Bike at Bedtime: Giacomo Nizzolo’s BMC Timemachine Road

Italian racer Giacomo Nizzolo sprinted to victory in the Clasica de Almeria last week, gaining the first win of the season for Team Qhubeka Assos, and this is the BMC Timemachine Road he did it on. The victory was notable as the first for British wheels brand Hunt at the highest level of road racing.

The BMC Timemachine comes in two flavours: the straight Timemachine is the time trial version while the Timemachine Road – and I suspect you’re one step ahead here – is the drop bar aero road bike. It is available only with disc brakes and features what BMC calls “an aerodynamically perfected frame” and an ICS (Integrated Cockpit System) aero handlebar and stem. Nizzolo got so low in the finale that he was nearly licking that stem.

BMC says that, like most aero road bikes, the Timemachine was designed using CFD (computational fluid dynamics) computer software, before being tested in a wind tunnel and on a velodrome.

It uses 12mm thru-axles and flat mount disc brake callipers. The frame weighs a claimed 980g and the fork is 410g (with an uncut steerer tube). The aero seatpost is 190g.

The fork is an asymmetric design with an aero fairing that’s designed to reduce drag around the brake calliper.

The bottle cages are designed to work especially with the frame tube profiles to manage airflow and minimise drag. Stock versions of the bike also come with storage that sits below the bottle cages, in that area where the seat tube and down tube meet, but it needs to be removed for UCI racing as it counts as a fairing.

The ICS Aero handlebar routes the cables and brake hoses into the frame. Steerer tube spacers are removable without the need for re-cabling.

BMC says that it has considered comfort with tube profiles and a carbon fibre layup, particularly in the rear stays and fork blades, designed to deliver a smooth ride.

Like the majority of the pro peloton, Team Qhubeka Assos uses Shimano Dura-Ace Di2 groupsets. That’s a CeramicSpeed Oversized Pulley Wheel System on the rear derailleur, designed to reduce drivetrain friction and save watts.

Rotor provides the chainsets, including power meters. These are lightweight Rotor Aldhu cranks on Nizzolo’s bike.

The wheels come from British brand Hunt, which has been in existence for just a few years. Team Qhubeka Assos has loads of options available to riders, from 33mm-deep Carbon Aero Discs to the team-only 80mm-deep Hunt Carbon Wide Tubular wheels pictured on the bike above. Hunt says that 65% of the wheels they've supplied the team are for tubular tyres, and the other 35% are tubeless. We'd expect Hunt to offer the 80mm rims to consumers in a tubeless disc brake format before long.

The black wall tyres fitted to the bike at the top of the page are Goodyear Eagle F1 Supersport tubeless. These are designed for low rolling resistance, and Goodyear claims a weight of just 190g in this 25mm width.