Tour de Freds: Vintage vs. modern Tour de France bikes

The Tour de France is the hardest race in cycling. Riders pedal up the toughest climbs over hundreds of miles. How hard is a stage of the Tour? How fit are pro racers? We find out by riding a Tour “stage” on a legendary 7-Eleven team bike and a Cannondale SuperSix like those used by EF Education First pro cycling. We set out to simulate the queen stage of the 2020 Tour de France, stage 17. We pieced together a 108-mile route with 12,000 feet of climbing to see if we were up to the test.

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[Applause] three gears on this bike  [Music] sitting standing and walking   hey it’s spencer from the pros closet here with  bruce lynn bruce the tour de france is underway   i’m feeling feeling the spirit of the race  right now cool i feel like this means you’ve  

Got some big plans for us i think we should  do a ride bruce a tour de france inspired   ride uh what are you what are you riding for  a road bike these days so i actually just got  

A brand new cannondale super six oh it’s perfect  yeah so that is the bike ridden by the ef   education first team which is america’s tour de  france team they’re racing over there right now   and you know what bruce i went into our vintage  bike museum and i found a 1988 puffy that was  

Ridden by the 7-eleven team in the tour de france  this is the original american tour de france team   so let’s take these bikes out for a ride oh that’s  really cool i’m always down the ride i feel like  

There might be a catch though well i mean  we can’t just do any old ride bruce we gotta   it’s gonna be like you know the spirit of  the tour we gotta really challenge ourselves   we should do a ride that simulates the queen stage  at the tour de france that’s the hardest stage of  

The race the one that decides the yellow jersey  i’ve got a route mind it’s going to be fun all   right 108 miles 12 000 feet of climbing summit  finish it’s exactly like the madeleine stage  

Stage 17 of the tour de france 12 000 feet yeah  i don’t i’m not sure i’ve done a ride that hard   actually ever well i mean just be glad you’re  not the one riding the huffy man you’ll be  

Fine listen we gotta let’s go check these bikes  out and make sure they’re gonna be ship shaped   for this ride all right let’s do it okay bruce  tell me about this cannondale you’re riding   so this is a brand new super six evo disc now  this is the third generation super six and canon  

Has done away with the traditional round tubing  they usually use now you see these truncated   airfoil tubes that you see on pretty much every  aero bike nowadays um you’ve got you know you   know it gives you a little more air advantage  makes the super six a little more better all  

Round yeah more better i like better yeah exactly  they’ve also dropped the seat stays um this thing   a lot of manufacturers are doing now it improves  the ride comfort a lot which would be nice for me  

If we’re doing a really long ride you’re kind of  slumming it with the uh ultegra i mean the huffy’s   got dura ace okay so don’t get jealous also you  know this is modern ultegra well so it’s got  

Modern gear range i’ve got a 36 32 granny gear  so that’s generous so i’m going to be spinning   and you’re going to be uh probably destroying my  knees so yeah let’s check out the huffy and see   all right this is a nice looking huffy  but uh you don’t get right out of the  

Tvc museum right i did this is such a cool bike  7-eleven team has got one of the most classic   color schemes in all of pro cycling a lot of great  memories of these bikes over the years so what you  

See here it says it’s a huffy but actually it’s a  serrata it was built by ben serrada it’s made with   true tempered steel uh i have been warned by alex  steeda who’s the first north american to wear the  

Yellow jersey and twitter france he warned me that  these frames tend to crack sometimes so i’m gonna   have to keep an eye on it make sure it’s safe for  this ride otherwise this bike it’s gonna need some  

New tubular tires i’m gonna get this taken care of  go see my friend mike gavigan gav the mechanic get   those glued up need some rubber that’ll last for  108 miles the gearing uh as you implied bruce is  

Going to be quite brutal for me yeah it’s a it’s  a 53 39 up front um i don’t dare count the teeth   on this back cog it’s a corn cob it’s a corn cob  it’s probably no bigger than like 22 teeth in the  

Back um got very sketchy breaks here are you gonna  use these uh coal bottles i don’t know if i should   they might give me some sort of disease i pass on  that one but it’s beautiful it’s gonna be fun to  

Ride get the tires sorted get the gears adjusted  get it cleaned off um probably put my own pedals   on it just in case i don’t know if these old looks  have much spring left in them but uh it’s gonna  

Be fun and uh like i said you know full dura ace  so i do have the edge over bruce in that product   bruce your bike’s pretty dialed my bike uh  needs some work i’m gonna get started on that  

