corwin1968

To my delight, Jan Heine of Bicycle Quarterly and Compass Cycles is advocating a new catetgory of bike that he is calling an "Enduro Allroad". This is a bike built to Jan's preferences (ie, light tubing, low trail, high quality tires) but optimized more for off-pavement riding. The biggest (and most exciting) difference is that this category of bike is designed to have 26" wheels and to run on Compass Cycles' new 26" x 55mm Rat Trap Pass tires. These tires are the same design and quality level as the other Compass tires but in a smaller and fatter size. This is HUGE news for those of us who like 26" wheels. There is also a 650B x 48mm Compass tire forthcoming.

Jan discusses his thoughts on this type of bike in the latest issue of Bicycle Quarterly.

Rawland has already introduced it's version of the Enduro Allroad in the forthcoming "Ravn", which looks to be available as a high component level complete bike or a frameset.

Rawland Cycles - Quality Production, Custom Qualities

Here is Rawland's illustration of a Ravn:

unterhausen

interesting that he didn't go with 650b

corwin1968

In the latest BQ he states that the goal was a tire with 70% more air volume than a 650B x 42 and the same overall wheel+tire diameter as 650B x 42. The 26" x 55mm met those criteria. There were other reasons for going with 26", at least one of which was the smaller wheel allowed narrower chainstays and thus lower Q-factor road cranks versus MTB cranks (which he seems to hate).

unterhausen

I'm not a big fan of MTB cranks either

bikemig 

I'm skeptical that there is anything particularly new here.

ThermionicScott 

That's the way of evolution, though: incremental change, some things catch on, other things go by the wayside. I don't like the term "enduro", but I do like riding gravel on puffy tires, so I'll be interested to see how these bikes and tires do.

dwmckee

This looks quite interesting, but I struggle with a place to ride it in the heavily developed Northeast US. I just sold my last gravel bike with barely 500 miles on it. I had great plans when I built it but could never find anyplace around western PA to ride it.

Well, Spring is almost here so until they get the paving trucks rolling I guess our 'paved' roads could be a good proxy for gravel.

unterhausen

some of the more rural counties in Central Pa seem to be letting lesser-used roads go back to gravel. There is one road nearby where it is only paved for a short distance in front of each house

bikemig 

It's not like 26 inch wheel long distance road bikes haven't been around for a while (surly LHT comes to mind, or the bridgestone XO series bikes). Maybe the whole gravel thing will spark a renewed interest in 26 inch wheel road bikes; we'll see. I know I like my '93 bridgestone XO-2 a lot.

Maybe RUSA needs to innovate a bit and set up some long distance gravel events.

unterhausen

RUSA doesn't set up events, individuals do and RUSA sanctions them. I've seen discussions of gravel before, would you expand the time limits? I can't think of anything else to do, and that would be problematic. My gravel 200k is about 2/3 pavement. And I'm not sure how you would expand the time limits. Weaker climbers are pushing the normal time limits, but stronger climbers do it in about the same time they do a 200k with similar amounts of climbing.

bmike

I have organized a few mixed events (paved, dirt / gravel). The NERds are running the events now in the NE and VT, but the Fall Classic was my original 110k and 200k fall event, and I used to do a 'Cafe Cruise' 100k on dirt / pavement in the spring.

VT Fall Classic 2012 « littlecircles

I've ridden the route on my IF with 28s, my IF with cross tires in 35, and my Fargo with 29r 2.1.
I agree with unterhausen that if the terrain and conditions (road or weather) aren't balanced, riders who normally finish 200k events with little time to spare might not finish gravel or mixed terrain events.

There's a whole lot of gravel riding going on, if organized events are your thing:
Gravel Grinder News | YOUR SOURCE FOR INFORMATION ON GRAVEL ROAD BASED RACING AND RIDING.

corwin1968

The Bridgestone XO series is the only thing I can think of that may be similar but I suspect that even the XO's don't share the performance characteristics of this new type of bikes. The LHT is a touring bike and not even remotely like the new category of bike. These are basically racing quality frames with racing quality 26" x 55mm tires. I can't think of anything that even comes close.

bikemig 

That's very cool. Still the idea of RUSA and gravel might be a nice US of A innovation on an old tradition.

bikemig 

Yeah the idea of long distance events using performance oriented bikes on gravel roads is completely new:



You're kidding about the LHT, right? To say that is not "remotely like the new category of bike" you mention is way over the top. Sure it's a touring bike but it can handle any of the roads you are talking about for a lot less money than the "new" uberexpensive rando bike you mention. There is something to be said for road bikes with 26 inch wheels that can take fat tires but this is not a new idea. @ThermionicScott in post no. 6 had it right; at best this is an incremental and evolutionary change, not a revolutionary one.

