Sam Gupta and Specialized ambassador, Alan Murchison, put the SL8 and the SL7 head to head along with the 8th generation of Specialized Venge.
Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:00Today we are down in Winchester and we're currently sat in the Southdown Social Cafe
00:08and today I've been joined by specialised ambassador Alan Murchison because this is a man
00:13who has ridden over 70 specialised bikes, he has an in-depth knowledge of the S-Works SL7 and has
00:19recently taken delivery of the SL8. So the question that I'm asking him is what is the difference
00:25between the two? We've been out on the roads to do some real world data testing, it's a little bit
00:30ghetto, it's a bit of a car park test but it is going to give us some numbers to have a look at
00:35to see how these two really perform. I think a really good place to start actually is just going
00:45to be looking at the similarities between both of these bikes because you know this is the eighth
00:49generation of the Tarmac so it is another iteration of it and that means that there are a lot of
00:54similarities and I think one of the key ones actually is just the shape of the frame, they're
00:58still sticking with the drop seat stays. The frame shape itself actually hasn't changed all that much
01:04and the geometry is identical. It's also meant that comfort of the bike I think is also going to be
01:09quite similar. Specialised did quote that there was a six percent improvement in compliance at the
01:13saddle. When you've ridden this bike you're short experience with it so far, could you feel any
01:17difference in comfort between the two bikes? Nah. No. I think six percent is a very small margin. I couldn't
01:23feel any real difference. It just felt really really responsive without being mega stiff because
01:29normally you say well it's responsive that means stiff and stiff means uncomfortable. Yeah. It seems
01:34responsive but it doesn't feel like you're riding a plank of wood for example. The only other similarity
01:40that I can really draw from this bike actually is the fork of the bike really replicates that of the
01:46Venge fork. I'd say the two between the SL7 and the SL8. I think they're actually quite different. The SL7 fork
01:53is a bit more circular and actually a bit narrower whereas the SL8 fork is definitely flatter and a bit
01:58longer. They've really dialed in the aero at the front of the bike. I think the other thing is a
02:02head tube as well. Yeah. There's a chunk there and that's more reminiscent of the Venge. So when I first
02:07saw this bike it looked quite odd because it looked very front heavy because it was built up at the front
02:12and then very very small rear stays and I wasn't convinced about the aesthetics of it whereas when you
02:18see it built up yeah it looks pretty good. Yeah. Looking at the price and weights of the bikes on
02:24offer an interesting picture emerges. Not only is the SL8 now cheaper compared to the SL7 in certain
02:31builds but now you don't need the S-Works SL8 to beat the S-Works SL7 in weight. The difference between
02:38the top end SL7 and SL8 is acclaimed 120 grams. However the lower grade 10R carbon version of the
02:45SL8 is just 100 grams heavier than the S-Works version. So if you want a bike as light as the
02:52S-Works SL7 then opt for the cheaper variant of the SL8 and then build it up in a matching spec.
03:04I was really surprised at how fast the SL7 was and climbing it was considerably faster than anything
03:11else. Where the Venge came into its own was once you started getting over 50k an hour like dual
03:15carriageway stuff which is rare. Let's be brutally honest we all have delusions of riding everywhere at
03:2150k an hour it's not something that any of us do on a regular basis. So the Venge was still very very
03:26fast above 50k an hour but rolling A-roads climbs the tarmac was just fast from the box you know it
03:32was a really really fast easy get on with bike and it felt fast and then the numbers the little test
03:38that we did it proved to be really fast on the road. Just day-to-day riding it's fast. So just run us
03:44through what did that test consist of in terms of the parkour? It was a climb an 800 meter climb it was a
03:50couple of k of rolling bumpy A-road sort of mixed surface and then there was 5k of dual carriageway.
03:56So a little bit of everything yeah nothing too technical and I was looking for repeatability
04:01as well so I did it on a bit of road that I think according to Strava I've done over 700 times.
