The Cervélo S5 has become an industry benchmark for aero road bikes. Whenever you see comparative wind tunnel data, with brands claiming to have made the fastest bike, the S5 is more often than not one of the bikes it’s benchmarked against, or in some cases, conveniently left out of the picture.
Visma-Lease a Bike has been racing the new bike at the Critérium du Dauphiné and now at the Tour de France, it has finally been officially revealed. For those looking for a grand upheaval of the existing S5 platform, this isn’t it. The familiar silhouette of the S5 remains, with small but meaningful tweaks to the frame, cockpit, and wheels all working towards the dual goals of decreasing weight and increasing aerodynamics.
Escape’s Ronan Mc Laughlin has the S5 in for review, but whilst he is busy checking handlebar widths at the Tour, here are the basics of what is new.
Don’t ruin a good thing
The current S5 was released in 2022, and in the years since, even with the introduction of new aero bikes, it has remained one of the fastest in the WorldTour. This made the task of improving it both difficult and risky, something Cervélo claims it was acutely aware of. The brand laid out four key goals at the start of the project: improve the aerodynamics, maintain stiffness and reduce system weight by 80 grams. Of particular note, the frame design is also specifically optimised around the Reserve 57/64 wheelset.
The plan to achieve this was also brief, and centered on updating the cockpit and tweaking the handling while maintaining the geometry's fit parameters. Above all, as Cervélo said in the presentation, there was a strong directive: "Don't **** up an already-great bike!"
The headline improvement for this new-generation S5 is that it’s claimed to be 6.3 watts faster than the existing model across the yaw sweep (-15° to +15°), although that improvement is at an undisclosed speed. The brand's comparison claims also exclude some of the latest aero bikes on the market, such as Colnago’s Y1RS, Ridley’s Noah Fast, and the Van Rysel RCR-F.
The DNA of the S5, including the wildly unique front end, is clearly intact with this new model, but subtle changes to the frame profiles have been made in pursuit of watt savings. The trailing edges of the tubes have become sharper, gussets are deeper, the seat tube has been shaped specifically for the Reserve 64 rear wheel to create an optimised aerodynamic system, and the head tube has increased in depth.
The fork has also seen a subtle redesign, with the brake caliper mounting point now deeper, and a change to the threaded insert, made to save weight. However, tyre clearance remains the same as the previous generation, at 34 mm.
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