Carlos Sastre’s new Cervelo S3

February 3rd, 2009 by Ron Callahan 3,298 views No Comment

BikeRadar.com/CyclingNews.com features Carlos Sastre’s new Cervelo S3 today.

Sastre has been familiar with Cervelo bikes for some time as they were the supplier for his former CSC-Saxo Bank team. Of course, with the move to the Cervelo Test Team, Sastre gets his choice of bikes from Cervelo’s fine stable.

After a back injury in 2004, Sastre had opted for frames with standard (i.e. round) profile tubes, feeling that they absorbed vibration a bit better and this helped his back. Now, however, he is on the S3, which features quite deep aero profile tubing and is said to be very happy with it. He feels that it offers the comfort of the R3 while giving the stiffness to weight of the Soloist.

The S3 also features a new internal cable routing system moves the derailleur housing entry points from the sides of the top tube to the top tube immediately behind the head tube. Cervélo claims this is both more aerodynamic while reducing cable friction and shaving off weight. The bike also features a 3T Funda Pro fork, a Cane Creek integrated headset and aero carbon seatpost. Sastre’s bike is fitted with a Shimano Dura-Ace 7800 groupset but will change to the 7900 group soon.

For now, Sastre is the only team rider on the frame but the rest of the Cervélo TestTeam will be using it a little later in the season.

One of the most raidlca features of the bike is a prototype Rotor crankset. On paper, Sastre is supposed to be using the Ágilis Evo crankset, but the bike pictured here features an as-yet-unnamed prototype that, while hollow, is radically drilled out and has considerably larger profle arms than the production model. The crank has to be fairly far along, however, as it has been fitted with a Quarq CinQo Saturn wireless power meter.