- 7 hours ago
Gravel bikes are more capable than ever before but can a gravel bike really replace a road bike, a gravel bike and a mountain bike? To find out we set Ed the challenge of riding nothing but a gravel bike for 3 months to find out whether a gravel bike is the only bike you need.
During this time Ed used the gravel bike on a bike packing trip, time trial up Alp d'Huez, commuting by bike and of course for gravel cycling. In this video we look at a gravel bike vs a road bike and see whether a gravel bike simply has too many compromises to be one bike for all your cycling needs including road cycling.
During this time Ed used the gravel bike on a bike packing trip, time trial up Alp d'Huez, commuting by bike and of course for gravel cycling. In this video we look at a gravel bike vs a road bike and see whether a gravel bike simply has too many compromises to be one bike for all your cycling needs including road cycling.
Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:00should we go and find another put you in another sticky situation that sounds really weird
00:06we're not dogging
00:13this is a gravel bike not my ground bike doesn't even have the right pedals on for my shoes
00:20this is videographers ed's gravel bike or the one that he's been using for the last three months
00:25after well he was bigging up gravel bikes a lot and so we banned him from riding literally anything
00:33else in that time ed has ridden it seemingly over most of europe up alps us over the dolomites
00:41he's done commutes on it he's done plenty of road riding on it countless gravel rides which
00:46might surprise you given their gravel bikes so in this video we're going to find out how we got on
00:52and whether a gravel bike really can be a one bike to do it all or are the compromises
00:58just too big this is cycling weekly let's get into it
01:05right ed this bike i know you've been loving it and fair play for riding nothing else for let's be
01:14honest quite varied riding for the last three months however i have noticed a difference because last
01:20time you were riding this bike it looked nothing like this it had a different wheel set on it and
01:24it had a different set of tyres on it so you basically cheated well i haven't really cheated
01:29i think i've succeeded in showing that a gravel bike can do a lot more than just gravel and that's
01:34not like i don't think that's news to anyone i think it's important to say at this point the kind
01:39of the parameters of what do it all what the all part of that actually is so for me personally
01:45that is
01:46everything that sits in between road racing i don't do that and what you'd be using a hardtail
01:53mountain bike for so general road riding touring commuting obviously gravel riding kind of using
01:59this frame as a starting point for all those things and then seeing how swapping out the wheels and
02:04tyres can accommodate that i mean if we just start with the tyres not even just wheels and tyres just
02:08tyres yeah so this bike comes with 40 mil tyres as standard and it's got clearance for up to 45
02:13mil tyres
02:14so these are 45 mil tyres and i've taken it all the way down to a 25 mil road tyre
02:18then did a big
02:19trip earlier in the year on my 32 millimetre touring tyres and then oh not those brown things the brown
02:24they are brilliant tyres how many i've got a question for you how many punctures did you get cycling down
02:30outdoors on those 25 mil tyres the ones that cost about 100 quid a tyre yeah i had a few
02:36how many three
02:37three okay i did 750 miles from croatia to switzerland on those tyres i didn't get a single puncture yeah
02:43that's because they're they're plastic no not rubber no they're great another point which i think is
02:49important when it comes to the tyres is that wider tyres are these days being more generally accepted
02:55as not actually slowing you down that much a 23 millimetre tyre is no longer the standard on the road
03:00like it's 28 in the pro peloton but a lot of like i'm now racing on 30s training on 32s
03:08so i would
03:08say that for me also 32 mil slick tyre is kind of like optimum and the industry seems to think
03:15so as
03:15well so bikes even road bikes racing bikes are allowing for more tyre clearance and to allow for
03:21more tyre clearance wheelbases are getting slightly longer so gravel bikes and road bikes or especially
03:25endurance bikes are converging for example the specialiserie bay now has clearance for up to 40
03:31millimetre tyres yeah i do agree with that so it's not miles apart from what we have here there is
03:36a
03:36difference but then with the wider tyre clearance this bike offers a lot more versatility than
