Christian Vande Velde’s Felt DA time trial bike relaxes in the July sunshine.Ben Atkins
The horizontal slimline top tube joins the aero section seat tube in an ultra smooth joint.Ben Atkins
The DA’s huge bottom bracket area features lots of carbon for stiffness, strength and aerodynamics.Ben Atkins
The Felt DA uses a conventional head tube but it’s completely shielded by the innovative Bayonet fork system.Ben Atkins
The huge aero-section down tube is scupted to closely hug the front wheel.Ben Atkins
Like many other time trial frames the DA has a cutaway seat tube to wrap around the rear wheel.Ben Atkins
In contrast to the DA frame’s other main tubes the top tube doesn’t need to cut through the air, and so is shaped to keep the frame stiff and allow a little comfort.Ben Atkins
The DA’s 10mm-wide seat stays are as narrow as the UCI allows to present as small a frontal area as possible (and also provide a modicum of comfort).Ben Atkins
The chain stays are almost as narrow as the seat stays but are stiff enough keep the rear end running straight.Ben Atkins
Even with 20mm-wide tyres there’s not much clearance for the rear wheel to pass.Ben Atkins
Rear facing droputs allow mechanics to move the wheel fore and aft to comply with regulations.Ben Atkins
The Bayonet fork system supposedly improves aerodymanics over a standard setup.Ben Atkins
Cables enter the frame behind the stem where the air is already ‘dirty’. MIL-spec o-rings prevent water from entering, too.Ben Atkins
The rear derailleur and rear brake cables emerge beneath the bottom bracket where they are needed.Ben Atkins
To keep it out of the wind the rear brake is located behind the bottom bracket.Ben Atkins
Just in case the emerging cables are all labeled.Ben Atkins
Garmin-Chipotle uses Shimano groupsets on both its road and time trial bikes.Ben Atkins
Vande Velde’s Dura-Ace chainset is fitted with 55 and 44-tooth chainrings.Ben Atkins
The Dura-Ace 7800 rear derailleur will be a thing of the past at this level before long as the new version is rolled out.Ben Atkins
There are no serious hills in either of this year’s time trials so Vande Velde pairs his 55/44T chainrings with an 11-21T cassette.Ben Atkins
From this angle, Vande Velde’s TT bar setup looks to be nothing out of the ordinary save for the complete lack of bar tape…Ben Atkins
…although the side view of his Oval TT bars shows the unusual shape of the 911 JetStream Custom set up.Ben Atkins
Oval’s JetStream technology is brought into play on the outer bars to help them slice through the air.Ben Atkins
Vande Velde likes his elbow pads nice and close together.Ben Atkins
Vande Velde’s extensions have a double bend to get his position just right.Ben Atkins
The DA uses a conventional aero post for easier packing in a travel case. The dual-position cradle allows for easier triathlon positioning, too.Ben Atkins
fi’zi:k doesn’t make the Chrono saddle any more but it produced a special edition version for the Garmin-Chipotle team.Ben Atkins
The Chrono saddle is relatively wide especially in the nose to make it as comfy as possible in the time trial position.Ben Atkins
As is usual in time trials Vande Velde has a full rear disc, in this case a Sub9 from Zipp.Ben Atkins
Zipp now produces its top disc wheels with PowerTap hubs which the team uses for both training and racing.Ben Atkins
Zipp’s 1080 front wheel has an incredible 108mm-deep section, apparently making almost as slippery as a disc.Ben Atkins
Garmin-Chipotle had Zipp make some special edition argyle decals for its wheels.Ben Atkins
To complete the Dura-Ace group Vande Velde uses Shimano’s SPD-SL pedals.Ben Atkins