Tour de France bikes: Fabio Jakobsen's Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL7

Tour de France bikes: Fabio Jakobsen's Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL7

A closer look at the Dutch sprinter's race bike for the 2022 Tour de France

Photos: James Startt Tour de France Words: Richard Windsor

Stage three may not have been his day, but Fabio Jakobsen can already call his debut at the Tour de France a success having raced to victory on stage two ahead of the world's best sprinters.

The Quick-Step Alpha Vinyl rider has completed a remarkable recovery since his horrific crash at the Tour of Poland two years ago, and has now shown he is back to the very height of his sprinting powers with a victory at the Tour.

Here we take a closer look at the team bike he's using for the race, a Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL7. It's the only road race bike Specialized currently offers the team since the all-aero Venge was dropped in 2020.Fabio Jakobsen bike

The 25-year-old is using a fairly standard setup on his Tarmac, with very few customisations.

First off he looks to be running a 56 frame, a beautiful navy and black fade, with a huge stem to allow him to get aero in the sprints.

At the end of that stem is a set of Roval Rapide aero handlebars with black Supercaz bar tape. Upfront is a black K-Edge mount paired with a Garmin 830 Edge computer.

As a Specialized sponsored team, Quick-Step have a choice between the American brand's range of saddles. He's opted for the longer shape of the S-Works Romin Evo saddle with Mirror tech; a technology developed by Specialized that is supposed to help the saddle better fit to your anatomy.

The groupset is fully Shimano, and Jakobsen has the complete Dura-Ace 9200 setup (no mix and match here) with hydraulic disc brakes. Up front he's using the standard Dura-Ace shifter setup with no sprint shifters to be seen.

In these images, taken at the Copenhagen Grand Départ before the flat road stages, Jakobsen is running 54/40 front chainrings, clearly not worried about any of the short inclines in the Danish stages.

The 12-speed cassette does allow for a valuable range of gears, with Jakobsen looking like he was running an 11-30 cassette. The crankset also features a built in Shimano power meter and appears well used already, with a number of scratches and marks visible on the crank arm.

The wheels are the new Roval Rapide CLX, featuring a 51mm deep front wheel and a 60mm deep rear wheel. The wheels are tubeless ready and Jakobsen's set are shod with 26mm S-Works Turbo tubeless tyres.

His bottle cages are provided by Tacx, who also supply the Quick-Step team with their custom race bidons.

Jakobsen and the other sprinters will be in for a wait for another pure sprint stage, though Tuesday's stage four could be an opportunity if they can navigate the short sharp climbs and technical roads of northern France into Calais.

 


Photos: James Startt Tour de France Words: Richard Windsor

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