I feel like I'm about to go on a shooting spree with a knife. The trail ahead is not really steep and not particularly challenging, but my bike with its narrow racing handlebars and 40 millimetre wide tyres feels very out of place. At least from my mountain biking perspective, I can think of a dozen reasons that speak against the current hype surrounding gravel bikes. The gravel topic is not as clearly defined as I thought. The more people I ask, the more definitions, philosophies and attitudes about gravel I encounter. For some, it is the great freedom on two wheels to explore areas near and far, for others the gravel movement has something of the early years of mountain biking.
"There used to be bad bikes with narrow handlebars and slippery tyres. I don't need to ride those things today," say die-hard mountain bikers. So it's no wonder that opinions differ when it comes to the material. To tackle roads, gravel and easy trails, many swear by racing handlebars and slightly wider tyres. On the other hand, there is the classic hardtail, which only weighs a little more, even with a suspension fork. There are new concepts between the extremes: full-suspension hybrids of MTB and road bike. Unsuspended long-distance mountain bikes. Cyclocross bikes with suspension forks and MTB tyres. Time for an objective comparison.
Comparison test: 5 gravel bikes and MTBs with and without suspension
- Hardtail with suspension fork: Mondraker Podium Carbon RR
- Hardtail with rigid fork: Orbea Alma M Team
- Gravelbike-Fully: Niner MCR 9 RDO
- Gravel bike with suspension fork: Cannondale Topstone Lefty 1
- Classic gravel bike: Cube Nuroad Carbon
You can conveniently download the complete comparison test of 5 gravel and mountain bikes from BIKE 11/2020 as a PDF below the article. The objective concept comparison including the test reports of the bikes costs 1.99 euros.
Why not free of charge? Because quality journalism has a price. In return, we guarantee independence and objectivity. This applies in particular to the tests in BIKE. We don't pay for them, but the opposite is the case: we charge for them, namely tens of thousands of euros every year.