03:41something like the roubet does there's actually only like a 200 gram weight difference between them
03:45where it gets a little bit convoluted is that i'd have this frame but then i would want to have
03:50two
03:50different sets of wheels with you know gravel tyres and road tyres mounted so that if i'm like one day
03:55i
03:55want to go for a gravel ride i'm not like then getting the tyre levers out and swapping them out
03:59but i
03:59would say that that is potentially more wallet friendly and more space friendly than having a fleet of
04:04four different bikes where there's probably a lot of crossover between them anyway and you know using
04:10each one for very specific types of riding i think you can cover both bases with one bike
04:20tyres aside i still think if we go on a road ride i'm dropping you if you ride this but
04:26i mean
04:26you're dropping me anyway because you're like a racer and you're younger than me that's not what i mean
04:30i mean like surely this is slowing you down it's got wider bars it's not an aerodynamic frame let's
04:35be honest like don't get me wrong i love gravel bikes i think they're great for gravel but they
04:40are great for gravel as the name would suggest but i i think it depends on the gravel bike so
04:44your gravel
04:45bike you've got a lauf segler and i'd say your bike is an out and out gravel bike it's got
04:51the
04:52spring front suspension much slacker angles and well 55 millimetre tyres on there at the moment
04:57it's pretty much knocky on the door of being like a kind of drop bar hardtail mountain bike mine has
05:04basically made my hardtail mountain bike redundant okay i haven't used it in in years to be honest
05:09well again that's kind of my point though with your bike it's like it's very much intended for
05:13off-road use and would be completely wasted out on the road like i know this is called a gravel
05:19adventure
05:19frame but 45 mil is the max as they say so the wheelbase is going to be that much shorter
05:25than
05:25your one you've got the front suspension which is mandatory you can't uh you can't get without
05:32oh you can't what it means with the suspension you have you can't lock it out like you just have
05:35suspension i would have to change the fork yeah yeah so that in itself is kind of pigeonholing it
05:41it's actually pretty niche to be honest i'd say your one oh gets enough hate in the comments for
05:45being pink don't you start as well
05:52i think it comes down to what width are these handlebars these are i think they're 40 between
05:56the hoods and their flares i think they're maybe a 43 or 44. that's actually fairly narrow for a gravel
06:02bike well you see i legal but i would i think i'd struggle to have the handlebars that i want
06:08on the
06:08road and the handlebars that i want on the gravel are two different things they don't happen on one
06:13bike i mean to be fair that is one good thing with like flared handlebars for example you can go
06:18very
06:18tight in between the hoods and then you can flare out something that if you're descending off-road for
06:23example something a lot more stable we're not making video which is can one handlebar do it all
06:29but like it's a pretty good feature that you get on gravel bike which has a double benefit on the
06:32road as
06:32well yeah so obviously an issue that you might find would be that gearing off-road to the gearing that
06:43want on the road might differ the chain ring sizes are smaller than the compact or semi-compact road
06:49for example yeah the only time though that i actually found that i was like starting to spin
06:53out at the top end would be on full-blown mountain descents to be fair i got up to well
06:58the fastest
06:58i've had the balls to go on a road bike which is 40 miles an hour on a road bike
07:03on a well on this on
07:05a well the fastest i've gone on any on any bike right yeah and also i had to get up
07:09all of those climbs as
07:10well the gear range there was more than adequate and bearing one that is with a bike system which
07:16weighed 25 kilos with all the stuff and some of the you know some of the inclines were ridiculous so
07:22it
07:22managed everything for someone who's a lot more powerful than me and isn't scared of going fast
07:27than 40 miles an hour the gearing at the top end i think i don't think would be sufficient i
07:30don't
07:31think it'd be sufficient for you i think you would start to spin out and obviously i know we're saying
07:34that we're not using it for racing but if you just like riding at those sort of speeds when you're
07:38riding on your own getting that right might be difficult and if you are even if you are swapping
07:42a different set of wheels in which has you know your road tires on it and your gravel tires on
