For a pretty price, it’s possible to own the very same top-of-the-range road bikes that are being raced by the pros at this year’s Tour de France. These top-tier bikes can very often carry a five-figure price tag, but are they really much better than the mid-range offerings?
> Tour de France bikes on a budget
To find out, we set about testing two competitive options from both categories before diving into the data to see whether Pogacar would still be in yellow if he was to swap in his V4Rs for a mid-range offering…
The competitors
It just so happens that we’ve recently finished reviewing two bikes that fit the bill very nicely:
> Van Rysel RCR Pro – The story behind 2024’s most talked about road bike
Representing our mid-tier option is the Van Rysel RCR Rival AXS. It has carbon Zipp wheels (303s), an electronic Sram groupset (Sram Rival AXS), a power meter and a frame sculpted by the wind. It has been widely lauded for its value for money.
It’s going up against a Canyon Ultimate CFR. It too has carbon Zipp wheels (303 Firecrests), an electronic Sram groupset (The latest Sram Red AXS), a power meter, and has been created using an “exhaustive process of wind tunnel testing”.
Clearly, there is going to be quite a difference in price between these two road bikes… and well, you’d be right. The Van Rysel, in this exact spec, is available to purchase for £4,500. The Canyon, which is the same spec as Movistar and Alpecin Deceuninck are using in the mountains at this year’s Tour de France, will set you back a cool £9,749.
That means that the Ultimate CFR is over twice the price of the RCR… but is it twice the bike? We’re going to try to find out!
PS: Before we get started, this article and video is by no means a dig at Canyon, or top-tier bikes in general. Van Rysel also makes a pro-level bike that costs twice as much as the one we’ve used in the test and many of the other bikes at this year’s Tour de France will cost you upwards of £12,000! It just so happened that it was these two bikes that fit the bill for our test.
‘Diminishing gains’
The other day I drew this rather rudimentary graph, and said that spending more than around £3,000 is about as much use as a handbrake on a canoe. I also said that Pogacar could win the 2024 Tour de France on a four-grand bike, something that might age very badly but for now, I stand by!
But in all seriousness, surely there is a measurable, significant difference between a superbike like the Canyon and a mid-range bike like the Van Rysel? Otherwise, why would anyone ever buy the range-topping models?
> Sram Red AXS vs Shimano Dura-Ace: which groupset is best?
To get some more concrete data than just listening to the word on the street, we’re going to compare a few things: their speed around a flat circuit at a set wattage, and how fast they can climb in an all-out TT uphill.
The hill climb test
We’ll start off with a climbing test, because usually as you spend more the most noticeable difference is weight saving.
For example, the higher-end Sram Red AXS groupset on our superbike is lighter than the third-tier Rival AXS on the mid-range bike. The wheels are also lighter, and indeed the frame is too.
> 10 cycling trends NOT to copy off the Tour de France pros
Before we get started, it’s worth pointing out that we selected these bikes because they have components (groupsets and wheels) from the same brand. They’re both size medium, and we were also able to use the adjustable cockpit on the Ultimate CFR to match the handlebar width to the RCR.
As you’d expect, the Ultimate CFR is indeed lighter, right on the UCI weight limit at 6.8kg in fact. The RCR, meanwhile, is not tickling the weight limit at 7.91kg, but it doesn’t feel ridiculously heavy either.
So far then, that extra £5,249 has saved us around 1kg. How much difference does that actually make on a climb?
> Lightweight v aero: which is best?
To find out, we selected a local climb with a gradient similar to that of the Galibier, as that’s where we’ve seen some of the biggest time gaps at this year’s Tour de France, and marked the start and finish points.
Our climb is 1.8km long, but despite being about 13 times shorter than the Galibier we hope that it will still give us a representation of how much faster, if any, our superbike is.
Results
Ok, so test complete and the results are perhaps closer than expected. The first effort I did was on the Van Rysel, and over our 1.8km climb I clocked a time of 4:46. Not exactly peak Pogacar…
Despite probably being a little fatigued, I then hopped on to the Canyon and completed the climb four seconds quicker in a time of 4:42.
