Pro Bike: Jakob Fuglsang’s custom painted Argon 18 Gallium Pro for Tour de Suisse

Last year Jakob Fuglsang won the Dauphine, but this year the Danish rider has chosen to race the Tour de Suisse in preparation for the Tour de France instead. And he’s taking part aboard a brand new custom painted Argon 18 race bike.

- 2018 WorldTour race bikes - The complete list of this year's race bikes

The Astana team, sponsored by Canadian bike brand Argon 18, has a penchant for custom painted bikes. Last year there was Fabio Aru’s beautiful red bike, and earlier this year Miguel Ángel López presented with a custom “superman” bike to honour his nickname.

And now Jakob Fuglsang's Gallium Pro has been given the custom treatment. The team and bike company have developed a “TriColor” scheme that is a reflection of his past, present and future racing career with a unique design that appears to give the impression of three bikes.

“This design was created to appear different from various views — front, the left-side and the right-side. Each angle showcases a dynamic of Fuglsang’s racing, interwoven together to a complimentary overall design,” explains the company.

“From the front, the bike appears a complete static red, making it easy to spot the powerful Dane in the peloton. In terms of details, a special superhero Ironman Fuglsang emblem decorates the top tube. Outside of the superhero genre, the emblems embody more than explosions and effects, it represents his resilient attitude and his will to push the limit.”

Argon 18 is ramping up its custom paint offerings, through what it calls the ParticuleR program, though it’s not clear if this is being offered to customers at the moment.

“This project reflects our concept behind our ParticuleR program, we break away from the norms with challenging production processes. This design with several gradients was particularly labour intensive, with production steps multiplied by three. We were able to accomplish this custom paint scheme with the active participation of Colourburn Studio.” said Alexandre Saint-Jalm, an art director who worked alongside the Astana Pro Team management to elaborate the unique design of Fuglsang’s ParticuleR Gallium Pro

As you’d expect, Fulsang appears happy with his new bike.  “I am impressed with my new bike,” he commented. “That’s so cool to get a personalized bike, special created for me. Nice feeling. I have a huge motivation ahead of the Tour de France, but this TriColor bike motivates me even more.

“Now we are here at the Tour de Suisse and I am delighted to try my new bike in this race. The Tour de Suisse is an important step towards the Tour de France and I will try to get a good result here. Happy to have this new Argon 18 Gallium Pro next to me, together we could reach something really nice.”

Away from the special paint job, it’s business as normal for all the equipment. So that means Shimano Dura-Ace Di2 groupset customised with an FSA K-Force chainset, including Power2Max power meter, and Rotor oversize pulley wheels. Wheels are the lesser-spotted Corima carbon tubular wheels with tubular tyres from a German company called Wolfpack.

What do you think of it?