Friday News And Views

Image courtesy of Onza Tires

 Onza Tires Brings Full Range Of Gravel Tires To Market:

Onza Tires, better known for mountain bike fare, has just announced a new range of gravel tires called "Alegra X". In an effort to guide riders to a "best tire" choice, these tires are arrayed in a ranking to categorize them from least grippy, best rolling resistance to most grippy, higher rolling resistance. With "1" having the fastest tread all the way to "6", with the most off-road ready" tread, Onza expects riders will better be able to dial in an Alegra X model which best suits their needs. 

All models seem to have 120TPI casings, single compound rubber, and a choice of tan or black wall sidewalls. Most are $59.99 USD. Sizes range from 40mm to 50mm, but not all models are available in all sizes or sidewall styles. 

See Onza's website for more details HERE.  

Comments: The ranking system is similar to how Vittoria Tires is doing things now within their range of gravel tires. Onza is not a big name in the States, so it remains to be seen how this range will be accepted. However; in my opinion this looks like a more budget friendly, high-value, low in features range. Tread designs are right in the current fashion trends for gravel, and you might be reminded of several better known brands and models while perusing the Onza range. 

Everything in the Alegra X range looks "safe" as far as how it will work on gravel, and I suspect these will all be okay for most people. However; I don't see much in the way of innovative design or anything overly inspiring here. Most of these tread designs are derivative, and look to be based off designs known to work just fine. Maybe Onza makes a dent here, but there are a LOT of choices in gravel tires in 2025/26, so the competition for space on rider's wheels is intense. 

Image courtesy of Madrone Cycles

Madrone Cycles Offers "Jab" Rebuildable Rear Mech:

Last year I featured the Madrone Cycles rear mech prototype in an FN&V segment. Now the rear derailleur for 1X systems from Shimano or SRAM is available to purchase. 

With a configurable, rebuildable design, the Jab rear mech promises versatility, longevity, and customization based upon the choice of different anodized colors. The Jab has received decent reviews so far, so the product looks promising. 

Prices will range depending upon configuration, but a standard gravel Jab runs about $298.00 USD. A Jab configured with a purple body and for Shimano 11 speed gravel usage, (shown) would run $327.00 USD. 

You can learn more on the page for the Jab HERE. 

Comments: Rebuildable? Okay......when was the last time you thought, "Hey! Why can't I rebuild my rear mech?" Maybe you've destroyed one in a wreck, or in poor conditions. Okay, maybe then. However, most rear derailleurs I have replaced over the past 30 years of repair work were 50% - 100% destroyed. You'd likely have to purchase a new rear mech anyway, unless Madrone sells all the individual parts for the Jab aftermarket. Sure, they sell most of the parts now, but what if you tweak the linkage parallelogram bits?

Then there is the price of admission. Again, as I stated in 2024, you can buy a brand new Shimano GRX rear mech for quite a bit less money. SRAM as well. Obviously, the Madrone offering looks completely cool and rad, but is it worth that much more? This is really what the piece boils down to. The way you answer this question will determine the part's value to you. There is no "wrong" answer here for a consumer, assuming it does its job. It's just that I'm not seeing what question this piece answers from a technical standpoint.  

Courtesy of Salsa Cycles social media

Salsa Reveals Another New Drop Bar Model:

The Mega Mid-South happened last weekend and both the men's and women's events were won on a new Salsa Cycles model which has not been released yet. 

The bike was feted in a Salsa Cycles social media post this week and the name of the model was revealed. The new model is going to be known as the "Flyway". 

This bike will, according to Salsa Cycles, be released this coming February. Details are said to become known about the Flyway in January, most likely because this is when dealers will be informed of those details.  

You may recall another teased new model from Salsa Cycles earlier in the Fall. I reported on this in an FN&V HERE. You may note that bike being a full suspension model with drop bars. This is not the same as the Flyway, which obviously is a hard tail, rigid front fork bike in the image shown here. 

Comments: Salsa Cycles has not redesigned, or tweaked the Warbird gravel racing bike for several years. It is long overdue for a refresh. Could the Flyway be a Warbird replacement? My guess is it will be replacing the Warbird, as Salsa's parent company has been sanitizing model names for several years. The Warbird refresh is a perfect time to axe the "militaristic" nomenclature and christen the refresh with a new, unoffensive name. Besides this, Salsa posted on their Facebook page that this bike is their "..... fifth generation gravel racing bike." Note: This is purely speculation on my part, but we've already seen a few re-namings in Salsa's line, so this would track if it is true.  

