Canyon just released a super limited edition of their popular Ultimate road bike, unique in that it is celebrating a photographer not a cyclist. The simple design of the Canyon Ultimate CF SLX LTD takes inspiration from the personal touch of Tino Pohlmann, a Berlin-based photographer whose work we’ve featured documenting Canyon road bikes for the past five years.
Plus, there’s a new RCC Ultimate, limited to Rapha Cycling Club members-only…
Canyon Ultimate CF SLX LTD, special Tino Pohlmann Artist Edition
Pohlmann has actually been photographing Canyon athletes since the 2008 Tour de France, and has provided many of the riding shots we’ve shared of new Canyon bikes in recent years. Now Canyon is again highlighting his work with a special Artist Edition of their best-selling road bike. Designed by Pohlmann, the Ultimate CF SLX LTD is said to tell the story of his traditional process…
“While looking over old contact sheets with Canyon graphic designer Lukas Beck during a workshop, Pohlmann had the idea for his design of the Ultimate LTD. He used to mark particularly expressive pictures with red sticker dots on his contact sheets to select the negatives he would turn into larger prints. This ritual is how the striking artwork for the top tube of the Ultimate LTD came to be: A section of such a contact sheet is screen printed on the greyscale gradient.”
Beyond the toptube contact sheet of the Col du Galibier, the red dot comes back below the seat cluster, overlapping seatstay, seattube & the Zipp 404 rear wheel.
The Artist Edition bike comes with a special signed booklet telling the story of the bike in greater detail, and highlight some of Pohlmann’s work documenting cycling.
Limited to just 50 complete bikes worldwide, the 6000€ Canyon Ultimate CF SLX LTD gets a suitably high-end build. It starts with a light CF SLX frame (not the even lighter CFR) and one-piece carbon CP10 cockpit, and gets a wireless SRAM Force eTap AXS 2×12 groupset, tubeless-ready 58mm deep Zipp 404 wheels, non-tubeless Conti GP5000 tires & a Selle Italia SLR Boost Superflow saddle (claimed weight 7.59kg complete). The limited edition bike is available in the full six size range, but obviously with limited availability.
Rapha Cycling Club X Canyon: The Ultimate Collaboration
Rapha also has their own limited edition Canyon Ultimate, too. Dubbed “The Ultimate” club road bike, the Canyon Ultimate CF SL 8 Disc RCC brings the popular black bike with its pink & gray strips back into the hands of RCC members – but now with sparkles.
The limited edition RCC X Canyon bike gets a more premium build than the Rapha rental fleet, plus a glittering, high-gloss paint job and a nice pink Rapha logo on the toptube.
The 5200€ RCC build is quite similar to the Tino Pohlmann bike, but starts with the slightly heavier CF SL carbon frameset. It gets the same SRAM Force eTap AXS 2×12 group but includes a set of SRAM power meter cranks. It also opts for slightly less deep 50mm DT Swiss ARC 1400 wheels. In the end that saved a few grams to a claimed RCC bike weight of 7.46kg.
Just 250 of the RCC Ultimates will be made, and you’ll need to go through Rapha to get the private link to buy one direct from Canyon, and your RCC membership will be verified before Canyon will send you the bike. Some sizes are in stock now, while other will have to wait until the new year…
