I've gotta agree with the other posters. The FX is definately a bicycle designed for riding on roads and I suspect the 7100 is just a "comfort" version of the FX. The "hybrid" or "cross" part of these bikes refers to riding on dirt or gravel "roads" or at the very worst, hard packed, smooth dirt or grass. My FX would handle hard packed dirt or grass just fine but the problem there is unseen ruts, holes, rocks, etc... It did not do well with those types of things.