Not something you see everyday...

Top-notch Canadian bike boffins Cervelo - who like to point out that the company's name means "brain bike" for the benefit of all us scumbags who went to schools that don't teach Foreignish - have long had a reputation for introducing revolutionary new concepts to the professional cycling world. The best-known example to date would the anti-gravity drive fitted to the 2011 S3, which riders have to be careful to lock to a solid and immovable object not to prevent it being stolen but to stop it floating away; an innovation unsurprisingly deemed illegal for competition use by the UCI.

They've been a bit quiet of late, however, leading some sections of the cycling press to forget all about them and concentrate on writing articles about how Bertie Contador should probably take a leaf out of Hippy Dave Zabriskie's book and adopt the vegan diet. But Spyclopunk, Cyclopunk's crack investigative journalism division, doesn't give up so easily; having secret channels and means of finding out what's going on in the secret research and development departments of the bike manufacturers - including access to covert military satellites capable of taking control of computers on Earth, entering "funny bike pictures" into Google and making up a story based on the results.

Cervelo S3, seen yesterday and drooled over in the bike shop

That's how we are once again able to bring you breaking news, revealing Cervelo's latest project - a new bike fitted with state-of-the-art "stealth" technology, with which they believe the Garmin-Cervelo team will be able to win the 2012 Tour de France.

"Well, it's a pretty simple idea really," said Cervelo engineer Bob Norris, who wishes to remain anonymous. "Basically, the idea is we build an invisible bike and then the guys on the team can whip past the other riders without them knowing about it. That way, the other teams will think our guys are back in the grupetto or have been kidnapped by a UFO or something and not give chase. It's genius. Mwa ha ha ha!"

Spyclopunk, who has a deserved reputation for asking hard-hitting questions, pointed out that the other teams might consider it a little odd and raise suspicions when they noticed Garmin riders passing them, apparently levitating in the racing crouch.

Cervelo's amazing new stealth bike, photographed by Spyclopunk

"Oh, but we've thought of that - that's why we're called Cervelo, see, 'cos we're clever," Norris explains. "We've also got these amazing invisible jerseys and shorts - you want to see them, they're like something out of Harry Potter, only you can't of course because they're invisible. We haven't been able to make the riders themselves invisible yet, but the plan is to sack the current team and sign up Andy Schleck, Brad Wiggins and a few of those other dudes who have to run around in the shower to get wet - those guys are so skinny you can hardly see them from the side."