Direction of gravel bikes

Equipment
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Too long front centre geo, apparently?

Today, Santa Cruz Bicycles is under the PON conglomerate of brands alongside Cervelo, Cannondale, Focus, and GT. I mention this as, due to its long front-centre geometry, the Stigmata is a non-UCI-approved gravel bike that clearly slants toward the off-road end of gravel cycling. Meanwhile, a bike like the newly updated Cervelo Aspero is one that offers a more road-like aesthetic, features, and geometry. In theory, a bike like the Cervelo Aspero is what I’d suggest to those looking to pin on a number, but this latest Stigmata has quite the race palmares (2023 elite men’s Unbound winner, to name one) thanks to Keegan Swenson – so that’s not so clear cut, either.

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445

Ugh, one more reason why I hope the UCI does not lay its regulatory fingers on gravel races.

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446

I thought Keegan ran the Stig at Worlds last year… could be mistaken.

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447

Thread needs merging with Best Gravel Race Bike 2024 thread.

This old video popped up on my feed, reminded me that some companies nailed big tyres way back. v1.0 Fairlight Secan cleared 650x57mm in 2019 and think it’s more now. Similar geo to a 2025 Crux too and more grav bike than most people could ever need (except those who live in that niche within a niche).

Have just ordered some 2.1 Mezcals for my Faran, could have gone bigger but means there is still room for mud guards should I fancy it :smiling_face_with_three_hearts: (more mud than grav here in Winter).

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448

He did. Tobin too.

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449

This well highlights the challenges any company faces when they push things to a level beyond what their customers want / expect.

Even if we all now agree that MTB tires are indeed the fastest choice (which we clearly all don’t), in 2019, this bike was WAY too far ahead of what people wanted / expected form a gravel bike. even a 40mm tire was considered “big” then, so jumping all the way up to a MTB likely immediately pigeon-holed this bike as a “adventure / rowdy / bikepacking” option and not a “race” bike.

Quantum leaps in the product cycle can happen, and when they do, they shift the entire paradigm…but it is really difficult to pull off.

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450

Mtb tires tend to stretch more too. My most recent 2.2s grew 2-3mm

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451

I think they don’t enforce that geo restriction for gravel. I’m fairly certain Keegan used it for worlds last year

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452

From memory, he also used a frame 2-sizes smaller than the SC sizing guidelines for his height. My speculation was primarily for better bar drop (lower frame Stack), but I also wondered if the shorter Front Center & Wheelbase might be to his liking. Either way, that smaller sizing might sidestep the geo limits, but I have not dug into the specifics there.

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453

The Fairlight wasn’t/isn’t considered a race bike because it’s steel, and from the UK with limited representation in the USA. It’s also not advertised as such, which is probably the determining factor between “race” and everything else.

40mm wasn’t considered big in 2019, it was the modal size and had been for years. The target spec for gravel bikes going back to the first models in the late 2000s was 40mm clearance - for the limited handful of tires available during those times.

650b MTB tire clearance has been relatively common going back almost a decade - the Open U.P. released in 2015 with clearance for 27.5x2.25, Diamondback had their Haanjo EXP, Raleigh Stuntman, and others with similar clearance. It took larger brands, and more product conscious public catered to by influencers to bring the bigger clearance bikes into focus.

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The issue as always, is that (road - even Gravel Road) racing takes place on 700c wheels. 650b has been reaching for the larger gravel market for almost 20 years and has yet to get a real foothold. People, either because they are fooled by marketing, or for many other reasons, seem to prefer more limited tire sizes paired to 700c wheels than deal with 650b.

Back to historical tire sizes - it’s interesting that the first Unbound (DK200) in 2006 was won on 42mm tires and then over the next few years the tires got slightly smaller until 2013/14 where the race was won on 33s. Since then, the tires have been 38-42mm until this year with Lachlan Morton’s winning bike sporting 2.1/44.

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454

You seem to have missed my point.

That is just revisionist history. The norm back in 2019 was 36-38 and using anything larger involved the inevitable “big tires are slower” discussion. Rider boards were FULL of “how much slower will a 40mm tire be vs. a 36 / 38 for Unbound (then DK)”.

Thank you for illustrating my point re: offering products that consumers don’t want, even if they are “better”.

