared trails with pedestrians, the freehub works better than any bell at alerting people to my presence. Coast for a few seconds and pedestrians a good 100m ahead turn around wondering why an angry hoard of hornets is approaching them.

I know some people enjoy a loud freehub, but this is a bit beyond my personal preference. I much prefer the almost silent running of the Campagnolo freehubs, but credit where credit is due, it acts as a fantastic alert when riding the trails. People will not miss you coming.

In terms of performance though, I am thoroughly impressed with these wheels. Scope might have gained more fame through the Artech wheels with fish scales and top level aero performance, but the R range of wheels are less than half the price and have most of the same performance.

I’ve even bought several pairs over the years, so can attest to putting my money where my mouth is. With the 45mm tyres fitted, measuring a shade under that width, and a 37mm external width, the wheels roll superbly and hold speed well. Going on the tarmac to head to the trails, the speed between these wheels and standard road wheels fitted is not massively different.

I’d say for most gravel this 40-45mm depth range is a very good balance for light enough to accelerate quickly and climb quickly, but deep enough to have some meaningful aero performance at speed.

At 1,444g for a 45mm depth, these are competitively lightweight wheels, and this does show when riding. The thing with gravel is that generally the climbs are tackled slower than tarmac for the same gradient, and gradients can ramp up quickly. This means lower wheel inertia, and weight requires more effort to accelerate up to speed.

Add heavier wider gravel tyres into the mix, and having a lighter rim can make more of a difference off-road than on tarmac. I’ve found the Scope R4.G climb very well, and the strong lateral stiffness also helps maintain a connected feel especially when mashing the pedals on more loose and rocky climbs. This lateral stiffness is most noticeable on the road, as cushioned low PSI wide tyres on gravel always take away an element of reactiveness of the wheels.

Although hookless, and me being a long term hookless sceptic, for gravel wheels with low pressures the system does work well. The tyres have maintained pressure, and going over some horrendously rough terrain and root infested trails, there have been no signs of tyre burps or pinches, and the rim has held up very well.

Value

At a penny under £1,500, these are not cheap wheels, but for a deep carbon wheelset they are in the bracket that I would term as good value. They sit alongside the likes of the Hunt Limitless CGR 40, and Reserve 44/40 G wheelsets. The Parcours FKT undercut them a bit at £1,249, and are deeper at 47mm and a fraction wider internally and externally, but also hookless and a touch heavier.

It’s a very competitive bracket for performance gravel wheels, and at this point they all have rather similar performance features, with just small differences separating them. If you want a quieter freehub, then the Scopes are not the wheels to go for, unless you get the brand’s special Silence Grease to reduce the known buzz of the Diamond Ratchet system. If you want to run wider tyres, maybe the Parcours are best with the 40mm external width.

If you want a pretty bombproof option with more heavily reinforced hub seals, no weight limit, and something that can tackle pretty much any form of terrain you throw at them, the Scope R4.G are certainly worth considering. Having used Scope R-line wheels across the last few winters, the hubs have held up exceptionally, and some truly heinous potholes have not led to any rim failures even when tyres have blown out spectacularly.

My best way to substantiate the value I see in these wheels, is that I have personally purchased sets of the road going version myself. Value is always subjective, but these are something I would, and indeed have, spent my own money on. I would suggest for most people that these wheels offer most of the performance of the likes of the Scope Artech 4.G, but for £2000 less.

Verdict

There's a much more expensive model in the range, but in my opinion, the Scope R4.G wheelset is the best gravel wheelset that Scope offers. Although the Artech model is lighter and potentially a little more aero, the cost is huge by comparison and there are some concerns about the delicateness of the hubs for off-road use.

The R4.G represent much better value in the carbon gravel wheelset market overall and based on previous experience with Scope R-line wheels the longevity should be impressive too.

The hub is intrusively loud though, and the rotors are a bit tough to fit and remove, but overall these are a highly impressive wheelset and a sensible investment for those who want a fast, lightweight, and resilient set of gravel wheels.

The Factor One has to be one of the most talked-about bikes to launch in years.

It first broke cover at the Criterium du Dauphiné in 2025, and very quickly broke our small corner of the internet with its wild time-trial-esque design, extremely wide fork and chainstays, and bayonet fork with razor-thin leading edge.

Less than a day later, it looked as though it was going to be banned by the UCI, who announced a rule governing how wide forks and chainstays could be, but I later learned that Factor knew about the impending rule change and designed the bike right up to the legal limit.

It won a stage of the Dauphiné a few days later, and was then raced at the subsequent Tour de France by Israel-Premier Tech. And to cap it off, a pre-production prototype tested extremely well in the Cyclingnews aero bikes wind tunnel test, both with and without a rider, as you'll see in more detail below.

Soon after, it launched officially with an emphasis on its progressive geometry. In fact, the only thing bigger than the fork clearance was head engineer Graham Shrive's presentation on that matter. I'll get into that later, but in simple terms the bike is designed with a modern racing position in mind; further forward, with shorter cranks, narrower bars and bigger tyres.

It also launched with claims of being faster than the Tarmac SL8 – which our own testing data agrees with but Specialized's does not – and at a price that is sure to make most wallets wince.

In the UK, a frameset (with handlebar and seatpost) is £6,920, and full builds start at £11,056 (Shimano Ultegra). 'Standard' builds top out at £13,419.00 with Campagnolo Super Record.

I was sent the model equipped with SRAM Red to review (with power meter), priced at £13,082. However, it also came with the £506 optional extra CeramicSpeed OSPW system, as well as the not-currently-specced Black Inc 62 Hyper wheels, which alone fetch £3,799 (£1000 more than the 'standard' Sixty Two wheels).

To my maths, that makes this build £14,588 (or £1,000 less with the 'standard' Sixty Two wheels).

Design and aesthetics

To begin this section, it's pertinent to revisit the motivations that drove its creation. For years, Head Engineer Graham Shrive had wanted to design a bike that really pushed the envelope, but the brand's founder – then CEO – Rob Gitelis didn't think the Factor brand was ready to put something like this out into the world.

Through its sponsorship of the Australian Olympic Squad, the development of the Hanzo Track saw them unearth plenty of aero gains. Then the UCI's rules changed in 2023 governing how the fork and down tube could be designed together. In 2024, our original round of aero bike testing proved that the Ostro VAM was not only competitive but a leader in the 'superbike' space both in terms of weight and aero. With all those things combined, Gitelis decided it was time.

Concurrently, the brand was a sponsor of the Israel-Premier Tech team, who, like the rest of the pro peloton, were slowly shifting their positions to this modern consensus. Saddles were being slammed forwards to get over the bottom bracket and rotate the body to lower the front end, shorter cranks were fitted to keep the hip angle open, longer stems swapped in to accommodate the newly shortened reach, narrower bars added for aerodynamics, and tyre sizes grew for comfort, grip and rolling resistance improvements.

Shrive says this led to riders running stems that were so long that they were unsafe, and it put their centre of gravity too high and too far forward on the bike, meaning any sudden braking came with an increased risk of an over-the-bars crash.

Therefore, he designed the ONE's geometry with this in mind, and the result is that across all sizes, the reach of the bike has grown by 20mm. In my size 58cm, that means a reach of 421mm, which is 19mm longer than an equivalent Tarmac SL9, which I have also been testing.

To offset the fit implications of the longer reach, the seat tube angle is now steeper. On all but the 47cm frame (where it's 1°), the seat tube is now 2° steeper than the OSTRO, at 75.5°. Some basic trigonometry tells me that at my saddle height (785mm), that puts me 27mm further forward, easily offsetting the extra reach.

At the rear, the chainstay lengths are unchanged, so the distance from the bottom bracket to the rear hub is still 405mm (except the 58cm, where it's 408mm). This is shorter than most of the competition, and lends itself to an agile ride, albeit there's nuance to this in the bigger sizes that I'll get to shortly.

To account for the trend towards bigger tyres (and to a point, shorter cranks), the bottom bracket drop is now 5mm bigger (thus it sits lower) on all sizes.

The rest of the differences against the OSTRO VAM are size dependent. To account for handling goals and toe overlap concerns at the smaller end of the size run, Factor has kept a similar wheelbase to the OSTRO VAM (technically it's 3 - 4mm longer), steepened the head tube angle, and offset this by reducing the fork rake (in the 47cm frame, Factor has changed the fork rake by a quite significant 9mm).

The goal of this is that toe clearance (or the removal of toe overlap) isn't solely achieved by slackening the head tube angle so much that it ruins handling. As such, smaller riders should get a bike that handles as well as bigger riders. I've been riding a 58cm so can't verify it, but the logic holds.

To compare that again to the Tarmac – the Specialized doesn't come in a 47, so I'll compare the 52cm frames – the head tube angle is 73.3° on the ONE, 0.8° steeper than the 72.5° of the Tarmac. However, both have 58mm of trail because the Tarmac's fork has a 4mm greater rake (aka offset).

All that is to say, this should make the handling of the ONE slightly sharper than an equivalent Tarmac, especially combined with 5mm shorter chainstays and a 1mm shorter wheelbase.

At the other end of the size run, though, the increased reach has mostly carried over into the wheelbase. It's now 16mm longer than the Ostro VAM in the 56 and 58cm frames (which I have here). That makes it more stable, but it does lose some of that agility that made the OSTRO VAM frame special.

To continue the Tarmac comparisons, the One is longer and lower (19mm more reach and 4mm lower stack in my size 58cm). The Tarmac's head tube is marginally steeper, with a shorter trail, meaning the front end feels a little more nimble, which is no doubt also aided by the Tarmac's lighter weight.

But added to this, the Tarmac's chainstays are only 2mm longer (again, we're comparing the 58cm frame), and the wheelbase is 16mm shorter. In tight corners, this definitely bears out in the Tarmac's favour, but the ONE makes up the ground in other places.

Rounding off this comparison, since the Tarmac comes specced with a -15mm offset seatpost (you can change it) and the ONE comes with a straight post (you can also change this), I can get 42mm further forward on the ONE, which makes for a big difference in how I feel when I actually ride the bike. I can obviously also slide the saddle back to undo this, and as I'll explain below, I tried a few different positions.

Before I get into that, though, let's just talk about some of the other standout design points, because aside from all these geometry shifts, there's some serious engineering going on here.

Primarily, that's the way the front of the bike is put together. It uses a bayonet-style head tube (where the steerer tube doesn't travel through the head tube, but rather in front of it and clamps top and bottom); a design popularised by the Cervélo S5 and also now found on the Colnago Y1Rs, but the leading edge of the ONE is insanely narrow, even by the aforementioned bikes' standards.

The way the fork mounts into place is a little complicated, to the point that Factor has a 'V2' in its manual that simplifies the original instructions.

Thankfully for the mechanics out there, no specialist tools are needed (unless you count a hollow socket, but a ring spanner works in its place).

There's a rather large 'tension rod' that sits vertically and is tightened from the bottom to first add preload and also hold everything together. In my time with the bike, I experienced a loss of preload on multiple occasions, creating that unnerving feeling of a loose headset.

Loosening and re-tightening to add preload got me through the few months I had with the bike, but not without the final attempt shearing off part of the head of the bolt, meaning I was then unable to disassemble it for a proper fix. I'm well aware a paying customer would just take it back to a shop for a fix here, probably when the headset loosened the first time, and so a proper disassembly-reassembly would likely remove this issue entirely.

Where the ONE really changes the script, however, is where the cockpit clamps into place. Instead of mounting at the point of the steering axis, it clamps into place approximately 4cm further forward, downwards onto the top of the fork using four bolts (which are later hidden by a carbon cover).

The steering axis, and thus the 'lever' you turn when steering the bike, is still normal, so handling feels familiar, but this design means less distance between your hands and where the cockpit meets the bike, which makes it much stiffer. This adds to the directness of the steering, but it has pretty dire implications for comfort, as I'll get into later.

The rear brake hose (and Di2 cables where necessary, but my bike was wireless) routes vertically out of the top of the head tube, and is then directed around a tight corner forwards into a hole at the rear of the one-piece cockpit, before being directed left or right depending on which way round you run your brakes. The front brake hose travels entirely through the fork, and thus exits slightly further forward before being bent around another tight corner to the opposite lever.

Both of these are pretty difficult manoeuvres. That much was already clear from the state of the hoses in my test bike – they'd clearly been ravaged by pliers or mole grips to force them where they needed to go.

I got a taste of doing it myself when I needed to swap the bars from the size 1 (90mm stem / 110mm effective length) the bike was accidentally shipped with, to the size 3 (110mm stem / 130mm effective length) I needed, and pliers really are the only way to get the hoses to bend where they need to go. I'm just glad we're no longer using cable-operated brakes, as this would be on par with the Venge Vias's infamous rim brakes.

The other big design story (both literally and figuratively) is the wide fork, and despite having thousands of words on geometry already, there's actually not a huge amount to say.

Somewhat obviously, they draw from learnings made in the Hanzo Time Trial and Track development. Specifically, learnings about tyre wake and how the disrupted airflow acts downstream, and how the fork leg spacing helps to smooth the airflow before it then goes on to hit the frame and rider's legs.

Factor says it tested multiple fork leg spacing iterations to see which was fastest, and settled on a fork that is 114mm at its widest point; a mere millimetre under the UCI limit of 115mm.

The crown of the fork protrudes forward from the head tube to the point that it creates a little shelf. I could probably sit a small mascot on here like truck drivers who tie toys to their grill, but that would likely upset Shrive and the aero motivations for making it this way.

The depth of the fork blades no doubt aids the bike's ability to 'sail' in crosswinds, but what's less discussed is that Shrive intentionally changed the shape so that the leading edge was more vertical, because that makes it more perpendicular to the airflow. Most forks sit at an angle loosely in line with the head tube angle plus a little bit of offset, but the ONE's fork actually kicks forward at the top before coming down more vertically toward the axle. This really changes the aesthetic of the bike – and I'm still not sure I'm over that – but from an aerodynamics standpoint, it reduces the (horrible phrase alert) 'wetted length', which is the length of material in contact with the air, and improves the effectiveness of what is.

Performance

Clearly, a lot is going on with the design of this bike, and there's a hell of a price tag to boot, but how does it actually feel to ride, as a bicycle, on the road?

Well, the biggest surprise to me when I first hopped onto one is that it felt… normal. Save for a headset issue on my first test bike, which essentially gave it indexed steering, the Factor One rides and handles a lot like any other race bike.

The primary affectors of how the bike rides – its geometry, its material, its touchpoints – are all fairly normal. I've already spent 1000+ words on the geometry so I won't go there again, but aside from a seat tube angle that puts you further forward on the bike, and a wheelbase that's longer, everything else is pretty much the same.

The forward-protruding fork makes the head tube angle look steep, but in this size, it's the same as the OSTRO and 0.2° different from the Tarmac. The trail is similar, the chainstay length is similar, the stack is similar.

So if you came here to learn if riding the Factor One was going to feel foreign compared to your current race bike, there's a good chance that it won't (assuming that race bike isn't from the 1970s).

However, before you rush off to remortgage your house, 'normal' doesn't automatically make it great. In fact, despite the price tag, there are a lot of things the Factor ONE doesn't do very well. Whether that actually matters to you will depend on what you want from it.

If you're considering the Factor One as your only bike, I think you'll grow weary very quickly. To peddle a metaphor, it's akin to having a car designed for track meets as your daily commuter, or to borrow one from my colleague Will, using a fish filleting knife as your general-purpose knife. I will cut up a pizza, but it won't be the best tool for that job.

The primary reason for this is that it's ridiculously stiff. I'd love to put some numbers to this, but Factor chose not to be involved in our road bike stiffness tests earlier this year, so I'm left to infer from feeling. And the main 'feeling' is a lack thereof, because every time I ride it for more than about 40 minutes, my hands go numb. This is probably partly due to my weight being further forward and thus more supported by my hands, but there's no getting around how insanely stiff the bike - and specifically the cockpit - is.

In my entire history of riding other bikes, I can recall one instance of hitting a bump and my hands coming off the bars, causing me to almost crash. It's happened three times on this bike. I don't think that's a lack of attention on my part either; the jolt through the front end of the bike is so much more severe than I'm used to that smaller bumps that I'm otherwise happy to ride over are enough to dislodge my hands.

I've ridden the One with two different wheelsets (the 'normal' Sixty Two and the Hyper Sixty Two), two cockpits (110 and 130mm), with the Black Inc stock bar tape, without bar tape at all (through necessity for one ride) and with Fizik's Comfortfeel 3.5mm tape. The stiffness or numbness hasn't abated in any case.

Of course, I'm framing it as a problem, and it must be said that the One can accept 32mm tyres, but that stiffness has its benefits too. Yanking on the bars in an ugly-face, all-out sprint, the difference is night and day compared to pretty much anything else out there. Have you ever picked up an old smartphone and wondered how the hell you ever lived with it? That's kind of how I feel when I try to sprint on anything else now. The responsiveness in the pedals feels marginally better, but the feeling through the bars is ridiculously good.

It carries over into climbing too. The Factor ONE weighs 8.2kg in this setup (with pedals and computer, no bottles) but has the sprightly feel you get on a 6kg lightweight bike because of how the stiffness translates to the road. I doubt for a second it's actually undoing the 1.5kg deficit it has to the O2 VAM when it comes to a hill climb, but from a pure sensations point of view, it's a nice thing to have on a bike that can also then barrel along a flat road with ease.

And 'barrel along' it can. The ONE is a bike that enables the en vogue modern, progressive aero position, and for that I really like it. Partly because it lets me open up my hip angle and prevent pinching of my hip flexors, which has long caused me discomfort, but also because I get to ride in that racy, forward, purposeful position that has long-ago been shown to be more aero.

I've always been quite quad dominant in my pedalling technique too, and I feel this lets me play to that strength. This is also the first test bike I've had in years where I've not had to slam the saddle as far forward on the rails as it'll go, and I buy into the notion that a longer front-centre reduces the over-the-bar risk, even if it's not something I've ever really worried about before.

The downsides to this position mean I now have more trouble with my neck, because rotating my body forwards means my neck has to compensate in the opposite direction if I'm still to see where I'm going. I had it especially badly on the Ridley Noah Fast 3, but I seem to be in the minority in having this problem, so I'll brush it aside as a me problem for now.

But this all leads to the ONE feeling really at home. I'm loath to say it 'feels' fast, because so many other factors could come into play on any given day and we have the wind tunnel data to prove that it is – keep reading for that – but it 'feels' happy. The longer wheelbase adds high-speed stability, and where I found the Ridley Noah was buffeted by the wind quite easily with its deep wheels and mega head tube, the Factor is stable and surefooted. The switch to the Hyper wheels adds a slight twitchiness to the front end by dint of its reduced weight, but with either wheelset fitted, the bike was quite content ticking along at speed, even when the going got a bit blustery. And once I'd put the longer-reach cockpit on, I could sit in a nice long, low, narrow position and tick at speed nicely.

When the going gets twisty, however, I can't help but shake the feeling that the handling is actually comparatively slow in comparison to the Ostro Vam, Tarmac SL8 and SL9. I'd add the Noah Fast 3.0 to that mix too, but the Noah Fast I've ridden was a smaller frame size, so it's not a perfectly apples-to-apples comparison - not least since the Ridley geo is even longer and lower than this, with a slacker seat tube angle.

The extremely stiff cockpit kind of helps to offset this and give the impression of precision, and it goes extremely well on fast, sweeping descents where the roads are smooth because the front triangle flex that can cause vagueness under high load – like you get on the Y1Rs – isn't an issue here. But on tighter corners and hairpins, I'd often miss the apex. Overall, I just struggled to develop the intuition for how the bike would handle like I could on the OSTRO VAM, or like I can on the SL9. This is exacerbated when the road surface gets a little rougher, as is common here in the UK, as every bump is felt through the hands, making steering inputs more difficult.

Of course, I'm splitting hairs here, but it sort of bears out in the geometry charts in my frame size too. I think riders on smaller frames will probably feel differently, because in that comparison against other race bikes, the ONE's gets a steeper head tube and pairs it with a short wheelbase, but in my size, it's a different proposition with a longer wheelbase and no meaningful change to head tube angle and trail. Thanks to the position change, there's perhaps a little too much weight through my hands too. It's not a dealbreaker though. As I say, I'm splitting hairs and comparing an elite bike against other elite bikes, and it's perhaps something that I could reduce by playing around with more tyre sizes, different cockpits shifting my weight balance around to find a sweet spot.

Aero performance - wind tunnel test data

Cyclingnews subscribers will already be familiar with this, but the ONE can lay claim to the title of being the fastest bike we've ever tested in the wind tunnel, both with and without a rider. That's against a cohort of over 30 high-end road race bikes, and includes pretty much all the big players from Specialized, Trek, Cannondale, Colnago, Cervelo and more.

The graph above shows the CdA (the measurement of how aerodynamic something is) at seven different wind angles, with 0° at the centre being a direct headwind, and a lower measurement being better or more aerodynamic.

The Factor One is highlighted, and it's clear that its aero credentials come to the fore as the wind angle increases.

Using the CdA from each of those wind angles and averaging them out, we then calculate the number of watts needed to overcome the aerodynamic drag of both the Factor One and dozens of other bikes that have been through the same test.

We use an old, basic bike as the comparison, and can see that the Factor One tops the list, saving 40.28 watts. Perhaps more usefully, it's two watts more aerodynamic (at 40km/h) than the next best bike.

With a rider on the bike, things shift a little, but the Factor is still within 0.04w of the top spot, which is well within the error margin of the test. In this test, it was 27.53W more aero than our baseline bike with a rider, and 7.9W more aero than the Tarmac SL8 (we're yet to test the SL9).

And in our third aero test, we swapped out the stock wheels for a 'control' wheel - the Enve SES 6.7.

This allows us to see how each bike compares with the exact same wheel-tyre combo, isolating the aero differences to the frame, fork, handlebar and so on.

In that test, we once again have Factor atop the tree with a sizeable step to the next best on test.

To read the full breakdown, head to our wind tunnel aero bikes shootout or our Factor One wind tunnel deep-dive.

Value

The price of this build is £14,588, or $15,788. Minus £1000 or $1100 for the 'standard' Black Inc Sixty Two wheelset.

That's £90 cheaper (or oddly, $288 more expensive) than a Colnago Y1Rs specced with the same groupset and a similar wheelset upgrade (Enve 4.5 SES wheels). But it's also £2,589 more than an off-the-peg S-Works Tarmac SL9.

To contextualise just how much money the Factor One will cost, here's a look at what else you could buy. You could buy a Tarmac SL8 Expert - Ultegra Di2 (£5,499), a Crux 5 Expert Force XPLR (£5999) and an Epic Hardtail (Comp, S-1000 AXS and Sid SL)

Alternatively, if you wanted a top-tier race product, you could buy a Canyon Aeroad CFR (£8029) and still have enough to buy that aforementioned brand new Crux 5.

Or to put another spin on it, if you're buying it because you want to get better at racing, you could buy that aforementioned Canyon Aeroad CFR, and then spend £300 a month on a support network of various coaches for 21 months to help you find significantly more than the few watts you're saving here.

Verdict

The Factor One is a singularly minded, out-and-out race bike, and for that type of riding it's really good, but it's an incredibly expensive tool for a specific purpose, not a versatile bike. It's the drywall screwdriver in the toolkit; brilliant at its job, and technically capable as an impact driver, but it'd soon get tiresome.

The handling might not feel quite as sharp as the OSTRO did, but it's still really fun to ride when you're trying to go fast. Racing, KOM hunting, or simply chasing your mates on it is a hoot, and the geometry allows that 'modern' position. It's longer, lower, but with a steepness to the seat tube that doesn't just stretch me out, instead letting me really get over the bottom bracket, drop my elbows and ride it hard.

As a result, it's a bike that holds pace on the flat as well as anything else out there, and the stiffness means sprinting is also better than anything else out there.

But the big takeaway is that it's so stiff that riding it every day becomes tiresome. Even after adding plush bar tape and swapping to my favourite saddle, I feel battered if I go for more than a couple of hours, not to mention my numb hands and pothole incidents.

As such, this is more a race tool than an everyday machine. And that throws up another issue in that it has such a divisive aesthetic that plenty of its potential buyers wouldn't actually feel comfortable turning up to their local race on one.

The ability to get into the modern position is really good. But the Noah Fast offers this too.

It's not a bike I'd overall recommend, unless for a very specific purpose.

The Garmin HRM 600 takes many of the features of the cheaper HRM 200 and builds upon them in a quest to become the best chest strap heart rate monitor on the market.

Not only does it read heart rate, but it also takes heart rate variability. Added to that are a host of other features that are somewhat lost on just cyclists, but for multisport athletes such as triathletes there are a lot of very useful additions.

New for Garmin chest strap monitors, this is the first unit that is rechargeable rather than using coin cell batteries. The battery life is solid, lasting on average a month or more for most users. Add to this a very comfortable strap, and useful LED lights on the front of the pod, and it’s a highly capable unit. But the cost is high, and for just cycling, many of the features feel unnecessary.

Design and specifications

First and foremost, the pod has been completely redesigned. There is now a button on the front, which like the HRM 200, can be used to set up pairing to avoid unwanted connections to the device, and also to check battery status thanks to the LEDs on the front. It works exactly the same way as the HRM 200, so to refresh your memory; the button needs to be held to enter pairing mode to easily connect to a bike computer or smart watch, and then single pressed in the future to wake it up.

The front LED has different flash patterns for connecting (orange flash), and connected (green dual flash). The LED can also display battery level at the point of waking up; green flash is okay, orange flash is low, red flash is critical.

The pod can then be removed, where at the rear you'll find the charging port, something new for chest strap heart rate monitors for Garmin and now competes with the Wahoo Trackr HRM. This is a now standard Garmin connector, the same used on the new Garmin Cirqa competitor to Whoop, and the Garmin smartwatches. Claimed battery life is ‘up to 2 months’, based on 1 hour use per day. So divide your hours ridden per week by seven to work out a rough average of how many hours a day you use it, and you’ll get an idea of a recharging schedule.

The heart rate monitor is resistant to five 'atmospheres' (often denoted as ATM) of water pressure, for those wanting to swim, which is more than enough to deal with rain and sweat from cyclists.

Data for HR and HRV is transmitted via the standard BLE (three concurrent connections) or ANT+ (unlimited), but the HRM 600 can also record activities itself when linked with the Garmin Connect app. It monitors distance travelled, calories burned, and intensity minutes, along with other features more running and swimming focused.

Weight is 18g (0.65oz) for the pod and 61g (2.2oz) for the strap as well (accurate as per my scales). XS-S (60-85 cm, 23.5"-33.5") and M-XL (80-119 cm, 31.5-47.0") are available and can be adjusted easily. A small tab on the inside of the latch is included to prevent irritation.

Heart rate itself is measured via Electrocardiography (ECG) taking actual electrical readings from the chest and heart, which tends to be far more accurate, especially with sweat present, than optical light based sensors used on the wrist or arm.

Performance

Using the M-XL strap, the sizing was spot on for me, and adjusting to size was very easy. Over the course of the testing period, the strap has not moved so the fit has remained consistent; something I have had issue with on other brands' chest straps. I really like the small tab inside of the latch, as this can be an area that causes irritation, but this removes that issue.

There aren’t grippers as such on the straps, but the large electrode reading pad has a certain grippiness, so it stays in place very easily even in hot weather with lots of sweat.

In terms of the data, I have compared it to several other heart rate monitors. Wearing a Wahoo Trackr HRM along with a Coros arm HRM and Whoop MG. The Garmin HRM 600 and Wahoo Trackr have read very closely, to the point where there is no real shift from the trend lines and data. The Whoop has been less consistent, being a wrist based one, while the Coros is solid as long as you don’t get too sweaty. In conclusion, the Garmin HRM 600 is more than accurate enough for its intended use.

I am a big fan of the rechargeability of the device. A lot of coin cell heart rate monitors previously have not had battery indicators, so you only know the battery is low once it conks out during a ride. With the HRM 600, as with the 200, the LED lights tell you roughly how much battery is left, and the claimed 'one hour per day for two months' seems to track correctly, as after 14 hours a week for a month, I needed to recharge the unit.

Removing the pod is easy, and the cable connects securely making charging a breeze. It’s a little easier with the Trackr HRM as it is magnetic and the pod does not need removing, but equally the charger is bespoke for the Trackr and can disconnect if shifted.

The ability to take heart rate variability (HRV) is useful as a metric to track, but ideally this needs to be taken overnight or first thing in the morning, and a chest strap is not the ideal solution for this as you also need a heat unit or watch to connect to. It’s more accurate than wrist based measurements, but more of a faff. This takes us on to the next issue for cyclists, which is that many of the smart features are more relevant to runners or swimmers.

Essentially, this is the ideal heart rate monitor for triathletes, but for those who just cycle, I think many of the features on offer are somewhat superfluous and will seldom get used.

Value

That superfluousness of features is the issue with the Garmin HRM 600. It’s a great heart rate monitor, and for swimmers, runners, or triathletes I can see real value in the additional features that it offers, but for cyclists, many of those features will not be realised, and you are paying for technology that is not going to be used. At £149.99 it is one of the more expensive heart rate monitors around.

If you want rechargeable units, the Wahoo Trackr HRM is a little over half the price at £79.99, and although it lacks HRV readings, it works very well.

The Magene H613 (£49) is even cheaper and still features the rechargeable element, but at just a third of the price. It means that realistically, for cyclists, if you want a heart rate monitor that doesn’t rely on coin cell batteries, the Garmin 600 HRM is not a good value offering.

Verdict

The Garmin 600 HRM is a great heart rate monitor that is accurate, has a good battery life, features recharging, and has a whole host of smart and additional features. However, many of those smart features are somewhat limited to swimming and running, so from a purely cycling perspective, many of them are superfluous.

At £149.99, this means that this is a very expensive heart rate monitor that might not really bring anything necessary to users looking to just use it for cycling. It’s a great device, but poor value for cyclists.

The Sweet Protection Tucker III 2Vi is, as the name suggests, the third iteration of the Tucker helmet, but not the third version of the road helmet. The Tucker started life out as a TT helmet with removable visor, but like the Giro Aerohead, became the aero road helmet of choice for the Uno-X team. This latest iteration is road only and aims to improve ventilation while improving aerodynamic performance.

Using a mix of MIPS and proprietary 2Vi technologies, Sweet Protection also aims to ensure this helmet maintains the primary focus of protecting riders’ heads. There is no Virginia Tech helmet rating yet, but the Falconer helmet from the brand has been a five-star scorer there.

Aero performance comes via specific channelling and has been designed with F1 input and tested on the heads of the Uno-X Mobility WorldTour teams. The previous iteration was amongst the top scorers in our wind tunnel testing, so just how does this latest model work in the real world against the best aero road helmets?

Design and Aesthetics

Sweet Protection starts off by stating that the Tucker III 2Vi has been designed with expertise from a Formula 1 aerodynamicist, and in collaboration with the Uno-X Mobility cycling team who are well renowned for a highly data driven approach. That sets it up very nicely for delivering on the claims it makes as a performance aero helmet. The brand states that in testing the new Tucker III 2Vi saves 10 watts at race speeds over the Sweet Protection Falconer Aero 2Vi helmet, a significant saving claim.

Aerodynamics on this helmet starts with the vents. There are three larger vents at the front across the centre line of the helmet designed to pull air in. This air then follows internal channels and exits at the rear through the exhaust. Each vent and channel has been specifically designed to limit pressure at the front of the helmet, and turbulence off the rear. The byproduct of this is supposedly enhanced ventilation via accelerated internal airflow at race speeds, 150% more air volume than the previous Tucker 2Vi according to the brand. Meanwhile the vents have a rounded entry and exit design to limit turbulence further.

There are two additional front vents on the temple for storing glasses. These can be covered with vent caps to limit drag, but for UCI events those are not allowed as removable sections have been banned. These vents feature rubber grippers designed to hold Sweet Protection eyewear securely but work well with a range of glasses.

