Lance Armstrong is back on his bike, and will be campaigning with the Astana team at select races next year. Ok, not exactly breaking news,and it’s clear that Lance never really hung up his shoes for good – judging by our sources he’s still as strong as the day he won his seventh Tour de France.

Anyhoo, we’ve just been sent some photos of Lance’s steed that he’s been out on and putting in the miles recently. The bike in question is a Trek (obviously) Madone 6.9 Pro, a bike that Trek gifted to the Texan last year. This one is unique, painted as it is with a custom Livestrong livery of black and yellow.

It’s been kitted out with a full SRAM RED groupset – SRAM’s sponsorship of Astana meaning a switch from his long-time allegiance to Shimano’s DuraAce, but Lance appears to be getting used to RED and its DoubleTap shifters. At the heart of the bike is a prototype wireless SRM Powermeter Pro with a new SRM PC VI system, which Lance will be using to determine whether he has the fitness to add another Tour de France to his list of race wins.

The rest of the build sees more or less standard equipment from Bontrager: inForm saddle, carbon stem and handlebars and Bonty wheels too. Interestingly Lance is running a 53/39 chainring setup with 175mm arms and an 11-25 RED Powerdome cassette.

All that, and a Mellow Johnny’s head tube badge and engraved stem cap complete the bike Lance is using for training at the moment. Expect to see a lot of new developments being tested over the following months, in particular wheels with Bontrager and HED reportedly working on some super-fast deep-section hoops.

Thanks to www.theroaddiaries.com for the pics.