Current Carbon Gravel Bike Design - What I Would Change

Today I thought it would be a fun thought exercise to take each part of a carbon bike design for gravel and critique it with my take on what could be different. My thoughts are going to be constrained to keeping things optimized for what I believe is in the best interest of the average rider, not necessarily for racing.

My opinion being that most brands make bicycles their racers want, or the bike a designer would race, and these designs are not focused on the everyday rider. Racing many times eschews comfort, practicality, and value. Media focuses on these "halo bikes" as being the thing which is "most interesting" to the reader. It would be as if every bicycle rider only rode what the equivalent automobile in racing is for a daily driver. An unaffordable, expensive to maintain, impractical car. Why do we do this in the bicycle industry? It's stupid. 

Anyway....

Image courtesy of Factor Bikes' social media.

I'm going to use this image grab from a Factor Bikes' social media post showing a racing bike from the recent Traka gravel event in Spain which shows a reportedly new Factor gravel bike model. This will serve as a model for the misguided racing focus on gravel bike design. 

Let me first say I am not against having racing bikes. What I am saying is the influence these designs have on everyday gravel rider's bicycle choices is far too great. In fact, it should have little if any impact on gravel bike design. Why? Because the vast majority of riders don't race, and do not need racing bikes. 

My thoughts will correspond to the numbers I have placed on the image starting with the seat post at #1 and going in a clockwise rotation from there to number 7 which will end my thoughts on current design for gravel bikes. 

#1 - Seat Post: This is easy, but any design using an aero seat post generally is adding more discomfort to the rider. This is because most aero seat posts are not designed to flex along their length, like a good carbon seat post does.  

#2 - Integration: The fad these days is to tuck away all the cables out of the wind. This is easier with today's penchant for wireless shifting, but those pesky brake cables still need to be hidden, apparently. This seems fine until you want to change your handlebar/stem combo for reasons of fit, comfort, choice, or all of the above. Integrated bars and stems take away all those choices. Fine for racers. Dumb for everyone else. Let those cables be free! Losing a few watts to air drag is nothing for the average rider, but they will gain choices, and less expensive maintenance costs down the road.  

#3 - Carbon Forks: For the sake of this exercise, metal forks will be excluded. Carbon is wonderfully light, strong, and supposedly "tunable" for ride qualities.  However; no carbon fork manufacturer has decided to take advantage of the tunability of carbon for rider comfort when it comes to forks. Either it cannot be done at all, or it cannot be done without assurance of avoiding failures and thus, liability for injuries, or designers just don't care about comfort in fork designs. I'm choosing the liability fears here, but that is purely speculation on my part. Whatever the case may be, carbon forks are overly-stiff and this is especially true on race designs. 

#4 - MTB Sized Tires: My theory on this is in relation to the point above concerning forks. These big, poofy MTB tires are being employed because forks are too stiff and stems with any built-in forgiveness are not possible due to integration and weight concerns. Ditch the heavier tires, use a commonsense approach to cable management, and maybe make the fork nicer to ride for we who are not the less than 1% of riders who are top-tier racers.  

#5 - Front Derailleurs and 1X: Chain management for a 2X system is now programmable on wireless drive trains. You don't even need to think about "when to shift" anymore, and so, why do we stick to the thought that a massively out of whack chain line on 1X is okay? It isn't. Racers feel 1X is more aero. This is laughable to the ordinary cyclist.  Even if aero is a thing with front derailleurs, and even if a mechanical system relies on the rider to make shifts, a 2X system is more efficient, does not rely on huge jumps in rear cog spacing, and can be made so the parts are less expensive, especially in regard to the cassette. 

#6 - Chain Stay Length: Racers want the rear tire tucked right up underneath their rear ends. Fine for racing, perhaps. It certainly will make you feel faster because, well......you'll feel every bump. Where is the seat on a bus with the roughest ride? Right over the rear axle. Average riders do not need short chain stays. I'm not saying we need really long chain stays either. Just don't put me on a bike with a rear wheel tucked right underneath me. 

