Tour Tech 2017: Chris Froome’s Pinarello Dogma F10

Team Sky’s Chris Froome is currently leading the Tour de France and this is the Pinarello Dogma F10 he's riding.

Pinarello announced the Dogma F10 at the start of the year. The Italian brand claims – as is usually the case – that the new bike is lighter, stiffer and more aerodynamic than the previous model, the Dogma F8 that Team Sky rode last year. It even puts figures on those claims: 6.3% lighter and 7% stiffer with a reduction in drag of up to 20%.

While retaining the flatback down tube profile of the F8, the F10 takes a few design cues from Pinarello’s Bolide time trial bike. The down tube has a shape that is designed to smooth the airflow around the water bottle, which is placed lower in the frame than before. Pinarello reckons that the down tube contributes 15% of the overall drag produced by the frame. It claims to have made this change with no detriment to the lateral stiffness of the frame. 

Pinarello claims the Dogma F10 saves 0.8secs per kilometre over the F8, which adds up to 2mins over 150km, although it doesn’t state the speed at which this result is achieved. 

Find out more about the Pinarello Dogma F10 here.

Many team leaders have their own paint job but Froome goes with the standard Team Sky finish: black with blue and white stripes. Each stripe represents a specific victory. The longest lines are the team’s four Tour de France wins. The short dashes on the jersey represent one-day races, while the medium-length lines represent multi-day stage races, with the number of stages determining the length of the line. WorldTour races are blue lines, while non-WorldTour races are white. Did you follow all that? Anyway, Froome has the same finish as everyone else but for his name and the rhinoceros, his own little logo, at the top tube/head tube junction.

Froome’s bike is fitted with a Shimano Dura-Ace Di2 groupset but he is still using Osymetric chainrings. These are clearly not round nor even oval. Osymetric calls this a twin cam shape, the idea being to get you through the dead spot at the top/bottom of your pedal stroke and “increase the usable gear during the power portion of the pedal stroke between the 1 and 5 o’clock positions of the crank so your body can take full advantage of its natural strength”.

We’ve spoken with senior Team Sky staff about these chainrings before and they’re not convinced of the benefit. On the other hand, Froome has won the Tour de France three times using the Osymetric chainrings so why change a wining formula?

As well as a K-Edge chain catcher, another improvised device is bonded directly on to the frame. It’s only Froome’s bike that has this, not those belonging to other members of Team Sky who use standard chainrings.

Rather than having a Di2 junction box at the end of the handlebar, the Dogma F10 has a port for it in the down tube that makes for simple on-the-fly adjustments.

Find out everything you need to know about Shimano’s R1000 Dura-Ace groupset here.

The pedals are Shimano Dura-Ace SPD-SL. Read our review of them here.

Team Sky use wheels from Shimano too. These are Dura-Ace C60s fitted with Continental Competition Pro Ltd tubulars in a 25mm width. The vast majority of riders in the Tour de France are now on 25-26mm tyres most of the time.

Froome uses a Stealth Evo combined handlebar and stem from Shimano’s Pro brand. The stem section is 120mm and the handlebar width is 400mm.

Rather than a standard satellite shifter for his Shimano Di2 electronic shifting, Froome has this skeleton version bonded to his handlebar. It’s all about function on a top-end race bike, which is just as well because this little unit isn’t going to win any prizes for beauty.

Froome uses a carbon-railed Fizik Antares saddle. Those two little silver marks on the top provide measuring points for the mechanics so that every one of Froome’s bikes can be set up in exactly the same way. 

The bottle cages are Elite Legerro Carbon weighing just 15g each.

This is the standard version of the Dogma F10 but Froome also has one labelled up as a Dogma F10 X-Light (below). Admittedly, the ‘X-Light’ seems to have been added as a sticker on an existing frame. Pinarello has yet to announce details of the Dogma F10 X-Light although it appears on the UCI’s List of Approved Frames and Forks. Our guess is that, like the F8 X-Light last year, it’ll be announced as a lighter weight version, out of the same mould but with a tweaked carbon-fibre layup. 

Our pictures were taken before just before the start of the Tour de France. Since taking the race lead Froome has been using yellow bar tape but he hasn’t gone all-out with a completely yellow bike.

Click here for loads more Tour de France tech.