The helmet features a very narrow profile by comparison to other aero road helmets. This has been achieved via what the brand calls a 4-Shell Construction, four separate shells for the front, rear, main body, and top of the helmet bonded onto the foam inner. The front and rear shell panels are described as Impact Shields and aim to boost protection further.

MIPS Air Node is used internally for rotational impact protection. Additionally, Sweet Protection uses its own 2Vi system, which integrates the MIPS system into the brand's own Impact Shields and padding for comfort and safety combined. There is no Virginia Tech safety rating yet, but previous helmets from the brand have performed well.

Fit comes via the 360 Occigrip Fit System. This uses a full band around the helmet with adjustment from a rear dial on the adjustable cradle. This allows adjustments to spread pressure evenly across the entire orbit of the head. The straps are adjustable in length, but there are no height adjustments around the ears to reduce material for claimed aero performance boosts.

Performance

First things first, getting the helmet on my head. The Sweet Protection Tucker III 2Vi sits quite narrow on the head, it’s essentially the antithesis of the POC Cytal or Octal helmets which have become slightly synonymous with a more mushroom head shape. Think Toad in Mario.

I am personally quite a fan of this design choice, it also tends to perform reasonably well aerodynamically for road positions where the head tends to move more and also riders spend more time in an upright position. Similar to the new Specialized S-Works Evade 4, the Sweet Protection also features a more cut-off rear taper, instead relying on virtual aerofoil shapes for wind manipulation. Again, this feature is designed to assist in performance with the head down, similar in design methodology to the Giro Eclipse Pro which went for a short tail rather than long tail design for this reason.

Back to the fit itself, although narrow in external shape, the helmet itself fits my head well. I have a fairly regular head shape. Narrow helmets like the Abus Gamechanger 2.0 are too narrow, while most other helmets tend to fit well. The 360˚ fit system on the Sweet Protection works well to give solid retention across the entire hemisphere of your head.

There are two fit gripes straight away though. Firstly, the straps have no adjustment around the ears. This was not a problem for me personally, but it may be for plenty of people. It’s likely a weight saving and frontal area reducing design choice, but it’s not a huge area for gains, and limits fit adjustment. The other issue is the rear dial, it works well, but ergonomically it’s not great. The grip for the dial is textured, but very thin and can be difficult to get enough traction on to tighten as much as you might desire. In gloves I can imagine this would be even more problematic.

Some interesting little add-ons that came with this helmet as well; a helmet bag is included, which is not a given even at this price, but also some vent bungs. These are not allowed for UCI races as they are removable parts, however, for road bike time trials these little bungs can fill the gap where the glasses arm storage is. For a time trial, it is very unlikely that those vents will be required as glasses stored in the helmet ruin the aerodynamics somewhat. Instead, the bungs fill the gap and maybe add to the watt savings by a very marginal, unperceivable manner. It’s very Dave Brailsford ‘marginal gains’, but every little helps.

In terms of the performance of the helmet on the road, I’ll focus first on the more tangible features. Aerodynamics are notoriously hard to judge subjectively, whereas weight and ventilation are far more tangible. Weight wise, this is a fairly chunky helmet, but the reality is that it doesn’t feel heavy when riding. It’s only 44g heavier than the Giro Eclipse Pro, so for the real weight weenies maybe this matters, but for the majority it makes virtually no difference.

Ventilation is an area where this helmet actually performs better than might be expected given the limited quantity of vents. At the front there are three main vents at the point of highest pressure, the two side vents for glasses arms storage, and then the rear exhaust which is one entity made up of three exit flows for the internal channelling.

At speed, the amount of air that enters the helmet is frankly exceptional. 35+kph provides a large amount of airflow, likely due to the combination of placement of the vents, large internal channels that are deep enough, and well positioned exhaust. At higher speeds, I’ve even felt some lift in the helmet as the volume of air flowing through the channels has been enough to lift the helmet up from my head, but not enough that it’s caused any concern for the security of the helmet. I’ve been testing this in temperatures of between 20-28˚C, so not excessively warm, but on the hotter side for riding, especially when going up steeper climbs with low airflow. Even in these scenarios, the ventilation has not been bad. It’s certainly not as good as a far more vented helmet such as the Giro Aries, or even the Giro Eclipse Pro. It is, however, far better than a lot of fully dedicated aero helmets that I have tested.

When things do get a bit too warm and the sweat starts dripping, those glasses storage vents are quite useful. They keep the glasses nicely out of the way, but do only work with straight armed options. POC Propel glasses struggle to fit, while POC Elicit or Oakley Velo Kato models fit well.

In terms of aero performance, we have yet to test this helmet. We have tested the previous version though, which was 10^th in our huge helmet testing round up out of the aero road helmets. That helmet was only around 2w off the best on the test at 40kph. At 50kph that helmet was then relatively faster, jumping ahead of some other helmets. If we take Sweet Protection at its word, then the Tucker III should be an improvement on the previous helmet, especially given the design brief of 45-50kph performance. The only test data however states that the Tucker III “saves 10 watts at race speed” versus the Sweet Protection Falconer Aero 2Vi. We don’t know what ‘race speed’ is, but let’s assume 45-50kph. At 40kph we found the Tucker 2Vi to be 1.52w faster than the Falconer Aero averaged across all yaw angles. 10 watts is a lot, and testing protocol is not divulged, but we can probably assume that the new Tucker is faster than the Falconer for sure, and likely faster than the Tucker 2Vi. Although the new Evade 4 is no faster than the Evade 3, even the 2, but has greater ventilation. Simply put, we can’t confirm how fast this helmet is without testing it, but there is good reason to believe it will perform well given the design methodology and performance of the previous generation.

Safety wise it is hard to judge the helmet. There are no Virginia Tech Helmet safety ratings yet for independent testing, but the 2Vi, MIPS Air Node, and use of shell protection have all been used in helmets that have scored well. The Sweet Protection Falconer helmet has scored 5 stars in that testing and uses many of those safety features which boosts confidence in the Tucker’s performance.

Value

Breaching the £300/$350 barrier, this is not a cheap helmet. Looking across the range of premium aero helmets that we’ve tested. In fact, in our helmet testing of 47 helmets, only the Kask Nirvana and Elemento, and POC Procen Air and Cytal cost more. Every other helmet stayed under the £300 mark, including those that performed better than the Sweet Protection Tucker 2Vi (previous generation version). Even the latest Evade 4 stays under this price, while some helmets such as the Ekoi Aero R also exceed that price barrier.

If you want the fastest aero helmet, you can likely get something that performs nearly as well for a good chunk less cash. I can’t however comment on the ventilation capabilities of some of those faster performing helmets in our test, and that was an area where the Tucker III genuinely impressed me for a race helmet.

But then other issues such as the retention dial, lack of strap adjustability, and no independent safety testing scores so detract from the overall value.

This is certainly a very good race helmet, and having tested a lot of different ones, this is genuinely the helmet that I lean towards when choosing what to race in. However, if I was spending my own money, I would likely veer towards the Giro Eclipse Pro, mainly for the greater ventilation along with lower price, even if at the cost of a watt or two. If I wanted the best value, the Van Rysel RCR-F is still really the class leader there.

Verdict

The Sweet Protection Tucker III 2Vi is an impressive race day aero helmet. The limited number of vents are carefully placed, alongside strategic channelling, to provide a huge amount of airflow when travelling at speed, which remains adequate even at slower climbing speeds. We don’t have independent aero testing yet, but there is good reason to believe this will be a strong performer. It’s not the lightest, but that doesn’t detract from performance in any tangible way.

The lack of adjustability, and limited performance of the retention dial are however not ideal, while at present there are no independent safety testing validations. I may be able to forgive some of this, if it weren’t for the £309 price tag which exceeds that of many competitors. A helmet bag being included doesn’t do enough to stop this helmet from not being the best value. Yet, it is the helmet I reach for when it comes to race days.

In most jobs, aimlessly browsing Instagram on the clock is anywhere from frowned upon (ie: Member of Parliament) to a sackable offence (bus driver/nuclear safety technician).

But in this job, it does sometimes pay dividends, as when I happened upon a short reel of Unbound Gravel and Traka winner, Rosa Klöser’s bike from The Rift, a gravel race in Iceland, something curious caught my eye.

Under her Hammerhead bike computer there was something sticking out that disrupts the relatively smooth flow of the computer mount; a single SRAM satellite shifter blip. Closer inspection, and a little more digging around on Instagram, reveals more, with a pair of blips attached underneath; one behind the other.

These satellite shifters from SRAM are totally wireless, and are usually placed either underneath the tops of the bars to allow riders to shift when climbing, or commonly when riding over the cobbles at Paris-Roubaix, or they’re placed in the crook of the drops for sprinters to allow them to shift up and down without having to reach for the paddles or shifter hoods.

I reached out to SRAM to see what was going on in this case, as the blips can also be used to control the Hammerhead computer screens, which it was suggested by my colleague Tom might make life easier over the rough basalt roads of Iceland. They are, in this case, being used for shifting however:

“Good catch! It’s for the gears indeed, it allows her to shift while staying in a more aero position.”

While the UCI has banned the ‘puppy paws’ position on the road, where a rider supports their weight on their forearms on the tops of the bars, hands lolling in space over the front wheel, things are less draconian in the gravel world, and while Unbound banned aero bars years ago, riders are still free to do whatever they can to get aero on smoother sections of the course.

Placing a pair of blips under her bike computer allows Klöser to stay in this aero, forearms-on-bars position without having to reach out to the hoods each time she wants to shift, and also likely encourages using the computer itself as a hand-hold, stabilising aid.

This isn't a new hack for Klöser however, as interrogation of our Unbound tech gallery reveals her race bike this year for Kansas' big day out had a single shifter installed under the computer too.

A new Cube aero road bike has been hiding in plain sight since June this year. That model, along with a host of other new machines, has now been officially released by the brand.

Both Tour de France races are over for the year, and hot, lazy August days at times feel like downtime before the excitement begins to build again for the year's final big races like the Vuelta a España and the World Championships.

But Cube is already looking even further ahead to 2027 and has pretty much announced its full bike lineup for next year, including the mystery aero bike we have wanted more information on for months.

We saw Team TotalEnergies with the new Cube aero bike at the Tour-Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes back in June, and the team has raced with it ever since.

That bike was announced today as the latest version of the Litening Aero C:68X; it's lighter, more aero and, in context, really rather 'cheap'. We have more details on Cube's range-topper below.

Since this is the first 2027 range news we've released, and possibly because we're excited for any news on next year's bikes, we've included an overview of some of the other models on offer from Cube as well.

The new CUBE Litening Aero C:68X

There is no model name change for the Litening Aero C:68X, but the brand's range-topper has undergone some changes in this latest update.

Cube hasn't gone into fine details regarding the design process for the new machine, but we've got the key points here.

The frame and fork are now 150 grams lighter and have 34mm tyre clearance. The steering forkstop pin has also gone, providing a bigger range of movement from the handlebars.

Geometry also remains the same, with no big changes taking place between the new and outgoing models, although a size 62cm frame has now been introduced.

The frame is said to be lighter, stiffer and more aero than the outgoing model, with a quoted aerodynamic saving of 6.2 watts. That's all the detail we have on that front for now, though I have asked the brand for more information.

There's a fresh carbon seatpost which is said to be 10% more comfortable, and that area of the bike is the easiest to differentiate between the old and new models. The new bike has a seat tube / top tube junction that drops away at an angle; look to that area if you are spotting the new bike.

There is also a new integrated handlebar specifically for the bike. Cube says the IC Aero Max cockpit helps put the rider into a more aero position. We got a little more info on the bar, and Cube told us there are palm support dents on the tops, special bar tape cutouts for where the tape is designed to end, and a little bit of flare to the drops. The brand is also speccing narrower bars and shorter cranks on 2027 bikes.

Prices for the bike begin at £4,999, but top-spec Dura-Ace (claimed 7.1kg weight) or SRAM Red builds - with Newmen Streem carbon wheels, Schwalbe Pro One Aero tyres, and the Aero Max cockpit - will set you back just £7,499 or €7,299. Still a chunk of money, but a very attractive price point in this top-tier aero bike category.

The lightest bike in the range isn't even the most expensive; the 6.9kg Orbit model with SRAM Red XPLR 1X drivetrain comes in at £6,999 / €6,999.

Road and gravel bikes

It's not all 7K Dura-Ace race bikes today; Cube has made some changes to its gravel and more affordable road lines too.

The Attain endurance bike range has received attention; specs have been strengthened across aluminium and carbon models, and a carbon frame model now starts at £2,500 with Shimano 105 Di2, carbon wheels and an integrated handlebar, which sounds like a competitively priced package that should rival bikes like the Canyon Endurace.

The Nuroad gravel range has also had an update, and another contender for one of the best specced gravel bikes around is the Nuroad C:62 SLT (pictured above). It's one of the few bikes on the market right now with an SRAM Red XPLR groupset for under £7,000.

Coming in at 8kg with Red XPLR, Newmen Streem wheels and Schwalbe G ONE RS Pro tyres, its RRP is £6,499. It also has mudguard mounts, rejoice!

Mountain and hybrid bikes

Cube's range could be called comprehensive; there are a lot of bikes. When it comes to mountain bikes, the brand has resurrected a previously discontinued model and streamlined a big range.

The Fritzz was discontinued back in 2018, but after a hiatus the brand has reworked and returned it to the range as an Enduro bike which will replace the Stereo One77 model. We don't have full details on the suspension and frame angles, but the bike will sport 170mm of travel, use a high pivot design and come with a mullet wheel setup as stock.

The sizable Stereo range, which until now consisted of 14 models, has been streamlined to a 150mm / 145mm travel bike and two carbon frame options. A Shimano XT-equipped bike will come in at £2,199, further reinforcing the Cube value offering.

Finally, whilst various hardtail and hybrid bikes have also received updates, there's a brand new model in the shape of the carbon-framed e-bike, the Supreme Hybrid C:62 deluxe. Both versions of the bike have a Gates carbon drive, integrated lighting, fenders, frame lock, kickstand and luggage rack. Prices start at £4,899 for this.

When it comes to road wheels, things are moving quickly right now. Carbon spokes are becoming commonplace, wheelset weights are decreasing dramatically, and a variety of rim widths are being offered, generally in the wider direction of travel.

The UCI maximum rim-depth ruling for road race use has also influenced things. Any rider in a UCI-sanctioned race can only use up to a 65mm deep rim, apparantly a measure to limit speed and improve safety.

DT Swiss launched its revamped ARC 1100 wheels last year, streamlining the third generation range of wheel depths to 55,65 and 85mm and introducing a new wheel shape and specific tyre pairing.

These wheels are the Swiss brand’s aero range toppers and are used by Uno-X in the WorldTour. In fact, wheels from the range have been ridden by the yellow jersey wearer in both the mens and womens's Tour de France this year - a cool stat.

They have also been designed and arrive with a specific tyre pairing; you can buy them pre-fitted with Continental tyres and tubes.

I’ve been testing the 65mm deep version for a few months now. I’ve ridden two road races on them as well as a load of training and general riding, and we’ve taken them to the Silverstone wind tunnel to see how they fared against some of the best road bike wheels right now.

DT Swiss has long carried a ‘quality’ label from cyclists and shops. If you are shopping for a new pair of ‘best’ or race wheels, my own comprehensive test riding, plus our own wind tunnel test results, should help you when it comes to choosing.

Design and aesthetics

The 1100's have a matte carbon fibre rim finish, with some classy silver decals. A silver 'DT Swiss' and 'ARC 1100' on each side, and a red section around the valve hole, perhaps to help make it easier to spot.

The wheels are built around that deep 65mm DT Swiss rim and with DT 180 DICUT hubs with ceramic bearings, which are the brand’s top models. There are 20 spokes in the front, and 24 at the rear with hidden spoke nipples. The spokes themselves are DT Swiss Aerolite II bladed steel ones, not carbon; you will notice.

The rims themselves use a V shape, widening from the spoke bed, and flaring out a little more at about the midpoint of the rim.

The wheels weigh 1559 grams as a pair on my scales, a respectable weight for a 65mm wheelset, but overall wheel weights are dropping so fast that it's starting to be viewed as a little heavier.

The brand now has a carbon-spoked, climbing-oriented wheel, the 38mm-deep ARC 1100 Spline CS model; head that way for carbon spokes.

The wheels have also been designed with a specific pair of tyres in mind and can be purchased pre-fitted with them, which is how my test set arrived. They came fitted with a 30mm Continental GP5000 S TR tyre on the rear, and the brand’s Aero 111 tyre at the front in a 29mm size, which the 22mm internal width has been optimised for. They also arrive with Continental TPU tubes fitted.

The rims are hooked, so there’s no need to check any tyre compatibility charts here. Though the tyres come with Continental tyres and TPU tubes, they do have DT Swiss tubeless tape fitted and tubeless valves included, so you won’t have to re-tape if you do go tubeless.

The hubs use the brand's Ratchet EXP system, and it’s very simple to swap freehub bodies or remove for cleaning. There’s a recording of the freehub sound below; it is on the louder side as freehub bodies go.

On the EXP ratchet, certain units are affected by a premature wear issue. Click the link to see how you can check your own.

The wheels have a 22mm inner rim width and an external width of just over 28mm. The rim itself also has a narrow 'V' profile. In the context of the overall market, will the wheels' overall weight, steel spokes and narrower rim measurements make them less appealing?

Internal and external rim width measurements are growing, and for riders looking to run larger volume tyres, a corresponding inner width may be the way to go. For all-out speed, is a narrower size better?

DT Swiss is in the narrower school of thought with these wheels. The brand argues that increasing inner rim width affects frontal area, a key consideration regarding aerodynamic performance.

According to DT Swiss wind tunnel testing, its V rim shape provides 'the lowest drag measured' as well as ensuring a 'small steering moment' to provide easy and predictable handling in crosswinds, etc. The brand also says the Aero 111 front tyre can help increase the sailing effect at certain Yaw angles, which can help us ride quicker for the same or less effort.

Performance

I've had a very good test period with the ARC 1100's. DT Swiss says this is the wheelset to choose for speed on flatter terrain, and this is where they do seem to excel. I've tested them with a Winspace M6 aero bike, and the Canyon Endurace SLX.

Sitting in the wheels in a road race or swapping off on my local chaingang at 50km/h+ feels very fast, and based on my feel I'd say up and over around 30km/h is where the wheels seem to really come into their own. It feels like they hold and maintain speed very well once moving, and the 65mm deep rims make pretty much any bike look mean; who doesn't love big deep rims?

Whilst they sit at 65mm in depth, I can’t say they are difficult to live with in any way. They perform well across the board. I've felt a couple of pulls in high winds, but generally crosswinds haven't been an issue, which aligns with the brand's claims on minimising steering moments.

No, they aren't as nimble feeling when climbing as a lighter, shallower wheel. But if you are looking at a 65mm wheelset, you are probably focusing on what it can bring to the table on the flat, and that's not what these wheels are for- not a day in the mountains.

That front 29mm Aero 111 tyre paired with the deep front rim can contribute to some harsher feelings at times, particularly compared to a bigger tyre and perhaps a wider rim.

Where I do notice a difference at times is in slow-speed acceleration compared to lighter wheels; the Roval Rapide CLX III wheels do spin up that little bit quicker, especially from very low speed.

On hillier, up-and-down terrain they also don't feel as nippy, and for a hard, hilly day there are better options, but again, these are for speed on the flat first and foremost.

That brings me onto weight in general; whilst these wheels sit at a perfectly acceptable weight for their specs, are they beginning to look a little heavy compared to what else is out there?

The Scope Artech 6.A wheel for the same depth rim comes in at 1307 grams, though they are in the next price bracket up. The 65mm Scribe Élan Ultra 6 wheels also weigh in at 1328 grams for less cash. (They also had similar aero performance in our test)

Lower overall weights provide improved acceleration paired with the aero benefits of a deep rim. There is, however, more to a quality set of wheels than the overall weight number.

The single issue I have had with the wheels related to water, and the habit it has of finding its way into the wheels. Something I have had to do twice is remove the tyre, inner tube and rim tape and empty water out of the rim cavity after riding in the rain. I’ve run these wheels with tubes, so it’s easy to notice the sloshing noise.

The wheels seem quite prone to taking on water, I believe due to the size of the hole at the rim for the hidden spoke nipples. Relatively short wet rides led to sloshing in the rim cavity. This adds weight and potentially unbalances the wheels, but can also lead to corrosion over time. On the hidden nipples, wheel truing will be more involved if it's needed, especially with a tubeless setup.

If you would use the wheels in the rain, and we all get caught in it at some point, check the wheels and drain them ideally each soaking.

You've read my thoughts on the wheels, but we also took them to the Silverstone wind tunnel for our latest CN Labs aero wheel test.

We tested a group of 14 wheelsets and asked the brands to send the fastest UCI-legal wheels they had, with plenty being around the 60-65mm deep range.

One bike was used for the test, without a rider. We tested at a 40km/h wind speed, with the bike's wheels at the same speed, across a range of Yaw angles and with 28 and 30mm tyres.

It's worth reading the entire test; there's so much information and data to look at, but here's the topline. Out of 32 wheelset tests across the two tyre sizes, the ARC 1100's placed eighth overall, and performed better with a 30mm tyre than a 28mm one.

The wheels tested within a watt of the overall winner, the HUNT 5AM Limitless Ti_UD Carbon Spoke, but are heavier and more expensive than that particular model.

In short, the wheels held their own against the competition we tested. The specifics will dictate whether they are right for you.

Value

RRP for these wheels is $3218 / €2499 / £2,599.98. (inc. tyres and tubes). For the UK market, that includes the Continental tubes and tyres I mentioned, which sweetens the deal somewhat; they aren't cheap tyres. That may well be the case for the US and EU too.

The wheels sit at the same price point as the Roval Rapide CLX III, the Parcours Chrono GT (62/65mm) and Reserve 57|64 Turbulent Aero. They are also just a touch more than the new Shimano Dura-Ace C60 wheels.

It's clear there's plenty to choose from at this price point, and I think the fact that good quality tyres are included boosts the value offering; you can pump the tyres up and you're ready to ride.

These are quality wheels that are in line with competitor prices, but I have a feeling the overall weight and lack of carbon spokes may make them less appealing in the premium road wheel top trumps stakes.

Verdict

The ARC 1100's 65s are undeniably fast on flatter terrain. Despite those deep rims, they aren't a handful and can be used for everything, which I have done with them. They are best suited to flat, fast riding, which is where they perform most strongly.

They are optimised for up to a 30mm tyre; if you do want a wider rim for 30mm+ tyre sizes, then they may not be quite what you are looking for with their narrower V-shaped rims.

If you are a speed merchant or are perhaps taking part in flatter road races or fast chaingangs, and want some deep wheels, they are a good choice and have performed very well for me.

For general riding and doing a bit of everything, the lower weight and shallower rims of the ARC 1100 55s would be my choice.

The fifth edition of the Tour de France Femmes is over in what proved to be a nail-biting race that all came down to the very last stage to see Demi Vollering become the first multiple winner of the event since its inception.

It was, however, a close fought battle with the yellow jersey changing hands multiple times throughout the race.

As well as a close fought battle for yellow, the polka dot, green, and white jerseys were up for grabs too, and we were treated to some long range breakaways, thanks in no small part to Sigrid Ytterhus Haugset's exploits for Uno-X Mobility on stage 3.

The green jersey was a more forgone conclusion, as Lorena Wiebes absolutely dominated the sprints with her usual display of force. Meanwhile, Puck Pieterse added to her young rider win in 2024 by taking home the mountains jersey.

Antonia Niedermaier took home the white jersey as the highest placed rider this year under 24 years of age, ahead of breakout star Paula Blasi.

Despite tensions within the squad, Blasi's Team UAE L’Imad was the team classification winner, with Elisa Longo Borghini claiming third overall, Blasi 5th, and Dominika Wlodarczyk in 7th, although the UAE squad didn’t take home a single stage win.

In total, six riders took home stage honors across the nine days of racing. Those victories were spread out among just three bike brands, three wheel brands, three tyre brands, and two groupset brands.

Stage-by-stage breakdown: Who won with what?

Bike brands: Who came out on top?

Specialized was the absolute dominant force here, with two thirds of the stages won by its bikes. Of course, the brand sponsors three WorldTour teams, with each one taking at least one stage win, alongside other Pro Teams too. This meant each of these wins was a point for the all-rounder bikes too, as the S-Works Tarmac range - now up to SL9 - has been ‘one bike to rule them all’ since the SL7 launched and Specialized removed the aero-focused Venge from its line-up.

Canyon took home two stages thanks to two of its three sponsored teams; Canyon-SRAM and Movistar. Wins were spread across the Speedmax TT bike and Aeroad aero road bike, with the Ultimate climbing bike seldom being used.

Ridley was the only other brand to take home any spoils with the epic solo breakaway of Sigrid Ytterhus Haugset aboard the very aero focused Noah Fast 3.0 frame.

Every other bike brand in the race failed to win a single stage, or jersey for that matter.

Specialized riders took home yellow and green. Canyon left with polkadot and white. Colnago, the dominant brand in the men’s race, took home the Team Classification, but no individual wins or jerseys.

All-round takes the crown

While the men’s race was a win for the aero frames, the women’s race showed that the all-rounders were the main bike of choice for riders who won stages.

This is biased due to Specialized only having an all-rounder, while Canyon and Ridley both took home honors with full aero bikes. Indeed many teams with the choice of aero and lightweight still opted for aero frames, likely due to it being easier to make aero bikes closer to 6.8kg with the smaller sizes often used across the women’s field than men’s.

Time trial bikes took home one stage win at the TT, but interestingly some road bikes were used for this, or rather road frames converted into time trial bikes.

But the main story was all-rounders winning across hilly stages and sprint stages proving the versatility. Interestingly though the Queen Stage up Mont Ventoux was won aboard an aero bike.

Groupset wars: SRAM keeps the crown

SRAM was the leading groupset brand in the Tour de France Femmes, usurping Shimano from the top-spot, but it was close.

Shimano counted its wins from Demi Vollering and Kimberley Le Court-Pienaar, while SRAM saw wins across a broader spread of riders and teams.

Campagnolo was again notable by its absence, although a reinvigorated groupset line-up could see changes in the future, as the brand is still the only 2x13 speed option available.

Roval steals the show, Zipp and DT Swiss share the scraps

Specialized’s in-house wheel brand, Roval, took the top spot as the wheels are used by the three Specialized-sponsored teams who took home most of the spoils. Winning wheels were a mix of the Rapide CLX III and Sprint CLX wheels.

Zipp took home stage wins with Movistar in the time trial, and Canyon-SRAM on Mont Ventoux, showing some versatility across high speed aero demands and long climbing efforts.

DT Swiss was part of the epic solo breakaway on Stage 3 where aero was pretty much everything to help secure that amazing win.

Triumphant tyres, with a tubeless takeover

A theme has developed, where Specialized and the in-house wheels and tyres were present across all the brand’s bike wins. The latest Turbo Cotton tubeless tyres were used across the entirety of the riders using those bikes to take home most of the stage wins.

Continental remained present with Movistar and Uno-X Mobility using its GP5000 tyres to take home stage wins. Meanwhile Schwalbe muscled in there to get a win with Canyon-SRAM.

Pirelli and Vittoria were absent, despite the strong presence both brands held in the men’s event.

Inner tubes and glued-on tubular tyres have again been missing from the biggest races. Brands have tended towards tubeless across the board now thanks to lower weight and rolling resistance. Additionally, with more lightweight race tyres, tubeless affords micro-punctures to fix mid-ride with limited pressure loss.

Two-by, or not two-by

1x groupsets only took home a single win in this race, and that was just the time trial. Even then, many riders were still using 2x, due to the presence of some hillier sections in that stage. For the rest of the event, 2x was used by most riders.

Part of this may be due to 1x being particularly useful for races where the speeds are significantly higher often across flatter terrain. Looking at the men’s event with stages in excess of 45kph most days, those stages present a perfect opportunity for 1x gearing. Plus there were fewer ‘transitional stages’ in the women’s race so fewer truly flat affairs.

Instead, 2x and the versatility it offers was preferred for the majority of riders at the Tour de France Femmes. It doesn’t look like that is set to change any time soon with the great gear ranges, smaller jumps in gears, and superb shifting afforded across groupset brands.

The original Roval Rapide CLX wheelset launched back in 2020, at the time joining the CLX 64 models; remember them? Last year, the brand launched the Rapide CLX III, the latest addition to the Rapide range.

The CLX III was rolled out in June last year, along with the Rapide CL III and Rapide CLX Sprint. The wheels shed weight with the introduction of carbon fibre Arris spokes and use a 51mm-deep front wheel with a 48mm-deep rear wheel, in what's occasionally referred to as a 'road mullet' setup.

These wheels are seeing regular action in the WorldTour by various Specialised-sponsored teams, and are generally a popular choice on Specialized models or as a standalone aftermarket choice; to be clear, Roval is a component arm of Specialized.

I’ve been riding them for months, tackling a road race and training on them. We also took them to Silverstone recently to see how they would fare against the best road bike wheels in our CN Labs aero wheel shootout.

Just another stop on the Roval / Specialized hype train, or do these wheels walk it like they talk it? I’ve put in the hard yards to find out.

Design and aesthetics

Carbon fibre spokes and overall wheelset weights seem to dominate conversations at present when it comes to the latest wheelsets. We will cover that, but for me the rim shapes and depths of the CLX III's need talking about first. There's more to a set of wheels than the spoke material and overall weight on the scales.

The CLX III's, like the II's they replaced, employ specific front and rear rim depths. The Rapide II's had a 51mm front and 60mm deep rear; the III's have a 51mm deep front rim and a 48mm rear.

The idea is centred around the Specialized design philosophy of optimising the leading edge, or to put it simply, the front of the bike where aerodynamic performance matters most; the rear wheel can then be made shallower to save weight and aid handling and acceleration. The brand says everything contributes toward aero performance, overall wheelset weight, and crosswind stability.

The rims have a wider, round external profile that is a lot rounder than some wheels with a more traditional 'V' shape, with a more 'normal' internal width.

Internal width for both wheels is 21mm, whilst the front external number is 35mm at the widest point, and 31.3mm at the rear. Even the bead hook widths are specific: 5.5mm at the front, 4.1mm at the rear. Roval calls this the 'Flatstop rim bead' and claims the wider beads help prevent flats if you smash the rim. I haven't tested this specifically; who deliberately rides down potholes? But I haven't punctured whilst testing.

The hub internals are by DT Swiss and use the 180 hub internals with a 36-tooth ratchet system. Spoke count is 18 up front and 24 in the rear, and surprise, these spokes don't come from Vonoa, who provide spokes for a lot of wheel brands right now, but Arris, a US-based firm making composite spokes.

The spokes use titanium end pieces and alloy nipples; four spares are included with the wheels, and they can be manually trued. So need to worry about dealer-only truing procedures.

When it comes to looks, the Rapide III's are a stylish wheelset without overdoing it. The hubs and rims are gloss black, with silver spoke nipples and end pieces at the hub. Two decal versions are available: gloss white (pictured) or 'satin carbon', which gives a stealthy, blacked-out look with black decals.

Performance

During my test period, I’ve used the CLX III’s with two pairs of tyres: the S-Works Turbo TLR tyre, and the newer Cotton TLR models, which pair the Specialized cotton performance into a tubeless-ready package; they are now what you see Remco Evenepoel and his teammates using. Thankfully I’ve encountered zero punctures or sealant sprays in my test period.

I installed both sets of tyres with a track pump, but the process wasn’t completely painless, with some seepage, mess and hesitancy for the tyres to seat and seal first time. The rim profiles of the CLX III’s seem to make things trickier. It certainly wasn’t a disaster, but a little more annoying than I would like.

I’ll get straight to the point: the CLX III’s feel pretty fantastic across the board. I’ve been impressed, and when I have switched back to them from other wheelsets, the point has been reinforced: they are excellent all-rounders.

They accelerate very well from low speeds, and feel fast and reactive when making changes in direction. I felt like I could dart around on them; they are exciting to use.