#7 - Tire Clearance: Just a thought here on tire clearances. I enjoy my 45mm and 50mm tires, but I also really like lightweight tires. There is a point of diminishing returns with regard to tire width. Especially if you want some kind of tougher casing or puncture protection. I'd rather ride a narrower tire which falls under 600 grams for my do-all roads bike choice. (Note - I did not say "gravel", although that surface is included) If I am mountain biking, I'll choose a proper MTB. I think a distinction is already there and trying to blur those lines is not only unnecessary, but confusing to consumers.  

Okay, those are my takes on current top-end gravel bike design and why I think much of what is being done is the wrong direction for most people.  I know not everyone will agree. I'd love to see what you think about these ideas. Let me know in the comments. 

 Thanks for reading Guitar Ted Productions 

The 32" Watch: Some Background On Those Bigger Big Wheels

Not really a novel concept. (Image courtesy of Baum Cycles)

 The 32"er wheel thing is all the buzz in certain circles of the cycling innerwebs. I decided today to take a cruise through the archives of 20 years of information logged on this platform to see if anything might pop up concerning bigger big wheels. 

Like so many other times I research this blog I found things I had forgotten about. Stories about 36'ers and 32" wheels which might surprise you from the standpoint of how long ago some of this stuff has been percolating in the background.  

My first introduction to anything larger than a 29"er wheel was back in 2006 at Frostbike when Ben Witt had brought his creation to the show to share with the bike nerds in attendance. It was a frame welded up by Mike Pofahl with Ben's 36" wheels attached. It was a raw, unpainted idea, and it was very impressive. 

The first 36"er. I had a chance to buy this thing. 

To my knowledge Ben's bike was the first 36" wheeled bike around. I knew of a 32"er cruiser made with Coker branding, but not a 36"er. The bike was an amazing experience. But a parking lot ride does not tell the complete story. 

Fortunately, I was afforded the chance to try the big 36"er out for a couple of months when Ben was considering selling the bike. By this time it had been painted red. This would have been back in 2009. I used it primarily for commuting, and a lot of what people are saying about 32"ers is very true for 36"ers. Big stability, major roll-over capabilities, lots of steering inertia. I was thinking hard about buying the bike and doing gravel on it, but in the end I passed on the offer. 

Eventually someone did do a proper gravel bike with 36" wheels. I wrote about this in 2021. So, yeah.....big wheels on gravel has been a thing for a while already. And if you click the link and read my post from back then, you'll see reference to the idea dating back to 2006. Right about the same time Ben made his first 36"er, and in fact, the idea was spawned by Ben's bike. 

Even as recently as two years ago, Curve Cycling from Australia was producing a big wheeled gravel bike. I posted about that and made my case for Ben Witt's pioneering influence then. So, I think it is a good perspective to give Ben some props for sparking interest in larger than 29"er wheels. Would it have happened anyway? Yeah.....probably. But it happened the way it did. 

And I think that is worth noting. 

Brown Season: Rare Air

Escape Route: Gates Park

February is a month when I would expect it to snow a lot, be not so great for cycling out in the country, and a month which would test my patience knowing Spring is just around the corner. I do not expect February to act like Spring! 

But ever since the beginning of the month we've been getting warmer and warmer until at the beginning of this past week it was evident we'd end the week with absolutely no snow on the ground at all. None. Like mid to late March, but a whole month earlier than that. 

With temperatures sneaking above 50 degrees by the end of last week, I decided I had to get out and see what was going on in the country. At the rate things are going the frost will begin to start coming out of the ground. When this happens the roads get messy and gooey. I wanted to get out while the roads were still firm. 

North of Waterloo. The roads were perfect.

Even the ditches were mostly clear of snow in many places. 

I went out on the Singular Peregrine Mk4. A bicycle relatively still new to me and one I am still getting used to. I had the Pirelli Cinturato H tires on this time set at 30psi. I think I could go lower, but during cold weather it isn't a good time for me to experiment with air pressure unless I plan on stopping to check the tire pressures a lot during the ride. I don't plan on this, so I lived with 30psi for the time being. It was okay. 

 

This was probably an impressive snow drift three weeks ago. 

I decided not to try to ride too fast or go too far on this first outing for 2026 in the country. Especially so since I am still dealing with the bruised rib from my crash two weeks ago today. So, I went slower than normal and I did just a minimal loop and went back into Waterloo. 