We can deduce from the images the  Flyway has a suspension corrected fork, larger tire clearances, and accessory fork mounts. The sloping top tube can be seen in this escape collective post, (paywalled if you want to read the entire post), which indicates dropper post compatibility. I'd also assume there is in-frame storage, full-internal routing, and possibly no support for mechanical group-sets, as is the fashion these days.  

We'll be keeping our eyes open for more on this "new" model after the turn of the New Year.  

The 32 Inch Wheel Watch:

More and more it seems apparent the 32 inch MTB wheel is going to be a thing in 2026. Rumors are being passed around saying more choices in tires are on the way, and more people are starting to move in a direction which points to small production runs of frames and forks for the wheel size. 

While I have ridden a 36"er, I haven't ridden one off-road, so I cannot say what a 32"er would be like. Furthermore, I'm not really interested in spending a bunch of money on an off-road bike I'd barely ever use. 

If I were to get into this wheel size, it would be for gravel, and for my sort of riding, a 32"er wheel makes a ton of sense. So, I am interested in what becomes of this sort of idea, and if it ever became possible, and the tires were there which made sense, I'd probably get one of these newer, bigger wagon wheelers for my stable. 

I think the rolling momentum of such a wheel would be primo for the rolling hills of Iowa. The vibration reducing possibilities are tantalizing for a man of my age who is not getting any younger. A drop bar, single speed 32"er makes a lot of sense to me, and if I would have to use 2"-plus wide tires, I'm good with it as long as the geometry is correct. 

So, while I do not need another gravel bike, I might need  a 32"er, especially if it was something which would extend my years as a gravel cyclist. 

 

Gore To Cease Marketing Cycling Wear:

In a surprise announcement via Gorewear's parent company, WL Gore & Associates GmbH, it has been learned the Gore cycling business will cease operations and remaining inventory will be sold out with no further replacements. 

Citing economic hardships in the business, Gore stated in a letter to retailers obtained by a German bicycle industry publication that they saw no good future prospects for success for the brand. You can read more about the closing of Gorewear in this Bike Radar article HERE. 

Comments: Gore was very aggressive in terms of marketing throughout the last 15 years. They were not shy about sending kit to several outlets, including some I have been associated with in the past. However; it never seemed as though Gore could gain a foothold against the Raphas, MAAP's, and other trendy companies. 

Gore did find itself with a hit when they developed the Shake Dry rain jacket, (shown) which had immediate effect in the marketplace, being heralded as a major technology breakthrough in wet weather cycling gear. However; it had to pull the technology off the market due to PFAS concerns and Gore's own commitments to environmentally friendly products. This was something that was a blow to the company as they never really had any answer to the Shake Dry jacket. 

This news comes on the heels of YT Bikes closure in North America, and with a slew of deep-discount sales for "Pre-Black Friday" within the industry. All of this is not very encouraging heading into Winter. 
 

That's a wrap on this week! Thank you for reading Guitar Ted Productions! Now get out and ride a bicycle! 

The Curious Case Of Onza

Back in the late 80's and early 90's, you knew, if you were into mountain biking, who Onza was. You had either seen their product, read about it, or had seen the ubiquitous porcupine sticker on a buddies rig at the trail head. You knew what Onza was. Bar ends, Porcupine tires, and those infamous HO Pedals.

But before I get to more about those pedals, I wanted to revisit the Onza juggernaut for a bit. Thinking back on that time, I cannot really say that any other company had such an over-arching success with mountain bikers. They had the bar end business locked up. You either rode Onza bar ends, or you weren't cool. The same with their tires for a time as well. Who could forget the white Porcs?

An old Onza catalog page courtesy of the "new" Onza's Facebook page.

  They also did something before anyone else did, in my opinion. Onza had a wide range of OE spec on mountain bike product and across more brands than anyone else. (English Translation: Their parts came on all kinds of mountain bikes) They made chain rings, seat posts, tires, brakes, and grips. Many higher end bikes from many companies were spec'ed out with at least something from the Onza catalog.

Added to this was the fact that Onza was a presence on race bikes of the best racers. One must understand that there was no internet to see things with. We had to actually wait to get our next monthly fix of Mounatin Bike Action, or Dirt Rag and we would disect the Pro race bike overviews to see what they were running, because, you know, that's what we should be running, right? And those guys and gals, in many cases, were sporting something Onza made on their rigs. Sponsorships for Pro mtb racers were something of a free-for-all back in the day, and racer's set ups were often rather eclectic mixes of several brand names.

