It has been ridden to countless great victories by the Columbia HTC and then GreenEdge Cycling professional teams, and today it is in the Team DSM fleet and of course it doesn't look much like the model of a decade and a half ago. In one respect, though, it is still one of the lightest bikes in the field.
The Scott Addict was derived from the CR1, which also had a frame that weighed an impressive 880 grams, but after the teams wanted something even lighter and the CR1 had been running for four years, a new top-of-the-range model was born in 2007 called the Addict , which weighed 790 grams in its lightest version (without fork and other fittings, but with an integrated seat tube). Thanks to IMP technology, the front tube, top tube and down tube were a single unit (no fasteners, no glue, nothing), which was a milestone in carbon frame construction and helped Scott launch the lightest bike in the world.
The Addict's amazing winning streak began two years later when the Columbia-HTC team with Mark Cavendish and others won 87 professional victories in 2009. Mark Cavendish and the sprinters proved that a very light frame can be very strong.
The next major development was in 2014 when Scott decided to go for a new carbon fabric, the HMX-SL. The frame had new joints and thanks to the stronger fabric, one less layer of carbon was used, bringing the weight of the frame set (fork and mounts included) down to under 1 kg. The integrated seat tube disappeared, but the cable routing was now done inside the frame. This was the Scott Addict SL.
In 2016 came the disc-brake version , which obviously required a completely new chassis design, with a new fork and rear triangle. The brake bridge was removed from the forks, and full carbon shoes were used. The result was a frame weighing 830 grams, which was only 60 grams heavier than the rim-rim version. The complete frame set with fork weighed 1175 grams.
Four years later came the Scott Addict RC Ultimate, which is now a fully hollow structure with no "solid" parts in the frame, including the flip-flops. There are now only four joints left on the frame where the chain and forks join, meaning the entire frame is made up of three one-piece assemblies. The complete frame set with fully integrated cabling weighs 160 grams less than the previous version.
In 16 years, the weight and stiffness of the top-of-the-range Scott Addict has remained broadly similar. However, the geometry has changed slightly to accommodate 28-inch tires, disc brakes and aerodynamic tube shapes.
Scott Addict history in pictures:
2007: The Scott Addict is born - weighing in at 790 grams, it is the world's lightest mass-produced frame.
2009: a certain Mark Cavendish (HTC-Columbia) wins a Sanremo, 3 stages in the Giro and 6 in the Tour.
2010: Cavendish wins 5 stages in the Tour.
2014: the new Addict SL is the world's lightest large-scale production frameset at under 1 kg (995 grams in size 54).
2016: the disc-braked version, the Scott Addict Premium Disc, is available
2016: special painting for the athletes of the Rio Olympics
2017: Simon Yates (GreenEdge Cycling) takes the Tour de France white jersey in his Scott Addict SL saddle
2019: Scott Addict RC Premium Disc records 17 professional wins that year
2020: a complete model refresh: the new Scott Addict RC Ultimate is designed with a fully hollow structure frame, aero shapes and fully integrated cabling.
2023: The Scott Addict RC Pro comes in the same livery as Team DSM's pro riders' bikes.
Source: cyclist.co.uk