 

I stopped at the Big Rock. The atmosphere was calm. There was barely a breeze blowing. I could hear the mournful cry of some bird or another a long ways off in the distance. I've come out to this rock many a time before. This was different. It seemed very peaceful. 

 

For a first country ride it was good. Not too long, not over the line to the point of being trashed, and the weather was super rare. I shake my head at this when I think about it being February. You have to wonder, is March going to be awful? 

Hmm..... I don't know, but this is a rare treat and I'll enjoy what I can of it.  

When The Answer Is "Yes"

Portrait of Ken Yokanovich by Ari Andonopoulos

 I was often about to say "To hell with it all!", when I was an event director of the gravel race known as Trans Iowa. Many times it was quite a frustrating labor of map reading, route finding, logistics planning, and dealing with people who were stretching my patience to the breaking point. I often wondered aloud why I was even putting myself through what it took to do the event in the manner which I believed it had to be done. 

To be perfectly fair, this was all mostly of my own doing. The frustrations, the road blocks, and the hurdles were mostly of my own making. I did not have to do it the way I did it. 

I chose to do it the way that I did it.  

Why? This is a question which would take a longer form to answer fully. I won't get into the weeds here on this but suffice it to say I did it the way I did it for the best possible experience for the participant I could devise. My goal? To ensure each rider would experience a soul-searching, mind bending, physically and mentally challenging experience. I also wanted to afford opportunities for human interactions which might lead to life-long impacts. 

The cost to myself and my family was not insignificant. Was it all worth the14 years I put myself and my family, volunteers, and friends through to see this event happen? 

Ken Yokanovich (L) and Ari Andonopoulos

In 2007 author Zach Dundas shadowed me during the Trans Iowa v3 event to gather material for a book he was going to write covering the underground sports scene in the USA in the mid-2000's. The book, "The Renegade Sportsman", (You can find used copies on Amazon), contains a full chapter on Trans Iowa and is well worth tracking down if you are a Trans Iowa fan or are curious about the event. It is, in my opinion, the most concise, entertaining, and thorough description of the event and its ethos I have come across. 

In the chapter on Trans Iowa Zach has this little bit concerning Ken Yokanovich, a veteran of three Trans Iowa events. Zach, along with other T.I. riders, were checking out some of the bicycles to be used in the event. Here is the bit from "The Renegade Sportsman", Chapter Three, "Ira vs Iowa":

"I particularly admired Minneapolis rider Ken Yokanovich's orange-Creamsicle-colered Quickbeam, outfitted with roomy, old-fashioned olive drab pannier bags and a custom cylindrical handlebar clip that held a tube of Blistex. Yokanovich would ride fixed gear. Other Trans Iowans tended to greet that decision with studied nods of approval, as if spurning one hundred years of bicycle evolution was indeed the most honorable course of action."

Ken finished that year, the first to do it on a fixed gear bike. One of only three who ever finished a Trans Iowa in the event's 14 years on a fixed gear bicycle. So, it is understandable why I might remember Ken with fondness, and why he is held in high regard by Trans Iowa veterans who know. 

But you never know if the feeling is mutual. Maybe this is not a big deal to people like Ken. Maybe he's moved on. This was nearly 20 years ago, so yeah..... I could see it. But people are sometimes amazing and surprising. Such was the case with Ken, who recently was motivated by a meet-up with fellow Trans Iowan, Ari Andonopoulos, to reach out to me via email last week. 

Ken wrote and told me the following: "Thank you for sharing your thoughts, bringing us together, and challenging us to be something we never knew we could be."

When I get messages like this, I sit back and I smile. Were all the days and years of toil and worry worth it? 

The answer is "Yes".

Breakdown

Happy Valentines Day. This post is about a breakdown, not a break-up. Just so we are clear. It also is not about the Tom Petty song by the same name. Although that is a great tune. Anyway.....

 I've been trying to do some local training rides on the fixed gear Twin Six Standard Rando v2. (From now on called the Fixed Gravel Bus, or FGB for short) I figure slower, steady fixed rides to help build a base of fitness is a good place to start on top of my walking and some other minor isometric type body weight things I do in the house, (when I'm not injured, that is!)

Anyway, this post isn't about training. This is about what happened to the FGB the other day while training. I was out on my usual graveyard loop which is nearly always carless and quiet when I felt something odd in the left crank or pedal. 

