Lotto Soudal’s fleet of Ridley road bikes spanned a couple years and at least four different models, truly giving the riders the option for whatever best suited the stage and preference. Above, the Dean TT bike sits on the right, with the team-color emblazoned Noah SL aero road bike behind it.
Both of the teams shown here, Lotto Soudal and Orica Greenedge, were running Continental’s Competition ProLTD tires on the bikes, which are a pro-only version of the standard Competition tubular available to the rest of us.
The Noah SL debuted at Eurobike last year as blend of the Helium’s lightweight and the standard Noah’s aerodynamics. The result is this rather quick looking road bike with a slammed stem.
Adam Hansen opted for the retro styled Helium introduced at last year’s races, which he customized with a top tube sticker that conveys life on the road.
The other option was the all-new Fenix SL, which launched in June.
Designed to be a long distance race bike, with an emphasis on race, the new Fenix SL became lighter, stiffer and more compliant. The chainstays are slightly longer than a typical race bike, but without giving up the flickability needed to whip through the pack.
To get the SRM cranksets installed, they had to use the latest SRM-specific Campagnolo crank arm. The hole directly behind the spindle is to access the C-clip that Campy uses to install their crank arms. It’s a Record-equivalent carbon fiber arm with steel Ultra-Torque spindle.
The headtube is just a teensy bit slacker than the standard Fenix, too.
Andre Greipel’s bike lacked the big gorilla graphics we’ve seen on some of his bikes.
Thin seatstays keep the bike more comfortable on the long days.
The Dean TT/Triathlon bikes used a mix of the Conti Competition ProLTD and Podium TT tires.
TEAM ORICA GREENEDGE
Orica Greenedge had a mix of old and new Scott FOIL aero road bikes on hand. The new model, which debuted just prior to the Tour’s start, dropped the seatstays, created an integrated handlebar/stem/fairing and otherwise milked the NACA profiles for all they’re worth. Those are the bikes in black and green.
The prior generation was in blue, and these two were being ridden by brothers Adam and Simon Yates.
Both of them opted to put the Shimano Di2 climbers switch facing forward, a mounting position we hadn’t seen used before.
Two-time Australian National Road Race Champion Simon Gerrans got a custom touch on his to celebrate the hometown wins.
Their Plasma TT bikes used Shimano PRO’s top of the line Textreme Carbon Disc Tubular on the rear with a tri-spoke model up front using a suspiciously similar carbon weave. While it’s not shown on the brand’s website, the front wheel debuted at last year’s Vuelta a España under Team Sky and does indeed use Textreme’s signature wide weave pattern and spread two fibers.
One of the riders mounted a GoPro to the underside of their handlebar with what appeared to be the camera brand’s peel ‘n’ stick mount often used for car hoods or surfboards.
