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Comfort improvements are in the forefront of 2017's trends, with frame features designed to absorb road shock
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Disc brakes are increasingly mainstream
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Many new bikes have 25mm tyres for better traction and comfort and lower rolling resistance
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You've never had a wider choice of road bike styles, from out-and-out race weapons to long-distance adventure and gravel bikes
2017 is here, but the bicycle industry has been busy releasing details of new bikes for many months. In case you missed any of the announcements, here are 12 of the hottest new road bikes to look out for this year.
Specialized Roubaix - from £2,100
One of the most popular bikes in the UK has had a total makeover. The Roubaix came to define a whole new category of sportive bikes when it was first launched, and for 2017 the famous Zertz inserts have gone and in their place is a radical new suspension damper housed below the stem, providing up to 20mm of suspension. The frame gets a completely updated geometry, it’s longer and lower, and there are disc brakes and clearance for up to 32mm tyres.
Trek Domane SL 6 £2,600 - £3,500
Trek last year launched the new Domane SLR with a front and rear Isospeed decouplers, the rear one offering a range of easy adjustment, and for 2017 Trek offers the Domane SL. It provides the new front-end Isospeed decoupler but retains the original, non-adjustable rear decoupler from the old Domane. That small change means the Domane SL is more affordable, with models starting at £2,500 for the bike pictured.
You can have the Domane SL 6 with disc brakes, this model costing £3,500, using a very similar carbon frame with Vision Metron 40 carbon wheels.
Giant TCR Advanced Disc - from £1,775
For 2017 Giant has added a disc-braked model to the range in the TCR Advanced Disc, with three levels to choose from Advanced SL Disc, Advanced Pro Disc (pictured) and Advanced Disc. The bike shares key features with the non-disc TCR Advanced but uses 12mm thru-axles and flat mounts, and the exact same geometry as the regular bike.
- Your complete guide to Giant’s 2017 road bikes
Orbea Orca M20team Disc — £3,199
Basque bicycle company Orbea was one of the early bike brands to offer disc brakes with its Avant endurance platform, but for 2017 it is offering its Orca race bike with disc brakes. The frame is lighter, down to 830g even with disc brakes, and it’s stiffer and more aero too, according to the company’s claims. There’s also increased tyre clearance, up to 28mm tyres will fit.
Argon 18 Gallium Pro Disc — £2,684.99 (frameset)
Argon 18 has given its top-end Gallium Pro a disc brake makeover for 2017, adding disc brakes and dropping a bit of weight.
Bianchi Oltre XR4 CV - from £5,499
Unveiled at the Tour de France, Bianchi’s update to its flagship race bike might not have had the most radical transformation on the outside, but inside it has produced a carbon fibre frame infused with the same vibration damping CounterVail, CV for short, technology first introduced so successfully to its Infinito CV endurance bike a couple of years ago.
Rose Xeon CWX-3000 — £2,395
The new CWX is an aero bike that is based on the company's X-Lite CW, with the same geometry and frame shapes, but it uses a lower grade of carbon fibre to make it a more affordable option. It's available with or without disc brakes.
- Rose Bikes 2017 road bike range unveiled
Storck Fascenario.3 £5,559 (frameset)
Yes, that's not a typo, Storck is charging £5,600 just for the frame! Storck is introducing the new Fascenario.3 for 2017, a bike that’s intended to be “the best road bike” out there with features variously designed for aerodynamic efficiency, comfort, stiffness, and ergonomic performance. You'd hope it's the best for the sort of money wouldn't you?
Read our first look of the new Fascenario.3 here
What new bikes are you looking forward to seeing in 2017?
BMC Roadmachine - from £2,499
Alongside its TeamMachine race bikes, BMC has gained many fans with its GranFondo Disc endurance bike, and in the new RoadMachine it takes the best of both models and built a lightweight performance-orientated endurance road bike. It has disc brakes, naturally, with 12mm thru-axles and, on the top model at least, features lots of internal cable routing, including inside the new stem, which takes the cables from the handlebar and points them inside the frame. Prices will start from £1,649 and rise all the way to £8,799.
Cervélo S3 Disc — £4,249
Cervélo is no stranger to cutting edge technology, being one of the companies that made aero road bikes, with its Soloist, very popular. And now it has embraced disc brakes, first with the R3 Disc and now with the S3 Disc. It's one of the small handful of disc-equipped aero road bikes currently available. The Canadian company makes some bold claims for it. It says the frame is more aero than the regular rim brake version, with a whole 2-watt saving. The frame is also 40g lighter and 9% stiffer. So disc brakes better?