04:07So another road and we did it based on heart rate and power yeah so we did a run on the Venge we did a run
04:14on the SL7 and we did a run on the SL8 bikes were pretty much set up the same they're all running
04:19Dura Ace Di2 power saddles CLX wheels tyre setups almost identical so they were all as close as they
04:28could be. Now one caveat obviously I like to tinker with bikes the Venge and the SL7 ceramic bottom
04:34brackets ceramic jockey wheels wax chains etc. The SL8 straight out of the box literally no changes at all
04:43so it's got standard bottom bracket it's got a greased up chain yeah factory yeah and it's got
04:48a stack on it like a big mark. 35 mil of stack there so I mean compared to the SL7 which has 15 mil
04:54yeah that's a sizable difference and I think the other thing as well was that on the SL8 there is
05:01no oversized pulley wheel system. It's a standard it's completely standard straight out of the box
05:05cool okay so run us through some of the numbers so first off we had the Venge then the SL7 and the SL8
05:10yeah how did the Venge perform? The Venge was really good and today we had a tailwind on a
05:15Joe carriageway which is always going to favor a full aero bike so climbing we did the climb the Venge
05:21was climbing 19.9k an hour and it did the the little loop that we did in 10 minutes and 8 seconds
05:28marching out at 66k an hour so it was fast it climbed okay and it was good and it felt really
05:35stable so the Venge was good okay cool and then the SL7? SL7 was climbing like an absolute demon
05:41right put in context the same climb the average 20.4k an hour so half a kilometer an hour yeah faster
05:47on a climb that's only like minute and a half long yeah uh it was almost identical speed max that is 65k
05:54an hour not quite as fast as the Venge um was honestly it was in within one to two seconds so
06:00so to be honest in the real world that's kind of negligible differences yeah it was it was what you'd
06:04expect the SL7 climbed faster it was faster on the bumpy rolling airwood yeah the Venge was faster
06:10above 50k an hour we're not telling anybody anything they're not going to expect exactly yeah and if
06:16you went to the engineers that specialised and said that to them you go yeah that makes sense that's
06:20what you make sense for sure then SL8 bog standard SL8 now bear in mind this was the first time i rode this
06:26bike today yeah so i've done nothing to it yeah i went out it climbed at 20.6k an hour so that's 0.2 faster
06:34than the SL7 and 0.7 of a kilometer faster than the Venge wow then the fact is when the climb was
06:40flattening off i was actually going down the gears i was you needed to yeah it was remarkable and it did
06:46it actually seven seconds faster over 10 minutes and again very short climb so as soon as you start
06:52to extrapolate that out yeah over something longer you know the gains will kind of compound it was mad
06:56and it also maxed out at 69k an hour wow you know so quicker than the Venge quicker than the Venge
07:02and nearly 4k an hour faster than the SL7 now bearing in mind wow that's running that stack i can't get
07:08down so it was really really quick but it just felt fast and there's quite a lot of things i can do to
07:14make this bike faster and personalised but it was faster it was faster on the climb yeah it was faster
07:18max speed and it was faster A to B so if you actually put that into context on a 10 minute test section
07:24you go half an hour 21 seconds over half an hour faster than the SL7 based on real ghetto aero testing
07:32but it felt comfortable it felt easy to ride and i hadn't dialed it in at all there was nothing i'd done
07:38i just rode it yeah and it was bloody quick well okay okay i think that's a really important point i reckon
07:43because in the real world how many of us are really like accurately tracking i mean most people ride bikes
07:49because they enjoy riding a bike for a lot of people it's not all about the data sometimes it's about
07:54that kind of intangible feel a bike gives you so in terms of ride quality is like we were saying you
07:59are so dialed in with the SL7 you really know that bike obviously this is still new to you but
08:03that also means you're going to be able to pinpoint where things are different yeah so how does the ride
08:10feel compare from the SLA to the SL7 okay that it feels more comfortable and it feels more responsive
08:17which those two things really go hand in hand so you think comfort you go ruby comfortable bike
08:22it's comfortable you could be on it all day responsive you think i could do an hour and a
08:26half two hours on this that feels comfortable and it feels responsive and it feels fast like
08:32doing just under 70k an hour that's seriously that's pretty fast seriously great on the first
08:37time out on a bike and it was planted bear in mind cross tailwind today so you've got the wind
08:41gusting in it's running the same wheels there's something they've done with a back end and how it
08:45feels it just feels fast so actually one thing i found with my time with the SL8 is how stiff the
08:51bike felt but i'd be interested to hear from you how do you think the stiffness compares not only to
08:56the SL7 but also the Venge the Venge was always a fairly harsh ride yeah because it just there was
09:02no comfort basically in that bike no it was never about comfort it won a lot of races but it wasn't as
09:07easy to get on with you know what i mean you you felt tired after it whereas you could ride the SL7
09:13day in day out you could do long days you could do a training camp you could do 25 hours in a week
09:17and you wouldn't feel completely battered yeah i would defy anybody to do 25 hours on a Venge
09:23and not feel tired it was it just it was a ruffled ride yeah with this bike i think immediately it just
