Thursday, July 28, 2011

Bikes of the Tour de France!: Specialized Venge

HTC, Saxo Bank, and Astana all have the choice to run Specialized’s aero Venge frame, which won its very first outing at Milan–San Remo this spring. We called it “stiff and solid, an unapologetic race rig. The rigid platform snapped up legendary Italian climbs and swooped down tight switchbacks.”

Bikes of the Tour de France!: Trek Madone 6.9 SSL

Leopard-Trek and RadioShack use the Madone 6.9 SSL as their daily driver. We haven’t tested Trek’s top model for a few years, but of the kissing cousin 6.5 we said, “The ride isn't the liveliest compared with other high-end race bikes, but the stiff frame rewards your efforts with speed. And despite that stiffness, the bike was comfortable even after hours in the saddle.”

Saturday, July 2, 2011

Introducing Tarmac SL4



June 30, 2011
 
Dear Dealer,

As we get ready to launch our 2012 line to you—which is packed with amazing bikes and equipment—we are also super excited to give you sneak peek at a bike that will be ridden by some of the biggest names in cycling on the grandest stage.

Come July 2nd, select riders from teams HTC-Highroad, Astana, and Saxo Bank-SunGard will race the Tour de France on the next generation of Tarmac: the SL4. This pure race bike is the culmination of everything we’ve learned to date about working hand-in-hand with pros: taking their insight and putting it to use designing the fastest bikes in the pro peloton, without sacrificing the ride quality we all demand. 

The Tarmac SL4 is the stiffest frame and complete module in the industry (torsional), and by far the stiffest and lightest Tarmac we’ve ever made, resulting in a lightning-fast machine. But, while improving on those numbers, we’ve also managed to improve vertical compliance to maintain the legendary Tarmac ride quality. We all know it’s not just the numbers, but how balanced the ride is—that is our magic. If you ask the pro riders who have racked up thousands of miles and hundreds of wins on Tarmacs over the years, they would agree. Thanks to them we’ve proven our idea that Smoother is Faster.

We’re super excited for you to experience the SL4 for yourselves—and of course to see it start winning races! We’re equally excited that riders will still be able to enjoy our race-proven SL3 frames, which won last year’s Tour. This is still the bike-of-choice for most of our riders in this year’s race, and will continue through model year 2012.

In fact the SL3 could win its second Tour de France, as reigning champ Alberto Contador will ride the same SL3 he rode to victory in the this year’s Giro—he’s a superstitious rider and wouldn’t even ride a special pink SL3 frame built for him during the Giro!

With the addition of the SL4, our already-unparalleled quiver of race bikes gets one stronger: It joins the SL3, Venge, Roubaix, and Shiv to make by far the most dominant and diverse collection of race bikes in the industry.

I am passionate about continually investing and innovating - not only to stimulate the riders and help them ride farther faster, but to support you and give you the tools to grow your business well into the future. The awesome new SL4, which will be available starting in August, will hopefully do both.


As always, thank you for your continued support. Here’s hoping we win a few more stages and maybe a jersey or two at the Tour!

All the best from the team at Specialized. We are here to support you to ensure our mutual success forever.

Sincerely,

 

Mike Sinyard
Founder and President
Specialized Bicycle Components