Rider-First Engineered

Rider-First Engineered™

The Rider-First Engineered™ philosophy is the result of two seemingly simple observations: First, when engineering a frameset, one has to have a clear understanding of how both road forces and rider inputs interact to inform how a bicycle actually rides. Second, that these forces are far different on a small bike than on a large one.

While the concept seems straight forward, actually creating Rider-First Engineered™ framesets demanded fully instrumented bikes to quantify these forces, a skilled team to establish size-by-size performance benchmarks and then the engineering ability to execute framesets capable of meeting these standards. This process allowed Specialized to design bikes that for the first time provide consistent performance across the entire size spectrum. In short—breakthrough climbing, sprinting, cornering and performance for riders of every size.

What makes Rider-First Engineered™ Unique?

Every Rider-First Engineered™ frame is developed independently based on the targets established from real-world testing for that particular sized frame. The result is a significant advance in complete performance for every frame size, from a 49cm to a 64cm, and everything in between.

Prior to the Rider-First Engineered™ approach, the cycling industry had followed the same basic development strategy when engineering a new frameset. First, stiffness and weight targets would be established through static lab testing and engineers would develop a 56 cm frame to meet those targets. However, in practice (by virtue of their smaller triangles) smaller frames were typically stiffer than the benchmarked 56 cm, while the larger bikes were flexier. While Specialized led the industry with a size-specific approach that included size-by-size changes to tube size and lay-up, what we discovered through extensive on-road testing was that the riders of smaller bikes were still having a completely different ride experience than the riders of larger bikes—even though they were both on the same model bicycle.

What does this mean for the rider?

Since smaller bikes are typically so stiff, the bike chatters and pushes to the outside in bumpy corners. On larger bikes, riders often feel the exact opposite—the bike could be more responsive as they changed direction in order to set-up for a corner. Even on average sized bikes, the Rider-First Engineered™ approach allowed Specialized to understand the dynamic forces a bicycle is subject to like never before, and to engineer not for the lab, but for optimum real-world performance that was proven by the Rider-First Engineered™ Tarmac's victories at the 2014 Tour de France, Vuelta a Espana, and Men’s World Professional road championships.

By establishing unique and independent performance targets for each sized frame, the Rider-First Engineered™ design philosophy means that Specialized engineers create not just one new bike, but rather a new bike at each size, each with the complete, world-class performance the bike is known for. With the Rider-First Engineered™ approach, every rider at every frame size experiences the performance they deserve.