There’s also a comfort, a kind of softness (I mean this in a good way) from the overall ride quality that I can’t fully put my fingers on; perhaps it comes from the rim shapes, good quality tubeless tyres or just the overall build, but there is almost a luxurious ride feel. We also mentioned this comfort in our Rapide CLX II review.

Get them rolling, and those big white Roval logos start to flick round when you glance down, and they feel very quick, about as quick as anything I’ve used to date, especially with a top quality road tyre fitted.

The pros seem to favour the CLX Sprints for most racing, except perhaps the mountains, but I don’t think there’s a massive amount in it in the real world. I used the wheels for a road race with 32mm Cotton TLR tyres, and they felt fast and poised, cornering excellently and stiff feeling when I followed moves on one of the circuit's climbs. They are also a prime example of how you can have your cake and eat it now when it comes to wheel depth and overall wheelset weight; 1338 grams is nice and light.

There are online comments to the tune of, 'why would you fit a deeper front wheel? Handling will suffer in crosswinds'. That may have been true 10 years ago if you ran something like a narrow 60mm deep front wheel and a 40mm rear, but times have changed, and these wheels with their more modern wider rim shapes do very well in the wind. To an extent it depends on the rider, but poor handling as a result of the mismatched depths is a non-issue, so don't worry on that front.

We also have some wind tunnel data for the CLX III's from our recent CN Labs aero wheel test.

We tested 14 wheelsets around the 60mm depth range, or 'brand's fastest' options, on the same bike at 40 km/h across a range of yaws. We also used the same pair of 28 and 30mm tyres for testing.

In our testing, the CLX III finished in the bottom half of the test group and was faster with a 28mm tyre than they were with a 30mm. The CLX Sprint wheelset was marginally quicker.

There was less than a three-watt difference between a lot of the wheelsets in our test, and rolling resistance and bike and rider differences would account for more than this number in the real world. The CLX III's are a competitive wheelset, despite not making the podium in our test.

Value

$3,399.98 / £2,999.98 / €3,498 is our RRP for the CLX III's. There's plenty to choose from at this price point. The Vision Metron RS are a little more cash; there's the CLX Sprints, of course, and several Zipp wheelsets amongst others.

The wheels have performed brilliantly for me; I really like the ride quality, handling, and my own perception of their speed has been good.

There are wheelsets out there that are cheaper by $ 1000-odd, with similar overall weights and aero performance.

You'll still have to pedal regardless; I don't think you stand to lose out on too much with a cheaper wheelset and great quality tyres.

Verdict

I like the styling, and I really like how these wheels ride.

They tick the carbon spoke box, the overall weight is low, they handle and accelerate well, and they feel fast pretty much everywhere. Throw in that plush ride feel and there isn't too much not to like.

They are excellent all-rounders in my opinion, great for racing and all-round riding thanks to their low weight, but they do sit at the premium end of the market; there's a lot of choice when it comes to wheels, possibly more than there ever has been, but for me the Rapide III is another very good wheelset from Roval.

Imagine for a moment if Tadej Pogačar had rolled up to the starting line at the 2026 Tour de France sporting a bike fitted with rim brakes. It would become headline news worldwide and likely cause every cycling forum on the internet to go into meltdown.

Yet, just a few short years ago, the debate over disc brakes still raged on. The headlines in 2006 made note when a rider was riding with disc brakes, and inevitably, when riders blamed cuts and gashes on the fast-spinning rotors.

Notably, Pogačar was among the last holdouts in the pro peloton, still using rim brakes long after most other teams had transitioned to discs. Ineos Grenadiers also resisted the change well after other teams succumbed to the inevitable. That provides us with a prominent benchmark against which to measure the dying breaths of the rim brake.

In the 10 years since the UCI allowed a trial period of disc brake use in the pro peloton, these powerful stoppers have become standard equipment. Yet the path to this moment was a rocky one. And the eventual acceptance of disc brakes paved the way for other technologies that were initially met with resistance.

So, to mark a decade since they broke onto the road scene, Cyclingnews asked me to delve deep into the story of how we got here, speaking to riders, mechanics, and product managers who witnessed the shift in real time, and how disc brakes have affected racing since their arrival among the pro ranks.

Carbon Wheels Roll Into a Problem

In the lead-up to the UCI's decision to allow a trial period for disc brakes in the pro peloton, another innovation was causing celebration and headaches. Carbon rims offered weight savings and stiffness benefits. They also presented a new difficulty: how to counteract braking forces on the rim itself and the delamination caused by heat from brake pad contact at high speeds. No one was specifically asking for disc brakes. But almost everyone was looking for a solution.

"Everyone was looking for lighter, more aero rims, but that meant you had to get into carbon," says Dave Lawrence, Road and Gravel Product Manager for Shimano. "That complicated braking surfaces and brake pad compounds. Hearing stories about rainy stages at the Tour, brand new brake pads weren't making it through the stage. So people started thinking about how to make rim brakes more durable, but then you get into noise and vibration. And from the product side, you think, disc brakes will solve that."

Keep in mind this was all happening while tubular tyres were the peloton standard. As brake pads heated the brake track on carbon rims, the tubular glue could soften, which could increase the likelihood of a tyre separating from the rim. It was a sea of potential benefits littered with icebergs of problems.

Carbon wheel manufacturers spent lots of engineering capital to explore potential solutions, from different types of carbon to less brittle and more heat-resistant resins. While progress was quick by engineering standards, the peloton needed faster solutions.

"Frame design, materials, capabilities, wheel technology, and expanding market and ride style evolved exponentially 10 to 15 years ago," says SRAM Road Product Manager Dan Stefiuk. "Yet braking was still archaic and relying – better yet, hoping – that if you squeeze a piece of rubber or cork against aluminium or carbon, it would slow you down predictably."

Behind the scenes, both SRAM and Shimano knew the solution already existed, and had proven itself for years in the cycling world already. "It was across all of the mountain bike world," says Lawrence. "People would come in from other cycling disciplines and say, why don't you use disc brakes here? Gravel was just getting started, and that was the heyday of cyclocross, too. A few renegade brands put disc brakes on their bikes early on, and there was a lot of conversation around that. That's how a lot of trends happen: it wasn't one big moment, but instead a lot of little things that started to build momentum."

Knives, Machetes, Spinning Blades of Death

But momentum can crash hard if the end user isn't on board. The dichotomy of cycling has always been the path brands must navigate to satisfy both hobbyists and pros. While everyday cyclists were quicker to note the advantages of disc brakes, the pro peloton was more skittish about adoption. It didn't take long after the UCI allowed disc brakes in the peloton for the first controversy to arrive.

During Paris-Roubaix in 2016, Fran Ventoso got caught up in a crash and wound up with a deep gash on his leg. He contended that he made contact with a disc brake while still upright and attempting to avoid going down. While it's still unclear all these years later what did or did not cause the gash, Ventoso's reaction stole the headlines.

"Disc brakes should have NEVER arrived into the peloton, not at least as we know them right now," Ventoso wrote in an open letter after the incident. "I haven't met any rider who has run out of braking power with traditional brakes; I haven't known anyone who didn't see his wheels skidding when you brake with all [the] power you've got, no matter traditional or disc brakes. Then: why use them?"

Ventoso's worries were, of course, warranted. No rider wants to be put in any more danger than our inherently dangerous sport already presents. The incident did encourage manufacturers to consider ways to ensure disc brakes and rotors were completely safe to use at high speeds. Ventoso's language was perhaps more flippant than necessary – he calls disc brakes giant knives and machetes later in his letter – but it revealed deep hesitancy among the pro ranks who felt new tech was being foisted upon them without buy-in or rationale. Ventoso's crash led to the UCI suspending its disc brake trial period.

Controversy struck once more in the following year at the 2017 Abu Dhabi Tour. Team Sky's Owain Doull got caught up in a crash with just a kilometre left in the race, and in amongst the wreckage, Doull said he made contact with Marcel Kittel's disc brake. Kittel was the only rider in the race using disc brakes. Like Ventoso, Doull called for disc brakes to be banned or otherwise modified for rider safety. Though Doull's call for rider safety was, once again, very much warranted, video later cast serious doubt on the notion that Doull's injury was caused by a disc brake.

The 'Mixed Brake' Era

It was perhaps the 'not knowing' part that kept the peloton's heels dug in on the matter. Safety is rightly top of mind for both riders and organisers, and adding a technology to the mix that had such huge potential to affect race speeds, braking distances, and even the chaos of crashes was enough to make all parties skittish.

"From inside the peloton, I think there was a bit of scepticism at first along with a worry about safety," says Ruth Edwards (nee Winder), Olympian and staple in the women's peloton during the disc brake era. "People didn't know if you could literally get hurt from the rotor in a crash, and also the difference in braking speeds that could cause crashes."

American cyclist Peter Stetina agrees with his compatriot's view. "There were suddenly two braking speeds in the peloton between teams whose bike sponsors pushed discs or rim brakes.

"That became the blame for some crashes in that first 'mixed brake' season. I remember one crash where a rider had a deep laceration, and everyone blamed the 'hot burning knife blades on our wheels', which were not fit for the mass pile-ups."

Indeed, disc brakes not only changed a rider's ability to stop more effectively, but also the way the peloton moved. Some riders on rim brakes might need more distance to slow down to the same pace as a rider on disc brakes. And riders on the new technology could brake much later before a corner, leading to a change in race dynamics.

From a production side, bike brands had to adapt to new braking forces, new production cycles, and even entirely new frame designs. "Some manufacturers had spent a lot of time developing calliper-based frames," explains Lawrence, "and depending on where you were with your product cycle, if you just came out with a rim brake frame, you may not have had the time or money to make a disc brake frame in that timeline."

Complicating matters further were the many variations in calliper attachment points. Changing those points often meant redesigning a frame and fork entirely, not only to accommodate which calliper the frame could accept, but also the braking forces that came along with it. "Some frames were flat vs post mount, QR vs Thru Axle, 130 vs 142, which all made for inconsistencies," adds Stefiuk.

"Ergonomics were new, and levers were larger than today. But there is no question that disc brakes performed better, more consistently, and were safer than rim brakes, and that benefited experienced pro-riders and brand-new cyclists alike."

And those spinning blades of death? Stefiuk says the industry took a proactive approach to the problem after the early days of disc brake trials in racing and began to mitigate the risk of laceration by rounding the rotor edges.

Stetina recalls another unique disc brake problem: rotor rubbing. In the early days of road disc brakes, the distance between the brake pads and the rotors could vary depending on a lot of factors, including rotor warpage, disc brake fluid heating, poor calliper adjustment, and a myriad of other reasons. It was an audible reminder to riders that this controversial tech didn't feel quite polished to them.

It wasn't just driving the riders crazy. Manufacturers knew they needed to solve niggling problems like these to encourage widespread acceptance. "There was more pad rub than you would have liked in first generations," says Lawrence. "We learned a lot, and we improved the product. We have about 10% more pad clearance compared to the early generations. Our early rotors had more deformation under heavy braking, so you'd get that ticking noise on long descents. And that's gone now."

Frames themselves evolved too. While changes like wider axle widths were downright necessary, a lot of the compromises and design changes manufacturers made to accommodate the braking forces of disc brakes turned out to be a bit of overkill. "At the time, most carbon frame production had transitioned to Taiwan, and frame designers needed to learn how to accommodate disc brakes," Stefiuk says. "To be transparent, some early disc frames relaxed their geometry too much to account for 142mm over-locknut-dimension (OLD), and one way to do so was to make the chainstays noticeably longer. In the mind of an athlete, not only are you giving me disc brakes and a heavier frame, but now I have a frame that does not feel as responsive and doesn't allow me to race the way I want."

Ride any road bike today, and you'll find that responsiveness is back in spades. The learning curve didn't just apply to riders, in other words. Manufacturers found ways to leave most compromises behind.

Unsung Heroes Rolling Their Eyes At Night

It wasn't just riders who bristled against this new tech. Behind every pro rider is a pro mechanic staying up late at night to clean, adjust, repair, and prepare bikes for the next day of racing. Disc brakes presented not only a shift in the way riders attacked races, but also the processes mechanics had to now adjust to keep bikes safe and running perfectly.

"Just like veteran riders, there were mechanics who preceded Indurain at the time that disc brakes were being introduced," says Stefiuk. "Some mechanics welcomed the new technology and saw the benefit of hydraulics and not having to swap cables overnight as they became contaminated from the stage before, while some mechanics still smoked cigarettes with a can of diesel fuel and a paintbrush to clean the drivetrain."

Guys who cut their teeth wrenching bikes when Merckx was a young buck were now being told to adjust – very often in real-time – to tech they were being told could also be dangerous for their riders if they screwed it up.

Lawrence remembers the initial training sessions for those mechanics. "It's funny, depending on the teams, for the older, more traditional mechanics it was one thing after another," says Lawrence. "Electronic shifting, then disc brakes. You had to go in and teach these traditional mechanics how to bleed brakes. I was there in the early days. You talk to the technical directors who are on the cutting edge, and they were the ones who were like, 'oh god, here we go, I have to explain this to my five Belgian mechanics!'"

Both Stefiuk and Lawrence agree that mechanics are the unsung heroes of the peloton, and while they may have met disc brakes with gruff and grumbles, they also met the moment. In the long run, it becomes old hat, and a benefit for those wrenches up late at night preparing for the next day's stage.

Forgetting It Was Ever Controversial

Perhaps it was just succumbing to the inevitable, or maybe it was real improvement and real results that got everyone on board. Either way, disc brakes rule the peloton and rim brakes are now a chapter in cycling history.

"Acceptance from my point of view was just mandatory," says Edwards. "It's what the new bikes at camp had on them. Off you went to go training, and you got used to it. Disc brakes are great. I have a lot of confidence in my stopping power now – not that I remember not having that confidence before. But I wouldn't want to be on rim brakes in a peloton of disc-equipped bikes. Descending definitely feels different; it's just all about learning your speed and what your equipment can do."

From a logistical standpoint, there's no doubt significant improvements in bike changes and setup made a huge impact. Stetina notes that "tech got better, thru-axle design improved, rubbing rotors became less frequent, and it all happened relatively quickly. But in many riders' minds, it wasn't ever fully adopted until a big mountain finish was won on a disc brake bike. After that, there was no valid excuse for the riders anymore. I want to say it was Pogi or [Egan] Bernal winning a five-star stage somewhere, and then we were all like, 'okay, it's here to stay now.'"

Maybe that was all it ever really took: a stunning showcase of superior performance. Feats of man carrying feats of engineering. Isn't that so often how it goes?

Light climbing wheels aren’t dead, but they’re certainly in a hospital bed, on a drip, and the immediate family has been told to come and visit. In the last decade, an ever-increasing focus on aerodynamics has seen the shallow wheel go from something approximating the default to a much more specialist option when considering the best road bike wheels, for those wanting to prioritise weight over all else.

Even lightweight bikes like the Scott Addict RC Ultimate are coming equipped with mid-depth wheels, as are all-rounders. It seemed a little against the run of play, then, when Zipp came out with a brand new 202 NSW wheelset earlier this year.

I’ve been using them in a range of really quite hilly environments, as is befitting. Full alpine ascents were scaled, as well as the savage and relentless Cornish coastal roads back at home, mostly aboard the new Cannondale SuperSix Evo, but also aboard the new Cannondale CAAD14 to try and invigorate what is quite a stolid machine as stock. They’re good wheels, but given their quite enormous price tag and some quite lacklustre constituent parts, I can’t really get on board with them with my consumer advice head on.

Design and aesthetics

If you’ve been riding a while, you probably think of shallow tubs when you see the ‘202’ number. While Hunt has produced lightweight tubular wheels in recent years, these are very much modern in terms of their tyre setup: tubeless, and as with Zipp's other options, hookless.

Hookless may not be the most popular thing in the world at the present moment. But the 23mm internal width should mean slightly enhanced compatibility with narrower (read: lighter) tyres than more progressive widths, but it does feel a touch backwards-looking in this day and age when 25mm internal is becoming something approaching the norm.

One thing I do like is that the maximum pressures for a range of widths are printed on the sidewall, so no annoying googling in the garage before the ride. There isn’t, however, a list of approved tyres as with so many other Zipp wheels as yet; I mounted up a set of 30mm Continental GP5000 S TRs (living to tell the tale) and set off into the mountains.

The wheelset comes in at 1,090g, though Zipp does state that this is the 90th percentile weight and that most sets will come in under this weight. On my scales, the pair came in at 1,050g, which is certainly light, but it’s not crazy light, as I’ll get into shortly. Part of this is down to the slightly odd decision to use metal, j-bend spokes which tip the scales at 3.3g each.

While it’s true that not every high-performance wheel uses carbon spokes, they’re definitely the norm on wheelsets that retail for just under £3.400/$4,200/€3,800 as these do. Each of the spokes is in the region of a gram heavier than a carbon counterpart, so for a grand total of 40 spokes (20 front, 20 rear), that’s 40g left on the table, and would have got my wheelset 10g under the kilo mark. Using carbon spokes also normally allows you to reduce the spoke count, which would further reduce the weight.

While we’re on the subject of spokes, Zipp is continuing to use J-bend instead of straight pull. This means the hub flange in general needs to be larger, which creates a slightly heavier hub, but also means a wider angle for the spokes to diverge, as well as a shorter distance for them to traverse, which could have improvements in stiffness.

Speaking to Bristol’s premier wheel guru, Rob Borek, it transpires many brands have switched to straight pull because it makes the hubs cheaper to produce in mass quantities as you need less material, but it also means you can lace them more easily with machines. I don’t personally think there’s any great issue with J-bend or with straight pull spokes. If the wheels are decent and fit your needs and budget, choosing to not go with them because the spokes aren’t straight is quite mad, and at least here you’ll have no worries about non-captive spokes ejecting from the hub under hard impacts.

Inside the hubs there are ceramic bearings as standard, along with a 6-pawl ratchet offering up 66 points of engagement, which for road cycling is plenty, given instant reactivity isn’t nearly so crucial as it is in the world of techy MTB. Mirroring the spokes, the use of pawls rather than a star ratchet feels a little out of keeping with the premium price of these, though it must be said I never had any issues with the engagement itself, and they are mercifully a lot quieter than the alternative, which is bliss when sending down long descents.

Aesthetics is a hard one to call on what is ultimately a pair of black circles, as most wheels are. I do quite like the graphics, which comprise a series of well-placed dash fades that make me think of 1980’s motifs in greyscale. The hubs, though, don't have that same premium aesthetic from a visual standpoint, but I think the most egregious thing is the silver nipples, which cheapen things significantly. There’s nothing different to black ones in terms of performance, really, but they just look out of place on a wheelset at this price.

Performance

I gave the Zipp 202s the best possible start in life with four days in the French Alps after the Dauphiné, including tackling the Col de Sarenne and Alpe d’Huez, plus several white-knuckle descents down the latter to really test their chops. They are, it must be said, an extremely pleasant set of wheels to ride, mounted up to a suitable machine; in my case the new Cannondale SuperSix Evo.

I didn’t have any issues mounting the tyres to the hookless rims. I am personally not overly enamoured with hookless rims for the road, but I do applaud Zipp for at least putting the maximum pressures on the sidewalls to stop me absent-mindedly causing an explosion in the office basement. Both a 28c Specialized Rapidair set and then a set of GP5000s went on with just a track pump (I managed to shred the former set instantly on some comically large shards of glass, it seems), and neither set lost more air than would be expected between rides.

The low weight is a big plus, and whether it was alpine climbs or the relentless, steep ramps on a trip down to Cornwall to raid the coastal roads, I was glad of the low mass. They certainly have that immediacy that is a function of both the weight and the stiffness. They never felt harsh, though. The 30mm rubber likely helps in this regard, but compared to some wheels, especially deeper options, they’re really quite mellow to ride over subpar tarmac, which the UK has in abundance for those of you unfamiliar with what can be charitably called our road network.

On descents is really where they came alive though. That lower rotating mass makes steering with precision a touch easier, and coupled with a reduced susceptibility to buffeting from the wind by virtue of just having a smaller side profile, they’re far less easily blown off course than many deeper options I’ve tried over the years. In hard cornering, whether full hairpins or fast open bends with more flow, they stood up extremely well, offering an extremely composed feel. I know in my head that the faster you go the more aerodynamics matters, and so on descents it’s perhaps even easier to argue the case for a slightly heavier but more aerodynamic wheelset, but I am a staunch believer in not living your riding life purely through the medium of a wattage chart; these feel brilliant on descents and you will have a lot of fun in a far greater range of conditions with them on versus something deep, in general terms.

They do, however, suffer against their deeper counterparts on the flat. The shallower depth will be less aero, but the lower mass also means at higher speeds you don’t have that flywheel feeling. They’re just a bit more of an effort to keep pushing on with on the flat, but you already expected that, didn’t you?

Ultimately, with mid-depth wheels reducing in weight and becoming the norm, the true shallow mountain wheel is now a very special tool, and with the price as it is for these wheels, it’s quite a hard sell if you don’t live somewhere especially mountainous.

Value

The Zipp 202 NSW wheels are really quite eye-wateringly expensive at £3.400/$4,200/€3,800, and I can’t help but feel like Zipp could have done more with these. They’re light, but not as light as some hyperlight options. To make life easier for you, I’ve graphed up a few key lightweight wheelsets, plotting both their quoted weight and their RRP, and these come out amongst the heaviest and the most expensive, which makes them quite a hard sell for a reentry into the lightweight specialised wheel market.

The spokes probably should be carbon at this price and with weight in mind, but make the nipples black to make them look more premium or make them internal to improve the aero package. Give us a new lighter hub just for these or something, maybe?

Verdict

If you live in Chamonix, Bern, Steamboat Springs, or Perranporth and you want a decent set of wheels for up hill and down dale, then these are good, and you will have a good time, especially if you prioritise handling, but you’re going to get more for your money elsewhere. And if your rides don’t look like a Toblerone every time you saddle up, then being realistic these are an awful lot of cash for a wheel that is not going to be ideally suited to your needs.

‘But I’m doing the Marmotte next year and need a wheelset for that!’ I hear you cry. If you’ve got the cash, then fill your boots, but if this is going to be your only wheelset, then I’d suggest going for something more general.

The latest controversy in professional cycling is not doping, not hidden motors, or even extended sticky bottles. No, the controversy sweeping over the Tour de France Femmes is padded bras, which have led to extra clothing checks as riders sought an aerodynamic edge in the stage 4 time trial on Tuesday.

But why on earth has this become a controversy, is there any merit to the claims that padding out a bra can make cyclists faster on the bike, and how is it supposed to help?

Interestingly, the science behind why padding your bra out can make you faster on the bike is based on very sound aerodynamic science.

When cycling, especially in time trials where speeds are higher and there's nobody to shelter behind, the majority of the force you have to overcome is aerodynamic drag. The faster you go, the greater this majority becomes. You just have to look at the giant time trial helmets that have taken over the professional peloton to see that aero gains are the driving force behind a lot of developments, if sometimes maybe at the expense of aesthetics.

Those large helmets give us some clue as to why padding out bras can create a performance gain. With aerodynamic drag being a key factor to overcome, one way of doing this is reducing turbulence around the body. This can be done via textured fabrics such as you see on skinsuit sleeves and backs, or by reducing the amount of ‘space’ around the body of the rider.

This is because that space, such as between the head and shoulders, arms and head, or behind the arms and into the gap between them, the body, and the hips, creates areas of low pressure.

Air flowing over the body then enters the low pressure area and creates turbulence, which creates more aerodynamic drag. Wide time trial helmets are used to close the gap between the head and the shoulders while also creating a smoother transition, while large visors are also now commonplace to reduce this gap between the rider's arms and the helmet.

This brings us on to those padded bras. The gap between arms, legs, and body is a large area that creates a low pressure area which draws air in, rather than flowing smoothly around the body. This in turn generates more drag for the rider to overcome.

By padding out bras, you could potentially smooth the flow of air from the arms, onto the body, and around the hips, and reduce the size of the low pressure area. It’s a similar principle to that used by the men’s WorldTour riders with radios down the front of skinsuits - or indeed Victor Campenaerts' under-arm radio placment - which before the UCI intervened, could be padded out significantly. Done for ‘comfort’ on paper, the reality was to create a fairing at the front of the suit to improve aerodynamics. In CTT-sanctioned events in the UK, this was taken to the extreme a few years ago with fairing fitted behind the arms, legs, and large water bladders down the front of skinsuits all to improve aerodynamic performance. Rule28 makes a specific aero gravel base layer with a bottle holder down the front, again to reduce that low pressure area and reduce drag - verified by the Cyclingnews Labs wind tunnel team as offering a saving of 2.73 watts at 40km/h. For context, stage 4 winner Marlen Reusser averaged 43.3km/h, at a (very) estimated 400 watts.

Padded bras effectively work on the same principle, and have the potential to reduce the rider’s coefficient of drag.

The idea is that it makes one a more slippery shape, rather than all these gaps, ridges, undulations and blunt edges that bounce the air all over the place and create more drag. It’s why a car, with a much larger frontal profile, is able to have a lower coefficient of drag than a cyclist; fewer moving parts in the wind, and a sleeker profile with fewer gaps that can create turbulence.

So yes, padded sports bras can help riders get faster, especially in time trials, although the difference is small, and the exact amount of difference it makes likely differs from rider to rider.

Of course, there are various ethical issues to consider when asking commissaires to check sports bras, too. Especially in a sport still predominantly represented by male figures when it comes to staff.

The announcement of additional clothing checks drew a mixed reaction from teams at the race. Naturally, all parties wanted to prevent cheating, but that was balanced against a need to avoid invasion of privacy when performing checks.

Considering that time trial helmets have been allowed to evolve into huge aerodynamic fairings that certainly aren’t designed that way for the protection of riders' heads, it seems a slightly trivial area to focus so much attention on. Similar to the banning of ice socks down the front of skinsuits in the heatwaves for the sake of limiting fairings, there are more important considerations at play.

With the men's Tour de France (and with it, the Tadej Pogačar procession) out of the way, now it's time for the real bike race of the summer, the Tour de France Femmes.

Lorena Wiebes might be storming the early stages, but Demi Vollering and Pauline Ferrand-Prévot are gearing up for a mega duel in the GC, while Kim Le Court, Kasia Niewiadoma-Phinney, Marlen Reusser, and Elisa Longo Borghini are all vying to upset the applecart, which has already been somewhat upset already by a barnstorming ride from Norwegian national champion Sigrid Haugset.

As ever, Cyclingnews is on the ground covering the racing in all the exciting detail, and here we're going to focus on the tech. In this gallery we've got the usual cohort of nerdy tricks and tidbits, as well as a host of stunning custom paint schemes, and even an appearance from SpongeBob SquarePants (of course!) - you'll have to read on to see what that's all about.

Welcome to our comprehensive guide on every Tour de France Femmes team's bikes, kit and components.

The 2026 Tour de France Femmes kicks off on the 1st of August. The nine-stage race, now in its fifth year, will be hotly contested, with defending champion Pauline Ferrand-Prévot aiming to repeat last year's success.

21 teams will do battle at this year's race. 14 are from the WorldTour - cycling's top flight, which ensures a team automatically qualifies for the event. The other seven are Pro Teams, which sit one division below.

Some of those squads don't have the visibility or fanbase that the larger teams do, and as such, the equipment they use can fly under the radar.

This guide provides a full rundown on every team's equipment, their frame options, tyres, computers and kit. Want to know what tyres the St Michel team use, or what aftermarket cranksets the Maybenne Monbana Mypie squad are running? This is the place.

This year's race should provide plenty of interesting tech opportunities that should create some variation. From the Stage 4 individual time trial that will demand aero optimisation to the summit finish on Mont Ventoux on Stage 7, where low weight may be a key factor.

Cyclingnews will be providing tech coverage from the race as it happens, so stay tuned.

• Tour de France Femmes key stages analysis
• How to watch the Tour de France Femmes
• Tour de France Femmes top contenders

Tour de France Femmes teams bikes and kit

AG Insurance-Soudal Team

• Bikes: Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL9 / Shiv TT
• Groupset: Shimano Dura-Ace Di2
• Wheels: Roval Rapide CLX III / Sprint
• Tyres: Specialized Cotton TLR
• Clothing: Castelli
• Saddles: Specialized
• Finishing Kit: Specialized / Roval
• Computers: Garmin

AG Insurance-Soudal have a proven equipment package from Specialized that's the same as a few other women's and men's teams.

Specialized provides the majority of the overall build. The team recently moved onto the new S-Works Tarmac SL9 frame, and Roval, Specialized's in-house component brand, provides the wheels and handlebar; even the tyres are Specialized Cotton TLR numbers.

Groupset-wise, it's the trusted Shimano Dura-Ace Di2, but don't hold your breath for many 1X setups, as Shimano doesn't currently offer a dedicated 1X aero ring.

Canyon-SRAM

• Bikes: Canyon Aeroad CFR / Ultimate CFR / Speedmax
• Groupset: SRAM Red AXS
• Wheels: Zipp
• Tyres: Schwalbe Pro One / TT / Aero
• Clothing: Canyon
• Saddles: Ergon
• Finishing Kit: Canyon
• Computers: Hammerhead

The clue is in the name with Canyon SRAM; the team races on Canyon bikes and uses a lot of equipment from the SRAM family, such as groupsets, wheels, pedals and bike computers.

The team tends to always use the Canyon Aeroad CFR frame, a no-brainer given how fast pro races are now. Canyon recently gave it a small update with UDH compatibility.

Componentry comes from SRAM in the form of the Red AXS groupset. The team has several models of Zipp wheels to choose from, from the aero 454 NSW to the super light 202 NSW.

Computers are the Hammerhead Karoo model, meaning the riders can set their shifter bonus buttons up to switch the computer pages.

The team also uses saddles from Ergon, a popular choice in the womens peloton.

Cofidis women team

• Bikes: Look 795 Blade RS 3 / 796 TT
• Groupset: Campagnolo Super Record 13
• Wheels: Campagnolo Bora Ultra WTO
• Tyres: Vittoria Corsa Pro / Speed
• Clothing: Exteondo
• Saddles: Selle Italia
• Finishing Kit: Look
• Computers: Wahoo

The Cofidis women's team recently received a frame upgrade in the form of the new Look 795 Blade RS 3 frame. It is a little lighter and a little more aerodynamic.

The frame's handlebars and seatpost are also from Look, but the rest of the equipment comes from Campagnolo. Cofidis is also the only team in the race on the legendary Italian manufacturer's equipment.

The team will use the latest Super Record 13-speed groupset, with Campagnolo Bora Ultra WTO wheels fitted with Vittoria Corsa Pro or Speed tyres.

French team, French bikes, French race. Cofidis will be targeting victory from Stage 1.

EF Education-Oatly

• Bikes: Cannondale SuperSix Evo, SuperSlice (TT)
• Groupset: SRAM Red AXS
• Wheels: Vision Metron RS
• Tyres:  Vittoria Corsa Pro / Speed
• Clothing: Assos
• Saddles: Prologo
• Finishing Kit: Cannondale
• Computers: Wahoo

EF Education Oatly race on the Cannondale SuperSix Evo 5 frame, which launched at the start of the year.

The bike got lower and narrower, whilst maintaining a lot of the overall aesthetics of the outgoing model. Cannondale also produced a new integrated handlebar to go with it.

The team use SRAM Red AXS groupsets, and carbon-spoked Vision Metron RS wheels also wrapped in Vittoria Corsa Pro or Speed tyres. The Corsa Speed is a time trial tyre but is being widely adopted by teams in road races for maximum speed.

Look out for world road race champion Magdeleine Vallieres' cool custom rainbow-painted bike during the race.

FDJ United - Suez

• Bikes: Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL9 / Shiv
• Groupset: Shimano Dura-Ace Di2
• Wheels: Roval Rapide CLX III / Sprint
• Tyres: Specialized Cotton TLR
• Clothing: Gobik / Nike
• Saddles: Specialized
• Finishing Kit: Specialized / Roval
• Computers: Garmin

FDJ United Suez use pretty much the same equipment package as rivals AG Insurance-Soudal.

