When you spend north of £3,000 on a road bike, carbon fibre frames are near-ubiquitous, so it can be difficult for a bike to stand out in this crowded market.
Enter the Cinelli Nemo Tig Disc. The Italian brand’s steel race bike is the answer to that problem.
Cinelli says the frame has been designed for riders who want the feel of a steel frame but the position of a carbon race bike.
Steel is real
The Nemo Tig Road is manufactured at Cinelli’s factory in Milan, Italy, and is constructed from triple-butted Columbus Spirit tubing. That means each tube has three different wall thicknesses to improve the ride quality and drop weight.
Columbus is Cinelli’s next door neighbour and Cinelli says the tubing is manufactured less than 50 metres from its frame-building workshop.
Cinelli has had a long association with Columbus, with former Columbus owner Antonio Colombo partnering with the brand back in 1978.
Cinelli says the Nemo Tig Road’s frame weighs 1,850g in a size 56cm. The Columbus Futura carbon fork it’s paired with is said to weigh 440g.
The Nemo Tig Disc flies in the face of many of the latest road bikes with ever-increasing tyre clearances – there’s room for 28mm rubber on this machine and that’s it. If you want to venture into gravel riding, Cinelli has the Nemo Gravel specifically for that purpose.
Cinelli paints the Nemo Tig Road in-house. The glorious metallic paint showcases the quality of the Tig-welded junctions and Cinelli’s attention to detail.
The minimally machined dropouts and the beautifully integrated seat clamp are just some of the highlights.
Cinelli says the machined, tapered 1 ⅛ to 1.5in head tube keeps the front end taut and the steering sharp.
The frameset incorporates flat mounts for the brake calipers and the hydraulic hose is routed internally to keep things neat.
The Nemo Tig Road uses a BSA-threaded bottom bracket standard. There is also the option for a press-fit BB86 at the point of purchase, although I’m not sure why you’d opt for that.
Cinelli also offers the Nemo Tig, a rim brake equivalent, which we’re sure will please many #savetherimbrake proponents out there.
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Shimano and Deda dominate the spec list
The Nemo Tig Road features a Shimano Ultegra Di2 R8100 groupset.
We really rate the Japanese brand’s second-tier electronic groupset and unless you really care about saving weight, it’s questionable why you’d opt for the pricier Shimano Dura-Ace Di2 R9200.
This build has some deviations from a full Shimano groupset though, with Cinelli speccing a Tifosi 12x HG cassette, Tektro disc brake rotors and a KMC X12 chain. You get a generous gear range, with Cinelli pairing the 50/34 crankset with an 11-34t cassette.
The rest of the build is predominantly made up of components from Deda.
The bike has Deda’s Route SL4 DB carbon wheelset. The 45mm-deep tubeless-ready rims sport a narrow 19mm internal width and are claimed to weigh 1,520g for the pair.
They’re wrapped in fast-rolling Schwalbe One Performance TLE rubber in a 28mm width.
The alloy finishing kit comes from Deda’s Zero range, the 100mm stem paired with a 42cm-wide handlebar. You could upgrade to a carbon seatpost if you want to eke out further compliance.
Rounding off the build, and in keeping with the largely Italian theme, is a Prologo Scratch Tirox saddle.
Outside of this arresting Pink Gold colourway, there are lots of colours and groupsets to choose from when ordering. Cinelli says there is around a two-month lead time after a deposit is placed to build and paint the frame to your specification.
This particular build retails for £5,799 and weighs 9.44kg in a size 58cm. Stay tuned for senior technical editor Warren Rossiter’s full review soon.
