The 2016 Giant TCR road bike fills the gap between the Propel aero bike and Defy endurance road bike with an all-new design that claims to be the “Total Race Bike.”
As a carbon frame, all models carry the Advanced moniker, and it’ll be available in three frame tiers -Advanced SL, Advanced Pro and just plain Advanced. And as any self respecting top-level road bike debuting in 2016 must, it makes all the important claims of being lighter, more compliant and more efficient. The only buzz phrase left out is “more aero.”
Most of the technology story is centered on the SL model, with Giant’s testing showing it bests its main competitors in frameset stiffness, stiffness to weight ratio and complete bike-with-wheels stiffness when paired with their new SLR 0 carbon wheels.
And it does all that while dropping 181g off the prior model’s frameset weight with plenty of newness trickling down to the others…
The SL frame, shown here in Team Giant-Alpecin livery, has a higher mod carbon mix and different layup than the others. And it gets an integrated seat mast, which lets them better control the overall feel of the bike and tune the compliance as a system. It saves a bit of weight compared to the shaped seatpost used on the others, too.
To knock 12% off the prior model’s frame weight, they had to pull material out wherever they could. Other weight savings were done at the fork by reshaping the steerer’s taper and whittling away the legs, helping it drop 30g.
One last little touch was to give the SL hollow carbon dropouts. Since this is the team frame, which you can’t buy, we’ll touch on other new features on the Pro model below. But first, some tidbits loosely related to team gear:
For 2016, there’ll be no disc brake version because they say that tech is more for the endurance rider than the TCR rider. So, it’s looking like they’ll ride the Defy disc for any UCI test races this year…until model year 2017, which is when they’re considering a disc brake TCR. If this sounds familiar, it’s because it’s the same story we heard just before their team received the new disc brake cyclocross bikes a few years back.
While you can’t buy this particular model, it’s still fun to see what it weighs (6.28kg / 13.84lb). That’s with the internal seatpost battery, which uses a custom mount to fit inside the top of the seatmast. Rest of the build is Shimano Dura-Ace and PRO cockpit parts with one of Giant’s new Contact SL saddles.
The ones you can buy are the SL 0 on left with Dura-Ace Di2 and the SL 1 on right with Ultegra Di2. Both use new carbon wheels from Giant. (click any image to enlarge)