Obviously, to try to balance out the effects of fatigue I then did the test again, this time with the Canyon first. On this run I clocked a time of 4:45, slower than my first effort but five seconds faster than I’d then do on the mid-range bike.
> How much faster is an expensive road bike?
Disclaimer: we realise that just like with any real-world testing, it’s impossible to remove all variables. I have since plugged the numbers into Bike Calculator, and it does seem feasible that I would be a few seconds quicker on a bike that is a kilogram lighter.
Flat test
Most people actually looking to spend their own money on either one of these bikes probably aren’t the type of person who is racing up the Galibier on the daily, so it’s potentially more important to find out which one is faster on the flat.
To do that, we found ourselves a flat traffic-free loop that measured 10km, cleaned the dribble off the bikes from the hill climb efforts and calibrated my power pedals.
> 6 of the best value bike upgrades
Rather than trying to ride as fast as possible, this test would require riding at a constant 250 watts. We’d also set off from a rolling start so that I didn’t spanner up the results trying to clip in or accelerate.
Results
Alright, results time! Our flat course was a grand total of 10 kilometres long with an elevation gain of just 34 meters. When we say flat we really do mean flat! To be honest it’s really hard to say that we found anything conclusive…
I took the Canyon first this time. I clocked a time of 17 minutes and 50 seconds.
The first effort on the RCR I was actually faster with a time of 17 minutes and 40 seconds. However, I then did the test again and was slower on both bikes, clocking times of 18:01 and 18:06 respectively. What can we glean from this then? Well, only that the difference in speed between the two bikes is way less than the margin of error of our test.
To be honest I wasn’t expecting to see any huge differences between the two on this test. Other than perhaps a fancy integrated cockpit, mid-range bikes very often share exactly the same frame shape and geometry as their more expensive counterparts.
> Tour de France bikes vs the bikes you can buy in the shops — are they actually the same?
I think we could have happily chosen all manner of manufacturers and not found a meaningful difference, or at least not as big as the one from making your body more aero, or switching to a set of deeper wheels.
Could Pogacar win the Tour de France on a mid-range bike?
Using our data and online tools such as Bike Calculator, we’ve calculated that a bike that is 1kg heavier would mean that Pog crossed the summit of the Galibier about 20 seconds slower, i.e. at an almost identical time to Remco Evenepoel. I think we know what that means: he would have likely still descended fastest and/or won the sprint for the line.
Combine this with the fact that the mid-range bike is not really any slower on the flat, and Pogacar’s subsequent efforts proving that he is the man to beat, even with the cumulative fatigue of racing a heavier bike for three weeks I personally believe that he would still be in yellow.
Of course, don’t expect the pros to be switching out their top-end bikes anytime soon. Grand Tours can be won and lost by a matter of seconds, so they’ll still be going after every possible advantage, however small!
Let us know how much you think is sensible to spend on a performance road bike in the comments section below as well as whether our results were what you expected…
-1024x680.jpg "“Clear anti-cyclist bias”: Lawsuit filed against Toronto police after cop doored cyclist… before ticketing rider over incident")
54 thoughts on “Would Pogacar win the Tour de France on a cheaper bike? Mid-range road bike vs superbike speed tested”
I think I’d be more worried
I think I’d be more worried about the position than the bike. Is that really how Pogacar rides? This chap looks a fair bit lower and more stretched out, and he’s not even on the drops:
https://www.ran.de/sports/radsport/news/olympia-in-paris-bdr-startet-mit-politt-und-schachmann-400151
I assume you’re talking about
I assume you’re talking about this? Yes – that is his typical position on the bike.
I was talking about the top
I was talking about the top picture. It looks a bit like how Hinault sat on his bike before he changed his position. He described it as sitting “like a toad”.
john_smith wrote:
Poorly Photoshopped pictures of someone supposedly riding a bike that he’s never been on in his life may not be reflective of actual riding position…
Nice bit of semi-science,
Nice bit of semi-science, thank you.
I think it shows that the top end stuff, be it frames, wheels, groupset, is really about marketing, and mid range everything is good enough for the rest of us.
Agreed. More than good enough
Agreed. More than good enough in most cases!
