Speed Concept, our fastest triathlon bike ever
How we made Speed Concept the fastest bike we’ve ever tested
The culmination of years of intense development, Speed Concept demanded an immense amount of meticulous testing and modelling to find and optimise for every small gain possible. The result is an incredibly aerodynamic bike that’s the fastest bike we’ve ever tested, and one that saves riders roughly six minutes on an Ironman course – a huge amount of time when competing at that level.
By the numbers
Thousands of CFD simulations
1 Manny
16 watts saved
Faster at any yaw angle
This yaw chart compares the new Speed Concept with the previous Speed Concept, with the Y axis showing the amount of drag and the X axis showing the angle of the wind in degrees. As you can see, the new bike is faster than the old one – no matter where the wind is coming from. Each point on the chart represents how the bike performs at different wind angles. We weighted the data based on conditions you can expect in the real world – for example, it’s more meaningful if a bike is faster at 7 degrees than at zero degrees, since you’ll always encounter a bit of wind outside.
Small gains add up to big speed
The Speed Concept was designed around a rider from the beginning. Sounds like common sense, right? But most companies engineer and test their bikes without using a full mannequin or a rider at any stage.
Take a quick glance at our key optimisation areas and you’ll notice a common theme – most are specifically intended to offset drag created by a rider. Of course, you can only see these small opportunities if you have a full rider on the bike during testing.
Why we use a full rider for development
The rider creates 70-80% of a bike’s drag. So, if there is an opportunity to make the rider even 1% faster, we’ll do it because it has an enormous impact on the bike’s overall speed. This is our fastest Speed Concept ever, and you can thank Manny the mannequin for that.
The fastest bike we've ever tested
Our unwavering goal for this project was to make the Speed Concept as fast as possible – and we've done it. Six minutes faster in an Ironman, 16 watts of energy saved. Now it's time to put all your hard work on the line, knowing that you're piloting a triathlon bike that's proven to make you faster than ever, too.
Find out more about the Speed Concept
Fit and travel
Find out how to dial in your fit and how to travel with the Speed Concept.
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