The team has also recently switched to the Tarmac SL9 from Specialized and uses Shimano Dura-Ace groupsets and Roval wheels.

European road race champion and one of the race favourites, Demi Vollering, races for the team. Look out for her striking custom-painted white European road race champion bike.

At times, Specialized also rolls out special 'Project black' lightweight bikes for big stages. Don't be surprised if Vollering switches to a superlight all-black bike at some point.

Fenix-Premier Tech

• Bikes: Canyon Aeroad CFR / Ultimate CFR / Speedmax
• Groupset: Shimano Dura-Ace Di2
• Wheels: Shimano Dura-Ace
• Tyres: Pirelli P Zero Race TLR RS / P Zero Race TLR SL-R
• Clothing: Alé
• Saddles: Selle Italia
• Finishing Kit: Canyon
• Computers: Wahoo

Fenix-Premier Tech use predominantly the same Canyon Aeroad CFR frames as Canyon SRAM but fitted with Shimano equipment instead of SRAM.

The team races with Dura-Ace groupsets, and we expect to see them racing on the new, recently released Dura-Ace wheels, which now have carbon fibre spokes.

The team will, on paper, have the option to use three wheelsets for road races: the C36, 50 and 60 models.

Tyres come from Pirelli and are the P Zero Race TLR SL-R model. The SL-R tyres have a specially shaped sidewall to improve the aerodynamic relationship between the rim and tyre.

The team has also launched a switchout kit for this year's race, which is in the Instagram link above.

Human Powered Health

• Bikes: Factor Ostro VAM and O2 VAM
• Groupset: SRAM Red AXS
• Wheels: Black Inc.
• Tyres: Vittoria Corsa Pro / Speed
• Clothing: Verge Sport
• Saddles: Selle Italia
• Finishing Kit: Black Inc
• Computers: Wahoo

Human Powered Health races on Factor bikes and, like a few other teams, technically can choose between a few different models.

The hyper aero and aggressive Factor One is used by some riders, but not all, it seems. Some prefer to use the brand's Ostro VAM race bike.

The team use SRAM Red AXS groupsets, Vittoria Corsa Pro / Speed tyres and Black Inc. wheels, which is Factor's in-house wheel brand.

Riders from the team will also race on custom bikes featuring characters from SpongeBob SquarePants. The designs reinterpret Mighty Jaxx’s XXRAY PLUS SpongeBob SquarePants and Patrick Star collectables.

The team has also announced a TDFF switchout kit featuring the message 'True Health is Self Made'.

Laboral Kutxa - Fundación Euskadi

• Bikes: X - Lab AD9
• Groupset: Shimano Dura-Ace Di2
• Wheels: Branta C50 UL
• Tyres: Vittoria Corsa Pro / Speed
• Clothing: Agu
• Saddles: Prologo
• Finishing Kit: X-Lab
• Computers: Wahoo

Basque squad Laboral Kutxa - Fundación Euskadi race on Chinese X-Lab AD9 bikes.

We tested the AD9 in the wind tunnel ourselves; we found it wasn't as fast as some of the very quickest bikes we've tested, like the Factor One, instead holding its own and sitting mid-table in our test.

The team bikes are fitted with Shimano Dura-Ace groupsets, and the team use X-Lab's own Branta 50mm wheels, one of the less well-known wheel brands in the women's peloton.

Tyres are Vittoria Corsa Pro / Speed models, like several other teams in the race.

Check out our women's Paris-Roubaix Femmes gallery for some truly wild bar tape wraps from the team!

Lidl Trek Women

• Bikes: Trek Madone, Domane, Speed Concept (TT)
• Groupset: SRAM Red AXS
• Wheels: Bontrager RSL
• Tyres: Pirelli P Zero Race TLR RS / P Zero Race TLR SL-R
• Clothing: Santini
• Saddles: Bontrager
• Finishing Kit: Bontrager
• Computers: Wahoo

Lidl-Trek race predominantly on Trek's Madone model, and like a lot of other squads with a couple of frames to choose from, tend to go for the more aerodynamic model.

The Madone has gotten lighter and more user-friendly over the last few updates; it's also more aerodynamic with the aero frame bottles than without.

The team use Bontrager wheels, Trek's in-house brand wrapped in Pirelli tyres, most likely the P Zero Race TLR SL-R.

Lidl-Trek are currently racing on some as yet unreleased Bontrager RSL wheels that we hear will launch later this year.

Like the 'Project black' Specialized bikes, the team also has access to Trek Project One 'Vapour coat' paint jobs, which save weight over the team's stock paint jobs.

Liv - Alula - Jayco

• Bikes: Liv Langma, Enviliv Advanced Pro, Avow (TT)
• Groupset: Shimano Dura-Ace
• Wheels: Cadex
• Tyres: Cadex Aero Cotton
• Clothing: MAAP
• Saddles: Liv / CADEX
• Finishing Kit: Liv
• Computers: Garmin

Liv - Alula - Jayco race on Liv bikes, and have a couple to choose from, the Langma and Enviliv Advanced Pro. Fun fact: Langma is the Tibetan word for Mount Everest.

The team races on Shimano Dura-Ace equipment, but is one of the squads we have seen fitting aftermarket 1x aero chainrings this year.

The brand races on Cadex wheels and tyres, likely using the Cadex Aero Cotton models on the Cadex carbon fibre wheels.

Lotto-Intermaché

• Bikes: Orbea Orca / Orca Aero
• Groupset: Shimano Dura-Ace Di2
• Wheels: OQUO RA57 LTD / CS
• Tyres: Vittoria Corsa Pro / Speed
• Clothing: Vermarc
• Saddles: Prologo
• Finishing Kit: Orbea
• Computers: Garmin

Lotto-Intermaché is a new team from this year and uses Spanish Orbea bikes to race on.

The team can choose between the Orca and Orca Aero, which was recently updated and given 37mm tyre clearance, some of the biggest around when it comes to pro race bikes.

The team also use OQUO wheels, racing on the RA57 LTD / CS, which have striking champagne coloured hubs and carbon fibre spokes.

Lotto Intermache are also another team racing on Vittoria Corsa Pro or Speed tyres, depending on the conditions.

Ma Petite Enterprise

• Bikes: Factor Monza / O2 Vam / One
• Groupset: Shimano Dura-Ace Di2 / Galfer
• Wheels: Black Inc
• Tyres: Hutchinson Blackbird Race
• Clothing: Velo Plus / AMD Bike
• Saddles: Selle Italia
• Finishing Kit: Factor
• Computers: Wahoo

Ma Petite Enterprise also race on Factor bikes, and some of the team's riders will also be using custom-painted SpongeBob SquarePants bikes from Factor.

The team's riders seem to favour the brand's lightweight 02 Vam, but we may well see the aero One model being raced as well during the race.

Dura-Ace groupsets and Black Inc. wheels round out the build.

The team use aftermarket disc brake rotors from Spanish brand Galfer, popular in the road and mtb world.

Unlike Human Powered Health, the team use Hutchinson Blackbird Race tyres.

Mayenee Monbana Mypie

• Bikes: Winspace SLC5
• Groupset: Shimano Dura-Ace Di2 / Cybrei
• Wheels: Lún Hyper
• Tyres: Hutchinson Blackbird Race
• Clothing: Craft
• Saddles: Prologo
• Finishing Kit: Winspace
• Computers: Garmin

The Maybenne Monbana Mypie team races on Winspace SLC5 bikes. Interestingly, the SLC5 is listed as an 'all-rounder' model by the brand, not an out-and-out race bike.

The team uses Shimano equipment, but uses lightweight Cybrei cranks and chainrings.

Wheels come from Lún Hyper, Winspace's in-house wheel brand, and Hutchinson provides the tyres.

Movistar

• Bikes: Canyon Aeroad CFR, Ultimate CF SLX, Speedmax CFR (TT)
• Groupset: SRAM Red AXS
• Wheels: Zipp
• Tyres: Continental GP5000 S TR / TT
• Clothing: Gobik
• Saddles: Fizik
• Finishing Kit: Canyon / Lizard Skins
• Computers: Garmin

Movistar use an almost identical setup to rivals Canyon SRAM.

The team uses Canyon Aeroad road machines, with SRAM Red equipment and Zipp wheels, but with Continental tyres instead of Schwalbe.

Look out for world and European time trial champion Marlen Reusser's custom-painted Canyon Speedmax TT bike on Stage 4 of the race.

St Michel-Preference Home-Auber93

• Bikes: Cannondale Supersix Evo
• Groupset: SRAM Red AXS
• Wheels: Mavic Cosmic / Comete
• Tyres: Michelin Power Cup / Time Trial
• Clothing: Poli
• Saddles: Prologo
• Finishing Kit: Cannondale
• Computers: Wahoo

St Michel-Preference Home-Auber93 also race on Cannondale SuperSix bikes with SRAM Red AXS groupsets, the same as the EF Education squad.

However, the team races on an all-French wheel and tyre combination with Mavic Cosmic wheels and Michelin Power Cup tyres.

Team Picnic PostNL

• Bikes: Lapierre Xelius DRS, Aerostorm DRS TT
• Groupset: Shimano Dura-Ace Di2
• Wheels: Ursus Arya R35 / 50
• Tyres: Michelin Power Cup / Time trial
• Clothing: Nalini
• Saddles: Prologo
• Finishing Kit: Lapierre
• Computers: Wahoo

Team Picnic PostNL race on French Lapierre Xelius DRS road bikes. Easily recognisable in the bunch thanks to their eye-catching rear frame triangles.

In the wheel department, the team use Ursus Arya wheels for road stages and Scope ones for time trials. Ursus wheels are available in two different depths for flat and hilly stages.

Groupsets are Shimano Dura-Ace, and the team races on Mnicheli Power Cup tyres. However, we have seen them use Vittoria tyres for time trials with the logos sharpied out.

Team SD Worx Protime 

• Bikes: Specialized Tarmac SL9 / Shiv (TT)
• Groupset: SRAM Red AXS
• Wheels: Roval Rapide CLXIII / Sprint
• Tyres: Specialized Cotton TLR
• Clothing: Specialized
• Saddles: Specialized
• Finishing Kit: Specialized / Roval
• Computers: Garmin

Team SD Worx Protime also races on the new Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL9 frame, and the American brand is the most well-represented manufacturer in the race with a total of four teams riding its bikes.

The team uses SRAM Red AXS equipment, the only Specialized team to do so.

For the rest, it's a very familiar spec list with Roval handlebars and wheels, along with Specialized tyres.

We have also seen star rider Lotte Kopecky riding an all-black S-Works Tarmac SL9 bike, so look out for that stealthy model too.

UAE Team ADQ

• Bikes: Colnago Y1RS, V4Rs, TT1/2 (TT)
• Groupset: Shimano Dura-Ace Di2
• Wheels: Enve Pro / SES
• Tyres: Continental GP5000 S TR / TT TR
• Clothing: Pissei
• Saddles: Fizik
• Finishing Kit: Colnago
• Computers: Wahoo

UAE Team ADQ, has two Colnago bikes to choose from: the V5RS and the aero Y1RS, which is one of the fastest bikes in the WorldTour.

The team use Shimano Dura-Ace groupsets and Enve wheels in a range of different depths.

The team also received a new time trial bike earlier this year in the form of the new Colnago TT2, which dropped around half a kilo compared to its predecessor.

Uno-X Mobility

• Bikes: Ridley Noah FAST 3.0
• Groupset: SRAM Red AXS
• Wheels: DT Swiss ARC1100
• Tyres: Continental GP5000 STR / TT / Aero 111
• Clothing: Fusion
• Saddles: Prologo
• Finishing Kit: Ridley
• Computers: Garmin

The Uno-X Mobility women's team races on the Ridley Noah Fast 3.0, a dedicated aero bike.

Wheels come from DT Swiss, and the team are one of the few to use the Continental Aero 111 tyres at times, depending on the conditions.

SRAM Red AXS groupsets are run with double and 1X chainrings depending on the course.

We recently tested the team's DT Swiss ARC 1100 wheels in our CN Labs aero wheels test if you want a deeper dive into WorldTour wheel aero performance.

Visma - Lease a Bike Women

• Bikes: Cervélo S5, R5, Caledonia, P5 (TT)
• Groupset: SRAM Red AXS
• Wheels: Reserve 34/37 - 42/49 - 57/64
• Tyres: Vittoria Corsa Pro / Speed
• Clothing: Nimbl
• Saddles: Prologo
• Finishing Kit: Cervelo / FSA
• Computers: Garmin

Visma - Lease a Bike can choose between two models of Cervélo bikes: the aero S5 and lightweight R5 machines.

It seems this year that the majority of rides are on the S5, one of the fastest bikes around, but look out for the R5 on the hilly days.

The team use SRAM Red AXS equipment and Reserve wheels with Vittoria Corsa Pro and Speed tyres.

Look out for some custom-painted bikes for the team's Dutch national champions and a special blue and white Giro helmet for defending champion Pauline Ferrand-Prévot.

VolkerWessels cycling team

• Bikes: Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL8
• Groupset: Shimano Dura-Ace Di2
• Wheels: Fast Forward Raw 55
• Tyres: Schwalbe Pro One / TT/ Aero
• Clothing: Bioracer
• Saddles: Specialized
• Finishing Kit: Specialized
• Computers: Wahoo

The VolkerWessels team ride Specialized Tarmac SL8 bikes, but so far this year we haven't seen them on the latest S-Works SL9 model.

The team run Shimano Dura-Ace groupsets and, fittingly for a Dutch team, Dutch wheels in the form of Fast Forward Raw 55 models.

The team pair these with Schwalbe Pro One tyres for road races.

The best road bikes, the ones that I sit fondly with in my mind’s eye long after the review period has ended, are like a balanced diet. A few healthy salads, regular hearty bowls of pasta, infrequent takeaways, and the occasional night where you have four martinis and a couple of cigarettes for dinner.

Some bikes are a little more salad, others have a couple more martinis on the menu, but they all regress to the mean; a happy medium of comfort, stiffness, aerodynamics, liveability, and style. The Incolor SSR is not like living on a balanced diet; it’s like trying to survive on a diet of popping candy and vitamin pills. You might not die, but you’re not going to have a particularly enjoyable time.

It is, on paper, a very accomplished machine, and a challenger for the best aero road bikes for sure. A very low weight, and a claimed aero package that is just shy of 4 watts faster than a Cervélo S5, a bike that is widely considered one of the best aero bikes on the market, and one that came out on top in our own wind tunnel testing. All the mod cons, and yet, much like the Felt Nexar, things quite quickly fell away when the rubber hit the road.

I’ve taken the SSR out on my usual test routes, involving fast flat riding, plus the usual hills and twisting descents that test the handling, plus a solid 7hr day in the chair to test its endurance capabilities, which I’ll admit is not what it’s designed for. All in all… I have not enjoyed it.

Design and aesthetics

Visually, the Incolor SSR is a striking machine. In fact, it shares a similar vibe to the Felt Nexar, insofar as it’s clearly designed with aerodynamics at the forefront of everything, but with a slenderness that makes it look fragile against the muscular frames of the Cervélo S5 and even more so against the likes of the Factor ONE.

There’s more than a hint of a Giant TCR about the thing, with the compact frame and integrated seatpost, but the scalloped cutout to surround the rear wheel is Canyon Aeroad, and the bayonet fork is very Cervélo, at the head tube at least. The crown and legs, also extremely blade-like, are a thing of their own, and able to swallow a surprisingly large tyre. Officially the bike will accommodate a 32c tyre with a 2x setup, or a 36c with a 1x. All very modern.

What was also modern was the cockpit, which arrived in a 120x35.5 guise. A wider one also arrived, but let’s be real, I’m not going to fit that when there’s something as tastefully aero already fitted; shoulder pain be damned.

The seat mast you need to cut to size yourself, and unlike bikes from the likes of Giant whereby there’s some wiggle room in the topper to adjust the height, here you can modify your saddle height by a couple of millimetres by using different 3D printed saddle cradles. It’s certainly neat, and clearly done with aerodynamics in mind. Luckily my test model arrived with everything bang on, and topped with a suede-topped (yes - fun, right?) unpadded carbon saddle that, praise be, was at least a shape I was comfortable with. I did find after an initial test that the saddle was just on the cusp of being a little high for my tastes, so I swapped from my Bont shoes to a slightly higher stack pair of Lakes, and everything was on song from there on in.

Incolor claims ‘custom geometry’ as an option, though this is perhaps a bit of a stretch. What you can do is select a ‘more aggressive’ or ‘more relaxed’ version of each of the seven sizes (45-60), which either increase the stack and reduce the reach or vice versa while keeping the saddle height range the same, for an upcharge of $600. I tested the standard version, however, which is probably what most of you will opt for, too. A 72º head tube angle is perhaps a little slacker than most, certainly 1.5º slacker than a Tarmac, for example. The stack in my size is 2mm lower than a Tarmac, but the reach is shorter by 6mm, so like me you may be able to bump up from your usual stem size to compensate.

In terms of aero claims, SSR quotes a frontal area that is 60.37cm2 smaller than a Cervélo S5, resulting in a claimed 3.99 watt benefit at 45km/h. Take this with a pinch of salt as this was done over a yaw sweep of -20º to +20º; wind yaw angles of 20º at 45km/h aren’t impossible, but they are very rare. We don’t know what weighting Incolor used, but by the graph we have, it is clear the SSR outperforms the S5 at higher yaw angles. Regardless, to be in the right zone as the S5, taking its data at face value, with a bike that weighed 7.05kg with pedals, the aero bottle cages and the neat 3D printed titanium computer mount, is impressive. We will be testing it in the tunnel ourselves in the coming months to validate these claims.

There are also stiffness claims too, with the SSR stiffer in ‘pedalling stiffness’ (which I assume is at the BB) than a Tarmac SL7 and SL8, a Giant TCR, a Van Rysel RCR (not the RCR-F I don’t believe), and a Cannondale SuperSix. It has a stiffer head tube than an SL7, an RCR and a SuperSix, and has more laterally stiff forks than all but the TCR. Sadly, there’s no quoted data for the seatpost stiffness, something which I fear was totally overlooked, as this is by some margin the least comfortable bike I’ve ever ridden.

Performance

Everything about this bike: the claimed aero superiority, the low weight, the modern tyre clearance, the lifetime warranty, the modern cockpit options and ‘custom geometry’, and the nifty 3D printed accessories. All of it simply falls out of the conversation because this is an almost unbearably uncomfortable bike ride.

It feels crystalline and brittle, even in comparison to the Van Rysel RCR-F, a bike that was in its own right uncomfortable but one I still managed to tap out an early spring 200km ride on without wanting to simply walk home halfway round. The main culprit is the integrated seat mast, and while some of you may look at the unpadded saddle and say that’s the culprit, I will gladly point you to my stupid flat bar road bike, which has a bare carbon saddle on it that I can sit on for hours on end with no issue. It doesn’t feel like there’s not enough give; it feels like there’s no give, and it has knock-on impacts beyond just battering your undercarriage.

On climbs, where the low weight should make it sing, the stiffness of your perch means you bounce jarringly if your cadence gets too high. The weight makes it a good climber, sure, but for extended climbs of more than a couple of minutes I want to be in a position where I am able to focus solely on the pain in my legs and lungs, and not my arse.

On the flat it is fast; part of that is down in no small part to the 355mm cockpit, which is probably going to do far more than any frame aero package, but it ticked along very happily on fast roads, and when things were smooth I could tuck into a lovely aero position. The front end may lack the lateral stiffness of a TCR, but it does feel like it has the vertical stiffness of a breezeblock. Like the rear end, the front is entirely unforgiving over anything other than beautiful millpond tarmac, and this has implications for the handling.

There’s nothing wrong with the geometry at all. It’s not like the Felt Nexar, which seemed to get it all a bit wrong, but having a degree of compliance adds a sure-footedness to the equation that the SSR lacks.

Actually, despite the slightly slacker front end, it is quite a lively bike to ride; perhaps the narrower cockpit is at play, but I don’t think to a great deal. I never felt truly at home sticking it into the corners as it felt like it could judder and skate over the surface at any time rather than hunkering down into the forces that are borne upon it and dealing with them with composure and a degree of grace.

To try and alleviate things a bit, I swapped the quite cool ‘Aerowav’ wheels (these were perfectly fine, if also quite stiff, and rather like riding Campagnolo Hyperons in my experience) for a set of Enve SES 6.7s shod with 32mm Hutchinson Blackbird Race tyres, rather than the 28mm set that came with my bike. I wanted to use 35s, which would have just cleared the front derailleur, but I didn’t fancy taking the risk. In any case, things improved marginally, but not to the point that it became enjoyable. The Aerowav wheels did come set up tubeless as standard.

The Blackbird Race is a good, and quite underrated tyre in my opinion, and the higher volume and decent spoonfuls of supple gave the SSR a bit more self-confidence, but taking it on a longer ride was truly quite hateful. 1 hour is enjoyable, you can smash it out. 2 hours is totally bearable, but three is unpleasant, and anything beyond four is torture. After seven I couldn’t ride anything for a few days, with the rear end comfort complemented by a fizzing sensation in my hands that I’ve only experienced after strimming the allotment with a 2-stroke Stihl for several hours. I know it isn't an endurance bike and I wasn't expecting an armchair, but people train on their race bikes, and this is absolutely going to detract from your training if you're doing any significant volume.

Finally, I never managed to get the headset to tighten properly. The shiny top cap wasn't machined with enough clearance for the top cap bolt, which would bind in the countersunk hole before it could fully do its job, almost getting totally stuck at one point, so I just left it a little loose.

Value

The frameset, without a cockpit, will set you back $4,399, or $5,299 if you want the ‘custom’ geometry. That’s a lot less than an S-Works Tarmac frame, but when Specialized trickles out the standard Tarmac SL9, I suspect the differential will be less. It’s also a couple of hundred bucks less than an S-Works SL8 frameset, which is still a very, very good option and one I would pick over the SSR in a heartbeat.

When you package in the cockpit at $419 the difference between this and the best bike in our buyer’s guide, the Factor Ostro VAM, is minor. The same goes for the Cervélo S5, another absolutely sensational bike.

Verdict

I think you may have gathered at this point that I don’t think the Incolor SSR is a very good bike. It is a clear example of trying to design something that looks good on paper. It has to hit the wind tunnel numbers and the stiffness figures and the weight. It has to have the fancy 3D printed titanium hardware and the modern narrow cockpit, but it doesn’t feel like anybody took it out and actually rode the thing.

I loved watching Blackadder growing up. There’s an episode where Edmund Blackadder’s puritanical aunt and uncle come to visit, and instantly chastise him for owning chairs, which are of course an invention of Satan.

“In our house Nathaniel sits on a spike”... I think I know how he feels.

Shimano has launched an updated range of Dura-Ace wheels today, as well as two brand new wheels.

In doing so, the Japanese giant has ended months of speculation around prototypes which have been used in WorldTour races.

The whole Dura-Ace wheel series has been updated, and two new wheels have been launched: the C99 front wheel, and a new rear disc.

The new series will carry the Shimano model code of WH-R9370, a number we saw on wheels fitted to Alpecin-Premier Tech's Canyon Aeroad bikes at the Tour de France earlier this month.

Although it probably won't have been on many riders' minds for a while, this almost certainly marks the end of the road for Dura-Ace tubular wheels too. The outgoing R9200 Dura-Ace models were available in tubular versions, but the new R9370 will be tubeless clincher only. Let's wait and see what Van der Poel uses come the cyclo-cross season.

A key question riders may ask is whether these wheels are hooked or hookless; there is no specific mention of this detail in the Shimano press release, but we assume the wheels are hooked as the price list mentions 'clincher, tubeless'.

We now have new Dura-Ace wheels, but this launch only adds fuel to the fire regarding when we will finally see a new Dura-Ace groupset released. Alongside the wheels, we also spotted new prototype Dura-Ace pedals at Paris-Roubaix this year, but remain in the dark regarding an official launch of a complete groupset.

We took the opportunity at the Tour de France grand depart to ask a Shimano big cheese the question, but unsurprisingly, received no new information.

The new R9370 wheels

Shimano says the new wheels are "engineered for modern racing in collaboration with WorldTour cyclists and pro triathletes." They are said to have been developed using Shimano’s ‘Science of Speed’ philosophy, though the brand hasn't gone into detail on what that is.

The new range still contains the familiar C36, C50 and C60 models, but now a super-deep C99 front wheel and rear disc wheel have also been added to the range. Until now, Shimano has not officially manufactured a disc wheel.

Weight has been trimmed in part by using carbon fibre spokes, and improvements made in aero efficiency and structural stiffness. They have decreased in weight by up to 220 grams per wheelset. The savings come from a new structure and better rim layups, with new carbon spokes.

• The C36 has dropped 180 grams, and now weighs 1170 grams.
• The C50 has dropped 159 grams and now weighs 1302 grams.
• The C60 has dropped 220 grams and now weighs 1389 grams.

The wheels are optimised for 28-30mm tyres, and the cup and cone bearing system Shimano has long favoured has also remained. Shimano has also built in the ability to adjust bearing preload whilst the wheels are installed in a bike.

The wheels have 23mm internal widths and front- and rear-specific rim profiles. External widths have been engineered to balance ‘aero and crosswind stability’.

There aren’t any major aero claims or data to look at, but Shimano has cited up to a 2.7-watt aero drag saving at 48 km/h with 30mm tyres, we assume across the board as no specific combination is listed.

The brand also cites CFD simulations and performance across ‘real world’ yaw conditions, not just ‘idealised wind tunnel angles’.

Since we started spotting prototype Shimano wheels, their carbon fibre spokes have been a talking point, and the new wheels will all feature new Shimano carbon spokes.

There will be two carbon fibre spoke variants depending on the wheelset: the ‘Super Aero’ spokes have a 5.2mm x 0.8mm profile, whilst the regular ‘Aero’ spokes have a 4mm x 1.1mm profile.

Shimano says the spoke type and count are tailored per model to create the intended ride characteristics depending on the application: fast aero wheel, climbing, etc.

The cup and cone bearings remain in place; Shimano says this "allows rotational torque to be optimised when installed on the bike."

Shimano has favoured cup and cone bearings historically on most of its wheels, and says they demonstrated "significantly lower friction than typical cartridge-bearing setups" in comparative testing.

Shimano cited a test involving wheels with cartridge and cup-and-cone bearings. Both had 500n of vertical force applied, which represented the bike and rider. A further 200Nm of thrust force and 5000N clamp force were applied via the thru axle. The test showed a 30% lower rotational torque for the new cup and cone bearings.

Bearings are said to be now replaceable, but this has long been the case; bearing cups are now also replaceable and waterproof sealing has been improved.

Shimano Dura-Ace C36

• The updated C36 wheels will have part number WH-R9370-C36-TL.
• Claimed weight is 1170 grams per pair.
• 23mm internal rim width, 29.4mm external rim width.
• Aero spokes, 18 front, 21 rear.
• Price: Front: £1,099.99 Rear: £1,199.00 / US pricing TBC.

Shimano Dura-Ace C50

• The C50 wheels will have part number WH-R9370-C50-TL.
• Claimed weight is 1302 grams per pair.
• 23mm internal rim width, 31mmm external front rim width and 32mm external rear width.
• Aero spokes, 21 spokes front and rear.
• Price: Front: £1,099.99 Rear: £1,199.00 / US pricing TBC.

Shimano Dura-Ace C60

• The C60 wheels will have part number WH-R9370-C60-TL.
• Claimed weight is 1389 grams per pair.
• 23mm internal rim width, 31.5mm external front rim width and 32.3mm external rear width.
• Aero spokes, 21 spokes front and 24 rear.
• Price: Front: £1,099.99 Rear: £1,199.00 / US pricing TBC.

New Shimano Dura-Ace C99

• This is the new C99 aero front wheel for TT and Triathlon, and has the part number WH-R9370-C99-TL-F.
• 99mm rim depth.
• Claimed weight is 792 grams.
• 23mm internal rim width, 35.2 mm external rim width.
• 16 Super Aero spokes.
• Price: Front: £1,199.99 / US pricing TBC.

New Shimano Dura-Ace Disc

• This is the new R9370 D disc wheel for TT and Triathlon, with part number WH-R9370-D-TL-R.
• Designed to pair with the C99 front wheel.
• Claimed weight is 987 grams.
• Full disc construction.
• Price: £2,299.99 / US pricing TBC.

The Tour de France is over for another year. The biggest bike race in the men’s professional field, and the race where brands tend to release their newest models in the hope of taking home stage honours to back up marketing claims.

Although this was another display of Pogačar domination in the GC battle, there were far more enthralling battles across every other classification and for many of the stages. The white jersey top three was split by just over three minutes, while the mountains and points jersey classifications were only truly settled in the final few stages.

Mads Pedersen made it three-from-three for points jersey classifications in Grand Tours, joining a very esteemed list with that and a stage win.

Richard Carapaz provided much entertainment in the final week taking two stage wins and the Polkadot jersey leaving Pogačar with just one classification leader’s jersey for the first time in any Tour de France he has completed.

Meanwhile Uno-X took home another stage win to go with their first last year, Decathlon CMA-CGM took their first home grand tour stage win in this guise along with Olav Kooij fulfilling his big signing potential. Alpecin-Premier Tech also lit up the race and Tim Merlier dominated the flat sprints. Meanwhile Remco Evenepoel sealed his place as one of the top riders in the men’s WorldTour field, winning his first Tour de France road stage ahead of Pogačar, a time trial, and claiming 2nd on GC.

In total, 12 riders took home stage honours, across eight bike brands, nine wheel brands, two groupset brands, and five tyre brands.

Stage-by-stage breakdown: Who won with what?

Bike brands: Who came out on top?

Colnago once again took home the bragging rights, in large part thanks to Tadej Pogačar and his insatiable thirst for stage victories, but also with debutant Isaac del Toro on stage 2, taking a rare win for a lightweight bike.

Specialized remain second across the two teams they sponsor, while Canyon were third with all their wins coming courtesy of Alpecin-Premier Tech. Meanwhile Richard Carapaz ensured Cannondale took home multiple honors. A big spread of brands make up the rest of the wins as teams split the spoils between them.

Meanwhile many brands missed out, with Pinarello likely feeling the worst hit given they sponsor two teams. French brands also missed out, along with their national riders, making it a slightly woeful Tour for the home nation save for young superstars Pual Sexias and Lenny Martinez completing the top-5 in GC.

Lightweight still beaten by aero

With two time trial stages, almost the rest of the stages were taken aboard full aero or all-rounder frames. The sole exception here was Isaac del Toro on his lightweight Colnago V5RS rather than the Y1RS that Pogačar exclusively rode.

All-rounder bike victories came thanks to the Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL9. Meanwhile the updated, lighter, and more aero Cannondale SuperSix Lab71 also claimed stage honours.

It’s still clear that the prevalent trend within the WorldTour, as stage speeds get faster and faster, is to focus on aero bikes. Even with some brands having bikes fitting in somewhere between lightweight and all-rounder, full aero was the preference. In pursuit of light weight, some brands even did paint stripped versions of their aero frames. Colnago has a bare carbon Y1Rs, while Giant stripped the purple paint off some of the Giant Propel advanced SL frames to shave some grams.

Given that the climbing speeds of GC riders is now so high, the descents can still prove decisive at high speeds, and the run in to the climbs can be in excess of 50kph, the fastest route to the finish line often requires the most aerodynamic savings possible even at the expense of a few hundred grams.

Groupset wars: Shimano beats SRAM… still

Yet again, Campagnolo was only represented by one team in Cofidis, and as with last year failed to take home a victory.

SRAM managed to double its tally from last year, but Shimano remained the dominant force thanks to UAE Team Emirates-XRG, Alpecin-Premier Tech, and Soudal-QuickStep.

Interestingly only Mauro Schmid took home a stage victory on Shimano outside of these teams. 13 teams in total at the race were on Shimano, with SRAM represented by 9 showing they continue to grow in force on the road side as they dominate in gravel.

