Cervélo TestTeam’s Sastre, Hushovd and Kristin Armstrong do wind tunnel work in San Diego

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By Jay Prasuhn

In a back room at the San Diego Wind Tunnel Cervélo co-founder and engineer Phil White sat at his laptop. With a phone held to his ear, he motioned to his laptop: “Which of these three shots do you think would make the best autograph card?”

When you go from team sponsor to team owner, no task — down to selecting autograph cards or getting your team cars brand-wrapped in time for the Amgen Tour of California — is too small.

“Being an owner doesn’t change anything, but it’s fun being more involved,” said White this week during a testing session on the eve of the tour. “When we started we were like ‘man, we don’t even know what we don’t know.’ It was a massive learning curve. It was a concept, an idea, so to see it come together is wonderful. And to start it off by getting Carlos (Sastre) was an amazing vote of confidence.”

Cervélo isn’t the first bike brand to title a team, but they are the first to handpick their accompanying product sponsors, making it a rival to the all-star collaboration that Lance Armstrong was once and is now again surrounded by the F1 group.

And true to its name, Cervélo TestTeam brought its centerpiece riders — reigning Tour de France champion Sastre, sprint specialist Thor Hushovd, and Olympic TT gold medalist Kristin Armstrong of the TestTeam women’s squad — to the tunnel to, well, to test. The trio honed their fit while working with sponsors including Castelli, Rotor and Catlike to provide feedback on shape, utility, stiffness, material choice and fit.

Between tests, Castelli’s Steve Smith counseled the athletes on the materials in their new race kits, with Sastre later testing a prototype skinsuit and a prototype Catlike time trial helmet. While those goods were off limits to press cameras, both Sastre and Hushovd’s bikes featured prototype Rotor cranksets that will debut at California, sporting drilled out crankarms.

The season hasn’t really kicked off, but value for the sponsors is already apparent. “Last year we sponsored Saunier Duval, and not 20 minutes after I heard the news about Ricardo Riccò at the Tour de France, and the depression that came from that news, I got a call from (Cervélo co-founder) Gerard (Vroomen) and he tells me about this new project,” Castelli’s Smith said. “There’s a big product development investment on our part, but already we’re seeing so much feedback. I mean, Roger Hammond has a degree in engineering, and Carlos is phenomenal with giving me suggestions. The guys that are selected are so much into product.”

As the team’s product development namesake indicates, team officials knew they were dealing with a receptive, tech-progressive group of riders. “At our first camp in Faro, Portugal, Phil and I gave technical presentations, and for three or four nights in a row, we showed them the difference in rolling resistance and aero drag with different wheels,” said Race Engineer Damon Rinard. “The next day, the riders took to heart what they learned during our presentations, and we saw the riders request of the mechanics to try some different wheels so they could get used to how they handle. They want to know everything.”

Rinard is charged with helping shape equipment selection for the riders and fielding feedback. “The race engineer position with Cervélo TestTeam is a lot like what used to happen with Formula One cars, where they had a race engineer who would determine tire pressure, suspension settings. In pro cycling, there have been a few predecessors to that, like Lance’s F1 group. At Cervélo TestTeam, the race engineer will choose tires, tire pressure, make wheel selection, handlebars and help determine position so that we have the best equipment for the conditions, on the day.”

The athletes concur that it was the focus on technical optimization that drew them to the squad. “When you win or lose by one percent, which at the top of the game is what we are talking, this is where you make it happen,” Armstrong said. “It’s a huge reason why I’m with this team.”

Hushovd played with not only his time trial position but also out-of-saddle versus in-saddle drag numbers aboard his S2. “I was shocked to see how the numbers went up as you get out of the saddle,” he said. “It was proof it’s better for me to stay on the wheel until I have to go into the wind. I’d been to the tunnel once before in Paris, but I never tested to this degree.”

And Sastre, who had the option of staying with Bjarne Riis and Saxo Bank, albeit with another bike sponsor, opted to take the new direction and instead stay with Cervélo. As evidence by a solid time trial that held off prime challenger Cadel Evans in the penultimate stage of the Tour de France last year, time in the tunnel aboard optimal equipment is worth its weight in gold to the diminutive Spaniard.

“As a climber, all the seconds I can get in the time trial are important, so to be here, doing this, it’s these small details that can help me a lot,” Sastre said. “I choose this team because I have a nice opportunity to give my feedback, and they have taught us so much about the technology in our frames — that it’s not a normal bike. There’s a lot of thought and engineering, and they explained to us why it’s stiff, or aerodynamic, or comfortable. They teach us how to understand our bikes, we can give them good feedback, and they can change to adjust to what we need.”

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