Winning Setups: Inside the Tour de France Podium Bikes
A recent Forbes article says it all: “The Tour de France: From French Niche Event To Global Phenomenon”. Forbes states that the 2024 Tour de France reached over 150 million viewers in Europe alone, with a total of 700 million hours of live television watched across the continent. From a global perspective, the race was broadcast in over 190 countries on 100 channels with total viewing hours exceeding one billion.
With such heightened media focus on the Tour, partner bike brands of each team find it to be their most important coverage of the year. The teams however try to balance meeting the marketing goals of the bike brands while optimizing each bike for the individual rider’s needs and performance.
Contender is proud to have all three podium bikes available at the shop. Each model comes in a number of different complete configurations but they come as a frameset only to build up any number of ways. With the finish of the Tour just behind us, there is no better time to highlight these bikes and dive into the detail of each podium rider’s individual set up and equipment preferences. The bikes shown in this Journal are available at Contender Bicycles and may differ from the exact team configurations used in the 2025 Tour de France.
This year, the top two podium spots featured new aero bikes while third place proved that aero isn’t everything. Tadej Pogacar rode his Colnago Y1RS in several configurations to the top step of the podium this year. Closest to the flying Slovenian in second place, Jonas Vingegaard chose the Cervelo S5 throughout the tour. In third, Florian Lipowitz rode the team-issued Specialized S-Works SL8.
3RD PLACE - Florian Lipowitz’s Custom Specialized S-Works SL8
Going into the Tour, no one was counting on Florian Lipowitz to usurp Primoz Roglic’s spot as team leader, much less lead the team to a strong third place while also taking the White Young Rider Jersey. Red Bull - BORA - hansgrohe rides the Specialized S-Works SL8, and Lipowitz’s personal bike is a custom work of art. Standing at 5’11”, the young German rides a size 54cm frameset, with a 135mm stem above 3cm of spacers.
The Tarmac SL8 firmly stands as one of the best ‘World Tour’ Bikes, a bike that can excel on anything from the fastest sprint to the highest peak. These featherweight frames can be easily set up to sit right at the 6.8kg weight limit. Lipowitz’s personal rig is kitted out with the latest from Roval and SRAM. SRAM offers their riders a diversity of chainring setups, and Lipowitz has ridden setups with both the 56/43t and 54/41t chainring sets.
On the climbing stages, Lipowitz has been running the new Roval Rapide CLX III Wheelset, the 52/48mm set that blends aerodynamics with weight saving. On each other stage, from pancake flats, to the punchy, rolling hill stages, he swapped on the Roval Rapide Sprint Wheelset, with its deeper 63/58mm setup. On each wheelset, the German runs a 28mm Specialized Turbo Cotton tire.
In a sport where every watt counts, Lipowitz runs the titanium Silca derailleur hanger made for the Tarmac SL8. This incrementally increases the shift quality, which can prove to be essential for the athlete. Rounding out his bike are an S-Works Power Mirror Saddle, and Shimano (yes, Shimano) Dura-Ace Pedals.
2ND PLACE - Jonas Vingegaard’s Cervelo S5
Team Visma | Lease a Bike unveiled a new Cervelo S5 specifically for this Tour de France, and it quickly became Jonas Vingegaard’s most trusted bike. The 5’9” Dane rides a 51cm, with a 36cm bar and 120mm stem on his S5. Radically, and new for this year, Jonas has made the change from a 172.5mm crankset down to a 160mm SRAM RED E1 Crankset.
Unique to Vingegaard, the Visma rider rides a 1x setup more than most other SRAM Riders. For the Mt. Ventoux finish, Jonas ran an aero SRAM Chainring, paired with a 10-36 cassette, not quite needing the XPLR range. The reduction in weight, also allowed him to run the Reserve 42|49 wheelset instead of the 34|37, which increased the aerodynamics for the long flat run-in to the Ventoux climb. While aerodynamics is not the primary goal of these climbing setups, reducing drag over the course of an entire stage across valley floors and down long descents factors into bike selection and configuration.
On the hardest stage of this year's Tour (Stage 18), Jonas changed out his wheelset and drivetrain. He added back on his front derailleur, likely choosing the 52/39t pair, and going back to a 10-33t cassette. With the added weight of the front derailleur, and the requirement for as little rotational weight as possible, Visma swapped to the Reserve 34|37s for the high mountains. On the flat stages, Jonas swapped over to the new Reserve 57|64, which brings the weight just under 7.4kg. The S5’s new one-piece cockpit has some extra hand positions that adds to the rider’s ability to be comfortable at the same time as having some improved aerodynamics.
One interesting preference to note is Vingegaard’s bikes run a waxed chain, to dial in the shift performance for each stage. Additionally, Jonas uses Wahoo Speedplay Aero Pedals, and the Prologo Scratch M5 Saddle. His tire of choice is the Vittoria Corsa Pro in a 29mm width.
1ST PLACE - A Bike Designed for a Champion - Tadej Pogacar’s Colnago Y1RS
Originally unveiled in December 2024, the Colnago Y1RS quickly became the center of attention with its unique aerodynamic design. Built with Tadej Pogacar’s fit in mind, this bike’s engineering focuses on a design to take him to as many race wins as possible. Throughout the tour, Team UAE Emirates has set up the Y1RS in many different configurations, from aero, flat stage builds, all the way to a featherweight configuration for an uphill time trial.
Consistently, each bike is equipped with Shimano Dura-Ace 12-speed Di2, with 165mm Dura-Ace cranks paired to Carbon-Ti chainrings. Tadej’s go to gearing, which he has used on most stages, is a 55/38t chainring set, paired with an 11-34t cassette. Impressively, the bike still shifts smoothly the 17t front chainring gap on the 55/38t setup.
For the Peyragudes Time Trial, Tadej used a 6.9kg Y1RS. This is 500g lighter than the stock Dura-Ace setup available to the public. To achieve this, Colnago stripped the frame to the bare carbon, using only a thin clear coat to protect the frame. The gram counting doesn’t stop there; Pogacar raced without bottle cages, bar tape, and a team radio. If it wasn’t strictly necessary for the bike, he removed it (besides his quintessential Hulk sticker, of course). The newly released ENVE SES 4.5 Pros saved critical grams for the time trial, especially with the 28mm Continental GP 5000s that the wheels were designed around.
After the time trial, the team rebuilt the unpainted frame for the remaining high-mountain days. Adding bottle cages, bartape, some world champs stripes, and a 160mm front rotor brought the total system weight to 7.2kg. For the flat and hilly stages, Tadej swapped to the standard ENVE 4.5s for increased aerodynamics, and for the ability to run 30mm Continental Archetype Tires. Despite the slightly higher weight, this setup did not stop Pogacar from winning Stage 4 with an attack on the 15% grade into Rouen.
Other bits on the build provide insight into Tadej’s preferences. He uses a Fizik Argo R1 Adaptive Saddle, Shimano Dura-Ace Pedals, Elite Leggero Bottle Cages. Even his computer needs to be aero with the Hinloopen Designs Computer mount.
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