De Rosa SK Pininfarina
The latest design and tech matched with classic speed
Pininfarina is a car design firm based in Italy with long-established customers, such as Ferrari, Alfa Romeo, Peugeot, Fiat, GM, Lancia and Maserati. In 2015, the car designers brought their expertise to a partnership with fellow Italian high-end transportation company De Rosa. The collaboration resulted in the De Rosa SK (Super King) Pininfarina, a race-ready aero bike.
The companies’ second iteration of the bike corresponded with a De Rosa rebrand, also spearheaded by Pininfarina. De Rosa, launched in 1953, kept the iconic heart logo, but moved to a sans-serif font with straighter lines rather than the previous softer and more bubbly design.
On the model-year 2020 SK Pininfarina, the company’s “vintage futurism” style black font is painted subtly on the grigio stealth colour frame. It takes a second to notice. Even before you catch the full logo, you will recognize the brand of the bike with its bright red heart that fills the “o” in “Rosa” and the slightly simplified heart outline on the head tube.
The frame is extremely sleek and glossy. Once you know it was designed by Pininfarina it’s hard not to compare the bike with a high-end car. The colour and gloss of the frame run all the way up the proprietary seatpost, which is held in place by a flush-mounted seatpost clamp. The seatpost and seat tube share a consistent aerodynamic shape, which gives the bike a coherent look and nicely balances out the flat horizontal top tube.
All the cable routing is internal and runs through the very clean integrated cockpit, which features an fsa acr system headset.
Internal cable routing does smooth out the look of the bike and saves some watts but it comes with the drawback of limited customizability of the cockpit.
Below the headset, the fork is aerodynamic. It’s designed for tires as wide as 28c, but can accommodate some 30c treads depending on the wheel and tire combination. The frame geometry is that of a standard race bike, but the sizing is somewhat uncommon: a size 50 fits more like a size 52.
Unlike the first edition of the bike, the new SK Pininfarina is disc-brake only, with flat-mount calipers and 12-mm thru axles. Disc brakes gave the designers more freedom with the size of the rear wheel cut-out, which adds to the bike’s aerodynamic properties, but doesn’t look overly dramatic.
Despite its aerodynamic design, the carbon fibre SK Pininfarina performs impressively well on climbs – likely due to its claimed 950-g medium-size frame weight and 370-g fork. Going downhill it really shines. In crosswinds, smaller riders will definitely be aware of the forces of the wind, although that is to be expected from an aero road bike.
On the flats, the De Rosa SK Pininfarina is in its element. It handles elegantly, cutting through the air smoothly on turns and accelerates with the grace of an Italian luxury car. Just like a Ferrari, this bike looks fast and feels fast, too.
“Going downhill it really shines.”