Prior to unveiling the ground breaking Tarmac SL8 and its unparalleled combination of aerodynamics, lightweight, and ride quality, we relied on feedback from our most trusted athletes to validate our designs. We made the first two for Remco Evenepoel and Demi Vollering to race the 2023 UCI World Road Championships. Now, for the very first time, a limited amount of these Project Black framesets are being made available to riders everywhere. While an S-Works Tarmac SL8 in every way, to ensure secrecy prior to launch, these frames don’t wear the Tarmac name, and even the official UCI sticker calls out the bike’s ‘prototype’ status.
- PROJECT BLACK: “Specialized relies on feedback from professional athletes in both developing and testing advanced pre-production products in real-world applications. With this top-level feedback, some of these design elements and products eventually show up in future retail product offerings.”
- AERO IN EVERYTHING: We’re putting aero where it matters - the leading edge - not just where it looks good. In the process we’ve created our most aerodynamic road bike ever. Yes, it’s more aero than the Venge. Clean air is optimized for maximum advantage with the Tarmac’s new nose cone - the Speed Sniffer. Doesn’t victory smell sweet?
- MINIMUM WEIGHT, MAXIMUM AERO: Tarmac SL8 took learnings from Aethos to be easily built at the UCI minimum with a full aero set up. The team delivered a mind bending, scale tickling 685 gram frame - 15% lighter than the Tarmac SL7 and lighter than anything on else on the World Tour*. With the ability to make lightweight a top priority in the down tube, seat tube, and rear of the bike lessons from Aethos were applied. The frame’s shape carries load so efficiently that extra carbon stiffness layers become redundant. *Unless of course you count the time Kasper Asgreen raced our 585 gram Aethos frame during a Tour stage.
- GOES LIKE HELL, RIDES LIKE HEAVEN: With massive gains in stiffness-to-weight - an improvement of 33% over the SL7 - the Tarmac SL8 takes legendary handling, aggressive responsiveness, and World Championship proven geometry to the next level. Thanks to our Rider-First Engineering, every rider, regardless of size, gets the same unprecedented ride quality and handling. In the saddle, the Tarmac SL8 delivers 6% more compliance, floating over rough road with a supple feel unique in the high strung world of race bikes. Tarmac’s proven geometry and 32mm tire clearance are identical to the SL7, ensuring easy adaptation and the versatility to run higher volume tires when needed.
- S-WORKS TARMAC SL8 PROJECT BLACK LTD FRAMESET: 68mm threaded bottom bracket, flat mount disc brakes, and no-hassle seamless integration - the S-Works Tarmac SL8 Frameset is the ultimate starting point for your dream build.