Another thing we did was that we devoured everything in print in the mags, including the ads, and Onza spent a lot of bucks on adverts. Like I said, it seemed like Onza was everywhere on everyone's bikes. Plus, it didn't hurt that their product was fairly priced and worked pretty well.

So, when clipless pedals came out, and Onza introduced the HO's, riders went ga-ga over them, because their retail price was significantly less than Shimano's or Time's for their pedals, and they were actually available, unlike Graftons and some others. Consequently, tons of people bought tons of Onza HO pedals. Oh yeah.....and they were also significantly lighter in weight than anyone's pedal designs. I remember that being a big selling point as well. Shimano 747's and Time pedals, while vastly superior designs, were tankish anchors that were far heavier than our old toe strapped caged pedals. No one was interested in slapping more weight on their rigs. Then of course, some of us never did get clipless pedals because you had to buy special shoes. What? No Chuck Taylors anymore? Blasphemy!! 

An Onza HO pedal still in use as seen on my workstand the other day.

 What is more, Onza HO pedals were many folks first rodeo with clipless pedals. So, when the elastomer sprung pedals started to exhibit very unpredictable behaviors out in the field, many riders were befuddled, discouraged, or just got mad and either ponied up for another system or reverted back to toe straps and caged pedals.

I was one of these "first timers", but not for lack of trying to get into a competing system. I initially went for Grafton pedals, which were a cool, caged pedal design that had a funky, triangular cleat. I got the pedals, but I never could get the cleats, so finally, after a few months of going back and forth with Grafton, I "settled" for the wildly popular Onza pedal. Boy.....was that ever a mistake! (Both the Graftons and the Onzas!) Anyway, it wasn't long before I was crashing my brains out on just about every ride because I was a clipless pedal newbie. Or was that really why. Eventually I caught on to the fact that it was really the pedals, and I was looking like an idiot falling over after every body else had stopped safely. Eventually, my HO's came off, and I got some Shimano based Ritchey pedals instead. Funny thing happened after that........I didn't crash anymore like I had been. 

Suddenly the word got around- Onza pedals suck- and riders turned in their Onza pedals with the boxes of extra elastomers by the dozens, literally. I can remember down at the old shop where I started that we had piles of Onza clipless pedals in boxes that no one wanted anymore. Well.......that isn't entirely true. Some people actually liked Onza HO pedals, and so they eventually bought up all the piles of parts and pedals to keep theirs going. Oh- and if you are still in the market for some Onza HO pedal stuff, click here.

This all coincided with the "CNC Era" and many folks were getting burned by poor performing, high priced "chi-chi" parts, and Onza kind of got caught in the cross hairs. Plus, their OE spec went way down when other companies started doing their own branded accessory parts. Combined with the poor PR from the pedals, Onza disappeared as a major force in the mtb marketplace by the late 90's. The only thing they left behind were those silent reminders, those porcupine stickers, which seemed to be on about every used mountain bike for several years afterward.

The "new" (again) Onza is UK based and just introduced a couple of cool steel frames like this 29"er. 

Onza disappeared completely from the US scene, and from mountain biking as a whole, for years. The brand was revived in the 00's by a UK company and the brand was seen on many trailsin parts and bikes for several years. I actually had an Onza branded trails freewheel on my Blackbuck, albeit for a very short time, as it failed rather quickly. Then, later on in the 00's the brand was used by another firm for tires only. You may have noticed Onza branded tires on some BMC bikes and other Euro brands recently.

Now it seems that the UK Onza is getting back to doing mountain bike stuff again with a line of handle bars, stems, and flat pedals. I just caught on to the new frames as well, which look rather cool. So, Onza, a company once on top of the mtb hill, is back at it again, albeit in a much smaller, localized way. Will they ever be a player in the US again? Who knows, but if they decide to come over and play here again, I would advise against any elastomer based clipless pedal reprises!

The Curious Case Of Onza

Back in the late 80's and early 90's, you knew, if you were into mountain biking, who Onza was. You had either seen their product, read about it, or had seen the ubiquitous porcupine sticker on a buddies rig at the trail head. You knew what Onza was. Bar ends, Porcupine tires, and those infamous HO Pedals.

But before I get to more about those pedals, I wanted to revisit the Onza juggernaut for a bit. Thinking back on that time, I cannot really say that any other company had such an over-arching success with mountain bikers. They had the bar end business locked up. You either rode Onza bar ends, or you weren't cool. The same with their tires for a time as well. Who could forget the white Porcs?

An old Onza catalog page courtesy of the "new" Onza's Facebook page.