ENVE and Roval take the majority

The winning tally for wheels closely matches the bikes, as many teams use proprietary wheel brands or a single one linked to them as is the case with ENVE and UAE. Roval, being a branch of Specialized, work with both sponsored WorldTour teams, but still could not overcome the might of ENVE sponsored UAE.

Shimano and Vision owe their successes to Alpecin-Premier Tech and EF Education-EasyPost, respectively, even with Vision also sponsoring XDS-Astana Team. The rest were split between in-house brands Bontrager with Trek, Cadex with Giant, and Reserve with PON-owned brand Cervélo. Swiss Side and DT Swiss took home wins with Decathlon CMA-CGM and Uno-X Mobility respectively.

Continental keeps the crown and tubeless tech wins out

Continental kept the crown as the winningest tyre in the race, but Specialized overtook Pirelli, while Vittoria and Cadex had the same number of wins as last season.

Interestingly Hutchinson and Schwalbe were no longer represented at this race as they were last year. Cadex now the singular tyre brand working with just one single team, the others all spread across multiple team sponsorships.

Tube type tyres and tubulars remain absent from the race as tubeless is the way to go. Even TPU inner tubes with weight savings or Latex with low rolling resistant are ditched in favour of puncture protection from micro-cuts that tubeless provides and can be invaluable with many teams opting for lightweight time trial tyres to drop weight and rolling resistance.

Two is still better than one

1x groupsets took home an extra win compared to last season, but two of those came from time trials and even SRAM sponsored teams predominantly opted for 2x setups when the mountains arrived. Vingegaard, notorious for 1x even on steep climbs, was unfortunately not present for the final week where perhaps the tables would be swung more in 1x favour.

However, 2x was the prevalent force and remains to be so. Weight savings between the two are small, given that the loss of the front mech required a chain catcher and often a heavier set rear mech for chain tension. While the aero savings up front may be offset by larger jumps in gear for a suitable range on more mountainous terrain.

"What bike is that? It looks unreal!"

This was generally the kind of Instagram message I received whenever I shared a photo of the Argon 18 Anti-Matter during my test period. People were, at the very least, definitely on board with the aesthetics of the Canadian’s brand's new gravel race bike.

According to the Department of Energy, 'Antimatter is the twin of almost all the subatomic particles that make up our universe'. The scientists at CERN make Anti Matter to test; has Argon 18 meddled with the very fabric of the universe to bring us this new bike?

Bad science jokes aside, the Anti-Matter was spotted at the Traka at the start of May this year, and officially released later that month. It slotted in as Argon’s fastest gravel race bike and, in the brand’s words, is "built for the fastest gravel races on the planet."

Competitive gravel races are fast now. Very fast. In fact, for any rider, a gravel race is generally an exercise in putting out the most power you can for prolonged periods of time. As a result, the bikes are getting more specific and more speed-focused to try and bring those power requirements down.

The Anti Matter was developed from the ground up to be aerodynamic as a system. The brand claims over 800 hours of CFD (computational fluid dynamics) and 45 hours of wind tunnel testing went into its development. One line that stuck out to me from the press material was "achieving road bike level efficiency on gravel terrain."

This Anti Matter and the Nitrogen Pro road models could be a matching pair; you can see a lot of the same design language across both bikes.

If nothing else, that tells us something regarding what the Anti Matter is about. It’s also produced in a pretty mean-looking bike, which always helps.

The Anti Matter is available as a frameset, and in three SRAM XPLR builds in Rival, Force and Red. I tested the middle-spec Force-equipped bike out this summer after we took it to the Silverstone Sports Engineering Hub wind tunnel to see if it was as fast as it looked.

Design and aesthetics

The Anti Matter appeals immediately. The narrow headtube, chunky fork crown, big down tube and dropped, angular chainstays all work together to produce an aggressive and aesthetically pleasing frame silhouette.

Pair that frame with a pair of deep, wide wheels in the form of the Zipp 303 XPLR S, aero chainring and that eye-catching black and blue fade paint with lurid neon decals, and you have a fantastic-looking package.

The neon on the ‘sea foam/neon’ paint scheme is an inspired choice. It’s the pick of the paintjob bunch for me and really brings the whole look together.

There are small flourishes dotted across the frameset, from the chequered flag-type logos on the forks and chainstays to the little easter egg behind the fork crown, which is the equation for the power needed to overcome aero drag and road vibration.

Argon 18 has used its ‘pro-level carbon’ for the Anti Matter layup; it keeps the exact type to itself, though. In terms of design, the bike possesses the features a top-end race bike needs.

At launch, the brand claimed a 14.5 watt saving over the Dark Matter model at 45km/h (+/-15degree yaw); based on that, if you are racing and are focusing on performance and speed, this is the model to choose.

First up, the clearance number: the Anti Matter has 55mm tyre clearance, not quite class-leading now but still very healthy. The 1X-only, all-SRAM build options give it away, but the frame is UDH-friendly and is designed around a threaded T47 bottom bracket standard; there's also a 1 1/8in round steerer tube, aero bottle cages and a total of 12 mounting points, but no frame storage hatch; remember this is a race machine.

The frame mounts are less 'attach your bikepacking bags' and more 'stick your Co2 canister here', or 'stick your aero top tube bag there'.

Altogether, there are two mounts on the top tube, some spaced for single items. Two under the top tube, four on the down tube, another two on the seat tube and a final two under the down tube. The mounts on the down tube can also be used to mount a specific WolfTooth 1x chain-guide, which is available separately.

A frame bag has been designed for the frame, and it comes included with all three models and the frameset; rejoice! It’s a collaboration between Apidura and ATTEN; Argon 18’s special projects arm dedicated to top-end components and products. It’s a sleek-looking thing, and fits neatly under the top tube; fitting it can be a slightly fiddly job so don’t leave it 10 minutes before your gravel race to whack it on.

Argon 18 has also made some strong spec choices that in some cases feature on all three Anti Matter models and help strengthen the build. All three models have CeramicSpeed SLT headset bearings, and come with Schwalbe G-One RS Pro tyres in a 45mm size. The Force and Red-equipped bikes come with CeramicSpeed T47 BB Alpha units, the brand's top-spec bottom bracket.

The Force XPLR version arrives with 170mm crank arms, with a left-hand Quarq power meter and 1x 44-tooth aero chainring (you can fit up to a size 52T). There’s a 10-46T cassette and 160mm rotors fitted to the Zipp 303 XPLR S wheels.

The top-spec bike gains the XPLR SW wheels, which share the same dimensions but get an upgraded hub, and some surface texturing. On the wheels, there is a healthy-sized approved tyre list, which is worth checking so you know what you can run.

The finishing kit is Argon 18’s own; there’s an integrated ATTEN CHB-01 handlebar, the same one that can be found on the Nitrogen Pro aero race bike. Available in 12 sizes, my 38cm / 100mm stem version measured 43cm at the drops, and has a reach of 75mm and a drop of 125mm.

Proprietary side-load bottle cages integrate seamlessly with the frame tube profiles, and the bar tape deserves a mention; it’s from Ciclovation and was both thin and grippy. I loved it. At the back, a 20mm setback aero seatpost, paired with a Repente Quasar 2.0 saddle, completed the build.

I tested a size medium bike, which is given a ‘54-56’ label, quite the span. For me, this bike is closer to a 54 than it is a 56; check if you will need a size M or L if you are a taller rider.

Stack for an M is 555mm, whilst the reach is 392mm.

Compared to the brand's Dark Matter bike, it's clear this is a racier model; the chainstays and overall wheelbase are shorter. Whilst the seat tube angle is almost the same, the Anti Matter's head tube angle has been steepened up.

Compared to a Crux 5? The two bikes have very similar geometry; an M Anti Matter and a 54cm Crux 5 have the same chainstay length, fork rake and bottom bracket drop numbers of 425mm, 51mm and 78mm respectively.

The head tube angles are within 0.2 of a degree of each other, whilst the Anti Matter has a half-degree slacker seat tube angle; it has a shorter overall wheelbase too.

My test machine arrived slammed, with the bars sat directly on top of the bearing top cover. Well done Argon 18 for not leaving a huge stack of headset spacers in place on a bike like this.

I was sceptical of the layback seatpost before I rode the Anti Matter. I’m a big fan of inline seatposts and think they contribute to more comfortable modern positions as well as racier ones.

The brand told me the geo had been designed around a layback post, though you can get hold of an inline should you desire.

There aren't any hidden surprises regarding the geometry; the bike may start to feel a little slower with a big long stem up front, but that's never an issue for me. It's a fast, performance-focused setup without going completely nuts.

I was pleasantly surprised on my opening ride to find the bike didn’t feel how I thought it would. I felt locked in and comfortable, not too stretched out as I feared. The 73.5 degree seat tube angle, 100mm stem and 51mm fork rake all help to put you in the right place.

Handling-wise, I feel the 100mm stem helped keep things nippy. I rarely need a stem over 100mm, and on a bike like this, I think it aided the steering. This is still a gravel bike, and things didn't feel too long or cumbersome; I could swing the bike into turns and still have fun.

Performance

The Anti Matter feels absolutely rocket-ship fast, particularly in faster gravel or off-road sections. Even on my first ride, I mouthed to myself ‘this is rapid’ on a fast and flowy dirt section that requires a quick shimmy as it traces an S through my local woods.

Why does it feel fast? The bike picks up speed instantly, and if the surface is smooth, that combination of the stiff bar and frame, 44-tooth chainring, aero Zipp wheels and the fast Schwalbe tyres means it does indeed feel road bike fast off-road.

This feeling of speed, and the bike urging you to press on, is a key theme of the Anti Matter. It’s one of those bikes that makes you want to drop the hammer, and it feels great to do so.

I value a gravel bike that can handle itself down a rough descent. On rough terrain, I felt some harshness from the bike and felt quite a lot of feedback via the ATTEN integrated handlebar. The bike is a good descender, and handled my technical test descents well, but it is a harsher experience.

The ability to hammer rough, rocky descents probably wasn’t a key aim during the Anti Matter design process, but if this is something you enjoy in your own gravel riding, the Dark Matter would probably be a better bike to go for.

SRAM’s XPLR groupsets rule the roost when it comes to gravel equipment, and Force is excellent; it’s slightly heavier than Red, but the brakes are just as powerful. That 44-tooth ring worked for me, and the bike's fairly low overall weight of 8.3kg helped when climbing (the Red-equipped model will be lighter still), but it would be easy enough to purchase a few alternate rings to suit your racing or riding. The groupset hasn’t missed a beat, and is a fantastic choice for any gravel bike right now.

The Zipp 303 XPLR S wheels with their 32mm internal width are at their best on faster, smoother terrain; get the bike moving on road sections or gravel, and it really flies. They aren't a magic bullet, though; their 32mm inner rim profile and skinny rim sidewalls can be susceptible to rock smashes, especially when running narrower tyres at low pressures.

They are all-rounders with the right tyres, but in my experience they are at their very best on faster, smoother terrain and with 45mm + rubber fitted.

Rattling down rocky, rough trails is at the harsher end of the spectrum, but everywhere else the Anti Matter feels racey, stiff and exciting. There is balance there; however, the steering isn't so sensitive that it's frantic, and it wasn't so stiff that it left me wanting to stop.

Wind tunnel testing

Thanks to our recent gravel bike wind tunnel test session, we have a set of aero data for the Anti Matter, helping to paint a clearer picture regarding its aero credentials.

We tested the same bike I’ve tested here, and it performed very strongly against a crop of the latest and most popular racy gravel bikes.

We carried out bike-only testing, as well as test runs with a rider. After all, you never see a bike racing on its own, do you?

Our test runs were all completed at 35 km/h, and across seven yaw angles from -15° to +15° in 5° increments.

Long-time followers of Cyclingnews' wind tunnel testing should by now be familiar with our trusty Trek Emonda baseline test bike; we use this as the baseline for all of our tests, so that we have a reference point for how fast every bike we test is.

Included below are two new graphs showing how the gravel bikes in our test group performed against the baseline so we can compare them.

In the bike-only stock build test, the Anti Matter topped the test group. For the full breakdown of the test day, head to our in-depth gravel bike aero test.

We tested with a rider too; CN Associate Editor Josh Croxton rode each bike and held a standard 'in the drops' position for each capture in the tunnel.

The Crux 5 took the top spot with a rider, followed by the Wilier Rave SLR, and then the Anti Matter. However, our error margin meant those bikes, along with the Reap and Dogma GR, could also claim the top spot; there was only a couple of watts in it.

We also tested the bike with the frame bag fitted and found a 0.75w saving (tested as bike only). So although the difference is small, you're probably better off using it, even if it's empty.

Our own testing showed the Anti Matter is a highly competitive gravel machine and that its aero frame design backs itself up in testing.

In the real world, the individual rider, their position on the bike and tyre choice and pressures need to be optimised to make potentially huge gains, but it’s clear that the Anti Matter is putting you in a competitive place straight away.

Maintenance

There shouldn’t be any nasty surprises when it comes to living with the Anti Matter. In fact, the stock headset and bottom bracket choices should help boost longevity.

The CeramicSpeed SLT headset bearings and Alpha BB both have lifetime warranties and have long service intervals. The SLT headset bearings were designed as a response to integrated front ends creating headset issues.

CeramicSpeed lists a service interval of 8,000–13,000 km (5,000–8,000 miles) for its BB Alpha, and a once-per-year service for headset bearings. CeramicSpeed recommends using specific products on them; make sure your shop doesn't fill your $300 BB with any old grease. Look after them properly, and they should look after you.

Elsewhere it's business as usual. Threaded bottom bracket, easy to service Zipp hubs, and you will need to periodically remove and regrease the frame hardware, seatpost, etc.

One point I really liked was the thru axles having the thread pitch specs written on them. It can be difficult to find the right thru axle in a bind, and it's a useful touch for the future.

Value

In this spec, the Anti Matter Force costs $8,999 / £7,900 / €8,995.

In context, things could be worse. I'd say the pricing is in line with plenty of other Force-equipped performance gravel machines in this price bracket, and if you are shopping, there's plenty to choose from.

I'll compare it to its nearest two competitors in our wind tunnel test for a start. One thing I will say now is I suspect that this will be a popular bike; it's been well received, and though we all have different tastes, I see riders wanting one.

A top-level S-Works SRAM Red Crux 5 comes in at $14,000; that's another price bracket.

The Anti Matter Force sits between the new S-Level Crux 5 (2nd tier frame but Red XPLR spec), and the Expert model (2nd tier frame, SRAM Force XPLR spec). The Crux 5 Expert sits at $6,995, but it has a two-piece bar and stem, and arguably less exciting Roval Terra C III wheels. It's also about the same weight.

A Wilier Rave SLR iD2 with Force XPLR comes in at $9,200 or $7,200 (no power meter), depending on the spec, with Miche carbon wheels. I see no weak spots in the spec of the Anti Matter; Force XPLR is great, the BB and headset bearings have been upgraded, and the bike comes with the frame bag. Things could be worse.

Verdict

The Anti Matter is a great-looking gravel race bike that feels absolutely rapid to ride. It has backed the on-bike, real-world experience up with a very competitive performance in our own wind tunnel testing.

Its focus is speed, and it’s best when you're pressing on smoother, faster gravel surfaces. I found it started to get a bit chattery and harsh when hitting rougher stuff at speed, but for everything else, it’s a rocket ship.

I could get aero, but the geometry let me find a comfortable position, which let me have fun in the rough stuff and hook into the drops for the techy stuff.

For me, it looks great, and rides brilliantly without being a one-trick pony that's only capable of being pointed in a straight line.

The mad scientists at Argon 18 have created their own form of Anti-Matter that is guaranteed to convert all of your energy into forward momentum.

Garmin has this week announced the acquisition of the popular cycling training platform, TrainingPeaks, as well as strength training plaform TrainHeroic.

The American technology company announced the news in a short press release on Wednesday, and stated 'financial terms of the acquisition will not be disclosed.'

The TrainingPeaks headquarters are in Louisville, Colorado. The 120-person staff will join Garmin's workforce.

Garmin, founded by Gary Burrell and Min Kao, has been a key name in the cycling world since its first bike computers were launched back in the mid 2000s.

TrainingPeaks was founded in 1999 by Joe Friel, his son Dirk Friel, and Gear Fisher. The web and mobile platform allows coaches and athletes to plan and manage their training programmes. TrainHeroic, meanwhile, focuses on supporting gym users and strength and conditioning coaches. Both were owned by Peaksware, a holding company that also owns a host of software brands in the music industry.

On the acquisition, Brad Trenkle, the Garmin Co-COO, said "TrainingPeaks and TrainHeroic share Garmin’s passion for empowering athletes and coaches around the world with world-class training tools, performance metrics and actionable insights.

"The addition of these highly successful platforms to the Garmin ecosystem will expand access to more authentic coaching experiences, connecting athletes with professional coaches who guide, motivate and inspire them to reach their goals.”

Dirk Friel has confirmed in a statement on his LinkedIn page that he will remain involved as a strategic advisor, and TrainingPeaks President Lee Gerakos will continue to lead the company.

He provided some insight into what the future may hold for the three platforms.

"Joining forces with an iconic, industry-leading brand like Garmin is the ultimate catalyst for our next era of innovation.

"By combining our coaching expertise with Garmin’s world-class technology, we are positioning ourselves to pioneer the next generation of athletic training software and services," he said.

In 2024, TrainingPeaks itself acquired indoor cycling platform IndieVelo, developing it into a new indoor cycling app, TrainingPeaks Virtual and established itself as a challenger to popular platforms like Zwift and MyWhoosh. The move from Garmin, with the capital behind it, could transform TrainingPeaks Virtual into a serious competitor in the space.

If like me, the Tour de France and glorious summer weather here in the UK have fueled your desire to get out riding, you'll be pleased to hear that Rapha has just dropped its big Summer Sale with huge reductions on new cycling gear.

So if you fancy gearing up for some fresh bike wear, including the best bib shorts, high-performance jerseys and all-weather cycling jackets (the sunshine won't last forever), there are bargains for everyone.

Explore the Rapha Summer Sale and save 51% or more.

Below I've selected 15 of the best cycling deals, and if any catch your eye, our expert testers have reviewed and rated the majority of them. Anyone requiring a detailed deep dive, then a quick search on Cyclingnews will provide just that.

Rapha has not publicly announced an exact end date for this year's summer sale. However, based on the current timeline and their historical trends, we'd expect it to run until late August 2026. Don't hang around, though, as some items are showing as limited sizing, and like all sales, it's only while stock lasts.

Rapha Summer Sale Men's Deals

Rapha Summer Sale Women's Deals

The highlighted deals are from the UK Rapha Summer Sale, but for those in the USA, the Rapha US Summer Sale has plenty of equally appealing discounts.

Below you'll also find the best prices on Rapha apparel from other retailers, relevant to your currency and location.

Tom Pidcock warmed up wearing a pair of special cooling gloves before he began Stage 16 of the Tour de France today.

The Briton rode to a 12th-place finish on the stage, 2:07 behind winner Remco Evenepoel.

Pidcock was spotted warming up before his time trial start wearing what looked like a pair of large black mittens. The gloves are a system that we haven't seen being used by any teams at this year's race, and a 'Coolmitt' wordmark on the side led to more information on them.

The $995 system is centred around 'Vasocooling' and focuses on cooling the palms of the hands to lower core temperature. The Coolmitt is comprised of a 'Patented VasoCooling Unit', a metal tank and a 'Rapid Thermal Exchange Mitt' - the big, bulky black mitts.

Ice and water are added to separate chambers in the main unit, which is battery powered. The system chills the water before cycling it through pipes into pads in the mitts. Cooler blood from the hands can then circulate to the rest of the body, cooling the core temperature.

Cyclingnews understands that more than one pro cycling team is using the system, and that Pidcock's Pinarello Q36.5 team has several pairs. The brand's founder, Craig Gile, provided more information on the system and explained it was originally funded by the US military and developed by Dr Craig Heller at Stanford University.

"We as human beings most effectively radiate heat out of the naturally hairless palms of hands, soles of feet, and upper part of the face, which has a distinct vascular structure", he explained.

Cooling these areas, specifically the palms of the hands, targets specific blood vessels called arteriovenous anastomoses (AVAs), which connect arteries to veins; cooling these areas can be far more effective at lowering core temperature.

The Coolmitt gloves deliver cooled water to a pad inside the mitts when is held by a rider and used to lower core temperature.

"The constant flow of water going across your hand is rapidly pulling heat out of your body, letting cold blood flow to your heart, and cooling from the inside out," Gile explained

"The water is at 12 to 15 degrees centigrade. Your hand is not directly against water. There's water flowing through a pad, and your hand is on top of it.

Gile also explained the importance of using the correct water temperature and how simply using ice-cold water could negatively affect cooling.

"If it's too cold, there's a defence mechanism in your body called vasoconstriction, and it'll actually close down that heat transfer and perversely contain heat in your body, as opposed to letting it go," Gile said.

The system was originally conceived to support the US military and is also utilised in industrial applications by firefighters and those working in extreme heat.

This isn't the first time equipment used in firefighting has been utilised for cooling in cycling. The GB cycling team used special chairs with troughs of cold water for arm cooling as far back as the Athens Olympics in 2004.

The temperatures in this year's race have been consistently high, and cooling and hydration have been a priority for every rider in the race.

Cyclingnews was at the Stage 1 TTT in Barcelona and saw a range of cooling strategies on display in the team start area, including Netcompany Ineos's wrist and hand water cooling trays, where the team's riders submerged their forearms and hands in tubs of water chilled to 8.8° Celsius shortly before starting.

The world’s biggest bike race deserves world-class coverage. Subscribe to Cyclingnews for unlimited access to our unrivalled reporting of the 2026 Tour de France. From Barcelona through to Paris, our experienced team will bring you breaking news, expert insight, and in-depth coverage from every stage as the battle for the yellow jersey plays out. Plus, access the Cyclingnews app to follow the action on the go! Find out more.

OK, I’m going to get this out of the way right at the top because: The CAAD needs mudguard mounts. It’s not aero, and at this price and the tier below it’s a serious contender for ‘first proper road bike’ for a great many customers, and a surefire contender for a spot in our guide to the best aluminium road bikes. I know it doesn’t rain in California, but it sure as hell does in Connecticut where Cannondale’s head office is, and it sure as hell does in the UK, too, even if the launch media was very Los Angeles. Despite this large gripe, I do actually quite like the latest CAAD.

I think it is going through a bit of an identity crisis of late. The old generation aped the dropped chainstays of the SuperSix Evo, but had mudguard mounts to make it a year-round performance bike. Now the stays are back up where they arguably should be for a metal bike, but with the lowest tier of the CAAD family now the cheapest road bike in the brand’s range, it seems caught somewhere in the middle of trying to be a crit bike of yesteryear while also offering new roadies an approachable package.

Despite this slightly confused outlook, I do like the platform. Rubino tyres on a bike at this price is a let-down, but it has the potential to be a really wicked road bike for those that don’t want carbon for whatever reason.

Design and aesthetics

As someone who lusts after the Liquigas-Cannondale era SuperSixes, I must say I love the decision to pop the seat stays back up where they should be. That, along with the basically horizontal top tube, makes the aesthetic package very classique and pleasing to behold.

Much like the latest SuperSix I am slightly underwhelmed by the paint options, especially given the crazy custom versions that have been kicking about on socials. The frameset-only option is delightful, as is the raw version, though these are so rare that I suspect they’re essentially a showpiece, like the 100-piece Team Dream Team limited edition. Black, white, or this perfectly handsome but dull cherry option are your choices, and if you want electronic gears, then it’s just this red.

Gone are the mudguard mounts (someone will die on this hill, I assure you, and it ain't going to be me), but there is a round seatpost and clearance now for 32mm tyres with a bit of wiggle room. This mid-tier model comes with the new SRAM Rival, and ‘robust endurance road wheels’ from DT Swiss of an alloy variety, paired with budget Vittoria Rubino Pro tyres. As I’ll get into when I discuss the handling, these are a little bit of a letdown and again point to the slight confusion of the machine.

The cockpit is a separate system, with alloy bars here. Given Cannondale is only offering integrated cockpits on its top-flight SuperSix models, it’s not a great surprise (and no bad thing) to have a two-piece on offer here. At the bottom bracket there is mercifully a standard BSA threaded shell, and there's UDH compatibility at the back, so no mad Cannondale standards of yesteryear.

The CAAD14 is geometrically very similar to the latest SuperSix Evo, a bike which I really, really liked from a handling perspective. In the same size, the CAAD is 15mm higher, which sounds like a lot, but the latest SuperSix cut 10mm from the head tube to make it lower. Same head tube angle at 73º, but a higher bottom bracket for the CAAD by 3mm, and 5mm longer in the chain stays, but all in all the lineage from SuperSix to CAAD is more or less a straight line.

Specs sheet aside, what I do like about the CAAD is the fact you can still mess about with it. Yes, semi-internal cable routing is a pain, but as a serial setup messer-abouterer I love the fact that, hypothetically with a bit of playing around with hoses and spacers perhaps, I could slap a Thomson seatpost and stem combo and some vintage classic drop bars off eBay and have something that looks pretty old school with modern sensibilities, or I could run it 1x with 35mm tyres and an extremely narrow cockpit to keep up with the trendy folks. It’s one of the main reasons I bought a Bowman Palace back in the day, and now run it with a flat bar like a moron.

Taking the mudguard mounts away, though, is dumb. It has endurance wheels; it’s alloy so will appeal to new cyclists and those looking for a winter bike that doesn’t handle like a water buffalo, and if we’re all honest with ourselves, despite the marketing, it ain’t a crit bike either. If you’re serious about racing, why would you get an alloy frameset that isn’t aero when you can get a Quick Pro frameset (as an example) for less money AND have aero gains AND have weight savings?

I hate to burst some of your bubbles, but if you crash and snap an alloy frame, it’s actually going to be harder to repair than a carbon one. It might take little knocks more easily, but the big stuff is going to write it off whether it’s made of plastic or tin.

Performance

The CAAD14 is, first and foremost, a laugh. There’s definitely something psychological at play, but not being aboard a bike that is carbon or aero, or both in this case, allows the mind to drift into a more playful space, and this is compounded well by the fact that the handling characteristics are pretty much as they are for the SuperSix, which is beautiful to ride. A little more stable with that longer back end, but basically the same.

Compared to my Bowman, admittedly a bike that is many years old now, the CAAD14 is worlds apart. It’s stiff enough in the frame, but like so many bikes it really pays to go up a little in terms of tyre sizes. Even up to a 30c takes some of the sting out of the tail that comes with not having a great deal of seatpost stickup. I have a size down here compared to my usual 56, and it is a little small (ideally I’d have this but with a longer stem, but we are where we are) and even here the seatpost doesn’t extend that far out. It certainly adds to the old school charm in a visual sense, but even a round carbon seatpost can’t do everything.

While I’m on the wheels and tyres, the stock wheels are OK, but the tyres are certainly a weak point for a bike where handling is such a key part of the appeal. Even if you don’t swap the wheels, you’ll have a far better time if you swap the Rubinos out for something moderately premium. Continental GP5000s and Vittoria Corsa Pros are good, but cost a bomb, and realistically, if you’re not dropping top dolla on a race bike then take my word for it and sort yourself out with a set of Hutchinson Blackbirds or Blackbird Race tyres and thank me later; ⅔ the price (or half, when on sale) and they feel really, really good. Same goes for Michelin Power Cups, though they don’t come in the same size range.

The stock wheels make for little to write home about, and I can’t help but feel I’d be writing “these would be a fantastic winter wheelset, and you can save some posh hoops for summer”, but THE RUDDY MUDGUARD MOUNTS ARE GONE.

I don’t lament the separate bar and stem combo, even if to all intents and purposes it’s just as inconvenient as a one-piece given the internal routing. I like the bars, and while they do flex more than I’d perhaps like when cranking out a sprint effort, they’re stiffer than the Seka Spear integrated cockpit. The ergonomics are sound, and being alloy I’m less stressed about leaning the thing up cack-handedly against a wall and it toppling over.

When the road points upwards I did wish I was on the SuperSix, even when I slapped a set of Zipp 202 NSW climbing wheels on. It’s just a little more stolid, but it gets over lumps perfectly well, even ticking off a few PRs on both sustained efforts and uphill sprints. The stock setup with pedals, cages, and computer mount tips the scales at 9.17kg (I did swap the saddle, though), and this isn't exactly feathery; it combines with the additional drag of the tyres, so it does feel sluggish at times, but it is an alloy bike with alloy wheels.

While one can’t necessarily feel the difference in a handful of watts here and there between the best aero road bikes, you absolutely can feel the difference between this and a frame designed to beat the wind. It’s not like having an anchor on or anything so dramatic, but you do have to work harder on the flat. Again, this is aided with better tyres, and you can do a lot with positioning, helmet, and clothing, but fundamentally this is a slower bike than a similarly priced aero frameset, whatever you put on it.

Downhill, though, it’s ripping good. The SRAM brakes are excellent and add a layer of confidence on top of the balance the geometry brings to the table. The same confident turn-in as the SuperSix is at play here, and a front end that is stiff enough to track where you want it to without being so stiff you skitter hither and thither. If this is to be your first ‘proper’ road bike, then there are far worse places to learn to descend than aboard one of these. It doesn’t descend quite as well as the SuperSix, but for a bike that costs substantially less it’s impressive how good an impression it can do if its premium sibling. It’s like the difference between Sprite from the fridge and room temperature Sprite. Same thing really, underneath, but one has a little more ahhhh.

It’s fun, but is that enough? The problem with the CAAD14 is that it’s sort of trying to be all things to all people and hamstringing itself in the process. It’s got the handling of an excellent fast road bike, but without the componentry, and realistically in this day and age if you’re buying a non-aero alloy frameset to race on seriously you probably need your head examining. On the flip side, it occupies the entry-level road bike space for the brand, but without shouldering any of the responsibility to be utilitarian that comes with that market position.

People buying their first road bike will also be looking for something to commute on and use all year round, and without mudguards it can do neither thing well. The Fairlight Strael manages to handle beautifully and be utilitarian enough to be a commuter, winter bike, and light touring masterclass, and if it can be done in steel then it can be done in aluminium, too.

I will also say that I never really got on with the groupset beyond the brakes. The gears were perpetually skipping and mis-shifting no matter what I did to trim and re-trim the rear derailleur. It was frustrating, and again, if this was my first dealings with electronic gears I’d be a bit non-plussed.

Value

£3,700 is a fair wedge but it’s substantially cheaper than the top-flight bikes I so often review nowadays. What else can you get for that money? An Ultegra-equipped Fairlight Strael… A bike I gave a perfect score to. I know any Nero Show followers will be wailing and gnashing their teeth, but both bikes are not aero, made of metal, and handle excellently. One is just a lot more adaptable and a lot more configurable.

It's also several hundred more than the Winspace M6 aero race bike my colleague Tom just reviewed. That has carbon wheels, a one-piece integrated handlebar, etc and is sure to be a much quicker machine.

From more mainstream competition, you could get an Ultegra-spec Canyon Ultimate, with carbon wheels and race tyres for the same cash. Maybe it ain’t as cool, but it’s more bike for your money. A SRAM Force version of the Ultimate with carbon wheels and race tyres will save you 350 quid over the CAAD, which you put towards a power meter, and you can get it in red not white, so people don’t accuse you of being an influencer on the internet.

What I’m trying to say is the CAAD isn’t particularly good value. It isn’t a good enough race bike to be raced as-is without investing in better tyres, for starters, let alone the wheels, and it isn’t utilitarian enough to be a year-round training machine.

Verdict

I liked riding the CAAD, but I am also here to provide consumer advice. I like riding bikes that are cool (have I mentioned my alloy flat bar idiot wagon?) but ‘fun and cool’ only really gets you to the marketing campaign. You can stick cycling’s most effervescent influencer on one in front of a Porsche, but that’s sort of all there is underneath. It is fun, and it is cool, but if that’s all it is, then why not make it cooler? Why not make it more fun? Give it the paint it deserves, and the tyres it needs. Give people who are coming to road cycling for the first time something to really show off at the cafe, and for pity's sake, give them some mudguard mounts.