 I pulled over thinking maybe I had a pedal coming out only to find that my crank arm was loose! The little preload screw was missing too. Dang it! 

So, I grabbed my tool kit and tried to shove the crank arm on the spindle best I could, then I tightened the pinch bolts on the crank arm down, and hoped it would get me home. 

It did!

Now I had a problem to solve and I am thinking about this style of crank as well. First, I assumed the little preload screw, in this case a metal one I picked up from N.Y. Roll somewhere along the line, was gone. I didn't even bother trying to find it. I just went into my stash of parts and found one off an Ultegra crank set and tried it out on the 105 crank.

 Hmm.... No go. Seems as though there are different lengths to these screws/preload bits. I think the one from the Ultegra crank is too long. I need to find a shorter one. I dug around in my crank stash to see if I could find this screw. (Or is it a bolt? Whatever....) I did find one which was shorter but it had a smaller diameter for the threaded portion. Oh..... So there are three different preload bolt types. Nice! (Part ordered and on the way)

But perhaps more importantly, I wonder if a two piece pinch-bolt style crank even a good idea on a fixed gear bike? I'm beginning to have doubts about the ability of this design to hold up to the rigors of fixed gear riding. This might require a move to a threaded, square taper crank/bottom bracket set up which I have full confidence in as far as holding up to this sort of fixed gear set up.  

Stay tuned... 

Friday News And Views

From a 32"er thread on mtbr.com

The 32" Watch: Vittoria Peyote 32" :

I've had a few folks keeping me abreast of what is going on with 32"ers and I have been pointed to a thread on MTBR.com concerning these big wagon wheels. I also was tipped off to the existence of this Peyote 32"er tire, as shown here. (Thanks! You know who you are!)

This is interesting as N.Y. Roll has fallen in love with this tire and so has another local rider, (in 29"er size). It\s a popular tire, seemingly. It's also a new design. So, it is a tire on the cutting edge of tread design and compound makeup. They wouldn't use such a tire and technology unless they had some serious intentions in mind. This is telling us this 32"er thing is serious stuff. 

As if the other things we've already seen aren't enough to convince us. It seems as though all the things we've heard will be coming true. 

Only a few bicycle brands are committed so far to the 32"er along with some custom frame makers. Dirty Sixer, being the long time proponent of bigger than 29"er wheels, of course, and then you have Vassago, Singular, Lenz Sport, Genesis and perhaps a couple others here and there. 

For a look at what a gravel 32'er would maybe look like, see this report from the UK based iceBike Show by Bike Radar showing a Genesis prototype. HERE.  

My feeling is Sea Otter will be when the lid will come off this thing and we will see who of the major brands will be stepping into the 32"er scene. My guess is all of those bikes will be either MTB XC, gravel, or road bikes, in that order of prevalence. I am sure a few will get raced at Sea Otter in XC MTB and during the gravel event. 

Suspension fork prototypes will be shown, and perhaps demoed. Rigid forks will be coming as well, with Enve rumored to be developing one. It's going to be wild. 

New Podcast Episodes

The Guitar Ted Podcast has been churning out episodes at a pretty good clip of late. The latest went up on Wednesday of this week and we posted another the week before. 

This latest episode is about the proposed legislation regarding bicycles in Iowa, motivated by what is going on with e-scooters and e-bikes. The episode we posted last week was all about the latest class to be inducted into the Gravel Cycling Hall of Fame. 

So, check those two episodes out in case you missed those. We typically don't do so many episodes in such a short period of time, so apologies if we caught you off guard! There is a reason for this though.

N.Y. Roll is on a "vacation" and we thought it best to get the last three episodes out before he went out on this short trip. A result of this will be that we have a bit of a mini-break and I would not expect our next episode to land until the end of this month. 

 One more thing- If you find our podcast on Spotify, please follow us there. New podcast episode drops will prompt an alert to your inbox, so you won't miss anything. If you find is on other platforms please subscribe, like, and review the show if possible. It helps us out a ton. 

Thanks for listening to the show! 

Gravel Racing For 2026 About To Begin:

February was always the month which kicked off gravel racing since the beginning of CIRREM back in the late 2000's. This year CIRREM is on the last day of February, the 28th. 

