How I Made My Bike Crazy Light

Ollie Bridgewood’s just made his Orbea Orca even lighter — and it’s now officially UCI illegal. 😅 In this video, he takes you through every modification he’s made to it and how much weight each one saves. Plus, to make things more interesting, this isn’t just an impractical weight-weenie build. It’s a fully functional, practical road bike, that’s of a spec & build that COULD actually win the Tour de France!🚴‍♂️💨 Maybe just with a different rider! 🤭

⏱️ Timestamps: ⏱️
00:00 Ollie’s super light Orbea Orca 🔥
00:46 Ollie’s First Thoughts on the Bike
02:09 Wheels, Freehub Sound Check & Weight Savings
04:23 Tyres & Tubes
06:22 Cockpit
07:45 Saddle & Seatpost
09:50 Bottle Cages
10:51 Crankset, Chainrings & Cassette
12:33 Pedals

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GCN1726

this is my beautiful Orbeea Orca but I’ve modified it to make it even lighter it weighs just 6.1 kg including pedals making it UCI illegal so I’m going to go through all of the modifications this I’ve made and how much weight they save but that’s not all this isn’t a crazy impractical weight weenie build with exotic super light flexible components and tires made from tracing paper this is a fully functional practical road bike that well is of a spec and build that would be capable of winning the tour to France obviously not with me riding it but hopefully you get my point so let’s get to it i’ve got big plans for this bike that I I can’t wait to do one of the things I’m hoping to do is to beat my PB time up outdoes and I also just love the way that it looks i think the tan sidewalls on these uh Pirelli P 0 just really suit the bike and that it looks blumbing great feel free to disagree in the comments um but there’s a problem with with lightweight weight weenie builds and this is something that’s not often addressed but when it comes to lightweight builds there’s a line and on one side of that line you have super practical heavy bikes and on the other side of that line you have super crazy weight weeny builds that can become pretty impractical components can be so light that they’re no longer stiff and are pretty flexible your brakes and gears might not work as well and the bike just might not be as comfortable now I want a bike that is still comfortable i want tires that have puncture protection and are bigger and give more comfort i want brakes and gears that don’t sacrifice performance and I want the bike to be stiff i want this to be a bike that is capable of being raced at the highest level of the sport in theory okay yes not by me but with that considered that was how I chose the bits for this bike i didn’t want to sacrifice stuff so let’s go through the mods the first thing I’m going to tell you about is the wheels because they look absolutely fantastic uh they’re Princeton Carbon Works Altera so that’s the the lightest wheel that they do it’s their climbing wheel still pretty arrow though keeping with a bit of practicality so they’re 3532s so 35 mm deep at the widest point 32 at the shallowest point with that wavy profile for aerodynamic stability um and I think they they match the bike really well especially with the silver graphics matches the the silver or baya graphics on the frame and they come with a variety of of different hub options that you can select uh but I didn’t go for the lightest option so the lightest one are the the Tactic Racing TRO1s but along the lines of that practicality thing I went for the next lightest which was DT Swiss 180s they sound [Music] good they’re not super loud which I like and also when you’re at slow speed they’re uh they get quieter not all hubs do that but yeah very [Music] smooth so as for the weight saving well the previous wheels I had in here were also Princeton Carbon Works they were 45 550s um so a little bit deeper that extra depth is about 100 g uh extra weight so 100 g saved there the hubs were also a lower spec hub uh than these 180s slightly heavier they were White Industries hubs so another sort of 100 grams saved on the hubs there as well um these wheels are weighing just just slightly over like 1,22 grams so very light there are lighter wheels out there there are sub sub kilo wheel sets that you can get but to do that you’re typically looking at getting tubulars which are slower uh or with some weight weenie builds they’re super lightweight wheels you can get but they’re not arrow at all and you need arrow um and also they can be quite flexible whereas these are incredibly stiff um and they’re actually the wheels that are used by Inos Grenaders whenever they take on mountain stages so next are tires now these are the the P 0 RS from Pirelli they’re top of the range sort of all round performance tire uh but they’re now in the retro version which has the retro sidewall on it which which I love i think it looks really smart on on this particular bike um and there’s actually a significant weight saving going on here so previously I had the wheels set up tubeless but these are the tube specific tire so you can’t set these tires up tubeless but the advantage there is that they’re significantly lighter so they’re 65 g lighter per tire by being a tube type tire than the tubeless one uh and in conjunction with that I’m running their TPU tubes but it’s their Evo smart tube so it’s a lighter one they make now just 35 g each so there’s a saving to be had there because with running sealant in in the tires you typically run at least 30 g of sealant and then you’ve got the valves as well which add a little bit of weight and so overall across across the bike you’re looking at about 140 150 g saved uh just in tires and tubes which in terms of bang for buck is probably the best best weight saving on the [Music] bike one thing to point out is you could save a lot more weight on your tires and it is common that when doing lightweight builds people put Veladrome tires on track tires or super lightweight time trial tires that have zero puncture protection you can also save weight by dropping down to a 23 mm these are 28s because that is what I want to use and like I want it to be practical and and these tires are are blooming great i mean they’re the tires that have been used by the likes of Matio Vanderpool and Mads Pedison to win loads of races this year blooming good tires i’m