In terms of the "performance characteristics" of the Bridgestone XO series versus this "new breed" of bike, sure. Bikes have gotten lighter and the material being used to manufacture bikes and bike parts have been transformed by new technologies; there is no radical new understanding of frame geometry though that makes old bikes obsolete. I'll take my XO-2 on any roads you want to ride your "new" breed of bike; the only thing holding the bike back is the rider, :

ThermionicScott 

Depending on the gravel/unroad content, I think applying a certain conversion factor to the distance makes more sense than altering the time limit. For example: 100 km instead of 100 miles, 125 km instead of 200 km, etc. Something in the ballpark of 2/3, or the usual factor we apply to convert km to miles seems to work well. A riding buddy and I were interested in starting a "gravel brevet series" at one point, but then his LBS job sucked away his interest in riding and it fell through.

bmike

any rush member can setup an event if they coorperate with a local RBA.
there are a few rusa sanctioned events that have mixed terrain components.

and permanents... any member can set those up too.

FWIW, I think gravel / dirt / mixed terrain riding doesn't exactly fit with where RUSA and ACP are at.
Rides using the spirit of RUSA rules, etc. make sense, but...

And, our dirt roads here can be in better shape than our paved roads.
Gravel? Not so much depending on when they grade, etc.
So, things can be fast or slow, depending on weather, primarily, and then surface condition (influenced by weather, multiplied by terrain.... there are some pretty gnarly climbs and descents on the Fall Classic.

MileHighMark

Thorn has been building similar bikes for many years.

corwin1968

I think you are reading more into this than is actually there. I never claimed these bikes are a revolutionary jump, just a new addition to the current bicycle market.

My excitement about these new bikes is actually because of the tires. In fact, these new bikes would be totally inappropriate for me, being a rather large clydesdale.

I've been wanting a fat, high quality 26" tire for some time and Jan is now providing them. If I ever do a new build to utilize these tires (as opposed to putting them on one of my old MTB's) it will almost certainly be an LHT (or the equivalent custom from R&E or Co-Motion). I still maintain that the LHT, a stout touring bike that a very large percentage of people who ride one describe as being a "dog" when ridden unloaded, is in no way comparable to a light tubing, racing oriented frame. It's like comparing an SUV to a sports car. Both are cars and both will get you where you want to go but they are each specialized for a specific task and many people prefer a more specialized tool.

unterhausen

it will be interesting to see if they can reverse the trend away from 26" tires.

I am planning some dirt road 100k perm routes, they are low on my priority list due to the fact that the roads have 3" of ice on them right now. In a couple of months they will be nice riding though.

As far as route planning/events go, I think that I am fairly normal in that it took me 5 years to really get around to making a permanent. I am about to submit a route that I thought of when I started randonneuring 6 years ago, but I didn't really think seriously about making it a perm until I had been riding a while. There weren't many perms in Pennsylvania when I started, now the number is increasing, but still not a whole lot.

Darth Lefty 

It's funny he's calling it enduro, as that also refers to a mountain bike event akin to stage rally where the downhill portions are timed but the rider must pedal uphill as a liason stage. The bikes used are 5-6" travel, and sometimes called all-mountain. An all-mountain enduro bike would bear little resemblance to an enduro all-road bike, but they might both have 650b wheels.

rhm

I realize most of my remarks have been covered already, but... I think even Heine understands 650b is a bit of an oddball size. If you have to scrounge for tires in the middle of nowhere, you're better off scrounging for 559 mm bcd than 584.
do you mean the absurd length? There are situations, off road, where the extra leverage (and the bb height it requires) will let you keep riding and regular road geometry won't. But unless you're going over helmet sized rocks, I agree. Short cranks and lowered bb make more sense. But the bizarre thing is, Heine favors 171 mm cranks, which I regard as pretty long. Certainly closer to the MTB standard (175) than what I ride (165 max). So maybe I don't get it. New technology? No indeed. But the thing is, he wants this to be top notch quality and super light weight. At my weight (165 lbs) I am frankly skeptical that different frames feel different, but I have enough friends in the 190-230 lb range who really feel the difference in different steels etc. So to a rider at my weight, a frame made of high end steel with very thin walls is always intriguing. And one made for fat 559 mm tires, all the more so. What's new, it seems to me, is only the availability. But...

Okay, you have my attention. Got linkie?

Chris Pringle

What don't you like about them?

Wilfred Laurier

I have never met or dealt with Jan Heine, but he seems to spend a lott of time and energy inventing things that have already been invented.

bikemig 

+ 1.

corwin1968

Jan's beef with MTB cranks is their width or Q-factor. He says he finds them very uncomfortable.

Also, the new tires might be great for your UTB's!