How I built this 2022 Cannondale CAAD13 for $400

I’ve been obsessing over this one KOM on my usual road ride for a year. I kept climbing up the leaderboard but the top spot was eluding me. Even though my fitness and training had improved I was still 20 seconds off the KOM. So, I naturally turned to the weight weenie sages across the internet when it came to building up a Cannondale CAAD13.

Before the CAAD 13 there was the All City Mr. Pink

My current steel framed all-road bike was weighing in around 25lbs. Even at a size 61cm frame, that’s a bit heavy by hill climb standards.

I swapped out my 32mm gravel king tires and butyl tubes for 28mm continental gp5000s and latex tubes.

I removed all water bottle mounts and mounting hardware for racks.

I stopped carrying a saddle bag.

Finally, I broke down and bought new Campagnolo Zonda wheels

$500 later and I was only down to 22lbs. However, this appeared to be enough to get me the KOM by 2 seconds. Not bad. But it was too late. I was hooked. I wanted more KOMs, I wanted a lighter, faster bike. I wanted a race bike.

Fantasy vs Reality

So I started shopping. And any weight weenie worth their carbon fiber should have a spreadsheet. Here’s mine:

Manufacturer	Model	Trim	Price	Weight	Groupset	Frame Material	Fork Material
Cannondale	Synapse	Carbon 4	2425.00	9.5kg / 20.9lbs	Tiagra 10 speed	Carbon	Carbon
Cannondale	Caad13	105 disc	2325.00	9kg / 19.9lbs	105 11 speed	Aluminum	Carbon
Specialized	Tarmac	SL6	2700.00	8.55kg / 18.86lbs	Tiagra 10 speed	Carbon	Carbon
Specialized	Allez	Sprint Comp	3000.00	8.8kg / 18.86lbs	105 11 speed	Aluminum	Carbon
Trek	Emonda	ALR 5	2299.99	9.04kg / 19.92lbs	105 11 speed	Aluminum	Carbon
Trek	Domane	ALR 5	2029.99	10.05kg / 22.16lbs	105 11 speed	Aluminum	Carbon
Canyon	Endurace	8 Disc	1999.99	9.22kg / 20.32lbs	105 11 speed	Aluminum	Carbon
Polygon	Stratos	S8 Disc	2599.99	8.7kg / 19.2lbs	Ultegra 11 speed	Carbon	Carbon
Polygon	Stratos	S7 Disc	2099.99	8.89kg / 19.6lbs	105 11 speed	Carbon	Carbon
Canyon	Inflite	CF SL6	2199.99	8.89kg / 19.59lbs	GRX 1X11 speed	Carbon	Carbon
Orbea	Avant	H30d	2499.99	9.6kg / 21.16lbs	105 11 speed	Aluminum	Carbon
BMC	Team Machine	ALR Two	2299.99	9.16kg / 20.19lbs	105 11 speed	Aluminum	Carbon
Ridley	Fenix	SL Disc 105	2599.99	8.21kg / 18.11lbs	105 11 speed	Carbon	Carbon

Off the bat, I knew the pursuit of speed and performance was going to be an expensive endeavor. In theory my search was simple, lightest bike for the price. In practice this proved to be hard for my wallet to come to terms with.

For bikes like the Trek Domane, I could spend 2029.99 and still have a 22.16lb bike. Not great. I could also spend $2700 on a Specialized Tarmac SL6. This gets you an 18.86lb bike but only with Tiagra 10 speed groupset. For comparison the Canyon Ultimate CF SL Disc costs you $3499.99 and you would have to wait at least until November for it to arrive. Not a great time of year to receive a brand new lightweight road racer. It appears that my criteria of lightweight and inexpensive were at odds.

Why are all these aluminum-framed, carbon-forked bikes so heavy? The wheels. Most of these bikes come with heavy entry level wheels wrapped in heavy, thick-cased tires. We are probably talking 5-6lbs of tire and wheel. Compared to the Zonda wheels and continental tires I just bought at 4.4lbs.

---

The secret ingredient

Being a newly indoctrinated weight weenie, I was obsessed with the custom bikes built for the British Hill Climb races. For those who don’t know, these races have no weight minimums and a lot less required components. Below are a few examples of these bikes.

Notice what they all have in common? Rim brakes. It took me a while to come to terms with this but what pushed me over the edge was a spreadsheet. This spreadsheet:

Component	Name	Weight (grams)	Price
Frame/Fork	Cannondale CAAD 13 Rim	1440	1009.99
Wheels	Campagnola Zonda	1540	Already own
Front Derailleur	Shimano 105 Braze On	109	55.00
Brakes	Shimano 105 Direct Mount Rim	348	115.98
Crankset	Shimano 105 34-50 Compact	752	Already own
Rear Derailleur	Shimano 105 Medium Cage	220	61.99
Cassette	Shimano 105 11-32	364	56.99
Bars	Salsa Cowchipper	322	Already own
Shifters	Shimano 105 2×11 speed	474	Already own
Bottom Bracket	Included in frame	130	Included in frame
Ties/Tubes	Continental gp5000, latex tubes	600	Already own
Seatpost	included in frame		Included in frame
Cables	Shimano	200	Already own
Stem	MSW 100mm	127	Already own
Saddle	Fizik Argo Tempo r5	241	Already own
Headset	included in frame	95	Included in frame
Chain	Shimano 11 speed	296	Already own
Total		7.258 kg / 16lbs	1299.95

I built out this hypothetical bike and scoured the internet for the most official weights of all the components and what I found was crazy, for just $1299.95 I could build a 16lb road bike.

I went to mikesbikes.com and bought a CAAD13 frame and I sourced the rest of the parts on competitive cyclist and universal cycles.

Here is the build video for my CAAD 13:

After building up the bike, and weighing each part to see how it compared to its manufacturers claimed weight, my CAAD 13 weighed in at 17.4 lbs. Why the difference? The weight I had found for the caad13 frame did not include the fork or the seat post. Yes, this was a bit of a bummer but all things considered that is still one light bike. A light bike that didn’t cost me $3500+. Do I regret not having disc brakes? Not really. Direct mount rim brakes perform really well on aluminum rims. I also live in California where it never really rains, so I’m not riding in conditions where disc brakes excel significantly over rim brakes.

Fuzzy math time

Now you might be wondering, how is it that I already owned all of these parts? The answer was simple. They were all sitting on my current bike. You might now be wondering, what good will a leftover frame and a few parts dangling from it be once I’ve stripped all the components off for this new bike? Well, if we look closer at the parts I’m taking there is still a lot of bike left.

I transferred over wheels, tires, tubes, crankset, bars, shifters, and a saddle. But if you recall I had just upgraded those wheels and tires so I could revert the old bike back to it’s previous, albeit heavier, set. It just so happens that I had an FSA crankset laying around that would work perfectly with this BB30 frame. So all I had to source was a set of shifters, bars, tape and a saddle. I bought a set of FSA adventure bars for $40, WTB volt seat for $30 and some generic bar tape for $12. That just leaves the shifters. I had recently watched Trace Velo’s review of his Sensah Team Pro shifters and found them on AliExpress for $88 including shipping. That’s a grand total of $170 to complete that bike. The best part? I just sold that bike for $950. After factoring in original cost of all the parts on the old bike with new parts purchased its total value was $1350. That means that I got a 17.4 lb bike for $400.

(Well kind of, just don’t think about all the money I spent on the previous bike. That money was spent long ago and everyone has stopped asking me about it by now.)

Now lets hope that translates to a few more KOMs.

---

CAAD 13 Components

---

Did you build a CAAD13? Tell me about it in the comments.