Ride Reviews

Greg Scanlan raced this 2022 Specialized S-Works Crux to a win the men's 50-54 race during the first-ever USA Cycling Gravel National Championships in Gering, Neb, last September. If everything goes according to plan, he will race the same bike in the same town and get the same result on Sunday. The 58cm Crux is dripping with Dura-Ace and weighs in at 17.50 lbs. The only difference from last year is a shift from 38mm to 45mm tires.

Good luck to Greg and everyone racing on Sunday.

Last week I had the opportunity to shoot Whitney Allison's embarged ENVE Mog. Even though ENVE's new gravel frame wasn't publically acknowledged until today, Whitney and Zack Allison of Bike Sports had been successfully racing/testing them since late September. They picked them up just after the Utah Belgium Waffle Ride and shortly thereafter, Whit rode hers to a 2nd at BWR Kansas and 8th at Big Sugar. The pair's Mogs are nearly identically built with ENVE rims, bars, stem and dropper posts, Shimano Di2 GRX, WTB tires, and Ergon saddles.

As promised in yesterday's 10 Tracks episode, we're featuring Dylan Canfield's 2018 QU-AX RGB disc mountain unicycle in today's Ride Review. Since 2018 Dylan has logged roughly 1800 unipacking and muni miles on this 14.69lb (as pictured) 27.5" mountain unicycle. The stock version of Dylan's uni would cost about $750.00 and is a mixture of QU-AX and Kris Holm bits. QU-AX unicycles are designed in Germany and made in Taiwan. Kris Holm is a unicycle and unicycle parts brand out of Canada named after one of the pioneers of mountain unicycle riding.

Here's Andrew Morris' 2023 Santa Cruz Blur. There aren't too many of these around yet and even fewer with the RockShox Sid Ultimate and front and rear remote lockouts which were added by his dad, RJ. The seafoam Blur weighs in at 22.6lbs as shown. The 2021 High School Freshman National champion with forgo Colorado High School State Championships and will instead be racing it at Marathon Nationals on Oct 23rd in Frederick Maryland. Among other awesomeness, you'll notice a lack of shifter cables thanks to the electronic SRAM XX1 AXS 12spd derailleurs and shifters.

If you've been over to the ENVE site to check out the new Melee, you may have noticed Whit and Zack Allison have their mugs plastered all over the gotdanged thing. The Bike Sports pros are sponsored by ENVE and have been racing the Melee in both road and gravel races all summer. I had the opportunity to review Zack's 54cm setup. Whit's Melee is nearly identical to the build below with the exception of a 52cm frame, 110cm stem, 38cm bars, and an Ergon Women's Road saddle.

This is a special Ride Review for a couple of reasons; 1) This rad Trailcraft Cycles Maxwell 27.5, and all Trailcraft Cycles bikes are developed locally in Fort Collins by Brett and Ginger Rosenbauer. 2) Trailcraft Cycles came on as a YGR advertiser this past Spring sponsoring the Trailcraft Cycles Kid's Zone. 3) I gave this bike to my daughter Lucy after she rode her bike to school every.single.day last year and helped launch the Webber Middle School mountain bike club. I surprised/terrified her with it on the last day of school by replacing her commenter bike with it.  She initially thought her mom's 1958 Schwinn Starlet had been stolen from her usual parking spot until she saw her helmet dangling from the handlebar.  She finally put it all together when I rolled up on her laughing and videoing.

It's been a second since I've published a Ride Review but since Brannan Fix had such a great start to his 2021 Elite CX season, I figured I'd run this review of his 2020 Pratt CX bike that I've been sitting on.

This bike was a demo bike that Santa Cruz loaned me for the White Rim. She definitely had a rough life before she got to me, but given that I rarely ride a MTB, this is a nice retirement home for her, for the time being.

This week we're taking the bike Kristen Arnold rode for her Kokopelli FKT attempt on Oct 8th for a spin.