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No buzzwords necessary. What was the norm for you, wasn’t the norm at large. 40mm hasn’t been considered “big” for gravel by most riders since probably the early 2010s. You’ve got to shift your window, as well as expand it. 2019 is only 5 years ago, not 10 years ago. GRX was released in 2019, for instance. Worth remembering that Unbound is and was not the only gravel event. It was relatively small until 2014/2015. The first Ultra Cross (now gravel) event in Georgia exceeded Unbound attendance from 2009-2014, for instance.

Most of the “rider boards” I was posting on in 2019 were trying to pack the biggest tires into a given frame, lamenting the lack of options in the 47mm+ range and discussing how to fit narrower 29" MTB tires into gravel and cx frames.

It’s helpful to remember that there has long been a population of “indigenous” gravel riders/racers that are ahead of the general population and are actually setting the pace. Riders coming to gravel later may have had one idea of tires but it’s clear that this was not the mainstream view in the time period under discussion. Beginner questions/sentiment does not equal the zeitgeist.

Otherwise, there have probably only been a small handful of 36mm tires, given that’s it’s not an ISO size. ISO sizes were spaced at 32-35-40-44, for a long time almost all tires that were advertised as 700cx38 were actually 40-622 ISO since there was no “38mm” spec. 37mm was added to help differentiate what the manufacturers wanted to offer and how the sizes were being impacted by rim width but these tires weren’t in the market until after 2019/2020.

Let’s clarify.

There is no one gravel bike consumer, just as there is no one exemplar gravel bike. The Fairlight Secan & Faran have both been extremely popular since release. For a big chunk of gravel cyclists there were exactly what they wanted. I do not believe, that in 2019, this bike was ahead of what people wanted/expected from a gravel bike. Back in 2015, the Open U.P. took off and it has even more advanced features and had a higher price tag.

Big 650b tire clearance, especially because it usually comes paired with more mild 700c clearance, isn’t pushing the envelope. The Secan fits 650bx60 and 700cx50, that’s not stunning tire clearance, and wouldn’t have been in 2019 either.

We have examples of what is actually too far ahead - the Chamois Hagar, the Niner MCR, the Lauf Grit, arguably the Canyon Grizl. The Lauf is an especially interesting one, when was that fork introduced? 8 years ago? And it took until this year to become an overnight success?

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456

Let’s not. My points are very clear.

Citing 650b wheel clearance as evidence of consumer desire for wider tires is a strawman argument since 650b wheel never gained any significant consumer traction. Moreover, bikes utilizing those wheels were seen as being purposed for “rowdy” and “aggressive” riding, not general gravel use.

Those are just facts.

457

Unfortunately, that does clarify your earlier post.

650b wheel never gained any significant consumer traction

There are more than 200 650b road and gravel tires available, today (this excludes MTB tires). The majority 47mm or larger. I think 650b is a popular niche with recreational cyclists, but significantly less popular with gravel racing cyclists.

Evidence of consumer desire for wider tires for gravel riding is all over the internet. WTB created an entire campaign around 650b for general use in 2016. It created quite a trend for a few years but fizzled out around the COVID boom. Most of the marketing can still be found, this was the industry following the wants of the consumer and smaller niche personalities (Jan Heine, Grant Petersen, etc).

Marketing was around mixed terrain, road riding - not heavily towards rowdy or aggressive MTB-lite style that we see more recently from other manufacturers.

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Well that is because it wasn’t meant to clarify it, as the previous post was very clear.

Exactly my point.

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Niche doesn’t mean small.

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That is exactly what it means in this context…

A specialized market
A niche can also refer to a small, specialized market for a business. For example, an ice cream shop that sells unique flavors like jalapeño and lavender is serving a niche marke

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I think we can all Google for AI answers if we need too. However, since I provided the word, and the context; no it doesn’t.

There is significant information asymmetry in our discussion, so I’ll conclude it here.

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I think 650b on gravel got the same response as 27.5+ and the “here’s a fatter tire for doing slower stuff like bikepacking” spin just didn’t get people excited.

Big 29" tires are the forbidden fruit at the moment until a couple million dollars of carbon molds amortize out, and everyone wants a taste.

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Considering how much people seem to like MTB hacks to DB gravel, grabbing the Trek Stache 29+ HT from years ago is a canvas waiting… :stuck_out_tongue:

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