Winspace has been making bikes since 2008, and despite being around for some time, only in the last several years has the brand’s visibility risen in the western market, as more and more Chinese brands have gained a foothold, popularity and visibility.

I’ve been test riding the Winspace M6 since April. It's one of the brand's latest aero road bikes and sits alongside the T1550 and T1600 models.

The M6 is available in a few configurations; I've tested the 105 Di2 version, though it's also available with 105 mechanical and Ultegra Di2 as well. It's generated interest wherever I've taken it, far more than some of the best road bikes I’ve ridden from more established brands.

As pictured, the bike I have been riding comes in at $3,900, making it a more attractive option than bikes from bike brands with similar specs that may cost a lot more or as an affordable yet capable platform to upgrade further down the line.

I’ve done all my road riding and training on it, and have used it for three road races. Here’s how I got in.

Design and aesthetics

Winspace owns its own factory in China, which I believe allows for some of its competitive pricing. Spec-wise, the bike comes with a strong overall package that doesn’t really have any gaping weaknesses.

You can do quite a lot of customising when ordering on the Winspace website, and the brand uses a direct-to-consumer model supported by dealers in different regions. You can choose from one of nine colour options, and custom paint services are offered in at least the UK, with prices starting from £450.

Two integrated handlebars are available: the Hyper bar, which is what came with my bike; I chose a 36cm/105mm combo and loved it, or you can choose the Hyper 2 for $100 more, which to my mind looks a bit like the bar shape on the Colnago Y1Rs.

The seatpost is an aero Winspace model, which has 15mm of layback in size M and upward, and is inline for the XS and S sizes, topped off with a Selle Italia Novus Boost Evo X-Cross Superflow, an XC MTB-specific saddle, but one which I have also found very comfortable, visually it also fits in well with the bike, and doesn't look out of place.

Handlebar width and stem length can be specified, as can crank length, and (to an extent) chainring size. It's all very customisable, and you should be able to get close to the exact build combo you want. One thing to note is shipping times; you can currently expect a 30-45 day wait for your order to arrive.

My bike came with the stock Unaas Hard D50 wheels with 28mm Continental Grand Prix tyres and tubes, but you can spend up to $1000 more by upgrading things on the wheel front.

The groupset is the always solid Shimano 105 Di2, and it was solid as a rock. The bike comes with a 170mm 34-50T chainset, and I did swap in a 36-52T for a road race; for general riding it’s absolutely fine, but if you're racing and need some more speed in flat-out fast finishes or for a better chainline you may want to go bigger. There's also no included power meter, a positive or negative depending on your opinion; PM crank arms for Shimano chainsets are relatively inexpensive though.

One aftermarket part that caught my eye immediately as I wax each new test bike's chain was the chain itself. Winspace spec'd a SUMC flat top model - a Chinese brand that I wasn’t familiar with. I'm a stickler for running Shimano chains with Shimano groupsets, but I must say performance has been good from it. I can’t say shifting performance was any different to a Shimano unit or poor in any way, and I was paying very close attention.

So, for the frame itself, the M6 is constructed from Toray T700/T800 and M40/60 carbon fibres. Various brands use Toray, so material-wise, the quality is there.

The bottom bracket standard is T47, and my bike came fitted with a Token screw-together unit; the cranks span very well straight out of the box, but more on this further in.

The frame is UDH-friendly and has 32mm tyre clearances; I've run it with 32mm Specialized Cotton TLR tyres comfortably at times.

Winspace quotes 900 grams for an unpainted size M, and my bike came in at 7.9kg out of the box.

The M6 is billed as an aero bike, and the frame is angular and many familiar aero shapes are there from the deep head tube, which tapers at the front (pictured below) to the seatstay junction area; perhaps the most eye-catching are the 68mm deep fork legs which flick backwards at the bottom.

Aero-wise, the brand says the bike has been to the Fuji wind tunnel and this was preceded by CFD modelling. Compared to the brand's C5 bike, Winspace claims an 8.9 watt drag reduction at 48km/h, though that bike has an almost identical frame from what I can see. I don't have any comparisons for the T1550 and T1600 models, though, which would be desirable.

What we don't have currently is any of our own wind tunnel data for the M6, but I would like to see how it fares against a range of current models.

Performance

I've ridden the M6 for over 1000 miles, including using it in three road races, even taking a 5th place in the last one, to really test it in anger and have been highly impressed.

As is often the case with the bikes I know are really going to fit me well, my laps around the block to scrub the brakes in told me a lot straight away, and I was able to find a great position on the M6 pretty much immediately.

Position and fit will make or break things, regardless of the bike you are riding, so let's look at the geometry first. I'm 176cm and have been riding a size M bike, which has the following key geometry figures (full table below):

Stack: 535mm
Reach: 383mm
Wheelbase: 980
Trail: 63.1mm
BB drop: 72mm
Seat tube angle: 74 degrees
Head tube angle: 72.2 degrees

The geometry results in a pretty user-friendly bike in my opinion; that 383mm reach number is the same or within a millimetre or two of bikes like the Cervelo Soloist, Specialised Aethos, Ridley Grifn RS and Ribble Ultra Race, all bikes I have ridden and been very comfortable on. In short, it isn't super aggressive, and a range of riders should be able to get comfortable, and if you do need a longer stem, it's only going to make the bike look mean.

I was very comfortable, but could still achieve a low, aero position on the hoods. Stack-wise, the bike is a touch more aggressive; I rode it with 20mm of spacers.

In use, there is little for me to fault when it comes to the M6; it has performed excellently across the board.

I've loved the handling; it's sharp, exciting and precise. I've felt completely confident on the bike, and descending and cornering under pressure in races has provided another solid testing ground.

The Hyper bar has helped in this department; I really like what it brings to the table. It feels very stiff, though I am a lighter rider, and the shape and ergonomics really help you put the bike where you want it. Also, in its 36cm size it falls within the UCI handlebar width rules, as long as your shifters aren't at a crazy angle, so racers will be ok on that front.

I've ridden the bike with three different wheelsets and a range of tyres, from 28s, 29s and 32s; the bike has felt comfortable with all of them. It's a racy bike, engaging and snappy, but it hasn't beaten me up, and 30 or 32mm tyres will do a lot there. One thing I did notice was that acceleration was improved at low speed with a lighter wheelset, specifically some Roval Rapide CLX III's I'm testing.

The Stock Unaas wheelset weighs in at a claimed 1609 grams, with a 21mm internal width, Pillar steel spokes, cartridge bearing hubs and a three-pawl freehub. The hubs feel buttery smooth, and combined with the 28mm Conti Grand Prix tyres and tubes, the wheels feel nippy enough and smooth. There's nothing wrong with them, and they have felt livelier than other budget wheels I have used.

I've tried the bike with premium wheelsets from Roval and DT Swiss, and an upgrade in wheels and tyres only unlocks more performance. At speed on flat and rolling terrain it feels really quick.

I've done all sorts of efforts and training sessions on the bike, and sprinted flat out on it; it feels very good when accelerating and riding out of the saddle, and the ride quality is there.

Does it feel quite as stiff and direct as something like a Canyon Aeroad CFR when you are really stamping on the pedals? Not quite, but it's not a million miles off and for a bike at this price point, it's meant as a compliment.

I could do everything on this bike; its 7.9kg weight isn't too bad. Of course, we all want a lighter bike, but for a 105-spec aero machine, it's not bad in my opinion; it would be easy enough to start dropping some weight, and the M6 itself certainly doesn't feel sluggish.

I've had no mechanical issues with the bike of any kind, and the quality and paint finishing all seem very good.

Maintenance and servicing

A single issue has raised its head so far, and that relates to the bottom bracket. When I first removed the chain to wax it, I was highly impressed with the way the cranks span; it was probably the best spin test I've seen in a test bike.

Fast forward a few months, and the cranks still spin very well, but the bearings are sounding a bit blown out and rumbly.

I'm light and easy on equipment; I'm also light on the bike washing. I removed the cranks for an inspection, and the right BB bearing feels rougher than the left one. Not terrible, but there's some roughness there which I wouldn't expect after less than six months of use.

A bearing upgrade may help; I can't vouch for the quality of the stock 'Takino' branded bearings, but if that failed, perhaps a deeper look at things would be needed.

Elsewhere, it's a similar story for a bike like this: minimise front-end blasting to protect your headset bearings; though you can access them for regreasing, the bottom bracket is threaded, you just need the correct Token bb tool, and keep everything as clean and as well greased as you can. I can't say there are any specific points to mention.

Value

As mentioned $3,900 or £3,460 is our price tag here for the M6 with Hyper bar and 105 Di2.

The bike comes pretty much assembled, and you get the integrated out-front computer mount included. The bike also comes with a neat foam-lined cardboard box with spares, spacers, a light mount for the combo computer mount, and a Shimano Di2 charger cable.

How does it measure up to the competition from bigger name brands? Let's look at Canyon, with it's often hard to beat direct to consumer pricing.

A base-spec Canyon Aeroad CF SLX 7 starts at $4,999 or £4,499; that bike also has 105 Di2 with a power meter, and 65 mm DT Swiss ARC 1600 carbon wheels with Continental Grand Prix 5000 S TR tyres. It's about $1000 more, with a bigger spec, but you can't specify stem length, and you will need to purchase the computer mount separately. A Specialized Tarmac SL8 Comp with 105 Di2 and alloy wheels comes in at $4,699 or £3,599; that's without a PM and with a two-piece bar.

I've discussed the excellent performance, but putting that aside, I think a key part of the Winspace value proposition is the range of customisation options on offer. You can spec a heck of a lot straight off the bat, and I see notes on the UK website, for example, on communicating cassette and power meter preferences. For less than a lot of bikes, you can choose a lot of the spec to suit from the off, which could save a lot of money and time further down the line.

Verdict

Winspace has put together an excellent all-round road bike in the M6. It's a bike that performs very well everywhere. The handling is excellent, and is further boosted by the very good Hyper bar. The ride quality is good, exciting and engaging, and the bike is comfortable to ride; this will only be boosted by larger, tubeless tyres if you want to go that way with it.

I'd like it to feel even more direct when really putting the power down out of the saddle on steep climbs, but that's a finer point; it really has impressed me across the board.

It sits at a competitive price point, and you can customise an awful lot at point of sale; I think it also provides a good base to upgrade from in the future, or as a competitive frameset to build up into a race bike, etc.

Check the geo, and if it's right for you, I promise you will not be disappointed in the M6.

While on the tech hunt at the Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe team hotel in Barcelona before the start of the Tour de France, shortly before I spotted Remco Evenepoel's new Shiv TT bike in the back of an open van, something else caught my eye and sent me down a rabbit hole later that evening and over the course of the days since.

I noticed an open cardboard box with a shipping label on the side detailing its original contents: Mitopure powder, softgels and gummies.

The label showed that it had been shipped from a well-known car company in the USA, to an employee of the team in Austria.

Initially unfamiliar with Mitopure, I later learned that it is a trademarked, highly pure form of a substance called Urolithin A, manufactured by Swiss company Amazentis – part-owned by Nestlé Research Centre – and marketed under the brand name Timeline.

Notably, that Timeline brand name was handwritten on the box, too, alongside the name of another of the team's employees.

What is Urolithin A?

In short, Urolithin A is naturally occurring substance derived from pomegranates, that is claimed to speed up the clearing of damaged mitochondria, potentially improving mitochondrial function and recovery.

Cyclingnews members will perhaps recall Tim Lawson referencing it in our premium feature on supplements too:

• Ergogenic edge or empty promise: How do we know what's really inside cycling supplements

But to dig a little deeper, I spoke to David Bailey, a man whose career spans the English Institute of Sport, three years at the Nestlé Research Centre, and a trio of titles as Head of Performance at BMC Racing, Bahrain McLaren, and nowadays NSN Cycling Team.

He explained that Urolithin A is a naturally occurring byproduct produced in your gut from the breakdown of a group of polyphenols called Ellagitannins, which are found primarily in pomegranates but also in raspberries. However, only some people can produce it in meaningful amounts, depending on their gut microbiome, genetics and diet, and thus, supplementation can be beneficial to those who can't.

In Amazentis' preclinical work – using rodents – Bailey explains that they showed that it had a "potent effect on mitophagy," the process that clears out damaged mitochondria, and given that as you age your mitochondrial function declines, this could have a positive impact on slowing the effects of aging.

This was in around 2021, long after Bailey had left Nestlé, but the company consulted him on its potential application in elite cycling.

"When I joined them, I was between teams," he explained. "I had a lot of contacts, and I made connections with other teams, and a number of teams tried it.

"There would be a potential case used for it at the back end of a Grand Tour, where you're dealing with three days of mountain stages, high calorie turnover, high, high physiological stress," he continued, but later added that, "it's still a bit of an unknown."

Is it legal?

In short, yes. Mitopure is NSF Certified for Sport; something that Bailey himself made happen.

"That was the first thing I told them. I was like, 'teams will not take this on board unless you can guarantee...' Well, you can never guarantee against contamination, but you go through the batch testing process," he said.

This certification, according to the NSF Sport website, verifies that products do not contain any of 290 substances banned by major athletic organizations, the contents of the supplement actually match what is printed on the label, there are no unsafe levels of contaminants in the tested products, the product is manufactured at a facility that is GMP (Good Manufacturing Practice) Certified and audited annually or bi-annually based on grade for quality and safety by NSF.

Which teams are using it?

Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe denies that they have ever used Mitopure products.

"The team is not using Mitopure at the moment," the team's press officer explained when asked for comment, and later reiterated his statement by saying "the supplement you mention was neither used, nor is it currently in use."

Bailey said he understands one team from his initial round of outreach is still using it. It's not Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe, for clarity, but he requested that the team name be kept off-record.

Perhaps most tellingly is that Bailey confirms that his own team, NSN, isn't using it: "As a weighted marginal gain in nutrition, it's a bit of an unknown," he explained. "There's no point rolling that out until you've got your ducks lined up with fueling – carbohydrate intake – or things that are well established like caffeine, creatine, bicarbonate use. Those things are the ones that we know there's clear evidence for."

I also spoke to Sam Impey, former performance nutritionist at British Cycling, as well as the team known today as Jayco AlUla, and who is now Co-Founder and Chief Scientific Officer at Hexis, a brand that supports numerous WorldTour teams with their fuelling strategy and tracking. He explained that he's unaware of any team using it.

So, does it actually work?

Bailey calls it an unknown. Impey concurs, saying, "It's a postbiotic that might have benefits, but the evidence base in high-performing athletes is not there. We know way less about how this works and how to use it than ketones."

Clinical trials in older non-active adults showed that supplementation improves muscle strength, endurance, and biomarkers of mitochondrial health, suggesting that it may be an effective ergogenic aid in other populations, but how that then translates to elite athletes is highly speculative.

As Bailey puts it, "The guys racing the Tour de France are freaks. They have a natural adaptation – more so than you and I. We all have an ability to mitigate the oxidative damage that you get, and they will have even more, which is why they're able to do it day in, day out.

A few examples of trials exist, and two shared with me by Bailey loosely suggest potential, but neither are cut and dry.

The first, titled 'Effects of Urolithin A supplementation on performance and antioxidant status in academy soccer players during preseason: a pilot randomised controlled trial concludes that six weeks of supplementation improved aerobic endurance and some measures of jump performance in elite academy players, while preserving aspects of antioxidant status, but caveated that confidence limits were broad, and that the study "potentially support UA as a feasible and well-tolerated intervention in athletic populations," and that it warrants further research.

The second, titled 'Evaluating the Impact of Urolithin A Supplementation on Running Performance, Recovery, and Mitochondrial Biomarkers in Highly Trained Male Distance Runners' found that "Four weeks of daily UA supplementation facilitates recovery by downregulating inflammatory pathways and indirect markers of muscle damage. However, despite a reduction in rating of exertion and increased aerobic capacity, UA supplementation did not further enhance performance in highly trained male endurance athletes."

Evidence vs opportunity

Without clear evidence that Urolithin A offers a performance gain, you'd be forgiven for wondering why teams would risk giving it to high-performing athletes on the world's biggest stage.

But despite not using it for his own team's riders, Bailey presents a sound argument.

"Scientific research moves at a glacial pace. So, you know, working in sport for you know 20 years of my life, I learned that you can't really wait for them to figure it out, and you have to make a call."

That call is probably made by weighing up the known risks against the potential upsides, and when the upside is a shot at winning the Tour de France, it's likely a hard one to ignore.

The Quoc M Pro Lace shoe launched in March this year, and along with the more affordable Escape Road models, brings a lace-up option to the already popular Quoc road shoe range.

The M Pro Lace shares a lot of the same design features as the existing M3 Pro and M3 Air shoes that I have tested and reviewed over the last couple of years.

Lace-up road shoes are, if not fully in vogue, certainly a lot more popular of late amongst the best cycling shoes. There’s the aero angle, and they are regularly cited as being more aerodynamic than a boa or ratchet-equipped shoe, and the sports big names such as Tadej Pogačar, Jonas Vingegaard, Remco Evenepoel and Isaac del Toro are all using lace-up shoes from a range of manufacturers right now.

Quoc says the shoes are ‘born from the pro peloton’s growing preference for lace precision’ and I have found the lacing system to offer more stability and better foot retention than the dials used on other Quoc models.

The shoes feature the existing Quoc carbon fibre sole, with a three-bolt drilling pattern, and a similar type of upper; the laces and new ankle opening design to facilitate them are the talking point here.

The shoes are also a little less cash than other top-level Quoc options; laces, it seems, are cheaper than dials, and the shoes carry an RRP of £290 / $400 / € 360

I've used them exclusively since the start of the year for all of my riding, training and three road races plus track meets; I’ve even crashed in them (not by choice). Here’s what you can expect if you are considering buying a pair.

Design and aesthetics

Quoc appears to have a formula for its road shoes, and the M Pro Lace is very much in keeping with that blueprint, design and aesthetics-wise.

The shoes use the same carbon fibre sole as the M3 Pro and M3 Air; it is a stiff unit that has always been plenty stiff enough for me for any performance-focused road riding. It is also a three-bolt-only setup, so you will need a four-bolt adaptor for Wahoo Speedplay cleats.

The uppers are also very similar in feel and looks to the aforementioned models. It’s a slightly textured mesh TPU surface with perforations all along the front two-thirds of the shoe and two smooth panels, a ‘laminated toe border’ in the brand's words at the front and rear, which makes cleaning them easier.

The major change has come with the addition of the laces, and with them a different tongue and ankle opening area which, to my mind, works better than the previous offerings.

I asked the brand about aero considerations, and it confirmed that aerodynamics hadn't been a specific consideration; the addition of laces was more about 'fit, durability and comfort'.

12 eyelets route the laces up to the split tongue, which splays across the front of your ankle comfortably; at least it has for me. There’s also an elasticated band about halfway down the tongue to tuck the laces under; they have never moved in use for me, and this has worked very well.

The shoes come in one colour, and that’s white, which is always music to my ears. If white isn’t for you, you will have to look elsewhere, I’m afraid.

The shoes themselves look super clean and stylish, and they generated plenty of praise on Instagram and online at launch. Styling is simple, with a ‘Quoc’ wordmark on the outside front of each shoe and a ‘Q’ on the toe box.

Included with each pair is a Quoc tote bag for storage, and three sets of interchangeable polystyrene arch supports, the same as its other models; these stick on, and whilst they aren’t in the same league as G8 or Solestar when it comes to insoles, it’s useful that riders can at least tweak their arch support to suit.

Performance

It’s worth saying straight away that if white shoes are your thing, you will not be let down with these. I think it’s fair to say they are some of the slickest-looking road shoes you can choose right now; clean, minimalist and stylish, at least to my mind.

I’ve ridden them for several months straight and have had a very good experience again. The cleat bolt holes are in a decent spot, not too far forward, and I didn't feel I had any issues in that department, although again, it's a personal one.

I actually sized up with this model to an EU 44, and have been happier for it. It’s a personal one; the shoes run true to size, I would say, but the added size has given my toes a bit more room and left me with a better feel overall - food for thought as these aren’t the widest or most voluminous shoes on the market. For wider shoes, consult our best wide cycling shoes guide.

The shoes aren't as comfortable as the Q36.5 Unique Pro shoes, a personal benchmark for me, but those sit at least a price bracket above.

Stiffness isn’t a concern for me; I’ve sprinted at the end of road races, on the track and done 45-second max uphill intervals and have never once wanted a stiffer shoe. All good on that front.

What is a big improvement for me is the improved foot retention and stability that the laces bring to the table. One of my few gripes with the M3 Pro shoes was the slightly subpar performance from the closure dials, which didn’t do the best job at tightening the shoe down and doing it evenly.

The laces allow you to tighten things down more evenly, across the whole foot, and importantly they haven’t developed slack or worked loose, something I feared.

The eyelets extend around the ankle, which helps lock things in, and the shape of both the laces and eyelet holes, and the not huge amount of stretch in the laces means they stay put. It’s an effective combination all round.

I’ve called Quoc shoes slipper-like in the past due to the open, almost cutaway ankle area; the laces mean this area has changed, and the shoes offer improved ankle support and a better hold when everything is closed down and the laces are tied.

Performance in the heat has been good; I’ve experienced slightly sore feet at the end of a long, hot road race, but this is down to overall fit more than a shoe's ventilation, I think.

The shoes scrub up nicely; it isn’t an effortless wipe-clean job, and you might need to do some light scrubbing and possibly wash the laces or replace them if they really get dirty, but they clean up nicely all told.

Value

In the context of the Quoc range, these shoes are a little cheaper than the M3 Pro and Air models, which have dials, and for me, having used all three pairs, they would be my choice.

A new product being cheaper is refreshing these days, so that’s a positive.

Overall, the shoes are still a lot of money, but it’s fair to say they are in line with or even cheaper than many premium road shoes these days, and they look fantastic, which is always going to draw you into buying something.

A key competitor is probably the Specialized S-Works Torch lace, which retails for around the same money. The Torch may have a slightly stiffer sole, but shoes are a personal choice.

Verdict

The M Pro Lace is my favourite addition to the Quoc range so far. They still look fantastic, but the laces improve the shoes' retention, foot hold and overall performance. I think more riders will be able to get a fit that works for them in them.

They are also cheaper than the dial equipped options, and if being able to tighten your shoes down well is of importance to you, I'd recommend you go for these and save a few dollars.

Aerodynamic advantage has become a key cycling battleground and not a week goes by without a new bike or wheelset being announced that’s X watts faster. But alongside aero equipment development, there’s a parallel arms race in aero optimisation of riders' clothing.

Since the rider, not the bike, represents around 80% of the total frontal area, drag reduction in clothing design is arguably more significant. At the same time, it’s harder to quantify and optimise. While the bike and wheels are rigid structures, riders move around on the bike, and each rider moves around and sits differently, so the fastest clothing for one rider could be the slowest for another; it's highly personal.

Assos and EF Pro Cycling granted Cyclingnews exclusive access as they wind tunnel tested Assos’s race clothing and explained how they’re working to develop the most efficient clothing for EF’s riders, the complexity involved and how different race kits suit different riders and situations.

Cyclingnews followed as Assos, EF Pro Cycling and their partners tested a range of skinsuits and other clothing at the Flanders Bike Valley wind tunnel in Belgium, with star riders in the men's and women’s teams in late April 2026, ahead of the year’s major stage races.

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More than a dozen speedsuits

Between its men’s, women’s and development teams, EF Pro Cycling’s roster exceeds 60 riders. That’s a lot of pro cyclists to equip for the team’s list of sponsors, which, as of the start of 2026, includes Swiss clothing brand Assos after its high-profile move away from Rapha.

It’s not just the sheer volume of clothing needed for 60-plus riders that’s impressive; it’s the amount of detailed analysis required to develop cutting-edge kit for the pros. Between Assos, EF Pro Cycling and other staff and riders, around 20 people were involved in the multiple days of wind tunnel testing.

Races are now invariably ridden in one-piece speedsuits to optimise the rider’s aerodynamics, and these need to be fitted precisely to individual riders. Assos employs a team of seamstresses at its factory in Switzerland to tailor its speedsuits to the exact measurements of each rider.

There’s not just one speedsuit for all conditions, either. Assos has over a dozen options for different conditions, and it issues multiple suits to each rider.

Luca Zanasca, Assos’s Senior Manager of R&D and Innovation, explains that different speedsuits are optimal, depending on the race conditions and the role or tactics of the rider wearing it.

EF Education-Oatly’s Cédrine Kerbaol told Cyclingnews that Assos supplied multiple different skinsuits to the team's riders. Which to choose for a race day was determined by her and EF Education-Oatly’s performance team, depending on factors such as the weather, race speed and her role during the race.

Alongside wind tunnel testing, Assos also tests its speedsuits in the climate chamber at Flanders Bike Valley, measuring riders’ core and skin temperature. The climate chamber can be set to temperatures from 16 to 32°C and humidity levels between 75% and 80%, to confirm how effective a speedsuit will be for hot or cooler races.

A climber such as Richard Carapaz might choose Assos’s lightest speedsuit, which is also more suitable for very hot days. Assos’s wind tunnel and track testing shows that it’s not as aero as its fastest road speedsuit though.

There’s another speedsuit that Assos recommends to EF Pro Cycling riders for fast races, breakaways and sprinters, while there’s an even more aerodynamic speedsuit available for the Classics.

Assos’s fastest time trial suit is saved for the cream of its riders who specialise in that discipline, including Kerbaol, who was French national champion in the discipline in 2023 and again in 2025 and GC hopefuls such as Noemi Rüegg who won the Tour Down Under for a second time in succession at the start of 2026.

It gets even more complex, as Zanasca explains that the textiles used for its skinsuits differ between men’s and women’s versions. The average speed in a women’s race is lower than in a men’s race, and female riders are in general of smaller stature.

To take a concrete example, the Liege-Bastogne-Liege men’s race, which was run the week before Assos’s wind tunnel testing, was won by Tadej Pogačar at an average of over 44km/h, whereas Demi Vollering won the women’s race at around 37km/h.

Assos also adjusts the cut of women’s speedsuits, moving the seam at the waistband upwards, so it doesn’t sit over the rider’s hips, where it might cause irritation. It has positioned its pockets lower down at the rear, overlapping with the shorts part of the speedsuit to reduce their impact on drag.

Different results for different riders

A speedsuit doesn’t perform equally for all riders, which is why EF Pro Cycling and Assos had booked the Flanders Bike Valley wind tunnel for multiple days to test the different options with the team’s elite men and women riders.

First to be tested was Kerbaol, who the following week broke away in the finale to win stage 3 of the Vuelta Feminina. She was followed by Rüegg, 2026 Women’s World Champion Magdeleine Vallieres, and a selection of EF Education–EasyPost’s elite men’s team riders.

Each was tested with a range of road and time trial speedsuits and accessories, including overshoes, during multiple wind tunnel runs at a variety of airspeeds, with the drag figures displayed on a large screen in the corner of the wind tunnel control room. Time trial suits were tested at higher wind speeds and a lower yaw angle (the angle of the wind as it hits the rider) than road speedsuits.

By the end of her testing at 1:30 pm, Kerbaol had been in the wind tunnel for multiple runs for over four hours. Elite time trialists can typically hold their position with just 1% to 1.5% variation in drag, but by this time Kerbaol’s drag figure was varying by 4%, suggesting that she was becoming tired. Holding a time trial position can be difficult even for elite riders.

Comparing Kerbaol’s wind tunnel results to other elite riders, Assos found that the same speedsuit could produce drag figures relative to baseline that were up to 8 watts different.

Alongside its current speedsuit range, Assos also tested prototypes for new designs. Zanasca explains that Assos works with its technical fabric supplier and the team to select the optimum fabrics for its future skinsuit designs, which it was testing with EF Pro Cycling’s riders for the first time.

Again, there was variation between riders, with different degrees of drag reduction relative to the baseline speedsuit.

It’s not just wind speed which affects drag; the rider’s position on the bike and the interaction with the helmet can have a significant impact on the results, which is why testing individual riders is important to ensure they choose the best speedsuit for them.

On the other hand, it's very resource-intensive, which is why EF Pro Cycling only tested its top riders.

Multiple options for poor weather

It’s not just warm weather performance that’s important. Particularly in the early season, race conditions can be wet and cold.

Assos provides EF Pro Cycling riders with not one, but three different shell layers: its Equipe RS Schlosshund lightweight rain jacket, Mille GTS Sturmprinz rain jacket that’s more robust and the Equipe R Thermo short-sleeved rain jersey. Between them, they give riders the option to layer up for the worst conditions or to choose thinner layers for rain protection when it’s warmer.

Shell jackets are significantly more draggy than a speedsuit though, so Assos is working on improving the aerodynamics of its poor weather gear.

Add to that training kit for warmer and colder conditions, including bib shorts, jerseys, tights and accessories, as well as branded off-bike clothing, and equipping the EF Pro Cycling squad is a substantial commitment.

Zanasca won’t provide details, but equipping a complete pro team with a full range of cutting-edge clothing, along with the R&D needed to develop and test new designs, clearly takes considerable resources.

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80 years ago, Gaston Lapierre gave his new bike brand his surname: Lapierre. Today, on Bastille Day, Team Picnic PostNL will race Stage 10 of the Tour de France on custom-painted 80th anniversary Lapierre Xelius DRS race bikes to honour 8 decades of their sponsor brand's history and its French roots.

Cyclingnews was out at the Tour de France in the run up to the Grand Dèpart, visiting team hotels and looking at bikes and equipment. The Catalan sun was high in the sky and blazing down on us as we made our visit to Team Picnic PostNL to try and take a look at this bike ahead of the race.

Not much was moving in the late afternoon heat, but we got some time with Warren Barguil's Xelius DRS bike whilst the team mechanics worked away quietly. By Stage 10 of this Tour, punished by the furnace-like heat and UAE Team Emirate's vice-like grip on the race, a new custom-painted machine for Bastille Day will no doubt boost rider morale.

100 individually numbered framesets of this Xelius DRS will be available globally in small, medium and large sizes, and will set you back €4,499.

Bastille Day always produces some explosive racing exploits at the Tour, and this 80th anniversary Xelius may well write a fresh page in the Lapierre history book today.

Cervélo has launched a new version of its Soloist road bike today. This update sees the model get its second update following its relaunch back in 2022 after a lengthy hiatus.

If you aren't familiar with the name, the Soloist was one of the Cervélo bikes raced by Team CSC back in the early and mid-2000s.

Perhaps it's just a sign of the times, but sometimes it feels like every bike launch has to be a thing, whether that be a new hyper aero road bike, gravel bike with MTB specs or aero wheels with laser beams and a single-digit spoke count.

Whisper it, but bikes aimed at regular riders still exist, and the Soloist is one of them. In the brand's words, it's for 'the ones riding through the sunrise before work, the ones gathered at the shop for the Tuesday night fast ride.'

The Soloist is very much a performance road bike, designed to be faster and lighter than the last version, and yes, there are some wattage-saving claims for me to share. It's even being raced by the Visma-Lease a Bike development squad this year, but it's not as aggressive and unapologetically race-oriented as the brand's S5 model.

I headed to the Netherlands to attend the bike's launch, test ride it, and talk to the Cervelo engineers and product managers about what went into it.

How has the new Soloist changed?

Cervélo has given the Soloist a pretty thorough overhaul, changing a lot of frame tube shapes to increase surface area and make the bike faster, and carrying out a comprehensive weight-saving programme that's resulted in a 176-gram system saving.

The top-flight SRAM Red build weighs a claimed 6.85kg out of the box, and the heaviest build is only 7.41kg; competitive weights all round.

Weight has been shaved in a few places, from the handlebar to the lightened seapost clamp bung and seat tube shaft; lots of components have been on a diet. The frame itself is 28 grams lighter, whilst the fork saves 16 grams.

Let's look at a few numbers first; I also have a number for the difference between this bike and the S5, which I found interesting. I don't, however, have in-depth wind tunnel testing protocols or testing procedures for you.

