Given the endless Specialized posts worshipping every single item that company announces, I thought it only fair to support a smaller brand.
This one supported by actual science. Not from the brands own marketing waffle.
I give you the Simplon Pride 2.
The only real tests by independent bodies have the Simplon as significantly faster aerodynamically than any other road bike yet created. It’s not even a contest. And yes, it’s even faster than the uber speed sniffer.
They’re the first company to take the new UCI rules and really push them to the limit. All the major manufactures will respond in time, but today. This bike from a small Austrian company is the fastest.
RennRad and Tour magazine are the only folks doing even remotely real testing. Anything else is just some guy/girl saying ‘it’s lighter and stiffer’ for the billionth time. Usually, at a press event, paid for by the company selling the supposed miracle bike.
Here’s a spreadsheet of Tour magazines recent testing.
If I was a crit racer, I’d be all over this bad boy.
No, I do not own one. No I do not have any affiliation with the company. I just think folks should be using facts to make purchase decisions. Not mindless brand fanboyism.
Let the detractors begin their dissent.
“It’s not real testing. It’s a bad tunnel sweep. It’s not including yaw angles that suit amateurs. It doesn’t correlate to the real world.”
Wrong. Both tests are actually pretty good. Absolutely better than any random claim by a manufacture trying to get you to buy their shiny new bike.
Larger surface areas keeps the flow attached at greater yaw angles. Very apparent in the testing. They’ve absolutely maxed out the size of areas like the head tube within the boundaries of the UCI legality boxes.
Actually, there’s a Youtube video of a black one on a work stand. It has a very cool stem/bar setup in the flesh. It’s quite cool looking in black. If you like the chunky aero look.
Weight is high 7kg range. I imagine you could drop it down to low sevens if you really targeted weight. That kinda goes against the premise though.
From the tunnel testing by RennRad, it’s a bunch faster in cross winds. First number is full yaw sweep. 2nd is dead straight. The yaw sweep is most relevant. Particularly, for amateurs riding at slower speeds.
Of interest, is the fact the aerodynamic advantage is significant enough to further lower the angle of a climb needed for this bike to be slower than an all rounder or climbing bike.
Seems a very logical choice for a sprinter, crit racer or generally someone who likes to go fast.
Their marketing argument since they got the tunnel was basically ‘our stuff is faster because we have a wind tunnel’ without providing much data to support it (I think the SL8 got a whitepaper but I’m not qualified to judge its quality). Citing science does not equal science. It’s just marketing without comparable data.
Right, I got that, but I felt like OP was implying that Specialized just says general, marketing wank “it’s faster.” And that felt weird to me because Specialized is, to my knowledge, the only brand that actually has the in-house facilities to do the testing. Obviously, that doesn’t mean all the data isn’t cherry picked, and we all know there’s multiple ways to game the aero system, but if there’s one brand that has the chops to back up claims with data, it’s Spesh. Heck, the Tour Magazine states the Simplon’s con being that its susceptible to crosswinds. Anyway, shrug, I don’t care about aero, carry on.
Are these results in a wind tunnel (i. e. for situations with laminar flow)? That’s the real issue with wind tunnel tests, they don’t represent the situations you encounter in essentially all situations (except perhaps for a velodrome). My understanding is that shapes which work well for laminar flow need not work well in turbulent flow.
Those are remarkable results for the Simplon. I’d heard it was fast, but didn’t know it was that fast. Those are definitely material differences if they translate to the real world of crit/road racing.
The old rim Aeroad really was a brilliant bike. So fast and light (my 2XL Ultegra Di2 was about 7.2kg with pedals). Shame it was also fragile.
If I was in the market for a new race bike, as a breakaway specialist I’d definitely consider the Simplon. But seeing those aero results, I hope my competitors don’t get one so shhh!
I’ve known the Pride II for a while as it was tested by Tour more than a year ago and seriously considered it before buying the Tarmac SL7. Unfortunately I already had almost all of the components and they didn’t sell framesets.
With the right components I was aiming for 7.2Kg for a black M frame. My colorful SL7 is at 7.0Kg but able to go <6.8 without losing aero. Of course the aero advantage of the Pride 2 is better than that weight saving, but alas.
