This is the Look prototype with which the Cofidis Team is racing
At the beginning of the season new bikes continue to be revealed and will be added to the catalogs of the brands in the near future. The latest to attract our attention is Look's multi-purpose prototype bike. In its return to the top category, Look has prepared a bike for the Cofidis team that could be called the 765 RS, a bike that aims to combine the features of its climbing and aerodynamic bikes in a single model.
Cofidis tests Look's new aerolight
We continue to discover prototypes of what will be the new catalog bikes. The latest to attract the attention of cycling enthusiasts is the prototype that Look has made available to the Cofidis team riders. A bike that would be placed between the 795 Blade, the French company's aerodynamic proposal, and the 785 Huez, its ultralight climber.
More and more brands are opting for the so-called aerolight bikes, given the need to provide professional cyclists with bikes that perform in the wide variety of terrains that they can encounter during the course of a single day: lightweight to face the climbs with all the guarantees but, at the same time, including the necessary aerodynamic qualities to improve performance at the usual speeds of competition.
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Why is the stiffness of a frame so important?
This is achieved, as you can see in the images of this prototype, which according to some sources would be called the 765 RS, by using a tube frame with much more contained sections, similar in size to those of the 785 Huez, but which are profiled in order to minimize resistance to the air flow that impacts on them.
Other features aimed at improving the aerodynamics of this 765 RS are also added, such as a perfect integration of the fork head into the frame; of course, the now ubiquitous fully internal cable routing and, most notably, the configuration of the seat stays, which opt for a design common on purely aerodynamic bikes with their low anchoring, halfway down the seat tube and a slight horizontal stretch at the junction that positions them in the ideal place to deal with the airflow resulting from passing through the rider's legs.
The question remains as to whether this new bike will replace one or both of the existing models in the Look catalog, similar to what happened with the Tarmac at Specialized, which, after taking the path towards aerodynamics, ended up making the Venge model disappear from the catalog, or on the contrary, it will coexist with the 795 Blade and 785 Huez as a third option halfway between both. An approach that we can see, for example, in Cervélo, which has its S5 aerodynamic, the R5 climber to which the Soloist has been added as a more versatile option.
Regarding the set-up of this Look 765 RS, there is little to report with respect to the standard models found in the Look catalog, with the only differences being the saddle, provided by Selle Italia as one of the Cofidis sponsors, and the wheels, Corima instead of the Look models found on the standard bikes. The handlebar/stem set, which is obviously aerodynamically cut and the specific seatpost adapted to the D-shaped seat tube, are the specific ones for this bike. This is also the case with the crankset, which uses the once ubiquitous SRM power meters in the co-development with Look that includes the curious bushing in the pedal anchor area that allows the crank length to be varied.