Toon Aerts of Belgium won the elite men’s European Cyclocross Championships over the weekend, not on a specialist cyclocross bike – something of a rarity nowadays – nor on the now more common gravel/cyclocross race hybrid, but on an Orbea Orca OMX road bike.
Like many brands, Orbea has a gravel race bike in its line-up, the Terra Race, which is available for the riders from its sponsored Deschacht-Hens-Maes cyclocross team to use. But Aerts instead opted to adapt the Orca road bike for his ride.
In its more usual road-going form, the Orca has a claimed weight of only 6.7kg, so it’s a bike that’s easy to carry over the obstacles on a cyclocross course. Orbea says it has kept the frame stiff, too, with a robust down tube, chainstays and head tube to resist torsion – advantages for the low-cadence, high-torque riding typically needed for cyclocross.
Orbea quotes a frame weight of 750g for the top-spec Orca OMX, while the Terra Race frame weighs a claimed 910g, so there's a useful 160g weight saving there.
Other components were more typically cyclocross, with Aerts running A Dugast (now owned by Vittoria) Pipistrello 33mm tubular tyres on Icon T3.5 Disc carbon tubular wheels.
You can buy the Pipistrello as a tubeless tyre too, but tubulars are still preferred for elite cyclocross racing because they can be run at ultra-low pressures without the risk of burping air, and can be ridden to the pits flat if the rider suffers a puncture.
Tyre width in UCI-sanctioned cyclocross races is limited to 33mm, while the Orca has a nominal 32mm clearance, so Aerts is pushing the frame’s capabilities. He swapped out the fork for the Terra Race’s gravel fork with 45mm clearance and a longer 55mm rake rather than the road fork’s 43mm, though.
Other spec details carried over from the road included a Shimano Dura-Ace groupset, although with the cyclocross favourite 46/36t chainrings, and a 40mm handlebar width – apparently the better leverage claimed for wide gravel bars isn’t needed to win in cyclocross.
Aerts was emotional at the finish. It’s a race he's won once before, a full nine years ago.
