5 Lightweight Tour de France Bikes 2025

In this video, we take a look at five lightweight climbing bikes used by the pros at the 2025 Tour de France. Even modern aero optimised bikes with larger tyres and disc brakes can be tweaked to reduce the weight. Afterall, these are the machines trusted to tackle the steepest and most demanding mountain stages.

Which one would you pick for your dream ride? Let us know in the comments!

00:20 Colango V5RS
02:05 Cervélo R5
02:59 Specialized SL8
03:57 Canyon Aeroad
05:30 BMC TeamMachine SLR

Credits:
Dario Belingheri / stringer
Luc Claessen / Stringer
Tim De Waele / Getty

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With the days of rim brakes in the Pro Palaton behind us, it was starting to look like super lightweight climbing bikes were going to be consigned to the history books. But fear not, we’ve been on the ground at this year’s men’s tour to France with our trusty weighing scales. And we’re pleased to report that the UCI minimum weight limit of 6.8 kilos is still an achievable target for modern race bikes, even with disc brakes. Here are five you need to look out for in this year’s race. First up, it’s the bike of defending champion Talle Paga. The Slovenian superstar is the bookie’s favorite for this year’s race and has left no stone unturned in his quest for yellow. You might have spotted this bike being raced already, but world champions custom paint job aside, have you noticed the bling, custom components, and pro touches? Artisal Italian brand Carbon Tai have decked the bike out with chain rings complete with TAD’s own logo engraved, a carbon headset cap, and even the through axles which weigh just 54.5 g for the set. The longer you look at this bike, the more custom parts you notice. silver envy hubs and spokes, a direct mount mech hanger, even a custom bottom bracket shell. All of these pro touches mean it actually came in under the UCI weight limit when Simon had it on our scales before the race kicked off in Le. According to our scales, Pagatcha’s Konago V5 RS weighs 6.765 kilos, which is just 35 g under the UCI’s minimum weight. Now, 35 g is not a lot, virtually imperceptible to the average rider, but it shows the length UAE team member XRG have gone to to make sure TADA’s got no excuses when the race hits the mountain. Not to spoil the lightweight party, but weighing scales do have a margin of error. What do you think? Do we need to take this weight with a tiny little pinch of salt and maybe recalibrate the bike radar scales of truth? Despite this feathery lightweight, it’s still a really functional build that will go just as fast on the flat as it will up the climbs. The 28 mm Continental TT tires balloon out to a plush 31 mil for added grip, comfort, and improved roller resistance. He’s also reverted to standard durace brake rotors instead of the carbon tie rotors on his V4 RS last year. More reliable, or is this an effort to add a bit of weight back to the bike? Carbon tie brake rotors or not, this is a proper weight weeny build. Of course, Pogy can’t be a proper weight weenie, else he’d have taken off that Richard Mle watch and save himself about 50 g and €300,000. Next, we have the unreleased Sevel R5 used by team Vizma Lisa bike at the Tour to France and Tour to France Farm. Simon got up close and personal with Matteo Jorgensson’s bike at the start of the race. And at just 7 kilos, including bottles and cages, pedals, and Garmin, we’re pretty sure this has to be one of the lightest bikes out there. Sell seemingly can’t stop releasing new bikes this year with the new Asperero 5 gravel bike breaking cover last month and the brand new S5 Aerobike being unveiled in the first week of the race. But will the teams actually use the new R5? We’ve already seen Simon Yates ride to a hilly stage win on board the more Aero S5 which he also piloted on his stunning attack over the Collida Fenestra to take the Malia Rosa at the Jurro Italia earlier this year. Will we see the likes of Yonas Fingerbar and Pauline Fan Proau favorite S5 or the R5? We would love to see this bike being ridden at altitude, but how much of an advantage can it really hold over the S5? Let us know what you think in the comments and follow the link in the description to check out Simon’s first look deep dive at this super light beauty. The third bike on this list is the bike of the rider who finished third at last year’s tour. And it’s the S Works SLA of the Aero Bullet