And we got a few days before we ride i’m gonna  get out on this old bike make sure it’s working   okay and then uh we’ll see you all bright and  ugly and we’ll go on a big ride stay tuned oh yeah   look at these new tires only the best so fresh

All right it’s like 7 a.m only way to ride  all day is to start early in the morning how   you feeling bruce i brought enough snacks yeah  yeah i had to stop the old convenience store   get some of my favorite paydays oh these are  chocolate ones that’ll be a fun surprise oh man  

All right well we got to get  going huh yeah let’s roll [Music]   how do you feel bruce just lovely   nice day for it you know it’s been a long time  since i’ve done a ride at sunrise it’s nice

That is cool oh you’re doing that right  now yeah oh so we got like 108 miles and   gonna go up testing rain down james and then  lee hill uh left hand and then up to eldora   yeah that’s the idea [Music] hi bruce 35 miles  in how’s the bike feeling comfortable the road  

Vibrations just like so muted it’s really  nice floating on a cloud yeah amazing yeah   um my initial ride impressions on the huffy  serrata it feels kind of like a race bike if   that makes sense i’ve ridden some other steel road  bikes this one feels a little stiffer when i get  

Up and really get on the pedals it’s got wide  bars which is a little strange like probably 42   centimeter i feel like it’s made for a sprinter  or a classic sky but i mean god forbid you’d have  

To ride this bike on cobblestones it would  be it would be chaos it’d be pandemonium i’m   noticing you’re you’re standing up a lot yeah  that’s a funny thing about a bike like this   i found this with other classic road bikes  personally i almost end up riding them like  

A single speed you don’t shift as much partly  because you can’t if you stand up you’re not going   to be able to reach the down tube shifter you’ve  only got well on this bike seven in the back i’ve  

Had other bikes with six in the back you know it’s  not a ton of speeds to click through so you kind   of just make the best of it you almost shift gears  with your body more than you shift gears with the  

Bike so getting up and standing is a different  gear than sitting down and definitely notice that   you’re able to sit and spin a little bit that’s  got to be one of the biggest technical advances  

A modern bike over an old bike from the 80s this  is an 88 just having that gear range being able   to adjust your gears to your body isn’t being as  taxed by just yeah back in the 90s back in the 80s  

It was big gear time just smashing so i’m gonna  have to channel that sort of smashy thing on this   climb because we’re at the bottom of our first  major climb this is our version of the call de  

La madeleine you know the the stage 17 queen  stage of the tour oh it’s so steep i am in the   39-21 bruce what’s it gonna take for you to get  get a feel for this here i’ll try it for a second  

Vintage awesomeness take the leg press machine  for 36 18 will be pretty close right hopefully oh yeah a healthy 50 rpm 47 47. three miles feels really long when  you get to the end of a hundred mile ride   so i am not gonna short change us but hey  we’re doing all right yeah getting there   it’s gonna get harder before it gets easier it’s  no climbing and uh i don’t know the gearing’s  

Certainly making it much harder on this bike it’s  got a little bit of a knock in the bottom bracket   yeah the bottom bracket needs to get rebuilt not  surprising i’m sure the pro team abused it well  

We got a few more miles to climb i don’t know i’m  feeling all right yeah for now we’ll get up there   pretty high altitude we’re going to drop long  long descent and then we’ll have another big climb 80s bottom bracket technology  that’s something i don’t miss  

Yeah that’s it it’s pretty much the top of the  first climb nice it’s a hot one oh it’s all melty   yeah that’s the temperature check for the day   chocolate melting temperature  fish good stuff there goes spencer you can’t go the uh you can’t go  to the same pace as me because uh  

You won’t be able to turn over the  gear because we’ll be going too slow so we’ve got no choice but to motor away [Music] we’ve got big descent ahead you’ll be fine  you got disc brakes oh yeah it’s gonna be nice  

I’m a little nervous about how the rim  brakes and tubulars will handle it [Music] [Music]   i don’t know if like the tubular glue is  getting hot maybe and squirming how it breaks   breaks it’s sort of like the executive  hand strengthener where you’re like

Like my forearms are pumped right now  i saw your bike doing a little like   and i was like yeah don’t know what’s happening  it’s just a compliance feature that’s what that is   gotta go back up again summit finish the tour is  doing a summit finish we’re doing a summit finish

I’m uh not excited so here’s something tour  pros definitely don’t do yeah check the   check my emails you know i just see  what’s going on text the wife the   guys in the tour probably still drink coke  though at some point i’ve got to [Applause]

I needed that i did not plan my nutrition very  well those guys are missing out on the nutrition   hack that is doritos the best mid-ride food  there’s a pro tip right there gluten-free got   a lot of sodium for your sweat might as well be  like astronaut food practically it’s so engineered  