09:29feels more comfortable now i'm not going to be deluded it's got a high stack it's got wide bars that's
09:34always going to feel more comfortable but it's bloody quick that shouldn't be quick in that setup for me
09:38not 69k an hour with 35 mil of stack like that's really surprising it shouldn't be so you think i
09:43take that out and then i will play about with the position a bit it's good if we kind of come away
09:47from ride feel and we come away from the numbers in terms of aesthetics there's a lot of ethos
09:54found within this bike specifically towards the rear end what are your thoughts in terms of look
09:59i like the look i didn't like it as a frame set when i saw it initially just because of the bulbous
10:03head tube on its own i wasn't convinced and it looked very skinny at the end it looked like a
10:08almost like a tte triathlon bike at the front and a crit bike at the rear i thought it's an odd
10:13combination just let it kind of looked unbalanced but when you have it built up it looks great this
10:17one's obviously some pearlescent funky matte white which that monochrome look is really cool
10:22it is yeah i love it so built up i think it looks ace i think it looks really good and it's also
10:28gone away from the kind of aerofoil tubes there's quite a lot of round tubes going on i like it
10:32so you and i've been privy to some some of the data from specialized you know von 2 milan san
10:38remo uh what what does that mean to you to a man woman cyclist in the street not much not an awful
10:45lot and the thing is my issue with that data as well is that it is so far extrapolated from a real
10:49world race situation yeah it's kind of that just to me feels a bit like marketing yeah um but yeah for
10:54the man in the street that's going to go and buy one of these bikes what does what does he or she care
10:59about yeah and that's the thing like that's why i always like to do this ghetto testing because
11:03people are like ah the tires or the power meter or the crank length or whatever that feels fast i
11:07ride my bike a lot i've had a lot of s works i've had a lot of road bikes i think that gives you an
11:13opinion that's valid yes as opposed to saying well it'll be however many seconds faster i'm on tour
11:18it'll be x minutes faster than milan san remo none of us are going to race milan san remo not not this
11:23week i don't think it's fast it's easy to ride fast i think that's something that's really
11:27important so look at the data that you're going to get from marketing my gut feel having ridden it
11:31is the numbers we're getting from specialized marketing downplay how good it is interesting
11:37okay that would be that they've actually erred on the side of caution in my opinion because
11:42they did it with the sl7 like i remember when it came out they gave you his numbers on sl7
11:46and i did some ghetto testing and i was like nah it's faster than that and i spoke to some pretty
11:52key people when specializes i said it's actually faster than avenge you know is it i said it is
11:56on real roads as a real person yeah and the problem is is if you've got a world tour pro
12:01testing a bike or you've got a wind tunnel yeah right neither do those in the real world no and
12:06having tested it's a completely staged situation yeah and and and how a world tour rider will ride
12:11a bike with a position a pedaling technique yeah it's completely and how they hold their head and
12:17how they hold their hands it's all very different to normal cyclists even you know people like
12:20yourself for sure yeah we love a bike and we ride a bike a lot but we're not world tour level cyclists
12:25and then you go to wind tunnels and you get data one tunnel is only part of the parcel you know
12:30it doesn't take into consideration the texture of the road how fatigued you are it's it's a finite
12:35number but it's a very controlled environment so i think yeah that's why you've got to ride the bike
12:39and i think if i don't know if they're going to run demo bikes or whatever i'm sure they will
12:43because people go well why am i going to change this really good bike yeah that bike's easy to ride
12:47real fast so that's what you've got to say is these numbers are great but they're only a guideline
12:51and that's why i would say get on the bike ride it play about with tire pressures play about with
12:55tire weather and see how you get on with it obviously as we said it's kind of the speed data is one thing
13:00but it's the ride feel that's what people are going to care about and i think we've both experienced the
13:05fact that this feels markedly different to the sl7 it does it does and even today you look we're going
13:10down the dual carriageway nearly hitting 70k an hour with a side tailwind yeah i never felt
13:16uncomfortable i never felt unstable i felt completely safe battering down the dual carriageway like that
13:21no problem at all there's not many bikes you could do that on straight out of the box and it felt
13:26really really fast yeah and and it just feels intuitive as well so now it's it's cool but i'd say
13:32use the data numbers as a guideline don't use them as a benchmark because if i actually think that
13:37the numbers are going to be far better in real life than they are on a paper that's published by
13:42marketing so there we have it now obviously i think we do always have to make sure that we take a little
13:47pinch of salt when we're speaking to an ambassador but this is someone who has got a vast amount of
13:53knowledge of the sl7 and the venge and basically every s works bike let's know your thoughts though
13:58down below what do you think of the differences between the sl7 and the sl8 if you enjoyed the video
14:04then please do drop it a like subscribe to the channel for more content and i will see you again
14:07very soon