Speed Culture with Canyon//SRAM Racing

As Canyon//SRAM Racing prepare to race the Tour de France Femmes aboard the new Canyon Aeroad, we sat down with two of the team’s key performance staff to understand how the culture of speed is pushed forward within the team, and how the working relationship between team and bike manufacturer leads to better, faster bikes – including with the new Aeroad.

It all starts with that question. And to win we have to be faster than everyone else out there, so how do we do that? We look at every aspect of racing. From rider performance to aerodynamics of the athlete to the finest details of the bike itself. Frame, wheelsets, and so on.

We do a lot of testing and calculations to have the fastest equipment underneath us to get that ultimate speed on the bike. We look at what the overall profile of a stage looks like. What are the number of ‘slower’ kilometres and ‘faster’ ones, and what the overall time gain is going to be with the equipment, based on the aerodynamics of the bike itself.

As a rider, it’s about getting there the best you possibly can: good nutrition, sleeping well, learning the course, knowing the other riders on the start line. I tell my riders: once you’ve done the utmost you can to be the best you can be on that particular day, then half the battle is done. From that moment on it’s just bike racing – there are lots of variables. As long as you have that mindset of being best prepared on the start line, the outcome is what it is.

Take the opportunities when they arise and never hold back. We always want to challenge ourselves and everyone around us. I still think that a ‘fear of failure’ is something that exists out there in bike racers. So my job is to create an environment where so long as a rider gives 100% of what they have, they can’t really fail.

Those are two clear cut days that stand out as examples when our riders didn’t question themselves or anything around them. One was Antonia Niedermaier at the Giro, the other was Ricarda Bauernfeind at the Tour. Both were slightly opportunistic moves – okay, they had to have the legs and be capable – but to actually take the risk of going out there off the front and seeing what happens, and then to pull it off… seriously impressive.

Discover how Canyon engineer Lukas Birr worked with WorldTour mechanics like Canyon//SRAM Racing’s Jochen Lamade to develop improvements for the all-new Aeroad. 

Behind each and every Canyon is a never-ending pursuit of speed, comfort and performance. Every generation of the Aeroad has been built this way, and the all-new model was no different.

Lukas Birr is lead engineer for the Aeroad, and his mission to make sure that Canyon’s pro athletes have the fastest road bikes in the world, is not a simple one.

“The material we provide is the athletes’ daily working material,” he says. “If I had a computer that didn’t work that well I’d be demanding about it too. So with this Aeroad, more than any other Canyon bike before, we went and got active input from our WorldTour teams and riders to find out their thoughts.”

In the constant technology arms race of the UCI WorldTour, anything less than the standard Canyon have set in the past could jeopardise performance. To help stay ahead of the curve, Lukas has a direct line to staff at all of the WorldTour teams that Canyon sponsors, and one such contact is Canyon//SRAM Racing mechanic Jochen Lamade.

“I work closely with Canyon to make sure that we have the best materials for our riders,” says Jochen. “I’m not an engineer, just a mechanic who’s working on the bike almost every day, but I think after years of doing this I have a good feeling of what works, and what doesn’t.”

It is this day-in, day-out relationship with the bikes – which are being pushed to their absolute limits at every race – that makes Jochen such an invaluable contact for Lukas to understand what needs improving, and how they might best do it.

“Jochen is one of the biggest assets we have [for the engineering team]. He’s incredibly experienced. By nature he’s a creative character, and he really wants to make us better and make his life better, so he sees the advantage of working closely with us.”

Jochen is pleased with the flow of communication: “We are in constant contact with each other, to report on what I feel, what I see when I work with the bike. And they send me everything I need, new materials, and so on. It’s a perfect relationship: I rely on them, and they rely on me.”

Jochen played his own part in developing the new Aeroad. Lukas spent a couple of days with him at the Canyon//SRAM Service Course in Leipzig, grilling him on ideas to improve the bike. One small but useful innovation that Jochen suggested was the inclusion of replaceable rubber ends on the front forks to stop nasty scratches when the bike is put on a stand or a trainer without a front wheel.

This Leipzig trip was one of several forays ‘into the field’ that Lukas took to develop this fourth generation Aeroad. “I went to races to observe and analyse the bike in action, to the teams’ services courses, and I talked to everyone as much as I could. And back at Canyon HQ, everyone is an ‘engineer’ too! People always have ideas, so I have my notebook with me and take little sketches. That’s all part of the journey.”

As for the finished product, the fourth generation Aeroad, Jochen believes that with the bike we are reaching the end goal in the ‘game of watts’ that pro cycling has become: “It’s always a fight between aerodynamics – which is getting more and more interesting, because you always want to be able to push less watts for more speed – and hitting that weight limit set by the UCI, 6.8kg.”

“A couple of years ago, we got the bikes right down to that limit, but then disc brakes came and so the bikes were heavier. With its developments and innovations, the new Aeroad is back down right on the limit, even with its full setup and pedals. I think that’s amazing.”