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Having almost finished a pre-Tour tech gallery, I thought that would be my tech gallery for the day, but then the stage one start village happened with a host of new tech on show, Jonas Vingegaard changed his bike setup, and that first gallery is now scheduled for tomorrow.
In the meantime, stage 1 is done, Adam Yates is the first yellow jersey of 2023, and there is a host of new tech to dive into. Here’s what I saw:
Remember, back at the Giro we speculated Remco might have been riding with wet weather tyres? Turns out they are a thing. Since stage 1 was dry, these were on the spare bikes on the team cars.Unfortunately, there’s still no official word on what exactly the wet tyres are, but given the tread looks very much like the existing Turbos, it’s likely something about the compound that makes this tyre a “wet” tyre. Most teams are now well aware of the benefits of maintaining thermoregulation and helping the body keep cool. It’s common for riders to wear ice vests as they warm up and cool down on the trainer. Inuteq is one ice-vest manufacturer. Lidl-Trek had these bags and a cooler box to keep the cool things cool. Ineos, on the other-hand, had a whole refrigerated van to keep the cool stuff cool.Ekoi has a new aero road helmet. No details on the new helmet yet but riders from Arkéa-Samsic, Israel-Premier Tech, and Lotto DSTNY were all racing with the new helmet on stage 1.The helmet features plenty of surface aero with just three large vents on the front.The helmet features a long down wash-effect tail, much like the new Trek Ballista aero helmet.Jacopo Guarnieri gives us a look at the top of the new helmet. And also the rear. Guarnieri also gave us a glimpse of some new shoes from Q36.5. The brand’s existing shoe name, “Unique,” still appears on the rear most wing of the carbon sole, but these are most definitely not the existing Unique shoes. A French tricolour twist to recently crowned French national champion Valentin Madouas’ Shimano S-Phyre shoes.Sticking with the shoe theme, Victor Campenaerts is racing with Nimbl Air lace-up shoes and this neat little cover. The Airs have a little tab to hold the tied laces in place, so presumably Campenaerts’ additional cover is some small aero tweak. Interestingly, Campenaerts also seems to be wearing new DeFeet aero socks. Sticking with Lotto, Maxim van Gils and Florian Vermeersch are racing with a new unnamed Ridley frame. The new frame seems to be a fresh “light-aero” offering from Ridley. There are definite aero cues, such as this profiled head tube.Truncated rear for the head, down, and seat tubes. And 3D-printed, aero-profiled headset spacers, to name but a few more aero touches.But seemingly Ridley have not gone all in on the aero tweaks. The seat tube is profiled but is far from the deepest we have seen.The bottom bracket is also relatively tall, but it is far from the mega-size bottom bracket shells we have seen on some bike of late. Clearly, Ridley is hoping to balance aero gains with weight savings here. Universal Derailleur Hanger (UDH) is officially on the road!It seems the seat stays flare out to accommodate the UDH.This RFID tag might not make it to Paris, it’s already looking like its losing the battle with the pressure washer before the riders have even started the first stage. What’s going on here? A UAE Team Emirates mechanic is spraying disinfectant on all the bikes prior to the start. That’s the first time I’ve seen that in three Tours since the start of the pandemic. Benoît Cosnefroy is racing BMC’s new unnamed but might-be-named Race Machine aero road bike. We saw the new bike under Ben O’Connor at the Critérium du Dauphiné and speculated at that time what the new bike might offer.The bike is still a prototype and BMC haven’t released any information as yet. One question we had back at the Dauphiné was just how much tyre clearance the new bike would offer. I measured these tyres at 28 mm, which given the relatively close fit here, suggests BMC has taken the performance-focused less-clearance route with room for perhaps a 30 or 32 mm tyre maximum.Perhaps more interestingly, we spotted these red dots on the hubs of a select few of the Campagnolo Bora Ultra WTO 45 wheels. While impossible to tell without measuring, the red dots may indicate a new version of the WTO 45 with perhaps a new wider rim. Campagnolo wouldn’t comment on whether these are in fact new WTO 45s. And a mention for Søren Wærenskjold to close out this gallery, the only rider I have spotted so far this Tour with a waxed chain.