Read more about the new S3 Disc here
Specialized Venge ViAS Disc — from £3,900
This has been a hotly anticipated bike ever since it first appeared on social media, but our first look at it reveals a bike that has had a total and complete disc brake makeover. It’s retained the key shape and form of the previous Venge ViAS frame, which debuted at the Tour de France last year and this year won the green jersey with Peter Sagan, but it’s been significantly modified to take disc brakes and 12mm thru-axles at both ends.
David has worked on the road.cc tech team since July 2012. Previously he was editor of Bikemagic.com and before that staff writer at RCUK. He's a seasoned cyclist of all disciplines, from road to mountain biking, touring to cyclo-cross, he only wishes he had time to ride them all. He's mildly competitive, though he'll never admit it, and is a frequent road racer but is too lazy to do really well. He currently resides in the Cotswolds.
18 comments
Jesus, those are some horrific looking bikes. Huge, oversized head and down tubes at odd angles leading to tiny, skinny seatstays and fat ugly chainstays. Give me slim, graceful Reynolds or Columbus steel any day. The blue one looks nice but I can't work out who makes it because the logos aren't big or plentiful enough.
I like the Specialized Venge though, but not the deep dish rims. I don't fancy those on a typically windy UK day.
I too love to keep it real with steel, i've never liked the diamond frame thing and the skinny seat stays, imo, looks all wrong.
Oh, the deep dish rims in the wind thing is solved by eating deep dish pizza pies!
The Oltre is by far the quickest thing I've ever ridden coming out of corners and accelerating I found myself a good few meters further up the road than I would have expected.
It's just a phenomenal bike.
Re Deep Dish...Me and Bike (semi deep carbons) together weigh about 74kg which should make me something of a kite. If you have good core and upper body strength (multi-sport helps) you can easily counter the steering troubles you hear about with bigger profile rims on the front.
Only one hot bike as far as I can tell, the Bianchi. Italians still do it better.
Maybe it's the camera angle but the bars on the Orbrea look like a ridiculously shallow drop.
The Cervelo S3 pictured is the £6.2k version (with Enve wheels & Di2), note the £4.3k version.
The BMC Road Machine is the ultimate Winter road bike in my opinion.
Cervelo S3 Disc ; I'd take that over the same price Specialized Venge Vias
And I thought the old S5 was ugly . . . that Rose is hideous!
DEEP DISH? Pizzas are deep dish (if you're in Chicago), but wheels never are. Wheels are deep section (hyphenate it if you'd like). As if any of this needs to be said, but "dish" is a thing specific to wheel building and has nothing to do with the depth of the rim.
Still not any mid level disc brake bikes with SRAM eTap HRD yet. Really hoping SRAM bring eTap to Force or make the RED eTap HRD upgrade groupset a little more economical.
Hmm, yes, but bikes based on steel tubes all tend to look exactly the same (sans paint or decals). At least carbon makes almost any shape possible.
Is the BMC a Planet Hulk Avengers special edition?
Yepp, that Rose has to be contender for fugly bike of the year...and it looks to be facing some stiff competition!
just because it can be done, doesn't mean it should be done...
Is there really that much value trapped in a Storck frame? It'a >GBP2k more than a C60 and more than many of the bikes listed here. And would kit out most of them with top class group-sets and wheels...
The BMC is truly ugly! The Bianchi in the flesh is really really gorgeous. From the photos the Giant and the Bianchi are the only ones I'd take bsed on looks.
In short, No. Storck are a relatively small manufacturer and develop everything themselves, so their background costs are much higher per unit than large manufacturers.
Blank out all the stickers and identifying marks on these bikes and put them in a blind test and even pros won't be able to tell you which costs more, in fact they won't even agree on the best handling / lightest etc. Once you're at the top level of frames (in fact even before you get to the top level) the value / best bike is entirely subjective.
I had a Porsche Bike R that was apparently designed by Storck and won design awards, it was certainly different, fat alu down tube like a Principia covered in matt purple paint that must have had something in it as it was very un paint like. Had lovely chromed forks that weighed a ton though the frame itself wasn't too heavy.
These are, well, meh at best.
porsche.JPG