07:46it
07:46you would run into difficulty with like your chain length if you're swapping between different cassettes
07:51i feel like that is an area which would have to be a compromise a caveat that i'm not saying
07:57there
07:57aren't any caveats i'm saying that they potentially outweigh owing owning two or three different bikes
08:06you have actually annoyingly nullified my next point as well what i was going to say about the
08:13geometry and for descending or cornering on the road and things like that it's got a slacker head
08:20tube angle it's got a slacker seat tube angle much longer wheelbase to fit those wider tires and
08:28i was going to say that surely that makes it less fun out on the road and on a descent
08:35but actually
08:37you're saying you've gone faster on this bike than you ever have on a road bike it's confidence
08:42because of that stability i'm a bit of a nervous descender the more confident i feel pays like
08:48dividends because i could be on a short wheelbase aero bike which has the capability to go really fast and
08:54go slower because i don't feel safe because in that context again once you take racing out of
09:00the equation once you take kind of performance out of the equation and replace it with versatility
09:04comfort and stability i feel like that is where the benefit is obviously for that to make sense then
09:11those things have to be more important to you than performance and it is for me i can't speak for
09:18everyone in fairness for me versatility means more to me for a lot of people i do agree that comfort
09:25and confidence will far outweigh any tiny performance benefit from a bike whether that's
09:34integrated cabling or a slightly more aerodynamic seat tube or something like that a slightly skinnier
09:42seat post that's everyone's every brand's favorite thing to do at the moment yeah and that is going
09:47to make minuscule wattages of difference even at 50 kilometers per hour yeah when most people's club
09:53rides most people's solo rides going out at the weekend average 25 kilometers an hour and i'm not
10:01saying that aerodynamics isn't important to those people but what i am saying is your body is almost
10:08the entirety of your aerodynamic drag yeah and if you are more comfortable on your bike and not
10:15at the cafe going oh god yeah look how cool and light my race bike is then you probably are
10:24going to
10:24have a better time one of my main points with using a gravel bike or trying to use a gravel
10:33bike for
10:34everything is it kind of depends what your relationship with cycling actually is and what
10:38you want to get out of it because for me i want to get enjoyment out of it and a
10:42byproduct of that
10:43is that it's good for fitness and it's really good exercise but because i don't race that is all
10:48secondary to just enjoying myself so for example this bike has currently got 45 mil tires on it we've
10:54been riding mountain bike trails on it and that is the same frame which has delivered me to a 30
11:01an
11:02irritating 31 seconds off climbing out two ways in under an hour up up up ah that's a pretty good
11:09range of things that you can do on it and i enjoyed both of them thoroughly i was comfortable
11:14in both situations i mean i was comfortable ish doing the mountain biking stuff like my wrists are
11:20killing me but outside of that it did pretty well another point i'd make about this bike which is a
11:25big
11:25positive kind of to do with the mounting points is that it's like a modern tourer you know what i
11:29mean
11:29it can do everything that like your classic steel tourer can do they're fantastic they can take
11:34massive loads and you can you know attach everything to it and take all your stuff you could ride it
11:39around the world very slow this can more or less do that but then take all that stuff off just
11:45a
11:45lightweight bike again three hours later you know you could ride that around the world if you wanted to
11:51find a pitfall in having a bike that you can ride around the world on jamie done
11:59i think the other thing that you need to bear in mind is that you've been enjoying riding this
12:03everywhere it's it's not a cheap bike it's a it's a sizable investment yeah it's not a cheap bike
12:10like this is not my bike i asked pearson if i could use it and they very kindly said yes
12:15and i
12:15need to give it back but it's got di2 on it's got carbon everything so it's a it's at the
12:19premium end
12:20of gravel bikes of this kind so going up out duez for example probably wouldn't have been as fun if
12:27i was doing it on an entry-level gravel bike that weighs i know 11 kilos or something like that
