Updated November 5, 2026 at 4:19 p.m.
Welcome to Dropped, a new weekly road and gravel cycling newsletter from Velo bringing you the latest ideas we’re always debating about group rides, plus a behind-the-scenes look at our coverage.
I recently published an article comparing the Specialized Tarmac SL9 and the Factor ONE. These are two of the most important road bikes of the last year(ish) and the perfect foil for each other. Both are built to go fast, but they represent completely different philosophies of modern speed. Because I’ve had the opportunity to spend a lot of time on both, I wanted to answer the questions everyone is asking. This is all very simple.
Comments tell the story
After posting this story, I started reading the comments. I generally do my best to read everything on every platform we publish on. But what I saw in the comments on this comparison was something I didn’t expect.
A lot of people think the Factor ONE is ugly. It’s planned. It looks nothing like most bikes and it strays as far from the traditional silhouette as possible for a road bike. When a design is this radical, it will naturally turn off some people.
The simple explanation is that Factor wrapped the tube shapes around the aerodynamic data and didn’t care much if the result looked weird. I could tell you that and move on, but I don’t think that’s the whole story. To see the reality, you have to look a little deeper into the feedback.
People calling him ugly was a given. What we didn’t expect is that most of these same reviewers openly admit that the Factor ONE is the faster bike. You’d see things like: “The Factor may be faster, but it’s ugly” or “The Tarmac is not an aero road bike, it’s an all-around bike.” »
Think about what that means for a second.
Is the Factor really faster?
The Specialized Tarmac SL9 is one of the fastest road bikes ever. Tour magazine tested it at 205 watts of drag in the wind tunnel at 45 km/h. It’s exceptionally fast, but it actually falls outside the top 12 bikes Tour has ever tested. The Factor ONE is indeed faster with a base score of 202 watts, and by optimizing it with different wheels, aero tires and a 1x setup, Tour was able to reduce that figure to 196.8 watts.
Objectively, it’s a victory. But you also have to think about how aerodynamic drag works. Run the tests at 45 km/h (about 28 mph) as this is the practical terrain for testing. If you go slower, you start to enter the wind tunnel’s margin of error and the results become blurry. But what about you and me? Over distances of 100 to 300 miles, my average speed tends to sit at an oddly specific 16.7 mph. On a normal day, I cruise closer to 20 mph. If I push hard on a shorter ride, anything beyond a few minutes might allow me to maintain a record of 24 mph.
At these real speeds, physics changes dramatically. Looking at the absolute best case scenario for the Factor (the fully optimized 1x setup, similar to how I use my size 54 with a SRAM XPLR drivetrain and Zipp 454/858 NSW wheels). At 24 mph, we’re looking at about a 5-watt advantage over the Tarmac. That’s still an impressive thing, although remember it took some work after he came to Factor. Move to a cruising speed of 20 mph and that gap shrinks to just 3 watts. Drop it to my long-distance average of 16.7 mph, and the aero advantage disappears completely.
So there is virtually no wattage savings at 16.7 mph, but there is a very real penalty on the scale. When I weighed both bikes ready to ride without the pedals, the Tarmac weighed a kilo less. This represents 6.5 kg for the Tarmac compared to 7.57 kg for the ONE. Is the ONE really faster?
The postman wins by default
None of this is an indictment of the very real speed that Factor wrestled with the ONE. I believe in aerodynamic efficiency and finding watts wherever I can. In fact, if I had to choose between the two bikes, I would choose the ONE (and I said so in the comparison article). I understand that on a long ride we spend the vast majority of our time on lower grades, which means the aerodynamic benefits lead to a faster overall ride. We also reap greater gains when we pick up the pace, although those benefits diminish when we slow down.
The point is simply that Specialized is technically correct in the philosophy it uses as its guiding principle. The Tarmac isn’t the fastest in the wind tunnel, but Specialized rightly points out that trading a few watts to save a full kilogram is a very valid equation. The brand also looks at racing holistically: when you work in a group, you lose many of the aerodynamic benefits that come from an aggressive frame profile anyway.
Another way to look at it is strictly as a consumer and not as a WorldTour rider. I ride alone a lot, which is why I like to focus on aerodynamic performance. But if you’re riding in a group, it’s incredibly common to just cruise and chat on the flats, only to turn the hills into a race. In this real-world scenario, you might legitimately want to optimize your climbing, since that’s the only time you’re actually competing. Or, you might just prefer the snappy feel of a lightweight bike.
All this to say: the idea that the Factor is definitely faster isn’t really true. It’s faster in some scenarios and slower in others.
What’s important, though, is that people believe it’s faster. The shape of the bike is marketing. When you look at the Factor ONE and think, “That’s ugly, but it must be fast,” that visual leap is all that matters. Perception is reality, and perception is that Factor has speed.
There is a carryover effect
And that’s where Specialized loses. The brand is the only one in the industry with its own wind tunnel, but somehow consumers look at the modern lineup and assume that innovation has stalled. Perception sells bikes, and that’s a long-term problem.
You might think you’ll never own a Factor ONE because it’s ugly, but this bike is exceptionally expensive anyway. Just like when I was talking about the Partington wheels, the ONE probably isn’t for you. It’s a halo bike, and it does exactly what a halo bike is supposed to do. Factor will eventually release another bike with a lower price and a more traditional silhouette. This is what bike manufacturers do and when that happens, consumers will already associate Factor with aerodynamic innovation and speed. They will automatically assume the new bike is fast. This is how brand perception works, and it’s exactly what Specialized is lacking.
The crazy thing is, Specialized practically invented this trend with the Venge. The Venge disappeared because the brand became so good at aerodynamics and carbon manufacturing that a dedicated aero frame became unnecessary, at least in a world where the UCI limits the weight of racing bikes to 6.8kg. But by killing him, everyone missed the marketing effect.
At the launch of the latest Diverge gravel bike, I spoke to the product manager who was also in charge of the Tarmac. I asked why there wasn’t a new Venge, and we discussed the fact that the Tarmac is now faster than the Venge ever was. That’s why he disappeared.
At the time I thought if you allowed a new Venge to be heavier you could make it faster, but I was making the same mistake as Specialized. I was looking at performance metrics. He asked me what I would need to see to justify a new Venge, and I told him a saving of 20 watts at an anonymous speed (marketing is marketing, so I allowed 20 watts at 50 mph, even though that’s not real life). His response was that they couldn’t find that 20 watts in the current UCI rules, so they didn’t build it.
In retrospect, I was wrong to put so many guardrails on a new Venge. On the one hand, ignoring the UCI rules is entirely an option. The Aethos frame is so light that most builds end up being below the UCI limit allowed for racing, so why not make a Venge outside of the pro rules as well? That’s a secondary point, though. The real takeaway is that if Specialized can make a new Venge even 1 watt faster than the Tarmac, the brand should absolutely build it. The Tarmac is an incredible engineering achievement, but it doesn’t look like it and people don’t see it for what it is. A Venge is necessary so the marketing team has a halo bike to carry the visual weight of innovation, even if the Tarmac remains the better bike for more people and/or a better racing bike.
What do you think?
I find it fascinating to examine the psychology of marketing. I consider myself an aerospace nerd, but I also think there is a lot of marketing in aerodynamic claims. The numbers are never wrong, but the truth you think you heard isn’t always the truth you actually heard.
Now I want to hear from you. As I said earlier, I read every comment. Let me know if you think I’m right or if I’m off my rock. Does Specialized need a Venge, even if it’s mostly just for marketing?
Gn tech
