2026 Cervelo ZHT-5 GX Eagle - Five Black

Make Mountain Biking Faster

When Team Jumbo-Visma decided it was time to race XCO, they came to us for the answer. The ZHT-5 marks a new era for Cervelo and the team, as we go racing together. Our engineering expertise has already been proven in cyclocross (R5-CX) and gravel racing (Aspero), and now we've upped the ante and designed a mountain bike worthy of the Cervelo name.

ZHT-5 is a Cervelo through and through: fast, efficient, and fun to ride. The 69-degree head tube angle, modern reach, and short chainstays combine to make a bike that's stable at speed and nimble enough for pack racing. There's room to maneuver in the cockpit, whether you're darting inside on an uphill hairpin, or hanging off the back to make time on the descent.

Speed First

Our mantra is to make riders faster. And doing that means creating bikes that turn power into forward motion as efficiently as possible. Nothing does this more effectively in dirt than a hardtail. But power is nothing without control, so we focused on making a rapid cross-country race bike that still handles confidently in technical sections, feeding the desire to ride faster.

Stiff, Light & Ready To Fight

Weighing in at just 907g (size Medium), ZHT-5 is a featherweight fighter with the punchy turn of pace that only a hardtail can deliver. Decades of making frames built for the strongest sprinters in the world has fed into a super stiff mountain bike design that propels you to the front without compromising weight or ride quality.

Modern Geo For The Modern XC Rider

If you've not ridden a hardtail for a while, you'll be surprised at how the ZHT-5's 69-degree head tube angle, 457mm reach (size L), and 430mm chainstays feel progressive and refreshingly modern. If you've ridden them all your life, you'll be baffled at how we've managed to eke out yet more performance from such a clean and simple design. The ZHT-5's geometry puts you in the driving seat to carve up all the tight hairpins and features that litter the ups and downs of today's XC trails.

Not Our First Rodeo

We know from winning cyclo-cross World Champs that when the going gets gritty, threaded bottom brackets are the best way to go. ZHT-5 adopts the BSA threaded standard to meet the strength, stiffness, durability and serviceability needs of racers and race mechanics alike. It also makes it the ideal winter training companion.

Cervelo Mountain Bikes

Today's elite cyclists aren't confined to a single discipline. We see road legends racing gravel events, cyclocross champs racing road events, triathletes tackling endurance FKTs. Bike racing is addictive and the boundaries between disciplines are increasingly blurred. So when Team Jumbo-Visma told us they wanted to race Olympic Cross-Country, it came as no surprise. "How long do we have?" was our only question… and the Z-Series project began.

Our Approach

Our goal for the ZHT-5 is the same as for all our bikes: to make riders faster. So we worked fast to develop a whole new platform in time for the 2022 World Cup season. The ZHT-5 was wholly developed by Cervelo engineers, based on learnings from our road, cyclo-gross and gravel platforms in balancing tube shape, composite layups, and ride quality parameters, all with an eye on practical usability for the rider. We were ready to race within months of getting the call. Then disaster struck.

Comeback King

Team Jumbo-Visma's cross-country mountain bike racer Milan Vader suffered life-threatening injuries during a crash at the Itzulia Basque Country in April 2022. The five-time Dutch National XCO Champ had to learn to walk again. Not only did he do that, he defied medical predictions by being back on his bike and training by September the same year! Milan's incredible comeback sees him spearheading our cross-country ambitions once again. Stay tuned for Round #1 of the UCI World Cup in Nove Mesto in May 2023.

Frame Sizing

How do I determine what bike size I need?

The age-old question, isn’t it? There are many factors that go into bicycle sizing and fit, particularly for high-performance bikes. Without being able to measure you and see you on a bike, precise fit information is difficult to supply. It’s also not unusual for someone to be able to ride two different sizes depending on their goals, flexibility, and fit tolerance. That said, we have some fantastic retailers, and we’d encourage you to go start a conversation with them about what you want from your new bike.

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