- Coming up, the best new, interesting, and custom tech
that we've managed to find in the last 24 hours.
Here at the Giro d'Italia.
(mechanical transitions)
- At the Tour de France, Mavic provides neutral service.
You may have seen Si's excellent video covering it,
but at the Giro it's different.
They actually have Shimano giving the neutral service,
and these are the neutral service cars,
and on top of them are the neutral service bikes.
So what they are, are Pinarello Dogma F10s,
which is pretty sweet, and there's a mixture, interestingly,
of disc brake ones on that car,
and rim brake ones on that car and for the pedals,
well I've not seen any Speedplay equipped bikes
but there's a mixture of Look pedal bikes
and Shimano pedal bikes.
So as long as you've got one of those two pedal systems,
you should be all right, should the worst comes to worst.
But they're really nice, they're even in Shimano colors,
so they're sort of black, white, and blue.
And to be honest, I'd be tempted to break my bike
so I'd get one of these.
- I have got an unbelievable box of tricks in my hand.
A fresh delivery from SRM to Bahrain-Merida,
and a few other select riders here at the Giro d'Italia.
So they have customized each and every one
with the riders picture on the side, and their flag colors.
That, of course, is Italy,
and then are a couple of Slovenian colors here as well,
but beyond that, if you're a very special rider,
like Caleb Ewan, you get a nice yellow one.
If you're Vincenzo Nibali, you get this blue one
with his picture on the side and his emblem there.
Beyond that, if you happen to go into the pink jersey,
you get this one, that is amazing.
It's got the Gazzetta newspaper round the edge
and included in that, is a picture of Vincenzo Nibali
on the Gazzetta newspaper, and then the pièce de résistance.
Just down here,
it's not for any of the riders here, in fact.
SRM have made this, for the Sheik of Bahrain
with real gold.
- It's absolutely tipping it down today.
Given the weather, you'd be forgiven
for thinking we're in England,
but no, we're in Bologna, Italy because it's the beginning
of stage two of the Giro d'Italia,
and because it's raining so much,
the choice of lube that the teams are using
becomes really important, and the Team Ineos mechanics
have just been applying this new Wet Weather ceramic lube
onto the bikes' drivetrains, in the hope that this lasts
much longer and doesn't wash off as easily,
but should the drivetrain start to make noise,
as the riders are riding along, which there's a chance
because it's such a long stage
and the rain looks pretty bad,
then they might drop back to the team cars
whereupon the mechanics can precariously hang out
and squirt some more lube onto the drivetrains.
Because today is a wet day, we're also seeing the mechanics
going round and tweaking the tire pressures
in the riders' tires.
They generally like to ride lower pressures
when there's less traction on a wet day,
but the exact pressures vary
depending on the rider's preference,
and also just, well the rider's weight and size.
I'm over at the Lotto-Soudal bus
and here I've found one of the bikes that belongs
to one of the favorites for the second stage of the Giro.
It's Caleb Ewan's Ridley Noah Fast,
and befitting of his sprinting style,
we've got a really interesting cockpit on this bike.
So he's got a 36 centimeter wide bar,
which is very narrow,
and also this ridiculous Deda 13 centimeter stem
that's got a minor 17 degree on it.
Just to get him in that really aggressive position
when he's sprinting right over the bars.
And on his stem as well, he's got a cool sticker
saying, pocket rocket Caleb Ewan, that's pretty cool.
It's also interesting to see how he fits onto this frame
and also how you take into account
his extreme sprinting position
because there isn't actually much seatpost visible showing,
in the way he's got it set up at the moment.
This is the bike, of breakaway specialist,
and Caleb Ewan's teammate, Thomas De Gendt
and because he's a breakaway specialist,
it's quite cool that he's got this very aero cockpit.
All-in-one piece bar and stem
fitted to the front of his bike
to try and make it as aerodynamic as possible.
It's a really neat bar and stem, this.
I've not actually seen this particular one before,
but it's very sleek indeed, and very flat on the top,
so he can get into that position where he rests his arms
on the tops of the bars to get super aero, cool.
And then also on this stem, he's got the route details
for today's stage.
A little, mini map that's been printed out
with all the locations of the feeds and climbs
and intermediate sprints as well.
In case you were wondering, the bar width is 40 centimeters
which is pretty narrow and interestingly,
De Gendt is favoring the Helium,
which is Ridley's climbing bike,
over the aero bike, the Noah Fast,
which Caleb Ewan's choosing.
Even on a flat stage.
- Custom piece of tech for you now.
As you all know, we use Wahoo Bolts and more lately,
Wahoo Roams at GCN, and they've brought a custom one
here to the Giro d'Italia, pink.
This'll be used by the Bora-Hansgrohe
scored over the next three weeks.
Bright pink too.
- Vincenzo Nibali has a choice of two road bikes
here at the Giro.
The Merida Scultura, the lightweight climbing bike
he's often favored in the past,
but also Merida's aero bike, the Reacto,
and Merida have made a special one for him,
where they've taken the paint off to make it lighter.
Paint adds a significant amount of weight,
so they've saved a substantial amount,
probably over 200 grams, by taking that paint off,
but they've still given it a cool, custom paint job
on the down tube, to signify his victories in Grand Tours,
which is really nice.
Aero bikes offer a measurable benefit and advantage
to professional cyclists.
Even climbers and team leaders,
but they're often hesitant to ride them
because there's a slight weight penalty
over their climbing bikes.
So Merida has worked hard to try and reduce the weight
of the Reacto, to get it competitive for Nibali
and taking the paint of is one of the things they've done
but they've also fitted some lightweight components.
So it's got these really lightweight skewers
at the front as well,
which are different from what
the rest of his team are using.
