The demands Paris-Roubaix places on the riders and their equipment tends to give rise to eye-catching tech choices. The 2026 men's edition, the fastest on record, was no different.
At the start and in the velodrome, I saw teams mixing and matching road, gravel and mountain bike parts to an unprecedented extent. This year tyres and chainrings got even bigger, with the latter increasingly being 1x.
Ever higher average speeds mean the days of dedicated Roubaix bikes are no more, but one team did deviate from the all-out aero bike playbook. Other teams tried to eke out comfort in different ways and Lidl-Trek rode rims with two valves. I also spotted unreleased Shimano wheels and Michelin tyres.
Wider and wider tyres
In the pits at the start of the men's race, tyres narrower than 700x32c were rare. Compared to the more typical 28c, this higher volume offers more grip due to its larger contact point and comfort because it can be run at lower pressures. All the mechanics I asked said they were inflating tyres to 3-3.5 bar or 43-50psi depending on the rider's weight and preference.
32c is right on the limit of the Cube Litening Aero C:68X's clearance.
Many modern race bikes easily accommodate tyres with a 32mm measured width, but on wide internal rims some tyres looked perilously close to frames and forks. And some riders went a step wider with the 700x35c Continental GP5000 S TR, such as Tadej Pogačar.
Pogačar just about squeezed these extra-wide Conti tyres in, but they didn't stop him puncturing.
Read more: Paris-Roubaix: Tadej Pogačar's new Achilles heel
Single chainrings
The 2026 race was the first men's edition to be won with a single chainring (Pauline Ferrand Prėvot won last year 1x). It's a trend it seemed the majority of the male peloton had adopted in a bid to reduce drag and weight by dispensing with the front derailleur and inner ring that see next to no use on a flat, fast course.
This 54T SRAM Red Aero chainring was a common sight.
This is also explained by SRAM's increased presence. The American groupset manufacturer officially supports 1x on the road whereas its rival Shimano does not.
Carbon-Ti is a sponsor of Pogačar's Team UAE Emirates
As a result, Shimano-equipped teams turned to third-party narrow-wide chainrings, from brands such as Carbon-Ti, and added chain catchers for extra security.
Team TotalEnergies' Sandy Dujardin also used one, presumably paid for by the team.
Few teams embraced single chainrings across the board though. At EF Education EasyPost, for example, Kasper Asgreen bucked the trend by sticking with two chainrings.
Whether riders had one or two, chainrings tended to be huge. Josh Tarling's 62T Digirit dinnerplate was the largest I saw, while 54-56T was more typical. Shimano showed that it can satisfy riders looking to maximise chainring size for better chainline efficiency.
Jonas Rutsch had an enormous 58/44T combo on his Orbea Orca Aero along with what must be the peloton's longest stem.
The tall German has no trouble fitting his race notes on to this tiller. Note the handlebar tape across the tops too.
Inflation innovation
The UCI put pay to Visma-Lease a bike's plan to use the Gravaa adjustable tyre pressure system this year.
Read more: Adaptable under pressure: Inside Gravaa's tyre pressure adjustment technology
But Lidl-Trek cooked up a UCI-legal way to reduce the impact of punctures by introducing the commercially available Odyssey Optis to the Bontrager A64 gravel wheels. This twin-valve design places a kind of TPU inner tube inside the tubeless tyre. It inflates without excessively expanding to help keep the tyre seated and provide something to ride on if in the event of a puncture.
Non sponsor-correct choices
Paris-Roubaix is so demanding on tyres that teams sometimes go off-script to meet their grip and volume needs.
Team Picnic PostNL mechanics had got their black marker pens out. What you can see of the tanwall and the size of the blacked-out area suggests these are the Vittoria Corsa Pros, one of the race's most popular tyres, not the Power Cup of their sponsors Michelin.
Jayco AlUla are sponsored by Giant's sibling component brand, Cadex, and tend to ride the Aero Cotton, which is said to be optimised for this Max 50 Wheelsystem. At Roubaix, they were on the 700x32c Vittoria Corsa Pro, perhaps because the Aero Cotton only goes up to 700x30c.
At least a couple of Jayco-AlUla riders also prefer different saddles to the stock Cadex Amp. It just so happened that these bikes with an SQ Labs saddle and what looks to be a Fizik 3D-printed option were parked next to each other.
Aero over endurance
The vast majority of teams selected aero bikes, continuing a long-term move away from endurance bikes in favour of aerodynamic efficiency at little cost to comfort or tyre clearance.
On the roof of the Alpecin-Premier Tech cars, there was a mixture of the Aeroad, preferred by Mathieu van der Poel, and the Endurace, an endurance bike in name only.