I guess quite a lot of road.cc readers do have £4,500 bikes – but I think it would be more fun to add a budget bike into the mix (e.g. the cheapest Boardman, or at least something in the C2W range). Not least as I suspect many people are inspired by the TdF to go out and buy something like that to get into road cycling in the first place.
I reckon the diminishing returns curve flattens out a lot quicker than in the chart above (acknowledging it’s about illustrating an idea, rather than being precisely accurate). Those on cheaper rides might be encouraged to discover their entry-level bike is actually 90% as good as the pros’. OTOH, they might be discouraged to realise just how big the gap to the pros in human performance really is – as someone once said, it’s not about the bike!
In a totally different sport.
In a totally different sport… my wife and I went to ballroom dancing classes about 30 years ago. At the end of year certificate party, a professional couple were guests. Extremely ordinary people you could barely notice, until they stepped onto the dance floor. Then they seemed to enlarge threefold, to glow and radiate a sort of glory, and they floated just above the floor. Holidaying in Menton, saw some pro riders training… wow! Silent lightening flickering up and down Madone and along sea front
No. The top level stuff does
No. The top level stuff does give the elites an edge, both in reality and psychologically. A few years ago, one of the big name bike suppliers made a dog of a TT bike. But, for us normal people, the benefit of high end is the margins the companies make from hedge fund managers buying high end so they can afford to make higher volume low nargin products for us
I think it would be fun to
I think it would be fun to see whether you could persuade a friendly TdF rider to join you for a little race – where you get an amazeballs bike and they get an entry level or mid range bike. Then swap and see.
My expectation is that the TdF rider will beat you on either bike because the performance bottle neck will be your physical conditioning versus theirs.
My other expectation is that they will marginally beat themselves on the better bike because they are at a level where they will not be the barrier to peak performance on the entry-level bike – and the better bike will allow them the freedom to demonstrate their potential.
Many pros ride so much they
Many pros ride so much they can tell if something’s not right by ½mm. Others are less bothered
They’re not 353 NSWs, they’re
They’re not 353 NSWs, they’re 303 Firecrest, and cost less than half the price of the 353 (but more than the 303S).
Glov Zaroff wrote:
Correct, which is weird because the Ultimate CFR ASX does come with 353 NSWs and none of the build options offers 303 Firecrests.
ETA Mystery explained, from Stu’s review of the bike last Sunday: “The Zipp 303 Firecrests our review bike came with are a claimed 1,408g, so they add some liveliness, with their deep-section rims bringing an aero boost once you are up to speed – and the standard build will ship with 353 NSWs, which are even lighter and a touch deeper.” Though why Canyon are sending out review bikes with lower-spec wheels than the ones that will be supplied to customers is unexplained.
In the review for the Canyon,
In the review for the Canyon, it was (eventually) clarified that the bike Road.cc received was not supplied with the standard build. But it would seem to undermine this comparison to some extent. I don’t think it would actually change the results noticeably (Jamie’s graph seems pretty accurate to me) but if you’re going to test a superbike, it probably ought to be the whole package including wheels.
He’d win on a 10 year old,
He’d win on a 10 year old, mechanical 11 speed, rim brake bike with 23mm tubulars also
Like my 2007 Cannondale
Like my 2007 Cannondale System6 Ultegra bought in clearance sale 2008 as it’s half aluminium half carbon. The frame won 2007 Giro & 3 stages of TdF (1 mountain top, 2 sprint) under different riders on different teams. But… no, it wouldn’t win on UK roads, maybe not in France, because ruts in roads now wide enough to swallow my 23c tyres
Nick T wrote:
Not sure about that, definitely a 10 year old, mechanical 11 speed, rim brake wouldn’t hold him back, but as I understand it 28 mm tires provide an approximately 15 W advantage over 23 mm so say 10% of his cruising speed, 2% of his attacking speed. The extra effort required to sustain his winning advantage, not to mention the additional fatigue associated with a less comfortable ride, might well take a pretty serious toll over a three week tour and make him more vulnerable.
