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When Tour de France starts in London on July 7., Team CSC’s riders should be off to a good start as the entire team has brand new Cervélo Soloist Carbon Super Light (better known as SLC-SL), all except for Carlos Sastre of course, who prefers the R3 frame – and he will of course have a brand new one of its kind – the R3 Super Light (R3 SL).

The major difference from the original frames to the new Super Light models are. as the name implies, the weight. The frames are a couple of hundred grams lighter and slightly stiffer in the construction and the color has changed from the familiar Cervélo red/black to black/white. The change of color is also seen on the new P3 Carbon time trial frames, which the riders will be using inthe Tour as well.

“The riders themselves can’t feel any difference, and as mechanics we don’t feel any difference either, whether we’re working on this frame or an old one, but of course you have to be as weightless as possible on those tough climbs,” says Team CSC’s chief mechanic Alejandro Torralbo, who in the weeks prior to the Tour is hard at work assembling the bikes. ”We, along with a lot of other people, are convinced that the Cervélo frames are the best in the world and of course that alone gives the riders a mental boost knowing that they’ve got the very best equipment, when they have to endure three grueling weeks of Tour de France,” explains Torralbo.

Fränk Schleck and David Zabriskie were riding prototypes of the SLC-SL during last year’s Tour, where Schleck won the Alpe d’Huez stage. For the last two years Stuart O’Grady and Fabian Cancellara have crossed the finish line as winners in Paris-Roubaix on an R3 frame, while Cancellara won the World Championship in time trial on a P3 Carbon last fall.

This season Riis Cycling has started distributing these popular Cervélo frames to bike shops on the Scandinavian market (See distribution.riis-cycling.com). And sales have gone pretty well in the Nordic countries.

”At this point halfway through the season most of the shops have already sold approximately 20% more than they’d anticipated selling for the entire year. Somewhat surprisingly for us the R3 frame has been the most popular compared to for instance the Soloist Carbon. But of course you can’t overlook the fact that this bike has won Paris-Roubaix two years running and that Carlos Sastre chooses to use it in spite of the aerodynamic advantages with the Soloist Carbon,” says Kim Plesner from Riis Distribution, who apart from Cervélo also distributes products from Descente, SIS and Morgan Blue.