going to show you the cockpit now because this is really cool uh this is from a company called Black Tech based in Taiwan and it’s something that I actually saw at the Taipei Bike Show this year so this is an integrated one piece bar and stem it comes in pretty much any size you can think of um and it’s just 245 g light so the carbon bar that I had on here before uh was was very light that was just 190 g but the stem was approaching 200 g it was uh alloy very stiff but quite a bit heavier so that’s a significant saving that’s made there and it’s the same size so 130 uh mil stem and a 38 bar with my shifters just angled in a bit how I like them um also has this nice integrated outfront mount but one of the coolest things about it is just how it’s all nice and integrated and all the cables are hidden it’s very smart they do different 3D printed top caps uh depending on the kind of bike that you have so that it all just fits nice and flush and uh while I’m here I’m going to pop my Wahoo on the mount because well I’m using the bolt um because it’s the smallest lightest head unit they do and whenever I’m doing like a a race or an event or something and I want it to be small and light and a bit more arrow that’s the one I use but this mount’s quite good cuz you could fit the Ace on there as well it’s nice and long um so onto the saddle now this might be a bit controversial for a few people um because I’ve bang been banging on about like practicality and not sort of weight weeny stuff and I’ve got like a bare carbon saddle on there so uh this is the Celeria SLR Techno so it’s the exact same shape as the SLR uh Boost with carbon rails that that I bloom in love and use all the time and because it’s the exact same shape and profile I actually find it pretty comfortable if I was doing a crazy long endurance ride like you know when I when I rode at Monte Graer or something yes like I I I wouldn’t use this but for a se several hours I’ i’ve had no issues with it so that’s why it’s on there but I appreciate that some people might think “Oh that’s not very practical.” So this weighs 95 g which is very very light the one that I normally use for all of the big endurance rides I’ve ever done um that’s only 30 grams heavier 125 grams so I could easily swap that back and put that other saddle on if it made you happier and able to sleep at night um and it it would still be incredibly light it would still be less than 6.2 kg so yeah there you go so while while I’m here I’ll mention the seat post cuz that’s not stock so the standard one uh was 190 g this is one from a company called Bjorn Cycles that makes quite lightweight bits and it weighs just 120 g but the crucial thing is is it’s still rated to 120 kg meaning that it still is you know well I mean that’s all well not quite double my weight but yeah it’s uh it’s still going to hopefully be strong enough and practical but a significant saving the other thing is the u on this particular bike for those that are unaware the Di2 cigar battery is mounted in the seat post so I just took that out and I’ve remounted it inside there too [Music] bottle cages next and these are really cool so these are Topi’s top of the the line cage uh they’re called the Fetszer R10 and they’re just 10 g each now the cages that I had on before were carbon shuttle cages very light but 20 g each uh so I’ve saved 20 g across the uh across the both bottle cages one of the things that also helps that is they have titanium bolts just make sure you put grease on there so you don’t get galvanic corrosion but they actually save a couple of grams um so these are made of Kevlar in this nice weave pattern and uh well I think they look really smart uh you can get them in all black but I went for this red weave one cuz it ties in with the red on the frame but the crucial thing with these is that they do actually hold a bottle really securely which is often the undoing of many a weight weeny lightweight bottle cage incidentally uh Camelback GCN water bottles available at shop.global cycling network crank set next and this is probably the biggest single weight saving on the bike so the standard Jorah Ace uh chain set and chain rings that I had on there were 696 g whereas this one these carbon cranks they’re from a Chinese brand called Lee uh this is their top of the range X Novanta crank and it’s just 279 g when it’s fitted with the Jorah Ace chain rings that I’ve kept the same uh it’s then 385 g but still massive weight saving on there and it’s got a power meter spider too um same length 170 mm cranks I had before but as for the the chain rings and also the the cassette there are again lighter weight weeny options out there you can get crazy carbon lightweight chain rings and all sorts but I’ve kept with Jorah Ace because it works and it shifts amazing the shifting on the Jorah Ace cassette and the chain rings it’s just it’s just as good as it gets and uh I didn’t want to compromise on that um on the cassette that is an 1134 cassette as well you could save a bit of weight by going for a a closer ratioed smaller cassette but I want that 34 to other thing that that’s standard is the bottom bracket you can save a little bit of weight often by switching to a ceramic bottom bracket um a ceramic bearings typically weigh a little bit less than steel but it’s only a tiny amount and I found that that on this frame the alignment is really really good and the bottom bracket with just a stock BB spins very nicely and um I’ve got no issue so I think I’m going to keep that until uh it needs replacing and it’s worn out i think that’s about it apart from uh the pedals which are Wahoo Speedplay Nanos so they are the lightest one they do with titanium axles just 168 g a pair so very light as well um yeah I’m really happy with this i’m loving it and it I mean it feels blooming incredible i pick it up again cuz it is just like it is it is really light i can’t wait to take this to the mountains and uh but but hopefully go up them faster than I’ve ever done before so if you want to see that make sure you subscribe to the channel so you don’t miss it let us know what you thought of the mods let us know if you’ve got any suggestions for further mods I could do to to make it any lighter um than it already is maybe under 6 kg but uh I’m going to go now love you bye