Building on its five-year strategic partnership with Red Bull Advanced Technologies, and the recent release of the Speedmachine TT/triathlon bike, BMC has unveiled the Teammachine R road bike.
According to BMC, the new Teammachine R balances weight, aerodynamics and power transfer to offer up a ‘pure race bike’.
Rob Gray, Technical Director of Red Bull Advanced Technologies (RBAT), said “Collaborating with BMC has taught us a huge amount about bikes, and it’s been fascinating seeing the result of shared knowledge between these two industries [F1 and cycling].
“In this project we added more CFD simulations of different conditions than would be typically undertaken. Adding more points to analyse helped us deep-dive into the areas where performance increases are fundamental. The end result of Teammachine R is something we’re extremely proud of.”
Stefan Christ, Head of R&D at BMC, said “Merging the meticulous engineering approach from F1 with the bicycle knowledge from the BMC Impec Lab was what we needed to keep pushing boundaries and make this huge step in performance.”
Featuring a Halo Fork, the ultrawide parallel fork legs on the new road bike have increased the inner fork spacing. This allows turbulent air to be shuttered away from the frame, helping to reduce aero stall. BMC notes that the result is… ‘cleaner air that hugs the frame longer resulting in a significant drag reduction.’
Taking full advantage of new UCI rules, the revised bottom bracket design optimizes surface area for cleaner airflow. Additionally, the aero shaped design reduces the distance between the frame and the rear wheel helping to keep airflow attached to the rim as opposed to being separated by the tyre.
Key tube shapes have been redesigned to reduce frontal exposure while still maintaining a balance of stiffness and compliance. Also, by expanding the horizontal profile in key locations, the Teammachine R is able to respond more effectively across a wider range of yaw angles.
Proprietary integrated bottle cages on the Teammachine R claim to make the bike faster with bottles onboard.
As with the recently launched Speedmachine, RBAT provided insight into the notion of ‘Driver Feel’ and how the driver is connected and feels at one with the car in top level motorsport. Applying this to cycling, BMC notes that it was able to delve deeper into ‘Rider Feel’ and incorporate the notion that understanding how a bike will react on the roads, leads to better predictability and handling for the rider, and ultimately more confidence to ride at speed.
- Teammachine R 01 LTD (SRAM RED eTap AXS) – €14,999 / USD / CHF
- Teammachine R 01 TWO (SHIMANO Dura Ace Di2) – €13,999 / US$14,499 / CHF 14,299
- Teammachine R 01 THREE (SRAM Force eTap AXS) – €9,499 / US$9,499 / CHF 9,699
- Teammachine R 01 FOUR (SHIMANO Ultegra Di2) – €8,999 / US$9,199 / CHF 9,199
- Teammachine R 01 MOD – €5,999 / USD / CHF
www.bmc-switzerland.com
www.redbulladvancedtechnologies.com
