2009 Cervelo R3 SL Frameset Bicycle

Upgrades from R3:

Lighter frame - We don't like to talk about weights, as many other manufacturers have made a mockery of it with outlandish claims. If weight is important to you, ignore claimed weights, have your dealer weigh the frames and see how light the R3 SL is compared to its competitors in the real world.

Squoval:

The dominant forces on the downtube and chainstays are lateral bending forces. The best way to resist those is with a lot of material far away from the center plane. Square tubes do this best, but can easily buckle. A slightly ovalized square creates the best of both worlds, which explains why Cervelo's Squoval shaped frames win stiffness and lightweight tests everywhere.

The front and rear of the toptube also use the Squoval shape to counteract lateral bending, but it transitions to oval in the center to counteract the torsional loading in that section.

Smartwall for Carbon:

Upon hearing Smartwall, most people immediately think of Cervelo's method to obtain excellent lateral stiffness in an TrueAero tube. But the Smartwall principle is universally applicable, not just on aero tubing. After the tube shapes are optimized, the lay-up allows us to further refine the character of the bike. In fact, Squoval tubes are very well suited for the Smartwall application as they have two sides that are very far removed from the central plane - i.e. adding even a small amount of extra material there increases the lateral stiffness significantly. To properly distribute the loads from the Smartwall section into the rest of the tubes, the additional plies are feathered.