Tubulars are more comfortable
Tubulars are more comfortable and compliant than clinchers/tubeless as the entire chamber is flexible under load. Having tried riding larger clinchers my rides are measurably faster on narrower tubulars and I prefer the feel
Tubulars are more comfortable
Tubulars are more comfortable and compliant than clinchers/tubeless…
This pro-tubular propaganda for tubulars is going the same way as the pro-rim brake propaganda- nowhere. There are a few more propagandists for rim brakes, but approximately 0% of people on here are riding tubulars and both minorities will eventually die out. Tubeless v. tubed still has some way to go and I may be in the minority on that
Having an opinion and
Having an opinion and expressing it is not propaganda. Rim brakes have clear advantages over disc brakes. Saying so doesn’t make you a propagandist.
Rim brakes are in fact disk
Rim brakes are in fact disk brakes, the rim is the rotor and pads are, well, the pads. All braking is about the tire’s adhesion to the road, once the tires has reached max adhesion it doesn’t matter if that was accomplished by rim or disk brakes. Of course in wet and or muddy conditions disk brakes are much more favorable, but even with a road bike in wet conditions if you have Kool Stop salmon-colored pads on they will stop very aggressively in the rain and the only thing slowing you down from stopping fast is the tire’s adhesion to the road. Odd, we’re back to the tire adhesion thing.
I am still riding on tubulars
I am still riding on tubulars for 99% of rides
wtjs wrote:
A lot depends on the quality of the roads you are riding on, but I believe that size for size on the same roads tubs are faster and more comfortable than clinchers. Using our local weekly club 10 as a testing ground I can run higher pressure in 23mm tubs than I can with 23mm clinchers (frame and forks won’t take bigger tyres) without feeling that I am losing speed due to being shaken to bits. Also, nobody is suggesting that elite riders use 28mm clinchers at 70 PSI on the velodrome, its all tubs at 180+ PSI because the surface suits them. By choice on normal road rides I’ll use 32mm clinchers at 65 PSI but although they are more comfortable they are not as responsive. Anecdotal Information but that is all most of us can supply to any of these debates.
You can equal the ride
You can equal the ride quality of tubulars with any of the Vittoria Corsa Pro series tires, depending if you want speed or puncture resistance, and then use latex tubes. The Vittoria Corsa Speed tire you will not tell the difference between a tubular, and with the others in the Corsa line you probably won’t either.
froze wrote:
I beg to differ, a pair of track wheels I bought second hand for training had corsa speeds on and they were rubbish for both speed and comfort, I swapped them out for Pista speed clinchers which were much better but still not as good as the pista speed tubulars even though I run the tubs at higher pressure. The absolute best were dugast silks which were awesome but expensive to run as the rear tyre struggles to last more than about 1000 miles
Nick T wrote:
Well, the fact that I disagree with you quite rightly means nothing. The fact that every professional bike rider disagrees with you means quite a lot. If 21mm tubs were faster and more comfortable than 28mm tubeless you don’t think the pros would still be using them?
Pro riders ride what they’re
Pro riders ride what they’re given.
Also worth noting that my words didn’t claim they were more comfortable, but that I prefer the feel. Big squishy tyres are definitely more comfortable, but they’re also more vague. I prefer the involved feeling of the road beneath me, more than I do floating along slowly on pillows
Nick T wrote:
Obviously they are generally confined to the bikes and components offered by their sponsoring manufacturers but they don’t just “ride what they’re given”, they spend many hundreds of hours every year testing equipment to try and gain those few extra watts that will give them an advantage. By all means ride whatever tyres and wheels suit you best, but do you really believe that professional teams and riders who devote their lives to finding the marginal gains that will give them the edge over their competitors know that there is a faster alternative to the gear they use available but refuse to use it?
Didn’t get much of a mention
Didn’t get much of a mention this year, but in previous years there were always many instances of the use of electrical tape and Sharpies…
It’s not easy to turn a
It’s not easy to turn a tubeless rim tubular with a sharpie though
Rendel Harris wrote:
Well, yes. Tubeless, clinchers, discs etc are all ciable technologies and have their respective places, but pro road cycling isn’t really that place. Tubular rims are lighter, stronger, simpler to manufacture, the tyres are safer in the event of a puncture and arguably provide a better ride feel. The downsides (gluing, added cost, less easy roadside repair etc) are negated by pro team setups. The public doesn’t buy tubulars because of those donwsides though, and manufacturers quite understandably want to sell their products, hence teams are using technology that is inferior as most sponsors have stopped producing new tubular rims. There’s no other sport that is so dependent on what the sponsors are able to market
Nick T wrote:
I would think that tubeless is safer in the event of a puncture as they don’t tend to lose air so quickly. There’s also the tyre inserts that they’ve started using so there’s less chance of the tyre coming off and also allows them to continue cycling until they can get a replacement.