The Soloist is said to be 8.6 watts faster than the old bike, with the older HB13 handlebar, and the same Reserve 42/49 wheels.

The new HB18 handlebar the bike comes with is said to be 134 grams lighter and 5.8 watts faster than the current HB13 model, so a chunk of the overall saving is coming from the bar.

And the S5 difference? The S5 with the aggressive HB19 bar, the one with the split, positive rise stem and 57/64mm Reserve wheels, is 11.8 watts faster than the Soloist in the above spec.

There's also an additional 4.3-watt saving when the bike is ridden with the new Cervélo 650ml aero water bottles, which are included with the bike. The cages themselves will take a round bottle, and the aero bottles physically stand up on their own, which is a nice touch.

Interestingly, the brand says round bottles will add 6.3 watts of drag to the bike, and using Soloist aero bottles adds two watts over using none at all. Food for thought there if you are watt hunting.

Why don't the Visma WorldTour team use the aero bottles? Simple: they have an existing bottle sponsor, though the aero bottle question sounds like it's being worked on.

Geometry has also been tweaked; the bike has a 2mm lower bottom bracket across all sizes to account for the updated 36mm tyre clearances the bike has.

The bike fits exactly the same as the R5, the brand's superlight climbing bike, and is a little more relaxed than the S5.

For instance, a size 54, the size I test rode, has the following geometry:

Stack: 544mm
Reach: 383mm
BB Drop: 74mm
Chainstay length: 410 mm
Seat tube angle: 73.5 degrees
Trail: 45.5mm

Pricing and specs

The Soloist will be available as a frameset and in five SRAM and Shimano-equipped builds, including a 1x SRAM Force option priced the same as the double version.

The bike and frameset will be available in 'black magic' and 'cloud break' colours and in an additional 'Maldive' colour as a frameset.

The frame is electronic only and is UDH compatable with a threaded bottom bracket.

All builds will come with the Cervélo HB18 integrated bar and Reserve 42/49mm and 40-44mm carbon wheels; all builds also come with a power meter.

Anyone purchasing a Soloist will also be able to request an alternate handlebar size and have it swapped at an official dealer within the first 60 days of ownership at no extra cost. A nice touch, if like me, you would want a different-sized bar or stem.

Claimed weight for a Red AXS-equipped bike is 6.85kg and rising up to 7.41kg for a SRAM Rival-equipped bike. Overall build weights are pretty competitive across the board.

Soloist Red AXS: $11,000 / £9,000 / €10,999
Soloist Force AXS: $8,500 / £7,000 / €7,499
Soloist Ultegra Di2 (4iii PM): $8,250 / £7,000 / €7,499
Soloist Rival AXS (Quarq Spindle Single PM): $6,800 / £5,500 / €5,999
Soloist Frameset: $4,000 / £3,500 / €3,799

First impressions of the Soloist

I snuck in two rides on the Soloist, including a fun devil take the hindmost race around a small circuit that Cervélo organised which was actually a refreshing and welcome test compared to some press launches. It also included a 50km/h tear-up with recently retired WorldTour pro Carlijn Achtereekte along a Dutch canal, another good chance to ride the bike in anger.

My main point of focus, if I were buying this bike, would be to swap in the narrowest bar I could get my hands on, and switch in the alternate lower stack height bearing top cap cover the bike comes with to drop the front end.

The front end felt a touch too high, and the bars were wider than I would like, which resulted in the front end feeling pedestrian and not as racy as I would like.

If a racy and aggressive setup is of importance for you, check the numbers to see if the available bar configurations will be right for you.

Issues like this can be a part and parcel of launch rides, and my job is to take those out-of-the-box setup niggles into account and feel through them. Bars can be swapped, and front ends lowered.

Even from clipping in and rolling around the block to check my saddle height and setup, I sensed a stiff frame that responded well to my inputs and an engaging overall ride.

This feeling only grew the more I rode it, and I found it to be a very good all-rounder that, crucially, is exciting to ride. It felt comfortable and smooth when up to speed, stiff and responsive when accelerating, and it handled very well when I pushed it into corners during our mini race.

One minor concern for me related to the stock Cervelo out-front computer mount; it felt very flexible and nowhere near as solid as a lot of units I try. I didn't have any issues, but I'd at least be double-checking it if paired with bigger units or with heavier lights and action cameras because it felt flimsy to me.

I also believe bikes come with Vittoria Corsa N.Ext tyres; switching to premium Corsa Pros would also extract even more speed.

There's a solid bike at the heart of the Soloist; now that it's received another update from Cervélo, it's more competitive than before. It may not be as fast or as exciting as the S5, but it strikes me as exactly the kind of bike amateur riders buy and own for years, tackling races, epic rides, sportives and holidays on, and hanging on to it because it means so much to you.

Keeping fed is a major part of the battle for teams and riders at the Tour de France. Riding for hours day after day requires a lot of energy. Fuelling needs for a Tour de France stage aren’t exceptional for athletes though; what is, is the three week duration for which riders need to keep this up.

To estimate just how many calories a cyclist in the Tour de France needs each stage above their basal level, we’ve totalled up the calorie estimates for each stage of the 2025 Tour for a couple of riders who share their Strava files online.

Sepp Kuss finished 17th in 2025, 1 hour 20 behind Tour winner Tadej Pogačar and posted his full set of Strava files for every stage. Matej Mohorič, who finished 126th, 5 hours 10 minutes behind Pogačar, posted stats for every stage except stage 7. We’ve taken Kuss’s Strava calorie count for Mohorič too for that stage.

Totalling their calorie burn estimates on Strava, Kuss expended 79,170 calories, while Mohorič burned 84,762 calories. Mohorič’s published weight is 70kg, whereas Kuss’s is 61kg, so you’d expect the larger man to burn more calories. That was true on almost every stage and particularly pronounced on mountain stages. For both riders, Strava shows the lowest calorie expenditure, averaging 673 calories, on the 10.9km uphill time trial from Loudenvielle to Peyragudes on stage 13 though.

Remco Evenepoel’s numbers on Strava were consistent with those of Kuss and Mohorič for road stages up until stage 12 – he abandoned the race on stage 14 after his poor result in the stage 13 time trial and didn’t publicly post his stats for the stage 5 time trial, which he won.

Pogačar too posts some of his racing to Strava, but Strava’s estimated calorie output is only around two-thirds that of Evenepoel, Kuss and Mohorič. Make of that what you will, but it’s likely he’s spoofed some of the data to hide the real numbers. According to Strava, it “uses your power output and a human-efficiency coefficient to estimate calories”, so it would be relatively easy to scale down power numbers before posting to Strava.

What does that mean in real terms?

“When a craving hits for those two all-beef patties it’s time to stop thinking about what’s on a Big Mac and take a bite”, according to McDonalds. At 580 calories per Big Mac in the US, one of its prize hamburgers might go some way to filling the energy needs of Kuss and Mohorič.

They’d have to stuff down quite a few to fuel their Tours de France though; around 140, of which ten would be needed to fuel the toughest stage in 2025, stage 18 from Vif to Col de la Loze with 5,642m of climbing, when they averaged just over 6,000 calories.

That’s in addition to their basal metabolism, so the actual number of Big Macs they’d need to keep fuelled for three weeks of racing would be significantly greater.

You’d soon get bored with eating solely Big Macs every day and the 34g of fat per burger isn’t ideal. In practice, pro teams take great care to provide riders with a balanced and diverse diet, to avoid food fatigue when eating to fuel such a high sustained energy output.

Teams travel with a nutritionist and a mobile kitchen staffed by one or more chefs to source fresh food at local supermarkets during the race and prepare the riders’ meals.

Numbers of gels and energy drinks consumed during a stage are tallied and pre- and post-race food requirements are calculated down to the gram to ensure that each individual rider stays optimally fuelled.

How does a Tour de France rider’s energy output compare with other athletes?

Strava data for Kuss and Mohorič suggests they averaged around 4,000 calories per stage to reach their 80,000 calories total for the race. How does that compare with other elite sports?

World Cup soccer players

It’s estimated that a pro soccer player will burn around 1,500 calories in a 90 minute match, for the outfield players at least. Over the eight games played in the World Cup by a team reaching the final four, that would equate to 12,000 calories in total over the five week duration of the tournament.

Tennis players

It’s estimated that a male pro tennis player burns just shy of 1,000 calories during a 90 minute match and a female player around 700 calories. It is worth bearing in mind though that the average Wimbledon final was 2h45m-3hrs for a men's singles best of five sets match, and 1h20m-1h45m for the women, who play best of three sets.

A 2021 study, using doubly-labelled water to assess energy needs (a method involving drinking water where the oxygen and hydrogen have been replaced with uncommon isotopes, and excretions then measured to assess metabolic rate), assessed the total energy expenditure (so the energy needed for play plus their basal energy expenditure) of a male and female pro tennis player over a 17 day period, including Wimbledon. It calculated that the male player averaged 5,520 calories per day and that he ran over 10km during 734 minutes of play across five matches.

The female player burned 3,824 calories per day, running 7.3km during five matches with a total of 519 minutes of play.

Marathon runners

Estimates suggest that it requires over 2,600 calories to run a marathon. When Sabastian Sawe ran the first sub-two hour marathon in London in April 2026, Maurten, which provided his in-race fuel, states that he consumed 115g of carbs per hour, so 230g in total, which equates to around 1,000 calories.

That figure was based on meticulous pre-race testing, including using doubly-labelled water to assess Sawe’s energy expenditure and feeding him carbon-13 labelled sugars (sugars where the standard carbon-12 has been replaced with the uncommon carbon-13 isotope) to measure his carbohydrate uptake. The balance of his energy needs would come from his internal glycogen and fat stores.

Ultramarathon runners

Ultramarathon runners have similar energy expenditure to marathon runners, just for longer durations. A recent study calculated total energy expenditure for two runners in the 161km Wasatch Front mountain ultramarathon at over 15,000 calories over 32.8 hours, or over 11,000 calories per day. One reported drinking 15.7 litres and the other 21.8 litres of fluid over the course of the race.

The study concluded that the runners only consumed around half the energy they expended, with the rest coming from their pre-race glycogen and fat reserves. The runners consumed around 20,000 excess calories and up to 40 litres of water in the seven day period after the race as they recovered.

Triathletes

It’s calculated that Ironman triathletes burn between 8,000 and 10,000 calories during an event. According to the Pyrenean Performance Lab, citing a study back in 2002, this comprises around 750 calories for the swim, 5,000 calories for the cycling and 3,500 calories for the run leg.

The 2002 study indicated that triathletes only managed to consume around 38% of this (3,500 calories) during the event itself, the majority (70%) during the bike leg. This resulted in a 5,800 calorie energy deficit at the end of the event.

Feeding strategies have probably got more clever since 2002. Training the gut to absorb a greater carb volume and optimised carb ratios in sports nutrition products are major levers of higher fuelling ratios. While it used to be thought that 60g of carbs per hour was the maximum that could be ingested, 120g or more is now often reported. Cameron Wurf claimed to have consumed around 200g per hour during his fastest-ever bike leg at an event last year.

And the rest

High altitude mountaineering is also energy-intensive, with estimates ranging between 6,000 and 10,000 calories per day. Climbers usually lose weight, with a study finding two-thirds of this to be due to fat loss. Appetite is suppressed at high altitude, everything you eat has to be carried on your back – or your sherpa’s – plus you have to melt snow for hours to drink.

And share a thought for those looking to ride the 4,300km Tour Divide from Canada to the Mexican border. Frenchman Victor Bosoni recently completed the challenge in just over 11 days, setting an FKT on his Factor Sarana. We don’t have his stats, but a post from Reserve wheels covering its ambassador Max Riese’s 2025 Tour Divide reports that he burned 113,000 calories over 14 days.

As a self-supported race, nutrition is whatever you can find in gas stations in the sparsely populated hinterland en route. It probably makes that Big Mac a dream meal.

Each year, when the Tour de France rolls round, the tech team at Cyclingnews heads to the Grand Départ before the race and, as we affectionately describe it, do a tour of hotel car parks. More specifically, we meet each team in turn, often in a somewhat random order, and eye up their bikes to create our mega Grand Départ tech gallery.

This year, with stage 1 being a team time trial, we spent the whole of Saturday bouncing from bus to bus, pulling together our team time trial tech gallery.

Most teams are very accommodating. Both Visma-Lease a Bike and UAE Team Emirates-XRG kindly dug out their respective leaders' road and time trial bikes for standalone galleries; Lidl-Trek provided iced coffees, NSN let us have a nosey about the mechanics' truck, and Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe kindly (albeit accidentally) left us a van door open. Oops/thanks.

But as well as all that, while we're in and amongst the action, we get to see some unusual stuff. Things that are either out of place, downright cool, or just simply funny.

This gallery is where you'll find those things. I've rounded up 30 images of just that: silly things, new things, and a photo of a saddle that looks like a curious emu.

Le Col just launched its Summer Sale, slashing up to 60% off some of the market's best cycling apparel. The sitewide discounts covers both the Men's and Women's ranges, and includes the best cycling jerseys, best bib shorts, waterproof jackets, accessories, and off bike lifestyle goodies too.

Shop the Le Col Summer Sale and save up to 60%.

If the Tour de France has inspired you to get out riding in the current glorious UK weather, the Le Col Summer Sale offers the perfect excuse to upgrade your cycling gear.

With such hefty discounts, the Le Col Sale is offering exceptional value for money, and it's sure to be popular. So if something catches your eye, I'd suggest snapping it up fast before it's gone, as like all the best sales, it's only while stock lasts.

Below I've added a selection of Le Col kit from the Men's and Women's Sale, and there are plenty of socks, you can never have enough cycling socks, right?

Some readers may be aware that Le Col entered a period of administration earlier this year. However, it is now trading normally again.

Le Col Men's Summer Sale Highlights

Le Col Women's Summer Sale Highlights

The Le Col Summer Sale is live now, and there is plenty of kit to choose from, and there is free shipping for orders over £130.

If you are a Le Col Member then there are exclusive member only reductions, including the LC_CC kit.

The chosen deals are from the UK site, but Le Col US is also carrying discounts, and worth checking out if you're US-based.

Below you'll also find Le Col deals from other retailers, which show the best prices in your territory.

Cycling, and the Tour de France, has a storied history with watch brands that goes back years. Tudor has its own team nowadays, but there’s been Festina in the past, and a longstanding partnership with Tissot and ASO.

Big Luxury Brands such as Richard Mille have established a strong presence in professional cycling through sponsorships and partnerships with top riders; therefore, high-end timepieces are more visible in the peloton than ever before.

Both Tadej Pogačar and Mathieu van der Poel are sponsored by Richard Mille while they are riding. However, beyond their partnership with Richard Mille, both riders are well known for being genuine watch enthusiasts, so they have built impressive personal collections over the years by themselves.

The longer I have followed the world of watches in professional cycling, the more I have realised that many riders are passionate collectors or own remarkable timepieces, beyond ‘just’ Rolex models that often take the headlines. For many professionals, a watch is far more than a luxury accessory; it often marks a significant milestone such as a major race victory, the signing of a new contract, or another important chapter in their lives.

Looking back through cycling history, fascinating timepieces have been part of the sport for decades. Even during the era of Greg LeMond, remarkable watches could be spotted on the wrists of professional cyclists. For example, at the 1990 Tour de France, LeMond was wearing a Cartier Santos on the final podium and during the time trial.

Throughout the years, several of the sport’s biggest stars have rewarded their teammates with luxury watches after major victories, too. One of the best-known examples is Mark Cavendish, who reportedly gifted each of his lead-out teammates a green Rolex Submariner when he won the green jersey at the 2011 Tour de France. The gesture perfectly illustrates how a fine watch can become a lasting symbol of teamwork, gratitude, and a career-defining achievement.

With that in mind, here are the ten most interesting watches spotted during the opening week of the 2026 Tour de France.

Tadej Pogačar’s Richard Mille 64-01 “Tourbillon Colnago”

We start with the most expensive watch spotted, worn by Tadej Pogačar. It’s worth noting that UAE Team Emirates became an official partner of Richard Mille in February 2021 on a multi-year deal that continues to this day.

Pogačar is also a personal brand ambassador for Richard Mille, beyond the team partnership. He regularly wears the ultra-light RM 67-02 (the same model as Mathieu van der Poel and the one that caused him to bleed profusely from the wrist during Paris-Roubaix) during races, but at this year's Tour he got a new model, the so-called “Colnago Edition”. This watch is limited to 50 pieces and is worth an estimated $1,000,000.

This new model combines cycling with the highest level of watchmaking artistry. By fusing the aesthetic and technical codes of Richard Mille with the visual cues of the Italian bike brand, the RM 64-01 Tourbillon Colnago is a new masterpiece to those who appreciate the often divisive aesthetics of Richard Mille watches. In simple terms, the skeletonised construction has been manufactured in such a way that the supports for the movement resemble the tube shapes of a Colnago frame.

Despite being a brand ambassador for Richard Mille, Pogačar has an extensive collection of watches from other brands that we can see him wearing when not racing.

One of them for example is a Rolex Daytona Platinum, with a current approximate market value of $165,000, a watch also spotted on the wrist of Tom Pidcock. Pogačar also owns a Rolex Green Submariner “Starbucks”, estimated to cost $15,000, and was spotted with a black Cartier Santos (around $9,000) recently, perhaps as a nod to Greg LeMond.

Mathieu van der Poel’s Richard Mille 67-02

Mathieu van der Poel was wearing one of his RM 67-02s at the start of the Tour, a watch we see on his wrist at every race and something that caused quite a stir at last year’s Tour given the price of the model.

Since early 2025, Van der Poel has been an official ambassador for Richard Mille, like Pogačar. The partnership is also showcased on the brand’s official website.

One of the key advantages of the RM 67-02 as a watch for cyclists (if one absolutely must wear a fabulously expensive watch while riding) is its exceptionally slim profile and ultralight weight. Weighing just around 32 grams, the RM 67-02 is crafted from Carbon TPT® and titanium. Combined with its highly shock-resistant movement, it is perfectly suited to the demands of professional cycling, whether on the road, over cobblestones, or on rough off-road terrain.

The current market value of the Richard Mille 67-02 varies depending on the specific athlete edition (for example, Mathieu van der Poel, Tadej Pogačar, or tennis star Alexander Zverev). Standard examples typically trade on the pre-owned market for around €220,000 to €320,000, while highly sought-after or limited editions can command upwards of €450,000.

The Richard Mille RM 67-02 regularly worn by Van der Poel is widely estimated to be worth around $300,000 on today’s market, although the exact value depends on the specific configuration and current market demand.

Away from Richard Mille, Mathieu van der Poel has also been a passionate watch collector of other brands. His personal collection includes several timepieces from Audemars Piguet, including both the iconic Royal Oak and Royal Oak Chronograph. He also owns a number of Rolex watches, with a particular preference for gold sports models, like his yellow gold GMT-Master II, or the Everose Gold GMT-Master II “Root Beer”. He also owns a Rolex “Sprite”, and the iconic stainless steel Daytona “Panda”.

Based on the watches he has worn publicly, the estimated value of his private collection is likely in the region of $300,000 to $500,000, although the exact figure is, of course, unknown.

Jasper Philipsen’s Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Selfwinding Chronograph

Philipsen, arguably the second highest-paid rider at Alpecin-Premier Tech, also appears to have developed a strong interest in fine watches.

Unlike some of his fellow professionals, however, Philipsen never wears a watch during races. It is only away from racing - or before and after a stage - that he is seen wearing one of his collection.

Over the past few years, he has been seen in a decent variety of options, including a classy Rolex Cosmograph Daytona “Panda”, a Rolex Submariner Date with green bezel, a Tudor Black Bay Chrono, and also a Rolex GMT-Master II “Batman”.

Ahead of this year’s Tour de France, Philipsen was once again seen with an eye-catching watch. During his arrival at the airport, the Belgian sprinter was photographed by a fan wearing an Audemars Piguet Royal Oak Selfwinding Chronograph, with a handsome green dial. This is further proof that luxury watches have become a visible part of modern professional cycling culture.

This model currently commands a market value of approximately $60,000 to $70,000 depending on its condition and completeness.

Quinn Simmons’ Tudor Black Bay Chrono “Panda”

Quinn Simmons has frequently been spotted wearing a popular two-tone Rolex Submariner (two-tone in this case meaning a combination of two different materials; in his case, gold and steel). However, at this year's opening event, he wore an understated Tudor on a leather strap. It was a Black Bay Chrono with “Panda“ dial. Such Tudor models are estimated to be about $4,000 to $6,000 depending on condition and age.

Mauro Schmid’s Rolex Yacht-Master 40

As a Swiss rider from the home of fine watchmaking, it seems appropriate that Mauro Schmid also wears a high-end Swiss timepiece. And what else could it be but a Rolex?

During the Tour de France opening event in Barcelona, Schmid was spotted wearing a Rolex Yacht-Master 40 with a platinum blue dial. The watch, which can also come with a slate grey dial with light blue accents, is perhaps the most elegant sports models in Rolex’s current collection, at least in this writer's opinion.

The Rolex Yacht-Master 40 has an official retail price of around $13,200. On today’s market, however, it is typically valued at approximately $14,000 to $16,000, depending on its condition and completeness.

Clément Russo’s Breitling Superocean Heritage Automatic

French cyclist Clément Russo was also spotted wearing a nice watch during the TDF opening event. This time, however, it was not a Rolex, but another prestigious Swiss timepiece from Breitling.

At first glance, the watch was not easy to identify from the available photographs. After conducting further research and confirming the model directly with Clément Russo, it turned out to be a Breitling Superocean Heritage Automatic with a blue dial.

The Superocean Heritage combines the brand’s renowned dive-watch heritage with a modern, sporty design. It has an official retail price of approximately $5,500, while pre-owned examples typically trade for around $3,800 to $4,500.

Luke Plapp’s Tudor Black Bay Chrono “Pink”

Australian cyclist and big watch lover, Luke Plapp, was spotted wearing an eye-catching number during the Grand Dèpart this year, a Tudor Black Bay Chrono “Pink”.

The watch is one of Tudor’s most distinctive and sought-after modern releases. It was introduced as part of the brand’s collaboration with several high-profile ambassadors, including David Beckham, co-owner of Inter Miami (who play in pink), and musician Jay Chou.

Although many cycling fans believe the watch was created specifically to celebrate the Giro d’Italia and its iconic pink jersey, this is in fact a misconception. Nevertheless, the model has become particularly popular among professional cyclists and cycling enthusiasts alike.

It had an official retail price of approximately $6,350 and is currently estimated to trade on the secondary market for around $6,600 to $9,000 dollars, depending on its condition and completeness.

Luke Plapp has also been spotted in the past with several other timepieces over the years. Among them are an Omega Speedmaster “Olympic Edition” and a Rolex Datejust with the popular “Wimbledon” dial, perhaps indicating that Plapp has a penchant for watches with a sporting connection.

The exact value of his watch collection is not easy to determine, as it is unknown how many timepieces he currently owns. However, based on the watches that have been publicly documented, the value of his collection is likely to exceed $50,000.

Ben O’Connor’s Cartier Santos

Something different for a change: a Cartier.

Australian professional cyclist Ben O’Connor was spotted wearing a Cartier Santos as he rolled onto the TDF podium during the opening presentation. Judging by the bracelet and overall appearance, the watch appears to be an older vintage model rather than a current-production Santos. As a result, the exact reference number cannot be identified with certainty from the available photographs.

What is clear, however, is that it is a classy Cartier Santos, one of the most iconic luxury sports watches ever produced. Depending on the exact reference and condition, Cartier Santos models of this type are typically valued at between $3,000 and $10,000 on today’s market. With a gold component to the build, they can be significantly higher.

José Joaquín Rojas’ Rolex Submariner Date “Hulk”

As this list is not limited just to active riders, but rather focuses on notable timepieces spotted during the Tour de France opening presentation, José Joaquín Rojas also deserves a place among the top ten.

The former Spanish professional cyclist, who ended his racing career in 2023 and now serves as a sports director for Movistar, has been a passionate watch enthusiast for many years. His collection reportedly includes a Rolex GMT-Master II, a Rolex Daytona Steel, and he has also previously been spotted wearing a Hublot.

In Barcelona, however, Rojas was seen wearing one of the most iconic discontinued Rolex sports watches, the Submariner Date “Hulk”. Unlike the newer Submariner “Starbucks”, which features a green bezel and a black dial, the “Hulk” combines a green Cerachrom bezel with a matching green dial.

Introduced in 2010 and discontinued in September 2020, the Rolex Submariner “Hulk” originally had an official retail price of approximately $9,050. Since production ended, it has become one of the most sought-after modern Rolex sports watches. As of July 2026, the model typically trades on the secondary market for around $19,000 to $22,000 depending on its condition, production year, and completeness. Its strong collector demand continues to drive its value upward, making it a true modern Rolex icon.

Paul Seixas’ Breitling Chronomat B31 Automatic 40

The watch on the wrist of French rising star (is he even ‘rising’ at this point?) Paul Seixas is a Breitling Chronomat B31 Automatic 40. The model is instantly recognisable thanks to its distinctive stainless-steel Rouleaux bracelet.

In July 2026, the Swiss luxury watchmaker Breitling officially welcomed the 19-year-old French prodigy into the fold as a brand ambassador.

At the same time, Breitling unveiled the Top Time B01 Eddy Merckx on 1 July 2026, a special edition created as a tribute to the legendary Belgian cycling icon. With its newly announced partnership with Seixas, Breitling is using the Tour de France peloton to showcase the new models on the wrist of one of cycling’s brightest young talents. Seixas’ watch costs about €6,400.

I think it’s safe to say the Cannondale SuperSix Evo has a passionate, dedicated following. Like the Specialized Tarmac, and maybe the Pinarello Dogma, it has a healthy lineage and hoards of passionate fans keen to espouse how it is the best road bike on the planet.

The new version is very similar to the outgoing model, which I must say was excellent. I had the pleasure of cutting about on a mid-spec model in the French Alps for a good while off the back of some work trips, in addition to a lovely week in Cornwall during a heatwave blasting along the always shockingly hilly coast roads. It’s good. In fact, it’s very good, but I don’t necessarily think it’s sufficiently different from the old one to justify itself from a consumer standpoint, in much the same way as the latest Giant Propel.

Design and Aesthetics

I know the designers will have been beavering away at improving the platform for months, but when I picked the bike up I did genuinely have to check it wasn’t the previous model. Visually it’s a very similar silhouette, with the key giveaway being the seatpost, which loses the cutout near the top. The fork crown is slimmer, and the head tube is 10mm lower (thanks to input from Ben Healey, apparently) which all amounts to a bike that is, according to Cannondale, basically just as aero as the old one, though anywhere from 35-72g lighter depending on tier, which is the same as one or two double espressos, not including the cup and saucer.

The geometry is basically the same save for the lower headtube, which affects the stack and slightly the reach too, which is good because the handling was always the big selling point of any racy Cannondale, and top-tier models get a beautiful carbon one-piece cockpit, though mid- and lower-tier options have to make do with a separate system. In my SRAM Force model, retailing for a cool $7,000, I would like to see a one-piece. There isn’t anything physically wrong with the Vision TriMax bar and conceal stem combo, and it is at least relatively narrow, but it looks like a bit of a cop out, especially with the holes at the base of the wings for external cables that will never be used. It’s like Cannondale either got a mad deal on a shedload of them, or already had a load kicking about and needed to fit them to something to shift them.

While we’re talking aesthetics, I am also not overly enamoured with the paint options. It’s matters not a jot to performance, but considering Cannondale is the brand that brought us the lefty fork, a bike with a rollerblade for a front wheel, and sponsors a pro team with vibes being as much of a performance metric as wins, the colour options all look like they were chosen by a boardroom full of Agent Smiths from The Matrix; it’s all a little corporate and plain. Give me anything but variations on grey, please!

Happily, the days of slightly bonkers Cannondale standards are behind us; the wheels are normally dished, and the bottom bracket isn’t a brand new standard that’ll die out in 6-8 months. The only slightly zany thing is the aero bottles and cages, which I have to admit I didn’t get on with; It was like being 17 again. When you’re on a low-pressure training ride it’s fine, but when the chips are down, and you’re pushing on, it takes a level of thought to get them back into the cage that a round bottle and normal cage simply doesn’t require.

Happily, our own wind tunnel tests show a noticeable improvement on the old model in aero terms, with a 6.9 watt benefit versus the old SuperSix, but this still sits it very much mid-table. It isn’t an aero bike, whatever the bottles say, and the low weight does mean it has designs on the high mountains. Top-spec models can be 6.4kg out of the box, while this model tips the balance at 7.7kg, which is certainly competitive at this price point.

Performance

Unlike the Seka Spear, which has exceptional aerodynamics and a middling ride, the new SuperSix has middling aerodynamics and an exceptional ride. The old one handled very well, and the new one handles… well, the same really. It’s certainly up there in the mix with the best of the best in terms of how it rides, with a poise and balance that only really comes unstuck and gets a little squirrelly above 75km/h when hard on the brakes approaching an alpine hairpin a little too quickly. The rest of the time it’s a delight, turning in on demand and, when faced with surprise oncoming lorries messing up my apex-kissing, able to dive out of a corner as fast as it jumps into it.

There’s nothing terribly wrong with the DT Swiss ERC wheels and Schwalbe One tyres in this spec, but they do feel a little wooden, especially the tyres, when mounted to a platform that sings in the bends as well as this. To see what could reasonably be achieved with some light modding, I slapped a pair of the new Zipp 202 NSW wheels and some 30mm Continental GP5000 S TR tyres and things were markedly better, though probably slightly less aerodynamic.

I have no qualms with the groupset, and other than it feeling like a cheap spec option, the cockpit was plenty stiff enough to hold up to sprints and hard cornering, as was the frame. It’s no Ridley Noah, but it has that taught bowstring I look for in all the best all-rounders that produces a pleasing efficiency when the road points uphill. Again, this was aided by swapping to the Zipp wheels, but realistically I think anything slightly more premium would be an improvement.

One thing that slightly confuses me is the decision to only change the groupset when going from Rival to Force-tier builds. Same wheels, same tyres, same afterthought cockpit. These components feel perfectly good on a Rival-level build, but they feel a little lacklustre on this mid-spec model, and I’d like to see more to bridge the gap to the premium builds. You can get a build with Reserve wheels for more money, which is good to see, however.

I found the position absolutely fine, but I test racy bikes for a living, and so the lower front end proved no impediment. I can’t help but feel, however, that catering to a single Ben Healey may have an alienating effect on a large proportion of the customer base who maybe don’t have the same supple lumbar spines as pro athletes.

In reality, aside from the cockpit, I can’t really fault it in terms of performance. It is brilliant, and while I lament the slightly corporate vibe of the thing, that has no impact on how it goes, turns, and stops, all of which are done in relative comfort. When we tested it in the wind tunnel, the seatpost looked alarmingly flexible laterally, but I am happy to report this wasn't borne out on the road. Comfy, but never floppy anywhere, all without being over-stiff; a bike I’d happily spend all day on were it not for the demands of modern life.

Value

Compared to a Force-equipped Tarmac, there’s a gulf of £250 in favour of the SuperSix at RRP. The Specialized Tarmac SL8, however, comes with a better cockpit and better wheels, so it’s a far better deal in my view. Speccing the better Reserve wheelset jumps things up £2k, but at least then you get the integrated cockpit, and then it’s a good wedge more than the Tarmac.

To further tip the scales against the SuperSix, an Ultegra spec Canyon Aeroad is only £104 dearer than an Ultegra SuperSix, but comes with an integrated cockpit, higher calibre DT Swiss ARC wheels, and top spec Continental tyres.

It’s a hard sell really, no matter how well it handles. This is further compounded by the fact you can still pick up 2025 model SuperSixes, which will ride just as well and only suffer a minor aero and weight penalty, for significantly less cash.

Verdict

In terms of pure performance, the latest Cannondale SuperSix Evo is a brilliant bike to ride. It handles superbly, climbs well, and while the aero package isn’t sensational, it’s an improvement over the old one. When viewed in isolation it’s great, but as soon as you start adding in the context of other options the value proposition isn’t as strong as other options, even from brands that traditionally command a premium.