It’s only the beginning yeah we haven’t  even like turned on to the actual climb [Music] yet all right that’s so popular there he goes this might be the  last i see of spencer for a while i’m in my easiest gear and i’m  grinding i can’t imagine how he feels

I am feeling the climbing waiting for  bruce bruce is being smart bruce is using   technology to his advantage making  this ride more comfortable for him   and i encourage all of you to do that when you  try to simulate a tour stage or do anything big i  

Love riding vintage bikes but there is a limit  to what you can comfortably do on them but um   man it’s great that the modern bike technology  lets people do bigger rides more comfortably yes that is the top for sure the slowest i’ve  ever done that climb this next 30 miles is  

Gonna be like pure suffering i was just like  watching my heart rate just trying to keep   it down and it’s so hard how’s that for you i  stood pretty much the whole time i’m pretty pretty  

Sore already yeah i think this is one of those  rides where i get sore midway through i’m dying oh my god i made it i barely feel human right now i was going so slow just look at that salt  oh my god i am a vessel pain right now  

I am not happy you made me do this i’m sorry right  now you can choose the next adventure have you   heard of uh communing with the butterflies spencer  i’ve not so i’m riding [Music] so slow a butterfly   could fly through my spokes i like that that  sounds very italian almost like any good  

Tour de france stage we must finish at the station  the ski the ski areas where we go to the cafe   it’s beautiful up there i think you’ll make the  time cut all right i think you’re close enough  

I’m motivated i think bruce cramped i think  he cramped i think he’s walking did you cramp   oh what’s cramped i’m ashamed but i  had no choice he’s doing it he’s riding  

Bruce is on his bike come on bruce you got this  man this is all a ruse my way of getting you to do   a hundred miler and it worked all right we’re so  close i bruce believe it i’m stoked you crushed it  

I’m in uh probably the deepest i’ve ever  been in the band cave that’s awesome   well i think it’s awesome maybe i should  be apologizing for roping you into this   right now i can barely think  don’t cramp again [Music]  

Oh you gotta ride back down to the car stuff okay  bruce we made it i’m super stoked for you that i   there was a real dark moment  there with like 20 miles to go   but you push through it pure determination  this is your longest ride of the year by 100  

Right i mean yeah this is all like a trick i got  out the vintage bike and i managed to get bruce to   do his biggest ride of the year what do you think  what’s it like to do sort of the simulation of  

The hardest day of the tour de france it was you  know i expected it to be hard but it definitely   you you can’t prepare  yourself for how hard that was   i’m really impressed now with tour de france pros  they’re out there in the heat they’re doing this  

Tour this type of ride totally and then they  do it again the next day yep and the next day   and me i’m gonna go i’m gonna go lay on the  couch tomorrow i think it’s it’s cool to to push  

Yourself i’m stoked that you pushed yourself and  went to like a whole different level of probably   what your ordinary ride would be definitely that’s  definitely the worst i’ve cramped in years it   was something to behold but you pushed through it  and you kept riding which is awesome so i we need  

A like a good name for this ride we need to  like capture it okay i’ve been thinking about it   let me explain i think it should be called  tour de fred’s now i know fred has a negative  

Connotation in cycling but i don’t like that i  think cycling needs to be a lot more inclusive   i think we need to have fun i don’t think we  should be looking down our noses at people i think  

All of us are friends we’re all just out having  a good time we’re all just out riding enjoying   the day we’re not pro riders we’re only just  pretending we are for a day everybody’s afraid   no matter whether you’re on a bike with down tube  shifters or a bike with disc brakes no matter  

Whether you’ve been riding all season super fit or  whether you’ve got you know a family and you can’t   get out as much and you’re not as fit as you once  were no matter if you’re experienced or or less  

Experienced it doesn’t matter we’re all in this  together we can ride together have a good time   that’s what it’s all about so that’s why i think  we need to take back the name fred and turn it  

Into a good thing cool i can get behind that thank  you so all you friends out there get out and ride   have fun be nice to each other and thank you for  watching yeah and shameless plug don’t forget   pro’s closet’s your place to get certified  pre-owned bikes like the cannondale super six that  

Bruce was riding not like the huffy 7-eleven bike  that i was riding those are just for the museum   but you can check out those bikes in our  museum please do it’s all online rosecloset.com   that’s all i got thanks for watching thanks for  getting me the ride yeah nice one bruce [Music]

There’s like some sort of  like grease oozing out of it probably just getting warmed  up if i start yo-yoing   because i’m dying don’t die we  got a lot of vikings still to do