The number of blown tyres in
The number of blown tyres in the peloton in recent years would suggest otherwise. Pro teams also put a tiny amount of sealant in to reduce weight, just enough to make it airtight, they don’t seem to care about the puncture protection benefits. You can put sealant in tubulars anyway, I’ve done it myself
Nick T wrote:
So, if they don’t care about the puncture protection benefits of tubeless, why do they use it if they’re slower than tubs as you claim?
why do they use it if they’re
why do they use it if they’re slower than tubs as you claim?
Clearly, it’s because they’re deluded dimwits who know much less about it than the real experts!
Marketing
Marketing
Nick T wrote:
You were doing fine until the bit I’ve highlighted.
You may not have seen the wind tunnel tests of some modern TL tyres on Roval’s current wide rims compared to narrower rims and tyres; or the real-world tests with various tyre widths showing that wider tyres are nearly always faster. Dan Bigham used Conti GP 5000s TT tubeless tyres for his successful Hour record attempt, as did Filippo Ganna. Do you think Dan would choose a slower tyre? Not on your life.
Carbon rims are carbon rims and if you think that being simpler to manufacture is therefore better then you’ve surely not noticed the recent developments in carbon layup, integrated handlebars, BB types, custom aero extensions, skinsuit fabrics, 3D printing and many other areas.
You may not have noticed the
You may not have noticed the push to supply hookless rims purely because they are much more simple to manufacture, despite multiple reports of blown tyres under road riding pressures. the hook on a carbon clincher is incredibly difficult to produce, the mould is complicated and you have to ensure you have fibres filling the hook somehow. Wheel suppliers don’t want to have to make two different systems for double the cost, hence the one they can sell is given to the teams.
The technology is indeed inferior, for pro racing specifically, for the reasons I’ve stated. It’s better for the average joe who doesn’t have the luxury of a support car or the ability nor inclination to support themselves on a rainy morning in a layby near Stoke
Nick T wrote:
And yet, as stated below, records are being shattered left right and centre both on the road and on the track by people using this technology, beating the records of people who used the technology you claim is superior, how do you account for that?
Why do I have to account for
Why do I have to account for that? Why don’t you prove to me that records wouldn’t be tumbling otherwise?
Nick T wrote:
Because you have claimed that the pro peleton has switched to inferior, slower technology and therefore logically times should have slowed, and yet they have got faster, so if you can’t provide an explanation for that we are left with the obvious conclusion that the technology to which they have switched is in fact faster.
Nick T wrote:
So, let’s imagine Pog, Jonas and Remco had all been within five seconds of each other before the start on Sunday. You genuinely think that even though technology was available to save, say, a minute over their rivals, not one of them would have said right, I’m using tubs and we can black out the maker’s name if necessary? Seriously?
I’m afraid your comments show a fundamental misapprehension of the purpose of sponsorship. The manufacturers aren’t that interested in persuading us to buy the actual products on show, because very few of us are going to want to, or be able to, shell out £15,000+ for exactly the same bike a GC rider uses. What they want is for their name to be associated with the best quality winning products so we buy their lower-end gear, which is where the profit lies. It doesn’t matter to Bora or Specialized or Shimano if a rider is using tubs or tubeless clinchers, or even if they are, as has sometimes been the case, using another brand or bespoke wheels rebadged, what’s important is that their name is prominently displayed on the rim. Preferably on the winner’s bike, so the suggestion that they would force a rider to use something that gives them less chance of winning is quite clearly nonsense.
If you favour tubs, that’s fine, if you believe they make you faster and are more comfortable, great. But when speed records for average speeds over stage races, individual climbs, classics, even the world hour record on the track for goodness’ sake*, are being broken time and again by riders using wider tubeless tyres, taking the records from riders who were using tubs, and when scientific testing has conclusively demonstrated that tubs are no longer the fastest option, to keep on insisting that just about everyone else, including all the best riders in the world, is wrong and you are right looks a bit daft.