  They also did something before anyone else did, in my opinion. Onza had a wide range of OE spec on mountain bike product and across more brands than anyone else. (English Translation: Their parts came on all kinds of mountain bikes) They made chain rings, seat posts, tires, brakes, and grips. Many higher end bikes from many companies were spec'ed out with at least something from the Onza catalog.

Added to this was the fact that Onza was a presence on race bikes of the best racers. One must understand that there was no internet to see things with. We had to actually wait to get our next monthly fix of Mounatin Bike Action, or Dirt Rag and we would disect the Pro race bike overviews to see what they were running, because, you know, that's what we should be running, right? And those guys and gals, in many cases, were sporting something Onza made on their rigs. Sponsorships for Pro mtb racers were something of a free-for-all back in the day, and racer's set ups were often rather eclectic mixes of several brand names.

Another thing we did was that we devoured everything in print in the mags, including the ads, and Onza spent a lot of bucks on adverts. Like I said, it seemed like Onza was everywhere on everyone's bikes. Plus, it didn't hurt that their product was fairly priced and worked pretty well.

So, when clipless pedals came out, and Onza introduced the HO's, riders went ga-ga over them, because their retail price was significantly less than Shimano's or Time's for their pedals, and they were actually available, unlike Graftons and some others. Consequently, tons of people bought tons of Onza HO pedals. Oh yeah.....and they were also significantly lighter in weight than anyone's pedal designs. I remember that being a big selling point as well. Shimano 747's and Time pedals, while vastly superior designs, were tankish anchors that were far heavier than our old toe strapped caged pedals. No one was interested in slapping more weight on their rigs. Then of course, some of us never did get clipless pedals because you had to buy special shoes. What? No Chuck Taylors anymore? Blasphemy!! 

An Onza HO pedal still in use as seen on my workstand the other day.

 What is more, Onza HO pedals were many folks first rodeo with clipless pedals. So, when the elastomer sprung pedals started to exhibit very unpredictable behaviors out in the field, many riders were befuddled, discouraged, or just got mad and either ponied up for another system or reverted back to toe straps and caged pedals.

I was one of these "first timers", but not for lack of trying to get into a competing system. I initially went for Grafton pedals, which were a cool, caged pedal design that had a funky, triangular cleat. I got the pedals, but I never could get the cleats, so finally, after a few months of going back and forth with Grafton, I "settled" for the wildly popular Onza pedal. Boy.....was that ever a mistake! (Both the Graftons and the Onzas!) Anyway, it wasn't long before I was crashing my brains out on just about every ride because I was a clipless pedal newbie. Or was that really why. Eventually I caught on to the fact that it was really the pedals, and I was looking like an idiot falling over after every body else had stopped safely. Eventually, my HO's came off, and I got some Shimano based Ritchey pedals instead. Funny thing happened after that........I didn't crash anymore like I had been. 

Suddenly the word got around- Onza pedals suck- and riders turned in their Onza pedals with the boxes of extra elastomers by the dozens, literally. I can remember down at the old shop where I started that we had piles of Onza clipless pedals in boxes that no one wanted anymore. Well.......that isn't entirely true. Some people actually liked Onza HO pedals, and so they eventually bought up all the piles of parts and pedals to keep theirs going. Oh- and if you are still in the market for some Onza HO pedal stuff, click here.

This all coincided with the "CNC Era" and many folks were getting burned by poor performing, high priced "chi-chi" parts, and Onza kind of got caught in the cross hairs. Plus, their OE spec went way down when other companies started doing their own branded accessory parts. Combined with the poor PR from the pedals, Onza disappeared as a major force in the mtb marketplace by the late 90's. The only thing they left behind were those silent reminders, those porcupine stickers, which seemed to be on about every used mountain bike for several years afterward.

The "new" (again) Onza is UK based and just introduced a couple of cool steel frames like this 29"er. 

Onza disappeared completely from the US scene, and from mountain biking as a whole, for years. The brand was revived in the 00's by a UK company and the brand was seen on many trailsin parts and bikes for several years. I actually had an Onza branded trails freewheel on my Blackbuck, albeit for a very short time, as it failed rather quickly. Then, later on in the 00's the brand was used by another firm for tires only. You may have noticed Onza branded tires on some BMC bikes and other Euro brands recently.

Now it seems that the UK Onza is getting back to doing mountain bike stuff again with a line of handle bars, stems, and flat pedals. I just caught on to the new frames as well, which look rather cool. So, Onza, a company once on top of the mtb hill, is back at it again, albeit in a much smaller, localized way. Will they ever be a player in the US again? Who knows, but if they decide to come over and play here again, I would advise against any elastomer based clipless pedal reprises!