It’s been a full three years since the last release of a flagship race bike from Specialized, and there has been a whole host of speculation over the last few months about when we might see the brand new Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL8.
Early speculation pointed toward a Tour de France debut which left us slightly confused when snooped around stage one to find the hottest Tour tech. But while the bike has yet to be seen at the Tour, Specialized sponsored Soudal Quick-Step on a training camp with images shared on social media.
What do we know so far?
Information is obviously thin on the ground for the new bike and our initial thoughts were that ‘spot the difference Tarmac SL8 edition’ is a pretty tricky game! A closer look though shows that there is still quite a lot we can infer from the photos.
There is a general remodeling of the frame shape, and it looks as though the bike has gone on a crash diet since its previous release, but this certainly seems to be an SL7.5 rather than an all-new platform.
Leaked stock image, and potential new colourway
(Image credit: Weight Weenies: Currentsea)
While most of the tubes have been slimmed down, the head tube is the only area of the bike that seems to have gained any material.
The head tube has been somewhat extruded, with the front of the bike now offering a much narrower head-on profile, whilst increasing depth from front to rear – this will likely be in the name of aerodynamic efficiency. Interestingly too, it does bear a strong resemblance to the headtube on the Cannondale SystemSix too, with the headtube protruding beyond the fork crown.
The fork looks to have been almost stolen straight off of the now discontinued Venge, with the increased depth of the fork blades presumably also inline with the aero front end ethos of the new machine.
While Tour de France images show the bikes fitted without the new Roval Rapide aero cockpit, the leaked stock image tells us that the aero front end will probably be included on high spec models.
The new Specialized shares resemblance to the protruding headtube on the Cannondale SystemSix
(Image credit: Weight Weenies: Jz91 and Cannondale)
The rest of the bike, as we mentioned, looks to be geared much more toward the climbing end of the spectrum.
The S-Works logo now barely fits on the downtube, due to its radical size reduction. From the photos we have currently, it is tricky to say exactly what tube profile Specialized has opted for, but we assume a D-shaped downtube will likely…