Will Jonas Vingegaard's Cervélo S5 be a two-time Tour de France winning bike?
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Jonas Vingegaard and the Cervélo S5 proved to be a winning combination in last year’s Tour de France - and the Danish rider, his Jumbo-Visma team and the Canadian bike manufacturer will be hoping for a repeat this year. At the time of writing, so far so good, with Vingegaard in yellow with the 2023 race entering its second week
The updated S5, which was officially released just after Vingegaards’s maiden Grand Tour victory last July, features the deep tubing you’d expect from a aero race bike; the revamped headtube and downtube both exploiting the relaxing of UCI regulations.
With a cursory glance Vingegaard’s S5 frameset looks much like last year's model. However, a closer look reveals a custom paint job, albeit a subtle one by today’s standards. The stars and the ‘Ride Your Dreams’ motif are part of Jumbo-Visma’s TdF collaboration with Efteling, a theme park in the Netherlands. Sander de Bruijn, a designer at the Efteling, wrote a fairy tale about a little cyclist who manages to break free from a merry-go-round called The Vélodrome and ends up finishing on the Champs-Élysées. Another version might have had a young Danish rider escaping from a fish-packing plant and ending up on the top spot on the podium at the world’s biggest bike race.
The S5’s seat tube cut out allows for an almost seamless integration with the rear wheel. And while the gap between the seat tube and the rear tyre is now just a few milimetres, tire clearance has been increased to allow for up to 34mm.
As for Vingegaard’s tires he’s running what appears to be a new Corsa Speed offering from Vittoria. These are tubeless and 28c, a combination that isn’t currently available.
The wheelset is Reserve’s 52/63 model - with the numbers indicating the rim depth. The shallower 52 is used on the front to help reduce the effects of crosswinds. These photos were taken before the Grand Depart in Bilbao but expect Vingegaard to carry on switching rim depths to match the stage.
Jumbo-Visma switched to SRAM for the 2023 season and the change in groupset is the biggest difference from Vingegaard’s ‘22 S5 to this year’s bike. Like the entire TdF squad he’s using SRAM Red AXS, fitted here with a standard 52/39t chainset. A few Jumbo riders have been experimenting with SRAM’s 1x chainrings of late, including Vingegaard, so it will interesting to see if he chooses this option for any of the upcoming stages.
Vingegaard pairs the chainset with a 12-speed 10-33 cassette.
The Dane sits atop a Fizik Vento Argo OO saddle. It’s a short-nose design, with carbon rails and a cutout to relieve pressure. Claimed weight is 134g.
The updated S5 was joined by a new integrated bar and stem. Cervélo says it’s both lighter and easy to set up. Vingeegard opts for a 5mm spacer while the team mechanics have taped over the bolts to help reduce drag - every second counts at this level, after all. Note the map of France that adorns the headtube - part of the custom paint job.
Another example of Vingegaard’s appreciation for marginal gains can be found in the mount for his Garmin cycling computer. What looks like a custom injection molded unit, it sits just in front of the bars, with almost no gap, adding further aero credentials to this watt-saving S5.
Whether it adds up to another maillot jaune for the Danish GC man remains to be seen - to follow the race check out our guide to 'How to Watch Tour de France 2023'.