If you have a SuperSix from a few years ago, I wouldn’t stress about upgrading. It’s certainly in the mix if you’re looking for a brilliant all-rounder, but if you were my mate down the pub I’d suggest you look for a 2025 model on sale before spending big on a 2026 model.

Since the heady days of peak Team Sky, the phrase ‘marginal gains’ has become so commonplace as to almost be a mantra for the sport as a whole. New bikes come out every year promising measurable gains in aerodynamics, weight, and stiffness, and every year pro mechanics meticulously modify them, especially for the Tour de France. We’ve seen some expensive mods, like Lidl-Trek’s $1,300 hub upgrades for every bike to shave a few grams, but while my colleagues roamed the pits in Barcelona they saw some truly marginal, marginal gains.

You may find some of these laughable, but when stages are won and lost by millimetres, and the calorific savings of even tiny gains adding up massively over a three week race, I choose to marvel at the seemingly bottomless well of innovation that performance engineers seem to draw from, as well as what must be near infinite reserves of patience from the armies of team mechanics who have to implement these modifications. Without further ado, then, in no particular order…

Tape over every bolt and void

Some bolts sit proud, some sit flush, and some are recessed. In all cases, though, there’s a little void into which your hex key or Torx bit goes, and the wind can eddy within these, ever so slightly increasing the system drag on the bike. Some are important due to being at the leading edge, such as the handlebar bolts on Jonas Vingegaard’s Cervélo S5, and others are important as they’re just big ol’ holes, like the hollow on the non-drive side of SRAM cranks.

If you’re going to tape one bolt though, you may as well do them all, and nobody does this quite like Visma-Lease a Bike, who even go so far as to tape over the adjustment bolts on the team’s seatposts. Tape, handily, doesn’t weigh much at all, so you can use it with gay abandon.

An aerodynamic bottom bracket

I’m sure, like me, you’ve spent hours staring down at your external bottom bracket cups just wishing they weren’t so damnably un-aero. UAE Team Emirates, or more specifically Tadej Pogačar, doesn’t have to stress about this as he has an aftermarket unit from Bikone fitted to his Colnago Y1Rs with a totally smooth non-drive side threaded cup to ‘save watts with every pedal stroke’ according to the brand, though it doesn’t say quite how many watts.

Considering that in order to remove the unit you need a special proprietary tool that tightens the cup from the drive side, it’s no wonder that only the team leaders get the unspecified wattage gains to go along with the 17g weight saving over the standard Bikone unit.

Special jockey wheel bolts

Pro cycling went through a phase where if you didn’t have an aftermarket rear derailleur cage with oversized pulley wheels, you may as well not turn up. The trouble with these massive sprockets is that they tended to weigh more, and at times they create something of a sponsorship clash. Now teams are looking to get their aero bikes down to the UCI weight limit rather than simply chasing every aero gain. Now, again at the UAE paddock, we’ve seen derailleur cages go on a diet, with the stock Dura-Ace retaining bolts for the jockey wheels being swapped out for aluminium ones.

Sadly, the CarbonTi website appears to be down, so for now the weight saving is unknown, but it’s good to see good old-fashioned weight weenieism alive and well.

Strips of coloured tape

No gram savings here, or ways to trick the wind. Lidl-Trek for the opening team time trial applied strips of different coloured tape down the sides of each rider's TT bike in an effort to reduce the cognitive load, and perhaps with a knock-on aero benefit too. If you’ve only got to think ‘I go in the line after I see yellow ’, you can glance across without really having to change your position at all and slot in when the colour is right. This is much easier than having to work out ‘is that Mattias Skjelmose’s lower leg spinning at 100rpm?’ Smart, and it builds on the Astana hack from 2025 where the riders wore different coloured gloves and aero socks.

DIY Aero derailleur

Is there no limit to the utility of black electrical tape? Not only can it be used to tape over every bolt and void on a bike, but it can also be used to tape over the lower portions of a Shimano derailleur cage to make a superlight aero hack, as we saw at the Ineos paddock. This must weigh a gram or two and save… well, who knows. Not a lot, but considering it costs pennies, you may as well do it, right?

Superlight bottle cages

For the last few years, the Elite Custom Race Plus was the king of the pro cycling bottle cage castle, partially because it’s good and also light, and partially because Elite sponsors many, many teams. Now, though, more and more riders are turning their backs on tradition and opting instead for the new Elite Leggero Carbon, tipping the scales at a mere 13g a piece; a 27g saving per cage which is on the cusp of being a maximal gain by the standards of this list. Pogačar himself even swaps his aero bottle cages on his Colnago Y1Rs for a set of these in his never-ending quest to keep his bike both aero and superlight.

Aftermarket thru-axles

Another quite un-glamourous part that’s been given the bling treatment at the UAE paddock is the humble thru-axle, which the team has swapped out for lightweight aluminium versions, again from CarbonTi, tipping the scales at a mere 31g for the rear of a Y1Rs.

Real weight weenies know that carbon thru-axles can be found, which weigh in the region of 30g for a pair, but we’re yet to see these be adopted anywhere yet, though it must be said the actual shaft could be made of cheese or spun sugar for all we’re usually able to see of it.

Lightweight disc rotor lockrings

While Lidl-Trek’s fancy hubs garnered a lot of attention, our eye was also drawn to one end of them where the standard disc rotor lockrings had been replaced by grey Tactic-branded units. These are ‘exceptionally light and strong’, and weigh a claimed 12.4 grams per pair; they are also machined from the same aerospace-grade aluminium as the hubs. There’s probably a handful of grams at play in swapping to these, and in all likelihood it’s probably as much an aesthetic or sponsor arrangement as an actual gain.

Old series Garmin

One thing that caught my eye while poring over images of Jonas Vingegaard’s Cervélo P5 time-trial bike was his choice of computer. Rather than the current small-but-premium Garmin Edge 550 that his team’s sponsor offers, he chose to run the smaller, older Garmin Edge 540. Given that for a time trial he was likely relying on a power number and perhaps a distance figure, the need for anything larger was likely surplus to requirement.

Aftermarket derailleur hanger

Derailleur hangers have two jobs: connect the rear derailleur to the frame, and in the event of a crash, they should bend or snap before the derailleur or frame does. Despite this, we’ve seen many iterations of upgraded hangers over the years, promising lower weight and crisper shifting, something that’s very hard to quantify.

These crop up on many pro bikes, but Pogačar seems to be the main culprit, with various coloured options depending on show at various points throughout the year.

Aerodynamic saddle

Yes, the thing that is almost entirely covered by your rear end for almost the entire time you’re riding your bike can be made aerodynamic, as evidenced by Jonas Vingegaard and his €490 Prologo Choice saddle, which is modular and features side vents for ‘unprecedented aerodynamic efficiency’. I’m not sure there was any precedent for aero saddles as yet, so Prologo is probably right in this regard, though actual wattage figures are hard to come by on the brand’s website.

Watch the pro teams line up for a pre-stage presentation at the Tour de France and you’ll see few hairs on display from the waist down. Pros and most road cyclists shave their legs, at least during the shorts season, but why go to the bother?

There are a couple of straightforward answers and some more involved ones.

On a simple level, cyclists – or at least road cyclists – have always shaved their legs. It’s a rite of passage to show that you’re a ‘serious’ roadie to get rid of your leg fluff, as much as riding with clipless pedals. There's certainly an amount of this that is 'pro cycling cosplay' though; pros do it, so I will too.

It probably also looks better to see a row of cyclists at the start line with smooth, brown legs than hairy legs too, particularly alongside the skin-tight clothing that’s another signal that you’re serious about your riding. Smooth legs might help with heat dissipation too.

Beyond that, pro riders have a massage after every stage to relax their leg muscles, reduce soreness, speed up removal of waste products and increase the speed of recovery, ready for the next day’s racing.

A massage is much more comfortable for a rider with smooth legs than hairy ones and there’s less mess from the creams and oils used if there are no hairs for it to get stuck in. It’s better for the masseurs too; it's been said that massaging hairy legs is like massaging a cactus.

Then there are the crashes. It’s easier to clean a wound if there aren’t hairs in the way. If your legs are bandaged after a crash, it’s less uncomfortable to change dressings if they are not pulling hairs from your legs as they are removed. It should be easier to apply creams and other medications to promote healing and there should be less chance of infection.

And we all know how uncomfortable scabs can be as they start to flake off if they have hairs and grit stuck in them.

More aero too

These are all classic reasons why cyclists shave their legs, which have been given for generations. But with the increasing obsession with aerodynamics, another reason for cyclists to shave their legs has come to the fore: it’s more aero.

Back in 2014, Specialized put six particularly hairy legged cyclists in its wind tunnel, measured the drag, then shaved their legs and repeated the runs. Its results suggested that there was a time saving over 40km of up to 82 seconds from shaving their legs and an average of 70 seconds. That’s around ten times the time saving of just 28 seconds over 100km Specialized claims for an upgrade from the Tarmac SL8 to the latest Tarmac SL9.

That number sounds enormous and has drawn scepticism, but others have repeated the test, with similar results, although we’ve yet to try it ourselves. For example, this video from 2024 found a 13 watt advantage for a triathlete when he shaved his legs and arms.

But shaving your legs completely may not be as aero as shaving a pattern into your leg hair. The late Mike Burrows of Lotus bike and Giant TCR fame suggested that a mohican stripe of leg hair just ahead of your legs’ widest point might create a trip layer and make your legs faster still.

And back in 2018, Lotto-Soudal riders smeared ‘speed gel’ on their legs for the Critérium du Dauphiné time trial. This was claimed to disrupt the airflow and create a boundary layer, lowering drag. The team came third in the time trial and speed gel was promptly banned by the UCI.

Some cyclists go further and shave their arms. When Specialized tested this in 2014, it found the gains were around a quarter of those from shaved legs, so it might be worth keeping the razor out for a little longer and finishing the job.

Walking up and down the hill where several team buses were parked ahead of the Tour de France teams' presentation gave me my first proper look at nearly all of the riders' race bikes on the eve of the race.

Lidl-Trek's bikes have garnered a lot of attention already due to their very eye-catching 50th anniversary paint jobs. It's a busy design with a lot going on that will set tongues wagging.

Having stared at Lidl-Trek bikes at several races already this year, my eyes were drawn to the silver hubs of their Bontrager wheels almost immediately, and it seems the team has rolled out a special hub upgrade for the Tour this year.

The squad's Bontrager Aeolus wheels have been built up on Tactic VR01 V2 hubs, a set of superlight and very expensive hubs that weigh in at a claimed 207 grams per pair.

The hubs themselves, as well as being superlight, use a 60-tooth ratchet system and no-contact freehub seal for low drag. The hubs also have a preload adjustment collar to tweak preload, or how much the bearings are compressed, to ensure they spin as well as they possibly can.

The hubs use ABEC 7 bearings, and are machined from 70 Series aluminium in Germany. I priced a pair up on the Tactic website, and you can expect to pay around £973 or $1,299

Luckily I found myself stood next to Glen Leven, the team's technical manager, who was happy to chat about the hubs and told me a little bit about them. Leven explained the hubs saved about 70-80 grams of weight for the team, and that the squad had something of a deal worked out with Tactic for supply.

Over the last several months, we have also seen the team racing on Bontrager Aeolus wheels with different logos and shiny silver hubs; these wheels are still officially unreleased, and Leven told me we can expect them to launch later in the year.

I wondered if the upgrade was to offset some of the likely heavier special paint the bikes have, but regardless, lighter, low-drag hubs are music to the ears of all bike racers.

The team also has at least one all-black Madone race bike using the brand's Project One superlight Vapour Coat paint, and the team told me this bike was bang on the UCI 6.8kg weight limit, and even had to have heavier parts fitted to make it legal.

A few of the team's riders also raced on their 'normal' team-issue Madones during Stage 3, not the 50th anniversary bikes, which could possibly weigh a little more.

I also noticed the team running Tactic disc lockrings, and they are also super light at 12.4 grams per pair. Like the hubs, they are made from 70 series aluminium and have material machined away from the body.

After going over my photos, I spotted more aftermarket parts in the shape of Chaser Sports aluminium thru axles, a Chinese brand I wasn't familiar with.

Chaser Sports manufactures aftermarket, lightweight thru axles for several bike brands. The ones for the Lidl-Trek and Trek Madones cost 113 dollars and weigh a claimed 37 grams per pair.

This isn't the first time Tactic hubs have been used in the WorldTour; Team Ineos used them back in 2023 when they used Princeton wheels (Tactic is part of the Princeton family)

The Tour de France is underway, and first blood has been drawn. Jonas Vingegaard wears the race leader's yellow jersey, with Tadej Pogačar sitting a mere six seconds off the lead after Stage 2's explosive showdown in central Barcelona.

We bought you a comparison of the two big GC favourites' time trial bikes ahead of the opening TTT, and are following that up with their race bikes now the first stage is behind us.

We bagged some time with each rider's number two race bike at their respective team hotels in the days before the race, and took a look at their setups and a few details that, at times, fly under the radar for such famous bikes.

There's a breakdown of components here: crank lengths, tyre sizes, and dimensions. The game is set, and we're going to see a lot more of these machines over the coming days.

The bikes themselves

First, the machines themselves.

Pogačar is riding a Colnago Y1RS, which was launched in late 2024. Pogačar has taken countless big wins on it since then and uses it pretty much exclusively now in an all-black version that only he uses. The world champion rarely rides the less aero V5Rs, though Isaac del Toro did choose to use that bike for Stage 2.

Vingegaard, meanwhile, is using the Cervélo S5 aero model; that bike got a refinement in the middle of last year, and the two models are amongst the most aerodynamic in the WorldTour based on our CN Labs aero testing.

Handlebars

We were allowed a good look at both riders' number two race bikes, something that never fails to surprise and impress mere days out from the start of the world's biggest race. We did leave the mini shadow bike stands at home this time, and used a proper folding bike stand. The shadow stand is a great tool, but we wanted to minimise the risk of one of these bikes toppling over if we could; it wouldn't have been a good look.

Bar-wise, Vingegaard's S5 has the accompanying HB19 integrated bar and stem from Cervélo with a single 5mm spacer underneath. It's an aggressive and low front end, and after looking at so many bikes, where possible a low front end seems to be a priority for the team for an aero gain.

We didn't have time to get the tape measure out here for full measurements, but Vingegaard's bar looked reasonably narrow; Cervélo offers it in 36/40 and 38/42cm versions, and it will almost certainly be one of these two. As long as overall handlebar width is 40cm (measured outside to outside) and the inner distance between brake hoods is 28 cm, bars are deemed UCI legal.

Vingegaard has a photo of his family attached to the bars of his number one race bike, as we saw this at the TTT start.

Pogačar's bike features the Colnago CC.Y1 integrated bar and stem, with its distinctive forward sweep. Pogačar's bar had a 145mm 'stem' and was in the 377-400 size, which complies with the UCI rules. The bar has a reach of 79 and a drop of 130. Pogačar also had an aero Wahoo computer mount and the famous Hulk sticker on the top of the bars.

Drivetrain and gearing

Each rider and their teams use a different groupset, with Pogačar on Shimano Dura-Ace and Vingegaard on SRAM Red.

Vingegaard's bike was running SRAM Red 1x, and he's been on board with 1x drivetrains for quite some time now. His bike had 165mm cranks with a 52-tooth chainring with a 10-34 or 36 cassette, complete with a waxed chain.

Pogačar uses a 2x Dura-Ace setup with a range of aftermarket drivetrain parts. He runs 165mm cranks too, but this bike had 40-55 tooth Carbon-Ti chainrings, and thru axles, pulley wheel bolts, and a direct-mount rear mech hanger all from the same brand.

He had a Dura-Ace cassette with an 11-34 tooth sprocket sizing, and a chain that looked like it had a drip wax lube applied.

His bike was also fitted with a Beone bottom bracket - a Spanish manufacturer.

Pedal-wise, Vingegaard uses the Wahoo / Speedplay aero pedals that have dimples on one side. His team buys these pedals themselves as they have an existing sponsorship agreement with rival Garmin for computers.

Pogačar uses Dura-Ace SPD-SL pedals with yellow cleats for a few degrees of 'float'.

Wheels and tyres

When it comes to wheels and tyres, there are some interesting differences to be observed.

Vingegaard's bike was fitted with 30mm Vittoria Corsa Pro Speed time trial tyres set up tubeless. The team's Head of Performance Equipment, Jenco Drost, told me at a recent event that the team use a 29/30mm tyre combination for racing too, and said they had found it to be fastest, but no more.

Vingegaard had Reserve 42mm deep, semi- or mini-hooked wheels fitted with a 25.4mm internal width with external nipples and bladed spokes, and seems to often prefer a slightly shallower rim. The team will have tested all combinations, and though there's up to a 64mm option available, Vingegaard tends to run shallower wheels.

Interestingly, you can't seem to buy a pair of 42mm Reserve wheels on the brand's website; the stock configuration is a 42/49 pairing, so the team must have built up some 42mm rims.

Pogačar's bike was fitted with Enve SES Pro 4.5 wheels with a 49/55mm depth and 23.5mm internal width. These wheels also have a mini hook, but with internal spoke nipples and bladed spokes.

Pogačar also had time trial tyres fitted with Continental GP5000 TT tyres, also tubeless matching Vingegaard's all-out time trial tyre speed. He did, however, have 28mm tyres, so a slighly smaller size than Vingegaard.

Saddles, seatposts and extras

When it comes to saddles, Vingegaard had a 140mm Prologo Choice fitted, a sleek-looking saddle with a cutout that the brand says is aerodynamically optimised; check out those side 'vents' in the images.

It weighs a claimed 152 grams, and the rails can be separated from the carbon shell, allowing for replacement parts to be swapped in the event of a crash.

In terms of details, we were particularly impressed with the neatness with which the Visma mechanics had taped over various bolt holes to smooth airflow; everything looked tidy.

Pogačar uses a 3D printed Fizik Argo saddle without a cutout, and with carbon rails. The saddle is available in 140 and 150mm widths, but I wouldn't be surprised if this was a custom saddle for Pogačar himself. It's a little heavier than Vingegaard's, with a claimed weight of 196 grams, or 190 grams for the equivalent 140mm version.

With European temperatures soaring this year, and stage 3 of the Tour de France already in jeopardy thanks to wildfires, it’s no surprise to see teams and riders employing every trick in the book to keep cool. Core temperature has a huge impact on performance, with most riders adding body temperature sensors into their burgeoning repertoire of metrics.

A cool drink doesn’t really cut it nowadays, though it does help (either when ingested or simply dumped over one’s head); nowadays there are plenty of other ways to beat the heat, even if the UCI has decided to ban the good old fashioned ice sock (though sort of incidentally, through the ‘no stuffing anything down your jersey’ rule which we suspect won’t be enforced on road stages).

The ice sock

Get a pair of tights (it doesn’t massively matter what dernier they are, though fishnets may be sub-optimal), cut them up, stuff the cavity with ice and tie it off at both ends. Hand them to your riders to stuff down the back of their neck, and Bob’s your uncle; you’ve got a very simple, very cheap way of cooling the blood where it’s nearest the surface in big, high-volume vessels.

Yes, the UCI has banned their use, going so far as to make rider after rider remove them on their way to the start line, but the ban was simply an enforcement of a rule that forbids adding anything beyond a race radio up the inside of one’s jersey due to it changing the morphology of the rider.

We suspect that, though it will remain technically illegal, it will not be enforced for the remaining road stages as the UCI would then presumably also have to ban domestiques stuffing bottles up their jerseys to take to their teammates, and they would never do anything so inconsistent as that.

Ice vests

Most easily spotted when teams use the model that makes it look like they’re wearing a gilet of Kraft Singles, every team will have some sort of ice vest on hand for the riders to wear during their pre-stage warm up. The aim is to get the muscles firing and shake out some residual lactate, without allowing the body's core temperature to rise unduly or sweat too much, expelling vital fluids and salts.

They are rarely actual ice, however (if those orange squares weren’t a dead giveaway), but rather a higher-density cooling gel with a higher heat capacity, meaning they lose their heat (or cold, in this case) more slowly. They also usually stay in gel form, despite being sub-zero, meaning they can more readily conform to the rider’s body, increasing the surface area in contact with the gel, and thus increasing the effectiveness of the garment.

Some teams use vests that simply cover the whole torso, while others seem to have cooling patches only in strategic areas like the neck and spine.

Deluxe fans

Anyone who has tried to sleep through a recent heatwave without the delights of AC (yes, my American audience, you’ve got the drop on us there) will know how a simple desk fan can be the difference between sleep and another torturous night.

Pro teams use fans, but they take it up a notch, with many utilising high-tech models that inject a cool water mist into the path of the air to add evaporative cooling into the mix.

At the Stage 1 TTT Ineos fans had green water tanks, which did look like they were trying to irradiate Tobias Foss, and while many teams settled on just a misting fan, Tudor went one further and added a Wahoo Kickr Headwind smart fan next to their misting units to not only keep their riders extra cool, but also help blow Marco Haller’s hair back like he’s in an ‘80s music video.

Carbohydrate freeze pops

While we didn’t get any snaps of this in action, a frozen gel during the warm-up is a tried and tested hack that’s often brought out on the hottest days. There’s nothing fancy to it, and a very easy one to replicate back home, though eating a frozen one while riding is a lot harder than it is on a static bike on a trainer. At the very least, it could keep you cool while it thaws out.

The Alpecin riders were all eating ice pops a few minutes before the start of their TTT effort, and ice and slushies are often used to help lower riders' core temperatures.

Alcohol spray

Evaporative cooling is pretty simple. Put a liquid on your skin, and as it turns from a liquid to a gas, it takes heat away from your body, in very simple terms. Water has been the go-to for this since time immemorial, but water doesn’t actually evaporate very quickly, especially when it’s humid.

As such, teams have been opting for a spray bottle full of alcohol (surgical, rather than Smirnoff) or at least a mix of alcohol and water, which is usually sprayed only on the arms or legs. It evaporates more quickly, and therefore gives a more rapid cooling effect. In all honesty, this probably isn’t one to try at home, and definitely don’t go pouring any on your head, or near any road rash you might have picked up. It also probably plays havoc with your skin, and I don’t know of any teams yet having a moisturiser sponsor.

Forearm bathing

An old military trick for avoiding heat-related illness, but now co-opted by Ineos at the start of the opening stage. Your forearms have many blood vessels very close to the skin's surface, particularly when you’re as lean as pro cyclists are. Submerging the forearms entirely in cold water (8ºC according to our photos, which could have been colder with the addition of some ice we suspect) rapidly cools the blood and subsequently the core temperature, ready for it to shoot up again during the time trial.

It looks dumb, but if something looks stupid but works, then it isn’t dumb. While Ineos were just pipped at the last by a marauding Visma-Lease a Bike, it clearly didn’t do them any harm, and as a team famous for its attitude to marginal gains, we expect to see this employed by other squads down the line, perhaps as early as the next time trial.

Good old fashioned water

Despite all the high-tech options, the most used cooling method employed by the pros, as it likely is by you or me, is simply to dump a load of water over your head from your bottle. Get one from your domestique if you can, try to remember not to use your carb mix by accident lest you glue your eyes open, and save a little to spray on your legs too, as these are the muscles that are getting hot.

After just one day of racing his sixth Tour de France, Jonas Vingegaard has laid down a marker in his bid to add to his pair of wins from 2022 and '23, by storming into the yellow jersey in the opening stage team time trial.

The Dane, who has never finished lower than second in the race's overall, makes his assault on the 2026 race on a Cervélo S5 aero bike. Widely regarded as one of the very fastest bikes in the World, the S5 received an update in mid 2025 to further refine it.

Cyclingnews visited the Visma-Lease a Bike Hotel in the days running up to the race and managed to get some time with Vingegaard's number two race bike.

Spec-wise, it's nothing we haven't seen before, with a 1X SRAM Red groupset and Reserve carbon wheels, but there are some really interesting details that, for me, highlight the team's attention to detail and their ability to focus on the little things.

I also received a tip that the team were doing a few things to lower drag in the derailleur pulley wheels; they use the stock ones, but I wouldn't be surprised if they had stripped the factory grease and added a light oil or grease to really make them fly.

Vingegaard rides a size 51cm frame that has a stack of 519mm and a reach of 376mm; he's added a single spacer under the stem.

We also got hold of Vingegaard's number 1 time trial bike, as well as his great rival Tadej Pogačar's, for a head-to-head comparison.

There’s no clearer indication of a team’s attention to detail than how they approach warming up for a Tour de France time trial in scorching heat.

The challenge of getting riders to warm up their muscles while simultaneously keeping their core temperature cool is an unusual challenge for teams, and many of them roll out every trick in the book to make it happen.

Ice socks, ice vests, misting fans and alcohol spray were out in full force, as well as umbrellas to act as parasols, ice slush drinks, ice pops and simply pouring water over the head.

But Netcompany Ineos have seemingly uncovered a new trick to add to the book and they turned many heads when a five-man team arrived at the warm-up area behind the start ramp with a trolley full of gear.

A crowd assembled, watching on with confusion, as the crew proceeded to unfurl eight folding tables, place them in front of a row of chairs, put giant plastic tubs on top of them and fill them with water measured to a specific 8.8°C.

When questioned by Cyclingnews, two crew members refused to explain their thinking, and simply told us, "you'll see".

Soon after, the riders arrived and sat down side by side with their arms submerged in the water. Oddly, they sat almost completely in silence and didn't interact with each other or the onlooking media. Dorian Godon would occasionally splash his face with the water but that was about the extent of their animation.

Since neither riders nor staff would open up, we're left to infer their motivations. Technically, we don't even know for sure that it was for cooling. It could be that the Netcompany Ineos riders are actually Thorny Devil lizards and they hydrate by sucking water through their extremities.

In all seriousness though it's obvious that this is a method to cool down, in what was a sweltering hot day in Barcelona, and that cooling one's arms is an efficient way to remove heat without cooling down the leg muscles that they'd previously been warming up; especially useful since the UCI has banned the use of ice socks during the race.

The respective approaches of other teams covered the spectrum. Cofidis struck me as unprepared. Their riders had no ice vests, were wearing double-layered skinsuits, and chose to prop their bikes on smart trainers in the direct sunlight, rather than under the shade of the provided tents.

NSN Cycling Team seemed slightly more prepared with ice vests, but had forgotten to put a bottle onto Marco Frigo's bike. It wasn't until half the team was already on the start ramp that anyone noticed, and it was too late to do anything about it. He raced without one.

Lidl-Trek impressed with their forethought. Speaking to Ellis Pullinger – the aero expert formerly known only as CyclingSpy on Instagram – he explained they brought a few road bikes over earlier in the day to secure a spot in the best part of the shade, where the wind was funnelling past a nearby mountain of ice that the ASO had provided for cooling water bottles. They also later arrived with half a dozen giant umbrellas to offer extra shade to their riders.

Both Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe and UAE Team Emirates-XRG appeared nonchalant with their respective approaches. They had the ice vests, but they both chose to warm up with the sun on their backs rather than in the shade, although Red Bull did offset this with their own giant umbrellas.

Of course, the race isn't won behind the start ramp. Ineos put in a good showing with Filippo Ganna landing them a surprise 2nd place, but it was Jonas Vingegaard and the Visma-Lease a Bike team who finished day one in the yellow jersey.

The world’s biggest bike race deserves world-class coverage. Subscribe to Cyclingnews for unlimited access to our unrivalled reporting of the 2026 Tour de France. From Barcelona through to Paris, our experienced team will bring you breaking news, expert insight, and in-depth coverage from every stage as the battle for the yellow jersey plays out. Plus, access the Cyclingnews app to follow the action on the go! Find out more.

At the start of the Tour de France stage 1 team time trial in Barcelona I watched rider after rider stopped by UCI officials as they left the makeshift warm-up area behind the start ramp. They were being forced to remove any ice socks that they'd stuffed into their skinsuits.

On a day where temperatures soared past 30° C, riders were using every trick in the book to keep their core temperatures down before the start: ice vests, misting fans, alcohol sprays, a strange arm cold water tub for the Netcompany Ineos riders, as well as the oldest tactic of them all — ice socks.

For the uninitiated, these are simply pairs of tights, cut down, stuffed with ice cubes and then tied off, and riders generally put them into the back of their skinsuits behind their necks.

Not only does the cold help to chill the rider but as the ice melts and the water then evaporates it removes heat in the process.

They are a common sight at the start of — and indeed during — almost every warm race in the calendar, but the UCI is seemingly now cracking down on their use.

"It changes the morphology of the riders' shape," the commissaire enforcing the rule explained to Cyclingnews, moments after stopping Victor Campenaerts.

“I know it’s only a little thing, but you have to draw the line. If you allow sometimes but not others, it’s not fair. And if you allow a little, riders may take more,” he said.

Indeed, article 1.3.032 of the UCI's technical regulations states: “Clothing and other items or accessories worn by a rider (including but not limited to helmets, glasses, shoes or in-race communication devices) may not modify the morphology of the rider.

"Moreover, any non-essential element which is added on (or under) or integrated in any clothing, or other item or accessory worn by a rider shall be forbidden. A non-essential element shall be any element which does not have a purpose which is exclusively of clothing or protection, or which is not strictly necessary for the functionality of the clothing, or other item or accessory. This shall also apply regarding any material or substance applied onto the skin or clothing and which is not itself an item of clothing or another item or accessory worn by a rider."

There's little doubt that a pair of tights is clothing, and that an ice sock down the back of a skinsuit can be classed as an element added under clothing, but I'm sure some would argue against the 'non-essential' part of the rule's wording, given the blistering heat on the streets of Barcelona on Saturday.

The confusion among staff and riders of various teams as they were stopped from entering the start ramp suggested it was a new rule to some of them, but Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe’s Head of Engineering, Dan Bigham, tells Cyclingnews that it’s actually been in force for a little while. "The rules are now explicit in that it’s only a radio down the front," he explained.

Visma-Lease a Bike's head of performance equipment, Jenco Drost, concurred.

"Since last year, they're quite sharp on items under your suit."

Despite this, images from the recent Tour de Suisse – which show a few different riders with ice packs in their jerseys – suggest the rule is yet to be enforced as consistently as the UCI might like.

"It was shared in the Tour de France equipment meeting," Drost continued, "but with this weather, riders try to keep it as long as possible."

The world’s biggest bike race deserves world-class coverage. Subscribe to Cyclingnews for unlimited access to our unrivalled reporting of the 2026 Tour de France. From Barcelona through to Paris, our experienced team will bring you breaking news, expert insight, and in-depth coverage from every stage as the battle for the yellow jersey plays out. Plus, access the Cyclingnews app to follow the action on the go! Find out more.

Perfectly timed for the Tour de France 2026, Specialized has launched the S-Works Tarmac SL9. Although it wasn't a secret, with various leaks, the new Tarmac SL9 is still one of the most eagerly anticipated launches of the year, and without doubt, it'll be one of the best road bikes of the year.

The Tour de France started last weekend, and the new SL9 will be front and centre, ridden by Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe. Team co-leaders Remco Evenepoel and Florian Lipowitz will look to take advantage of the aerodynamic efficiency claims and are targeting the yellow jersey.

Specialized is claiming the new S-Works Tarmac SL9 is "the fastest road bike ever made", which is a bold claim, considering it looks almost identical to its predecessor, the S-Works Tarmac SL8. It also comes with a whopping price tag of up to £11,999, so it's a massive investment for us, mere mortals. Although it looks almost identical, there is a ton of tech going on behind the scenes to justify that cost, including a new layup, a more aero front end, and a deeper seat tube cutout.

With the SL9 launch, there are big discounts on the outgoing SL8, already our choice as the best aero bike, especially outside the S-Works top-tier builds. So if you've had your eye on what was once the "fastest road bike ever made," then now's the time to take a look. Below I've listed the discounted models at Balfes Bikes, and with limited sizing, they are likely to go quickly. I've also added the S-Works Tarmac SL9, just in case...

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