- I've got the chance to take a closer look
at Jan van Berkel's bike.
Now Jan is the current Ironman Switzerland champion
and this year at the Ironman World Championships,
he's gonna be riding this very nice
and slightly unique Factor Slick.
(logo whooshes)
(upbeat music)
Okay, let's start with the frame itself.
Factor is a relatively young brand
and you may have already heard
of their Factor One road bike,
which features something called Twin Vane Evo technology.
This TT bike features that same technology,
which is quite special and quite unique.
It's essentially a split downtube,
so there is a gap here within the frame,
so that air can flow through it
to improve its aerodynamics but all
whilst keeping its stiffness
through the bottom bracket and headset.
But the really special bit on this frame
is the custom paintwork because Jan being Swiss,
he wanted to show off his Swiss origin,
but without being quite so in-your-face with it
with sort of the standard Swiss flag.
So he's gone for this traditional artwork
that comes from Switzerland called decoupage,
and it is something that traditionally is made
out of paper, so it's hand cut out of paper, very fine art,
and he has this on his frame which I absolutely love.
But really interestingly is that this mountain range
you can see on the rear stays here,
actually represents a horizon in Switzerland,
so you can match that up with the mountains.
And to add to that, after the Ironman World Championships
this year, he's gonna be getting married
on the top of one of these mountains.
Okay, well now let's take a look at the front end
of the bike with the base bar and aero bar setup.
Now this comes from 51 Speedshop,
which is a brand from Mat Steinmetz,
who is a very famous and well-known bike fitter
and coach from Boulder in Colorado.
And actually 51 Speedshop setup comes standard
with the Factor Slick bike, but Jan has opted
for the increasingly popular ski bend option
with the aero bars and he's got it set up
quite tight and quite close and very aerodynamic.
So, Factor actually have a bottom mount
which comes out between the pads
but because he's got it set up so close,
he's actually had to have a custom mount made,
which extends a little bit further out,
so you can still mount the bottle
and then his computer behind.
Right, moving down from that and onto the wheels,
and these are the Black Inc wheels,
which are Factor's own brand,
and they are the model called the Eighty
which would suggest that they are an 80 mil rim depth.
And for the tubular wheels, they are,
but these are actually the clincher wheels
and these actually come in a 75 mil rim depth.
And for the rim width, they come in at 26 and a half mil
and on them he's got the Continental Grand Prix TT tyres
and a 23 front and rear, he has previously used 25 mil
for the Ironman Switzerland just for increased comfort.
But here in Hawaii, he's going for the 23 mil
and on the subject of the tyres,
actually with the frame itself, it can accept anything
up to 28 mil in terms of the tyre width.
The braking on the front is integrated into the fork here
and the rear brake, it's under the bottom bracket,
it's not overly integrated but it is hidden
behind the bottom bracket design.
(lively music)
Well, moving back and onto some of the other componentry,
and given that Hawaii is quite a fast and flat course,
he's running quite a large 55/42 tooth chainring setup.
And whilst we talk about the chainrings actually,
Factor have designed their front mech system
so that it can be quite easily
and quickly removed, so you can run this,
one bike setup that we're seeing some people trying
for some of these fast and flat courses.
We'll also talk about the gearing.
He's got an 11/25 cassette,
so quite a small and short range,
but again, quite well suited to this course out here,
and that is all in Shimano Dura-Ace.
So on the front on his aero bars and his base bar,
he's got the electronic gearing for Shimano Dura-Ace 9150
and that's actually in Synchro Shift,
so that means he doesn't have the option
to shift up to his big ring or into his small ring,
actually does it automatically as you're shifting
through your cassette, as you go into those easier gears,
it'll drop it into the small ring for you,
but also compensate by shifting up a couple
of gears on the cassette, so there's none
of these sudden changes in gearing.
And on the back for that derailleur,
he's got the Ceramicspeed OSPW jockey wheels,
so again, it's all about sort of smoothing out
that chain flow, reducing the friction.
And in fact, Ceramicspeed have kitted out
this whole bike, so he's got Ceramicspeed
bottom bracket bearings and headset bearings.
And to finish off that componentry,
he's using the Stages single sided power metre.
But interestingly, he's running in a 160 crank length,
which is quite short but this was suggested
to him by a previous coach, that used to work
for British Cycling and had Bradley Wiggins
using 160 mil crank length, so suggested it to him
and Jan's really got on well with it.
And it's actually something we saw a lot
of triathletes trying out as it sort of helps
to open out the hips in preparation for the run of the bike.
Works for Jan, so he's continued using that
over the last few years and on the end of those
he's got the Look Keo Blade pedals.
Well, now, moving on to quite an important factor
for triathlon bikes and that is with the storage.
So, you'll notice already this storage box coming
out of the seat tube and this is Factor's StoraPak.
Jan is gonna be using that on race day
for his spares, tubes, canisters, you name it.
On the top tube here he's got a Profile Design storage box,
or bento box so he'll be having his race day gels in there.
And he's actually had this slightly customised for him
in that he's had it pushed forward slightly
and integrated his Di2 Junction Box into that,
so it's all nicely hidden.
On race day, he's also gonna have an aero bottle
on the seat tube area here,
which can help to improve aerodynamics.
And then, as we mentioned already,
he's got a standard bottle between his aero bars here
on the front and he's also got one coming off the rear
of the saddle here, using a Profile Design bottle cage
to hold it nice and tightly.
And that saddle is the ISM Adamo Racing 2 saddle
and that features that split nose, two prong nose,
sort of design that we see quite commonly on triathlon bikes
and essentially all that allows you to do is sit
a little bit further forward on the saddle,
tilt your hips around and relieves that pressure
that you might get on the perineum
on a standard saddle that isn't split,
and just allows you to get really comfortably
into that aero type which obviously very important
for an Ironman.
Now finally, I think we should take a look
at some of the measurements and the weight of the bike.
(beep)
(playful music)
Let's see...
I'll do that one.
(measuring tape clicks)
(beep)
Okay, so let's start with the saddle height.
That comes in at 720 mil and then let's look
at the aero bar setup so that pad setup,
where I said it was quite a tight setup, and that,
if we go from centre of pad to centre of pad,
that is 140 mil, so quite tight.
If we went from the very edge to the inside edge
of the other side, we are around 55 mil,
so really quite close, just enough room
for his Garmin mount there.
Now the reach, so going from the back of the aero pads,
elbow pads to the saddle, we're roughly talking
around 500 mil or just under actually, around 490 mil.
And we're somewhere around 9.45 to 9.5 kilogrammes.
Well there we go that is Jan van Berkel's Factor Slick
pro bike and I've got to say, it's probably one
of my favourite custom paintworks to date.
It's even got his Berkelized logo on here,
that I just absolutely love it.
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