I've asked the mechanics at Bahrain-Merida
how much Vincenzo's bike's coming out at on the scales,
and they've told me they've managed to get it
to 6.9 kilograms with a power meter
and a transponder on there,
which, well that's incredibly competitive
for an aero road bike these days,
and well I'm sure he'll be very happy to ride it.
In fact, he's just gone out for a ride on it now,
and another detail I spotted on it, was the saddle,
which wasn't a sponsored saddle.
It looked to me like it was a Fizitk Antares
and all the logos have been rubbed off
and it was blanked out.
I'm over at the Team Ineos truck, and I've got hold
of Pavel Sivikov's bike, and it's this beautiful
Pinarello Dogma F12.
New tech, but we've made a video on that before,
but what's new here is something quite subtle.
I've spotted some brand new Continental tires,
and from a distance they look just the same
as the standard Pro Limiteds but I can tell,
looking at them up-close, these are a brand new model
and I've done some digging and apparently they've got
a higher thread count than before.
So 200 TPI,
rather than 100 TPI,
so that makes them more supple,
and also apparently the weight of them
has been reduced as well.
So now these tubs are just 240 grams,
making them, well anything lighter's always gonna be
slightly more beneficial, isn't it?
For those of you that aren't familiar
with the Competition Pro Limited,
it's a tubular tire from Continental,
meaning that it's glued onto these Dura-Ace rims.
So I've got some verniers and I'm gonna measure
the width of it and see what these new tires
are coming out at.
So although it says 25 millimeters
on the side of the carcass there,
it's actually coming out at 24 millimeters on my verniers,
which are digital as well.
I'm also gonna weigh the Ineos F12
because it's the first time I've seen this bike
in a complete race build, with a power meter.
So I'm intrigued to see what it hits the scales at.
So 7.39 with a power meter and deep section wheels.
It's pretty competitive for what is an aero bike.
I'm at Jumbo-Visma now
and this is the bike of race leader, Primoz Roglic.
Now some really interesting things on his bike
that are specially because today is a flat stage
and also, it's really wet.
So one of the most interesting things I've spotted
are his tires.
He's running 28 millimeter tires, rather than the usual 25,
and he's also swapped the normal Vittoria Corsas
for Corsa Controls, which are more of a sort of winter tire.
They've got more puncture protection
and are a little bit more rugged.
So hopefully he's hoping that that will help him
in the wet weather.
Also to help with the flatter stage,
he's got a 54/42 chainset on there,
rather than the 53/39 he normally runs,
and the other thing that stands out on this bike for me,
is just the beautiful paint job.
So it's Bianchi Oltre XR4, which is an aero bike,
and on here he's got this amazing custom painted eagle,
on top of the Celeste, which is a nod to his previous life
as a ski jumper.
He's also running an integrated, all-in-one,
aero bar and stem from FSA, and interestingly,
he's put some pads on there so that he can rest his arms
on the tops and get into an aero position,
which is pretty cool.
And to denote his race leader status,
the mechanics have also put some pink bar tape
on his bike as well.
Just come to the Jumbo-Visma bus,
and it's now my favorite bus 'cause they've given me
a special pink cake,
which is to celebrate that Primoz Roglic is in pink
at the start of stage two.
(laughs) Bye.
These are the beautiful BMZ team bikes
of team Dimension Data,
and some of the riders have a choice of bikes
here at the Giro.
So they have the Timemachine aero bike,
but also the Teammachine SLR01,
sort of all around climbing bike.
It's less aero but it's a bit lighter,
so on the key stages in the mountains,
where they want a lighter bike,
the riders will tend to opt for that.
Whereas on the flatter, more aero stages, the faster stages,
they have the option of using the aero bike,
and the benefits that it affords,
and to be able to swap between the bikes more efficiently,
the team actually have a special jig
which they can use to change the positions on the bike
so that they're exactly the same.
So to the rider, it feels like the same place
when they sit on it.
The team are running Vittoria Corsa tire,
as these are 25 millimeter and I've seen 25 millimeter used
throughout on all their bikes, and they're tubulars.
Now they're glued to these rather nice ENVE 5.6 rims
and this differs from their time trial bikes,
where we've seen that they're actually using
the Corsa Speed clincher tubeless ready tire.
Although they're not running it tubeless,
they're running it with latex inner tubes,
and the reason why they're using clinchers in the time trial
is for lower rolling resistance
and weight doesn't matter so much,
but on the actual road stages,
weight can be a bit more important,
especially on the mountains,
and also it's deemed to be safer,
because when they get a puncture,
say even going down a descend,
you can actually ride on a flat tub a little bit longer,
which is crucial in a race situation, and at the moment,
you can't really do that on a clincher or a tubeless tire.
- You've got to love going round the teams
before a Grand Tour,
and seeing all the new tech, haven't you?
- Oh I love it, mate. - What was your favorite bit?
- I think that gold PC8 head unit,
with the 24 karat gold leaf on it.
- For the Sheik, that was pretty cool.
I like the Gazzetta one actually,
but my favorite bit was actually
Vincenzo Nibali's custom bike.
Even though we've already seen it last year.
Unfortunately, well I'd actually
done a piece about that myself,
and then you came along and did it better,
because that's what we used in the video.
Here's a bit of what I did.
This is the custom Bahrain-Merida...
(tone)
- And if you're wondering where you can get your hands
on one of these rather splendid Italy themed GCN t-shirts,
well they're in luck, aren't they Dan,
'cause they're on sale in the GCN shop.
- Yeah, shop.globalcyclingnetwork.com.
We'll put a link to that fairly shortly.
I still love the GCN Italia logo.
You're like an Italian Mod,
but a British Mod in an Italian t-shirt.
Anyway, let's conclude this video by saying
that if you didn't already see our TT tech video
from a few days ago, you can find it now, just here.