It’ pronounced—“Sir Vay Low”, isn’t it? This is spanish. So, I’m guessing, it’s pronounced like beer is, in Spanish: Cervesa, with the “C” pronounced like the English “S.”
Not Cur Vay Low. A few guys in a bike shop were talking about Cur Vay Low bikes a few days ago.
I could be wrong here. Know it doesn’t make any difference but thought I’d ask.
I can guarantee it’s pronounced like this:
Cer Ve Lo
Merry Christmas 
.
I’ve always thought it was Sir Vell Oh.
sehr-VEY-low
.
I’ve always pronounced it “Sir-Veh-Low”. Someone noted to me that the e is accented and that it’s technically pronounced “Sir-Vay-Low”. I can’t get myself to do it though. My “bad habit” is too hard to break. 
Hmmm, I say “sir-VEH-low” but I hear people say sir-VAH-low" also.
I think the guys and girls at Cervelo say “sir-VEH-low”.
I also pronounce it: “Great bike”.
Just go with “sir” and then the “velo” from “VeloNews”. That’s how you pronounce it in English. Why? Because we say so, never mind the accent aigu on the e. English doesn’t have the accent aigu, so why pay attention to it. If you’re talking about Cervelo in French on the other hand, you’d better honor the accent.
If Bobke can say “Tour DAY Fraance”, you can Say “Sir-Veh-Low”. Except that in this case, I think “Sir-Veh-Low” is the proper pronunciation.
I am just finishing up Bobke II. Interesting. Funny. Worth reading. I never realized that Bob Roll was insane. I thought he was just weird. Funny thing: In his book, even he says that it is just Le Tour. So I think he says “Tour DAY Fraance” just to annoy the French.
“Just go with “sir” and then the “velo” from “VeloNews”.”
That being the case (and risking asking a stupid question), how do you pronounce “velo” from “VeloNews”. Is it VEE-LOW or VEH-LOW?
Since this is coming from gerard, I’m taking it as the “official” pronounciation.
One of the girls in our Sunday group keeps commenting on how fast and nice looking my Chur-velo looks and where did I get it. I think she is Italian.
“Is it VEE-LOW or VEH-LOW?”
For me it’s vello as rhyming with jello.
It must depend upon where you are from and what kind of an accent you have. The English language is quite variable, wide spread and spoken in many accents. Think of someone from the deep US south with a slooooow draaawwwl speaking to a cockney Londoner.
As cerveloguy says, “vello” like “jello”.
you are right…there is an accent “aigu” (going up) on the second e of cervelo, so it is pronounced like the second e of cervesa.
if you say ser vay lo, it would be an accent grave (going down)…
It kills me when people claim to know the pronounciation of a non-existent word with an (in English) non-existent accent. Almost as funny as when people start writing out the spelling like “ser-veh-loh” and you start wondering how to pronounce “veh”.
Anyway, you can pronounce it however you want, you can hear how we pronounce it in this video clip: http://www.exn.ca/video/?video=exn20031010-cervelo.asx
(don’t find how the reporter mixes up features from the R2.5, the Soloist and the P3, he pronounces our name correctly and that’s all that matters
Fun and interesting audio clip – thanks for posting it, Gerard. (BTW: “Jair-are-d”, not “Zhay-rah-d?”).
PS: there’s some other informative stuff in there from Phil W and G.V. as well.
For example, proper pronunciation of “about” is not really “ah-bow (as in bow-wow) t” … it’s more like “ah-bah-oot”. Ditto for “outside” and “out there” – try a very quickly compressed “ah-woot”.
Bottom line: great bikes.
Actually, a combination of the Italian “cervello” and the French “velo”. Of course cerveau and cervello are the same thing, but the cervello is where the pronounciation of the “vello” like “jello” comes from, so that’s why it’s relevant. Between the French telling us we mispronounce it and the Italians claiming we misspell the debate will probably never end (all publicity is good publicity, right :-).
And yes, it is actually Zjay-rar, as my name used to have an accent aigu. Haven’t used it since I came to North America and people started butchering the name (in Montreal of all places, to add insult to injury). Now I only hear my name pronounced correctly when I visit the Alliance Franciase here in TO.
Well, this is getting even further off topic but yes, I am dutch and no, the dutch version of Gerard doesn’t have an accent aigu. But there were already too many “ordinary” Gerards in teh family by the time I came around so my parents francofied it to set me apart. Apparently my name was the only way they could distinguish me from my nephews, quite the slap in the face now that I think of it
A slow and joyous weekend in the world when we get 20 + posts on how to say Cervelo. Happy Holidays. Saw a whale and calf o my Christmas ride. Aloha G
In french, you would pronounce it : sair (like the end of swissair) - vélo (as you said in your post).
Here in the south, it would be sir-vay-ul-oh. (We can add at least one syllable to anything.) The alternate pronunciation is “that funny-lookin’ bahk we runned inna ditch”.