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Shär’s seatmast is also custom with extra overlap and a whopping 14cm setback.

His stem is an incredible 16 centimeters long; it’s a custom alloy version of Bontrager’s older Race X Lite model. He actually started the season with a 17cm, but halfway through the team’s training camp in Albuquerque, New Mexico he decided it was too long. Trek had the 16cm stem to him in less than 20 hours.

He is one of the professionals using SRAM’s Rival alloy cranks for fit. As with his frame, he uses the largest the manufacturer makes — 180mm.

Swiss rider Michael Shär is one of the riders that carried over from the previous Astana team. He’s 196cm tall and rides a 62cm Madone, the largest sized carbon bike the manufacturer offers.

Shär's bike towers over the other team bikes.

Wassmann estimated that the Red non-drive arm drops 30-grams from the stock configuration of the power meter.

If you look through the frame to the non-drive crank arm you’ll notice it’s not the standard non-drive arm that accompanying SRAM’s power meter, it’s actually a Red crankarm.

Leipheimer’s bike weighs just 7.1 kilos, with a SRAM SRM Pro and Bontrager Aeolus 5.0 wheels. With his Race XXX Lite climbing wheels the bike is at the UCI weight limit.

Leipheimer’s Red rear derailleur was missing as well. If you look closely you’ll notice that the Force derailleur is fitted with Red’s ceramic pulleys. SRAM’s team liaison, Alex Wassmann said that a ‘compatibility issue’ has come to the company’s attention. SRAM product managers aren’t 100-percent sure what the problem stems from and instead of jeopardizing the athletes chances, they made the decision to switch everyone to Force. Team Type 1 and Bissell have also switched.

According to the mechanics a year is the ideal time for proper tire aging, but the team is using an abbreviated period for the new Bonty tires at five to six months to more quickly comply with its sponsorship obligations.

Later in the year Astana will switch from Hutchinson to Bontrager tires. The Bontrager tires are currently resting in storage as part of the team’s tire aging process. The mechanics believe that tires that are not properly aged are more susceptible to flats because the rubber is stickier and not fully cured after manufacture. The team is racing Tour of Georgia on Hutchinson tires, all of which have been aging since 2005.

Trek’s tapered down tube terminates at a proprietary 90mm wide bottom bracket shell.

Astana uses a simple piece of twisted aluminum to hold the race number.

Trek’s new Madone has an integrated cap-style mast that doesn’t require cutting for fit.

Astana has a custom anodized version of Cane Creek’s new 110 IS headset. Trek’s fork utilizes a tapered steerer with a 1.125-inch top and 1.5 inch lower bearing. Leipheimer’s Race X Lite alloy stem measures 11cm.

Astana’s Levi Leipheimer is looking to continue his domination of the biggest American races and is the favorite in Georgia. He is riding the Madone 6.5, a step down from the top of the line. The frame is painted to commemorate his national championship title.

All of the team bikes were missing Red rear derailleurs. Instead the bikes were equipped with SRAM’s Force rear mechs. The Force derailleurs were, however, equipped with Red pulleys. The team mechanics would not say why the change was made before the race.

Astana’s bikes were all lined up before Stage 2 at the 2008 Tour of Georgia start in Savannah. The team had some interesting equipment specs at this year’s race.

A view out the back of the Bissell team car as Greg henderson, Dominique Rollin and BMC's Darren Lill draft through the caravan at mile 26 after race leader Ivan Dominguez called a group natural break.

Dear Readers,

Welcome to the latest edition of The Prologue, the weekly summary of news from the world of competitive cycling by your friends at VeloNews.com.

The spring racing season continued to gain momentum this past week, with Sunday's Holland's Amstel Gold Race kicking off the Ardennes Classics in Europe and the Tour de Georgia here in the U.S.

Since 2005 the U.S. Women's Cycling Development Program has been working hard to support the growth and success of women's competitive cycling in the United States. Their goal is to provide all levels of support, leadership, establishing partnerships and collaboration to strengthen the professionalism and competition amongst the entire women’s field. Recently the USWCDP decided to begin a partnership with JETCycling and its founder Jet Tanner in order to begin this growth process at the junior level of racing to the experienced level of Professional Cycling.

Pedro's biodegradable Green Fizz cleans the bikes and creates no oil slick on the pond behind.

Colorful base maps on the Garmin Edge 705’s big screen and share-ability between units offer easy route finding.

Calfee's tandem is torsionally stiff and smooth riding. Bamboo frames now account for 25 percent of Calfee’s total production, and 33 percent of the company’s road frame production.

The Reba 29 with Maxle Lite 20mm through axle QR offers more travel, less weight, and more stiffness.

Top-loading pads make pad change easy in the Elixir R. The G3 rotor saves 10g, and the entire brake is 20g lighter than a Juicy 7.

The tapered bore and integrated reservoir surrounding the piston (which is white, surrounded by a black O-ring, just behind the spring) are visible in this clear model of the Elixir master cylinder. The inside of the black, bell-shaped rubber bladder visible behind the piston is open to the air to equalize pressure inside the reservoir.

The Elixir R has an elegant shape, nice lever feel and movable pivot location.