After creating one of the best-known mountain bike brands in the world (Niner), Highlands Ranch’s Steve Domahidy decided to try a new path—a paved one. This month, the renowned bike builder debuts the first Domahidy Designs road bike: the Carbon Road, the official ride of Denver’s Groove Subaru Excel Sports Cycling Team.

The bike is actually the third release from Domahidy Designs, which the Littleton native started in 2014 after stepping back from the day-to-day operations of Niner. In February 2014, Domahidy revealed a pair of hard-tail cross-country mountain bikes, but even as those two-wheelers rolled out of his shop, he was deep in the development stages for a carbon-fiber road bike. “I took what I’ve learned throughout my 15-year career working with carbon to make a traditional and legal race bike,” he says. “It had to accelerate like a bat out of hell but also be comfortable to ride.”

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When Groove Subaru team sponsor—and avid cyclist—Alex Gillett confided that he was breaking every bike he rode, Domahidy knew he’d found his perfect test subject. Less than a month into the trial—with nearly 1,000 miles under his tires—Gillett was sold on the featherweight ride (the frame weighs just more than two pounds). “Calling the bike I was riding a prototype is misleading,” Gillett says. “It corners, descends, and sprints beautifully.” He signed up his entire team. So this season, Domahidy will build, then maintain, a fleet of 30 red, white, and blue Carbon Roads for Subaru Groove’s many races.

But you don’t need a VO2 max of 60 to pedal this sucker. This spring, Domahidy Designs will offer consumer versions of the Carbon Road for $1,699 (for the frame and fork; yes, you buy the rest of the components separately). Only the pros get the patriotic paint job. Your options are gloss black carbon with a sky blue and red stripe design or a sleek, motorcycle-inspired matte black carbon, neon yellow, and gray combo that’s perfect for the leader of the pack—which, on this puppy, is precisely where you should plan to be.