We started with a SOMA Double Cross frame. The Tange Prestige steel tubing is light, durable and the Cyclocross geometry offered the right blend of fast handling, generous tyre clearance and a less aggresive cockpit than his road bike. A Tange carbon fork saves precious grams over the lugged steel fork we usually use, but still does a good job of damping road buzz. A Chris King headset pairs the two. For offroad and all weather capability disc brakes made the most sense. Tektro Spyre are our favourite to pair with standard road pull levers.
Riley loves the ergonomics and reliability of Campganolo so we opted for Centuar 10sp with a wide range 12-30 cassette. White Industries VBC cranks and chainrings are available in a wide range of options as they are not constrained by standard bolt circle diameters. Riley has started with a relatively ‘standard’ 48-34, but might change to something lower and less orthodox like a 44-30 if his ambitions of Gravel Grinding evolve into Bikepacking…
The wheelset on this bike is a favourite of ours. White Industries hubs – CX11 rear and MI6 front. We paired them up with H Plus Son Archetype rims as they are wide, nice and strong with their 25mm mid ‘section’ construction and not heavy. Being all black doesn’t hurt either. The tyres are a brand new offering from SOMA. The Cazadero is 700×42 (the carcass measures 40mm on the Archetypes) and has a mildy aggressive tread pattern, with a constant centre so they offer a nice blend of speed on road and gravel, with decent off road traction when you venture onto singletrack. The tan sidewalls are super supple and look spectacular.
A Brooks Cambium C17 saddle with a Thomson seatpost, stem and Deda compact bars complete the (very black) picture.
We love this bike, and Riley does too. It is a fun, fast and practical bike to commute on that will have Riley spending his week planning offroad adventures for the weekend.