Gravel

Caledonia doesn’t fit in a box nicely, and we like it that way. It was conceived on our Thursday night rides—routes that often play fast and loose with ‘road ride.’ As we tried to stuff bigger tires into our R5s and streamline our Asperos, a new kind of bike was born. When we design a bike, we start with our library of tube shapes. These shapes are tubes we’ve used on other models that we know to have various qualities—aerodynamic, stiff, ultralight, etc.—and they help get us to the refinement stage on a bike more quickly. In the case of Caledonia, we wanted durability, lightweight, and aerodynamics to be in balance and selected a package that achieved the performance demands of this kind of race bike. Caledonia uses a standard round bar, stem, and seat post, giving riders the option to build their ultimate ride without compromise. Integrated accessory mounts and hidden fender mounts keep the bike’s refined lines so you can ride with lights and computers in a downpour and still look fast. Because we all know if it looks fast, it probably is. Rather than designing multiple versions of the bike with various fit profiles (R5, R-Series, etc.) like we’ve done in the past, we designed a system that enables a broad range of fits on a single bike while maintaining the aesthetic and functional cleanliness we demand. Modern road riders are looking for bikes to handle long-distance, high pace, no limits, and offer maximum fun. By placing lower modulus carbon in key areas to mitigate the brittleness of hi-mod fiber—the Caledonia delivers performance, comfort, and speed. Oh, and you can fit a 34mm tire in there. Or 31mm with fenders.

HAUL ASS, NOT CARGO A new breed of rider is emerging-one who loves the freedom and exploration that gravel culture was founded upon but who has a hunger to ride hard, to go all out, and to explore not just geography but personal limits. This frontier requires a new kind of gravel machine, one engineered not to roam the trails, but to race them. For these athletes, we engineered Aspero for pure, unapologetic speed, ready to take down finish lines, KOMs, PRs, and FKTs. A bike built without limits, for the riders looking to test them. It's stiff, Classics-racing stiff, and performs like you'd want a road bike to perform off-road. We think that makes sense, and it's what we were trying to do when we were stuffing bigger tires into our existing frames and swapping in aftermarket forks to get a 40mm tire up front. The flip-chip in the fork-we call it the Trail Mixer-keeps the trail measurement consistent whether you choose 700c or 650b tires. This maintains the bike's personality and handling characteristics when you switch from mid-fats to full-fat. There are as many different ways to do gravel as there are gravel bikes these days, but if you're toeing the start line, looking to stay with the lead group, and contend for the victory, Aspero is the bike to get you there.

Our engineers like to joke that, "if it looks fast, it probably is." But there's some truth to that, and Aspero-5 looks fast standing still. No cables in the wind, tube shapes from our aerodynamically-proven library, and a hint of a cut out in the seat tube, all add up to a bike that proves the adage.

FLAT OUT That's how Aspero debuted under the characters of the Wednesday Night Rough Club two years ago, and that's how it's stayed. And since, at Cervelo, we know that flat out doesn't stay flat out for long without a little help from science, we've come back from the drawing board with a new Aspero. A faster Aspero, a lighter Aspero, and-dare we say it-an even better looking Aspero. Our engineers like to say, if it looks fast, it probably is, but there's some truth to it, and Aspero-5 looks fast standing still. No cables in the wind, tubes derived from our library of aerodynamically proven shapes, and just a hint of a cut out in the seat tube to squeak out just a bit more tire clearance, add up to a bike that proves the adage.