Tour Day France Bike Tech

VNews pic - This looks oddly like a specialized s works cranks. However, note the double sets of chainring bolt holes. This would allow the team mechanic easily to add a compact ring or standard ring without changing cranks. This would be excellent to have for a cyclocross bike.
Tech Pics©James Huang














 

A photo of Contador's bike - early in the tour. Note the non sponsor cable housing. This stuff I would imagine is the iLink product from Alligator. It appears to be the lighter weight version and small iLinks. The cable itself looks to be coated running down the tube similar to the Gore Ride-On.

 Finish line cameras:
I think the high speed HD cameras and how they film the finishes is just dang impressive at the finish line. It deserves some respect. These things really do some amazing work.

Note the custom weight weenie skewer and carbon hub. I am not sure I would trust those skewers or hubs, but of course I don't weigh 100 pounds.







A french TV car swerved around a tree, to hit a few riders and move Johnny Hoogerland's name to the top of the cool guy/badass/big ring list. Surprisingly, nothing happened to either of the drivers and they never apologized to any of the riders they almost killed to avoid a tree.

This actual fence post was auctioned off for Charity days later. I am not sure what happened to the barbed wire. I am sure it had about 40 years of rust and cow hair on it. I think he ended up with 25 stitches.

And spawned a really cool t-shirt.

This man has now moved up to badass status. His man card just got replaced with a brand new one.

New Pro (manufactured by Shimano) one piece stem/bar. Can you say Barmac?

Or how about this one from RavX with the removable geek mount? Way way less cost.

Guess who's saddle?







I think the cable routing on this frame is awesome. I like the mounting area near the derail hanger. Note the different type of hanger as well. Odd to see a Sram Red derail on a TDF bike as well, many of these guys wouldn't ride them last year...for some reason.





I am not too happy about the $9000.00 U.S. price though. WTF specialized? who has the money to bike these bikes?
1. Dentists 2. Heart Surgeons 3. Wall St. brokers

There are about 10-12 other frames out there just as nice, almost as stiff, just as "aero" and for about 60% less cost.

I was pretty busy this year during the tour with work and training, I didn't have as much time to focus in on the super details during the stages, I barely got to watch all of them each night or every few days. Sorry to the 5 people that read this stuff. :)