*When Ganna took the record he used wheels that had been custom built from the ground up to fit his frame by Princeton Carbonworks, so no question of manufacturers trying to foist their favoured product on him. He could have chosen any wheel type he wanted and he and his team spent over a year researching and designing the fastest options; he chose 25mm clinchers and, as we know, smashed the record by over a kilometre (a record that was also set on clinchers by Dan Bigham, which in turn smashed the record of the last man to take the record on tubs, Victor Campanaerts, by 459 metres).
Rendel Harris wrote:
Your general point is probably sound, but I suspect Pog would have said “Whatever, I’ll just take 2 minutes out of you all whatever you give me”.
Fair point, “Hey I feel like
Nick T wrote:
Can you show any actual science for that?
Can you show me science for
Can you show me science for the opposite? I doubt you can even show me anecdotal evidence
The writer makes a very valid
The writer makes a very valid point though, and that is for an above-average rider who sees some local racing, a $5,000 bike is all they really need, in fact, dare I say, a $2,500 bike is all they need!
A typical $1,500 bike will usually come with Shimano 105 and standard cheap wheels but they are made to take the abuse of rough roads, and a bike in the price range is great for the average rider. The next price-to-benefit curve comes at around the $2,500 price, with that bike you’ll find Dura Ace, but again you get cheap but durable wheels, but a lighter frame. The $5,000 price range still gets you the same DA but upgraded wheels and the frame weight is about the same. What a person could do is get a $2,500 bike, and find a set of lighter wheels for around $1,500, now you have a $4,000 bike that will equal the $5,000 bike! You have saved yourself $1,000. But keep in mind, racing wheels are not intended to be used as everyday training wheels, they won’t last as long as cheaper wheels over the long haul…at least typically that is true.
froze wrote:
Are you writing from the year 2000? If not could you please provide a link to these £2000 Dura Ace bikes, I think a lot of people here would be in the market at that price!
And I have used tubulars for
And I have used tubulars for exactly 0% of my rides since about 85, and have never missed them.
When I started racing again a
When I started racing again a few years ago I trusted the new wisdom the clinchers were better but I’ve since gone back to tubs because they are faster and I’m getting slower and need every advantage I can afford.
Backladder wrote:
I’ve never used tubs, so am curious as to whether they’re quicker than tubeless (not that I’m likely to use tubulars as the reliability of tubeless in terms of punctures is better). Found this article comparing them: https://bikexchange.com/clincher-vs-tubular-vs-tubeless-tires/
There’s also mention in that article about Cycling Weekly’s test of the speed of them:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NGnKMvZ5Ig
There are supposedly
There are supposedly scientific tests that show both clinchers and tubs being faster, it probably shows that there are many variables that need to be tightly controlled and failing to do so can vary the results considerably. If you’ve never ridden tubs find a friend or club member who rides them and ask to borrow them, I find that the difference in feel is greater than the numerical differences in the various tests.
hawkinspeter wrote:
High quality clincher and tubeless tyres are faster now. From what I’ve read it seems that the brands haven’t been investing in R&D for tubular tyres for a while.
It has been shown repeatedly that wider tyres are faster, even if they don’t actually feel faster. It’s why most pro teams are choosing to run 28mm or wider tubeless Vittoria Corsas or GP5000 TT TR tyres on wide rims.
https://velo.outsideonline.com/road/road-racing/tour-de-france/every-tire-teams-using-tour-de-france-2024/
For ‘real world’ riding, especially on the poorly maintained roads that we have in the UK, I struggle to see why anyone would bother with skinny tubs when there are so many excellent alternatives.
Just being able to ride away
Being able to ride away after fixing a puncture without worrying that the tyre might roll off in the next corner more than makes up for any hypothetical loss of ride quality.
I don’t know, because I don’t
I don’t know, because I don’t care, whether any tubular rim wheels are ready-made with discs- if they aren’t, this would allow the ‘look at me, I know what you and everyone else doesn’t’ contrarians a last-ditch and doomed attempt to kill 2 birds with one stone.