Tour de France 2015 Bikes: Michal Kwiatkowski’s Specialized Tarmac

As reigning world champion, Etixx-Quick Step rider Michał Kwiatkowski has been awarded a custom painted Specialized Tarmac, and we had the opportunity to have a close look at it before the Tour de France got underway at the weekend.

We would like to say this is the actual bike that Michał Kwiatkowski is racing in the Tour de France, but watching yesterday's stage 6, it doesn't appear he's racing his custom painted bike, instead a regular black team bike. Maybe he doesn't want to get this one dirty? 

Regardless, it's a very pretty bike and too nice not to share with you. A predominately white frame and fork is a canvas for a set of Jackson Pollock inspired paint splatter decals, using the green, yellow, black, red and blue colours of the UCI rainbow jersey.

We’ve seen some good, and some bad, custom painted race bikes over the years. I’m putting this up towards the top of the list of good looking custom painted bikes. The splatter design is used sparingly, just on the top tube, seat tube, chainstays and inside of the fork blades.

Kwiatkowski’s name badge on the top tube is flanked with the rainbow stripes, and his Twitter handle. The stripes also feature, as if a reminder were needed, on the seat tube.

Underneath the paint is the latest generation Tarmac, Specialized’s go-to race bike. This current incarnation would be an SL5 if Specialized were still using that naming convention, but it’s not as it decided to drop it with the launch of this new bike. Changes to the frame are subtle, the biggest is Specialized’s size-specific approach to the frame, with the tube diameters, shapes and the carbon fibre layup adjusted for each size frame in the range.

This approach to frame design is nothing new of course. Many bike manufacturers have been doing this for quite a while. Specialized came to it after feedback from Alberto Contador regarding the stiffness of the size 52cm frame he was racing, citing too much stiffness in the rear triangle negatively impacting the handling on the descents.

Weight was also shed with cables all internally routed and the seat clamp is now integrated into the top tube to provide more exposed seatpost for extra deflection, aiding comfort. The Tarmac was also designed with disc brakes a key consideration, and the Tarmac Disc shares an almost identical design and the same geometry, but a few key changes to accommodate disc brakes. I’ve tested that bike, and very impressive it is, and you can read my review here.

- Review: Specialized S-Works Tarmac Disc

Anyway, back to Kwiatkowski’s bike. It’s built up with the same Shimano Dura-Ace Di2 groupset that the rest of the team use, along with an FSA K-Force Light 53/39t chainset. Etixx-Quick Step switched from SRAM and Zipp to Shimano and FSA this year. The team isn’t actually sponsored by those two brands, instead they buy the components themselves. Kwiatkowski will race with a power meter but this is one of his spare bikes and it’s rare that spare bikes are fitted with power meters.

FSA also supplies the team with handlebars, stems and seatpost, and the Italian company has produced a set of components with the rainbow stripes to complement Kwiatkowski’s frame and jersey. Kwiatkowski bucks the trend for aluminium handlebars with a carbon fibre K-Force item. Quite a few of the racers have moved to narrower handlebars for improved aerodynamics, and Kwiatkowski rides 38cm wide bars.

He also uses a carbon stem, FSA’s Os-99 item. The stem is 3D forged and CNC machined from aluminium then wrapped with a unidirectional carbon fibre layer, with titanium bolts further help to reduce weight.

- A look at the brand new Tarmac and a lot more disc models in the 2015 range

Roval CLX40 Rapide wheels are fitted with Specialized’s own Allround 2 24mm tyres - whether he actually races on these tyres is another matter, this bike was photographed on the Thursday before the Grand Depart. This is actually one of Kwiatkowski’s spare bikes, we know that because of this sticker.

There’s a K-Edge mount for Kwiatkowski’s Garmin. He’s an active Strava user and has been using his Garmin to share his Tour de France ride with his many fans.

The Specialized Toupe saddle also gets the custom painted treatment, well not paint, obviously, but a matched design on the fabric upper.

The mechanics can be quite fastidious when it comes to building race bikes. Here you can see the cables are neatly taped together to prevent them rattling against each other.

See all the bikes of the 2015 Tour de France here.