Now the international series, Gravel Earth, has its first event this weekend. The event, Santa Vall by the Traka, is located in Spain. So, a full two weeks ahead of CIRREM. 

There are probably some other gravel events in the South, in particular Florida, which are also happening in February. But traditionally speaking, February is the kick-off month for gravel activities in the competitive sense. 

Have you signed up for any races this year? Let me know in the comments section.  

Image provided by Ergon

Canyon-DT Swiss "Alt-Terrain" Team Announced:

Taking part in the season opener for the Gravel Earth Series will be a new team sponsored by DT Swiss, Canyon Biccyles, and Ergon called "Alt-Terrain Racing". 

 The press release says the 13 member team will be competing at the Santa Valla event under the name "The Wildcards". The team will be outfitted with Ergon saddles and handle bar tapes from their Allroad ranges. 

The team will serve as "rolling R&D platforms" for future Ergon products, according to the release. Ergon sees the team as an "unprecedented opportunity" to advance their drop bar product line. 

The team will compete in gravel, ultra-endurance, cyclo cross, and marathon MTB events throughout 2026. From the press release: “We are very much looking forward to working with this new professional team,” says Ergon’s athlete liaison manager Markus Zingen. “The team’s holistic new concept will significantly professionalize gravel racing and create a wide range of opportunities for both the athletes and us as a partner to drive targeted development forward.”

That is a wrap on this edition of the FN&V. Thank you for reading Guitar Ted Productions! Get out and ride a bicycle this weekend! 

Two Things

A collection of oddball things from 1994

When I Die, So Will This Knowledge:

My mechanic friend, Ari, and I were discussing the techniques, tricks, and wisdom gained in the trade all the years we've been at this. Ari said to me, "(Do) you realize how much crap we know?!!!"

Things like which parts go with certain set ups. Take for instance the image here. A 1" steer tube, a cable hangar, and a threadless head set. What does this tell you? 

It tells me this is a super-rare set up. You see, 1" threadless steer tubes lasted about two years in the industry because threadless (1994) came in just as 1 1/8th was on the rise. Also, cantilever brakes were on the outs in 1996, as linear pull took over, so cable hangars for any sort of threadless steer tube were hard to find ten years on. This means that Ritchey cable hangar is a super-rare part. The stem isn't far off either. 

And check out those "lugs". It was a Bianchi thing. They claimed an ability to make any lug with any angle, a thing unheard of with investment cast lugs. Bianchi could do this because they TIG welded the lugs first to either the head tube or the bottom bracket shell. Then the lug was brass brazed to a frame tube, like a traditional lug, which Bianchi claimed gave the frame better vibration damping qualities. They had a name for this - "Super Lug". Yeah.....I know some pretty oddball factoids. 

I was trying to teach my assistant at the Collective how to set up a traditional cantilever brake with the straddle wire and cable carrier. He's well versed in linear pull brake set up but this was giving him fits. I told him, "Yeah, it's a pain in the ass but you have to just take your time to learn it." 

Today, we look for an app, a way to electronically adjust our, whatever, and if this isn't working right we throw a fit. We are helpless and stuck with no options. Well, it wasn't like this always. Mechanics could find a way. But as we make everything a device, we take away the ability to field service, or even service an item at all. 

And who knows how to fix that old stuff anyway. Answer: When I die, there will be one less person who does know how. 

I Used To Do That?!

Related to the bike above, which was donated to the Cedar Valley Bicycle Collective late last year, is this bike sticker which was on it. I removed it for a reason. 

See, I designed the biker in the logo. 

I had forgotten I had done that. Long ago, before I even worked at Advantage Cyclery, I was a jeweler and where I worked we did all of our own design work. Not just jewelry, but advertising, logos, and we occasionally did work for other clients. Tom, who ran and owned Advantage Cyclery, found out I did this sort of work and suggested I give this idea he had for a logo a try. What you see on the sticker is what I drew up for him. 

It's no big deal. Just a logo for a long-forgotten Cedar Valley bicycle shop. But when I saw it, I was reminded of the days when I was spending time doing tons of design work. It was fun. Challenging, but fun. It is nice to be reminded that I did something cool one time. 

Ha!