himself, Remco Inul. Current Olympic and twotime world time trial champion, Remco is a rider whose setup is always absolutely dialed in and optimized up to the eyeballs to make him as fast as possible. Now, that amazing gold paint job is sure to add a few grams. And he could shave a bit of weight if he fitted a smaller chain ring rather than that 56 to dinner plate he’s turning over. But at just 7.1 kilos in its full aerospec, this is one of the lightest bikes we’ve seen at the race. At last year’s race, we spotted Remco racing a special lightweight SL8 frame with black paint to shave off even more weight. Will we see this frame wheeled out in the mountains? In the mountains, he’ll have the option to swap the Roval Rapid wheels out for the even lighter Roval Alpenist and get the build right down to the UCI weight limit. Of course, Remco and his teammates aren’t the only riders on Specialized this year. Red Bull, Bora Hansrower, and FDJ Suez will also be on the SL8. Will we see a lighter build from Primos Rockglitch or Demi Volerin? The Canyon Aero on a list of lightweight climbing bikes. Let’s not forget that last year’s Tour of France fan was won by Cassie on board an airrode which he raced up outdue to clinch the overall victory by just 4 seconds, the tightest winning margin in the history of tour of France. Of course, Canyon has the ultimate in their stable, which their website shows about 250 g lighter than an aero for the same spec. But aerodynamics do matter, even at slower climbing speeds, and arrow gains across a stage race can help a rider save heaps of energy, meaning they can dig even deeper when it really matters. We’ve not got our weighing scales on Cassia’s specific bike yet, but we did weigh Matthew Vanderpol’s Alpas Kernik spec bike at the start of the men’s race at a hefty 8 kilos. He rides a size large compared to Neodom’s much smaller extra small. And his bike was set up ahead of the flat sprint heavy opening stage in the men’s race with 60 mil rims, huge chain rings, and custom paint complete with gold sparkles. They’re scoped to make his bike a lot lighter come the mountains. Canyon’s own website quotes a medium aero CFR with surround axis as weighing just 6.98 kg. So I have no doubt Canyon Stram Zonda Crypto will get the defending champions bike down towards the UCI weight limit without too many issues. We seldom see the Canyon Zonda Crypto team reach for the lightweight Canyon Ultimate favoring the aero for most race days and after a consistent spring and aggressive tour to Swiss Neoma looks to be in great form ahead of the tour to France fem where she’ll be looking to defend her title. The arroad is of course also the bike of choice for Albin to Kernik as well as the men’s and women’s mobistar teams and Fenix to Kernik. With that many riders on canyons at this year’s tours to France, surely we’ll see some success from the German brand. Let us know what you think in the comments below. Completing the list, I wanted to throw in a bit of a wild card and it’s the bike for wild card team. In fact, the second division TUDA Pro Cycling team will be looking at the Swiss precision of the brand new BMC T- Machine SLR when the race goes uphill. An exciting team looking at poaching some stages. due to have the likes of Alfa Philippe, Hershey, and Michael Stoer looking to sneak up the road into a breakaway and nab a stage at some point this year. And the T- Machine SLR will be the bike of choice for the hillier days. Simon got his hands on Alfalip’s new bike earlier in the race. And on our own scales, the 52 cm bike came out at 7.125 kg, although that includes a set of Time XPro 12 SL pedals, the bike’s integrated Aero bottle cages, and the Wahoo Element Bolt 3 bike computer. Alfoop’s bike is sporting a raw carbon finish with a simple or bit massive red BMC logo and a clear coat finish and it’s complete with surround red axis drivetrain and interestingly the older DT Swiss Arc 1100 wheels. The previous T- machine had a special masterpiece edition that was even lighter than the stock build. Will we see a masterpiece model of the new bike? Only time will tell. Which of these bikes is your favorite? What have we missed? Be sure to let us know in the comments down below. And while you’re down there, remember to hit subscribe and click the bell icon so you get notified every time we upload a new video. Why not check out the hottest bikes of this year’s tour to France? The video is just up here.