12:31yeah
12:31easily could so yeah i have certainly been spoiled with that the lightweight of this even though it's
12:36got the longer wheelbase to me it's still i mean also i don't ride these like nine ten grand racing
12:41bikes i don't know what they feel like so to me this felt extremely responsive more so than my actual
12:46bike which is heavier than this and i think that goes a long way to counteract like the longer
12:50wheelbase you know when you're using a slimmer road tire because it's so much lighter it still to me
12:55felt extremely responsive but you wouldn't get that if you're on a more entry-level aluminium or steel
13:01framed gravel bike so unfortunately cost does potentially play into it quite a lot and i think it
13:08adds to the versatility i mean to be fair what annoys me with the way that brands structure
13:14their their sort of pricing structure is that they introduce electronic group sets before they
13:19start giving carbon wheels because i'm interested in carbon wheels i'm not interested really in
13:24electronic group sets okay it's very nice to use and nothing went wrong with it but as far as i'm
13:28concerned mechanical doesn't run out of batteries so for the sort of riding i do it's a yet another thing
13:34to charge up it you could end up in a sticky situation if you're in the middle of nowhere you
13:39find
13:39yourself at the bottom of the mountain and you're stranded in your hardest gear that's not a great
13:42situation to be and i'm not saying that mechanical is perfect but it's a lot easier to like improvise
13:47a hack if something goes wrong with mechanical than it is on something that's you know like software
13:51based if you know i mean yeah
13:56so in conclusion the last three months you've been banned from riding any other bikes yeah that ban is
14:05now is now lifted yeah will you be riding on the bikes or will you be continued to use a
14:13ground
14:14bike for everything well i'm going to have to because pierson are going to want this back
14:18but if this was my bike yeah i would still ride so i've got a 2008 specialized tarmac which i
14:27built up
14:27so that is my road bike and yeah i would still ride it but i kind of feel like that's
14:31more to do with the
14:32fact that you know i happen to own that bike and i like it and it has sentimental value for
14:38me but if
14:39this was the only bike that i owned then i just don't think i'd find myself logging for a 2008
14:45specialized tarmac because like i say this bike can do everything that i need it to do when i got
14:49into
14:49bikes about five or six years ago this flight is starting to really piss me off when i got into
14:54cycling about five six years ago i kind of inherited one bike more of an endurance bike then i saved
15:01up got
15:01another bike which is like my road bike now then i decided to get a single speed for riding around
15:06town and commute to work and the thing that's missing from my like inventory is a gravel bike
15:11i mean i'm going to get a gravel bikes i want one but i haven't really got much space for
15:16one whereas
15:16if i'd started with the gravel bike you can make a gravel bike into a road bike however it'd be
15:23a lot
15:23more difficult to make a road bike into a gravel bike so if we are choosing one bike to kind
15:27of cover
15:27everything there is only kind of one direction you can do that in so my point is if you're new
15:32to
15:32cycling i feel like you're better off starting with the bike that offers the most versatility and
15:37stability and stability exactly more confidence is borrowing if you're a newbie and then kind of
15:42thinking yeah i'm now going to save up and get myself a lightweight fast handling racing bike and it
15:48brings to my mind that new canyon as well the thousand pound one from canyon something like that as a
15:55as
15:56an entry-level bike but yeah no matter what your budget is i think if you're just starting out
16:02cycling get a gravel bike use it on the road decide if you actually you love gravel cycling and you
16:08don't
16:08want to ride on the road maybe you fall in love with road riding find a really good group ride
16:13and
16:13then decide actually gravel isn't necessarily what i'm doing most of the time yeah and choose your bike
16:20based on that yeah well there we go an actual conclusion please do feel free to continue our
16:27debate down in the comment section i'm sure we will continue this debate on the way back to the office
16:32if you like this sort of content then please give it a like subscribe to the channel and you can
16:37now
16:37actually give a video a hype on your phone apparently no idea what it does but please do it we're
16:43we're keen to
16:43find out
Comments