Modern Adventure Pro Cycling were alone in choosing an actual endurance bike, the Factor Monza, albeit an aero-optimised one which takes inspiration from the Ostro Vam and more radical One.
Modern Adventure Cycling told me Factor had identified the Monza as an ideal Paris-Roubaix bike before the team confirmed this in recons.
"It's mostly about durability," said directeur sportif Ty Magner. "These bikes ride incredibly well over the cobbles. In testing the guys loved them."
He explained that a reduction in aerodynamic efficiency would be compensated by the riders feeling fresher later in the race from riding a more compliant bike.
Most Modern Adventure riders were on unreleased 700x32c Michelin Power Cup S tyres inflated to between 3.2-3.3 bar (about 46psi) on to 58mm-deep Black Inc rims.
"That's one of the deepest [wheelsets] you can use but they also ride really well over the cobbles. There's no reason to go any shallower," added Magner.
The American squad was one of several SRAM teams to run gravel cassettes and rear derailleurs, Force XPLR AXS in this case, for better chain retention and shifting. "Because the UDH dropout is stiffer, you get much better shifting," said Magner.
Here you can also see the 'S' on the Michelin tyre, differentiating it from the existing Power Cup.
His riders weren't concerned about the gravel cassette's wider spacing. "There are big jumps towards the top, but when you get down to the 18-tooth cog, it's spaced like a normal road cassette. In a flat, fast race like Roubaix that's where you spend most of your time. You're not getting up to the top four, five gears today,' he added.
Some Monzas bore this Japanese-inspired artwork from Belgian artists Vexx
While some Modern Adventure racers requested double-wrapped bar tape, the Roubaix hacks of old, like front suspension, were nowhere to be seen.
"Bikes these days are pretty capable," said Magner. "Even 10 years ago there was so much hacking.Now things are pretty standard and as things come they work really well."
Mechanical assistance
Team cars can't offer riders the same level of mechanical support at Roubaix as at other races when it is easier to move up the convoy. Therefore legions of volunteers line the cobbles holding spare wheels. To fit these to their bikes, some racers carry their own tools, a sight reminiscent of elite gravel racing.
Jasper Stuyven had a thru-axle tool taped to the back of his seatpost.
Where mechanics could lend a hand, they had to know whose bike was where on the roof, as this plan from the Unibet Rose Rockets illustrates.
Gravel components
SRAM supplied most of the off-road components that teams implemented in 2025, but Shimano also got in on the act in 2026. SRAM's contribution usually came in the form of its XPLR gravel rear derailleur. Its clutch is designed to stop the chain from bouncing around and causing misshifts on rough terrain, like cobbles. But because SRAM's latest gravel groupsets are 13-speed, out of the box the rear derailleur requires a wide-range 13-speed cassette. Some teams, such as UnoX Mobility, did use the 10-46t Red XPLR cassette, despite its big jumps between gears.
Others, however, copied Lidl-Trek's hack from last year and modified the rear mech limit screw to stop it from changing into the 13th cog. This made it work with SRAM's tighter spaced Red road cassettes.
Shimano-supported teams looking to increase chain retention, particularly when using a single chainring, turned to GRX Di2 or XTR Di2 rear derailleurs from the brand's gravel and mountain bike lineups. Both these are 12-speed so immediately work with Dura-Ace, which is 12-speed for now.
This could be about to change though. Prototype Dura-Ace wheels on the Alpecin-Premier tech bikes suggests a new groupset and product line are imminent.
Comfort boosts
On this Red Bull-Bora-Hansgrohe Specialized Tarmac SL8, extra tape is holding down wireless SRAM blippers either side of the stem.
When aero is everything, round handlebars stand out as old school, but some riders still prefer them on the cobbles, finding cylindrical tops more comfortable to hold than a flat, aero profile.
On both kinds of bar, some riders had handlebar tape wrapped over the tops to provide a grippier and more cushioned hand hold.
This bare one-piece cockpit also has satellite shifters beneath the stem area.
Higher front ends aren't an exclusive trend to Paris-Roubaix – some pro riders' positions have got taller of late to make the aero hoods position more sustainable – but it was still interesting to see them on Sunday.
The Ridley Noah Fast has an aggressively low stack and this UnoX rider has mitigated it slightly.
Jonas Abrahamsen slammed his right down though.
As did Josh Tarling for a low and stretched position.
However, we also saw bikes at the opposite end. The stack on this Look Blade RS is much loftier.
Talking of Cofidis, they were the only team using Campagnolo, making this direct-mount rear derailleur a rare sight in the pro peloton.
Read more tech stories from Paris-Roubaix 2026:
