Cyclocross, Gravel & Touring

Marin Lombard

Marin Lombard 1

You can call it a gravel bike if you want. I’d say that with 700 x 40c tires the surface upon which you travel is almost irrelevant. Gravel, cobblestones, asphalt, wood chips, whatever you happen to find, just ride on it.

So there’s the 40mm-wide tires. You also get a lightweight aluminum frame and fork, Shimano Sora drivetrain components (that are very precise and reliable) and Tektro mechanical disc brakes (powerful, as well as precise and reliable). The drop bars are wide, so your steering control is really good on sketchy terrain. The saddle was pretty comfortable while test riding in jeans, so I’d have to imagine it’s fantastic when paired with cycling shorts.

So this is an all-condition road/gravel/commuter bike with good parts and a pretty reasonable price around $1200.

Marin Gestalt

Marin Gestalt 1

In case you’re not familiar with the term, Gestalt is a whole that is more than the sum of its parts.

Marin named these bikes quite well. These are great bikes that give you more than the component list (or the prices) would suggest.

The Gestalt series aluminum frame is smooth and light (actually a bit lighter and springier than the steel Marin Nicasio or Surly’s Straggler frame). All Gestalts come with a fender and front-rack ready carbon fork. The Gestalt versions that have mechanical (as opposed to hydraulic) brakes rely on the powerful Tekro Spyre models.

Marin Gestalt

All of these bikes feature internal cable runs and the gravel-ready 32mm WTB Exposure tires. In order to keep the prices reasonable, the Gestalt 1 comes with Shimano Sora components. The Gestalt 2 is equipped with a Shimano Tiagra drivetrain and the Gestalt 3 upgrades to hydraulic disc brakes.

Marin Four Corners

Marin Four Corners

“Four Corners” as in the middle of the American west where Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and Nevada come together. Buy this bike and plan a tour there yourself. It’s a versatile touring bike, and I’d bet a tour of that length would be enjoyable whether you rode along the paved shoulders of secondary highways, along the Great Divide trail or rumbling down gravel roads.

This is a great bike for century rides on the pavement, gran Fondos and gravel rides, long commutes, and just regular road or off-road rides with your friends.

This is a bike designed perfectly for the vast majority of Pacific Northwest riders.

If you can get over your whole “I might need a bike for a triathlon someday” delusion, this is the bike for you. Fenders, bags and cromoly tubing may not be very aerodynamic, but they sure make your bike ride a pleasant experience.

This bike has loaded-touring frame geometry with a slightly longer wheelbase and slack front end geometry, meaning that it’s a gravel bike with touring geometry that has been tweaked just a bit. The bike is comfortable for really long rides, and it will carry all of your gear without being too squirrely. The tires are 700c x 42mm wide and 650b x 57mm (2.1” mountain bike tires) will fit if you’re planning on even more rugged use. The frame is made out of cromoly steel, which delivers a springy, compliant ride quality.

The Four Corners has everything you want. It comes with mounts for 5 water bottles as well as racks & fenders, it has a triple crankset (pretty awesome in an era with so many single front chainring bikes), a WTB Volt saddle, Shimano Sora components (with a triple crankset for really low low gears) and TRP cable-actuated disc brakes. All for around $1100.

Bianchi Arcadex

Bianchi Arcadex w/GRX Di2

When you look at all of the options out there in high-performance gravel bikes, sometimes it’s hard not to get a little sleepy.

Every brand seems to have a Shimano GRX equipped carbon gravel bike. They all have swept-out drop bars, 47mm wide WTB tires, dropped seatstays that meet the seat tube just above the spot where a front derailleur used to go, water bottle cage bolts in seven or eight different spots on the bike, color options limited to matte black and “sand”. The worst part has to be the names. The names have to be all about getting back to some rural fantasy that seems completely at odds with the high-tech-hi-fidelity nature of the bike in question. The Wheat Thresher. Birch Rambler. Corn Husk. Gravel Roam. Dirt Wanderer.

This Bianchi will keep you awake. It’s blocky like a (super aerodynamic) robot. The signature celeste color has been an attention grabber for at least 80 years. The electronic shifting makes cool servo-motor sounds. They named it Arcadex! I don’t even know what that means! Exciting!

Bianchi Impulso Allroad

Allroad GRX800

You can call it a gravel bike, but this one is for roadways and trails made of asphalt, gravel, cobblestones, dirt, wooden boards, bricks or cement.

The 40mm wide tires will feel stable and squishy (yet still pretty fast) regardless of the road surface. The wide but shallow drop bars should make you feel comfortable and in control wherever you roll, and the Shimano GRX components should work well enough that you forget about the parts on your bike and just enjoy the ride.

The whole “gravel bike” thing might seem like the bike fad of the month, but it’s not. Gravel bikes really are what we’ve always wanted: One bike that does everything really well. It’ll go fast when you feel like going fast. You can ride these bikes safely and comfortably no matter the surface, terrain or traffic. You can carry a lot of stuff with you or leave it all behind.

The E-Allroad comes with a motor too.

Speaking of stuff, If you want this bike for commuting or long-distance touring, it’ll be easy to set this one up the way you want it. Bottle cages, fenders and racks fit just fine (in fact there are hidden holes where the fender struts slide in and secure).

If you’d like a bit of help up the hills, there’s the Impulso E-Allroad with an Ebikemotion X35 motor installed.  Three standard assist levels plus one triggered by your heart rate (if you wear a heart rate monitor).  The E-Allroad weighs only 28 pounds so it’s fast even with the motor turned off!

Ritchey Breakaway Cross & Outback

Breakaway Cross/Touring

These are the Swiss Army Knives of bicycles. Versatile, comfortable and fast, these bikes can be used for nearly every cycling scenario you can dream up.

Breakaway Steel Cross and Outback models usually get built up as “Gravel” bikes with knobby tires, low gear ranges and upright positioning, making them ideal for off-road touring and foreign adventures. That said, they handle really well on the road too, so a set of slick tires will turn these models into great choices for touring or commuting. Wanna race? The framesets are super light, they sprint and climb well (even if you don’t) so try one of the Seattle Cyclocross events or the Whistler Gran Fondo on your Ritchey. Flat bars, drop bars, 42mm wide knobbies or 25mm slicks, the configurations are almost limitless.

Outback Carbon with disc brakes

These Ritcheys come with a suitcase, and the big feature with the bikes is that they disassemble and fit into this case so you can take them with you wherever you go. The frame coupling system is secure and really simple, and we can show you how to pack your bike up and travel with them. The travel case flies under the radar (so to speak) so you won’t get hit up for oversize baggage fees like you would when flying with a standard bike.

The coupling system is slick. The frame, which comes apart into two pieces, is joined at the top by the seatpost (and you can use a carbon fiber seatpost if you want, it’s plenty strong) and a small clamp on the downtube. It’s a simple design, and probably more secure than the bulky S & S coupling system used by most custom frame builders. The break-away feature adds less than 100 grams.

All packed up and ready to roll

It’s a bit of a puzzle, but it all fits.

Frame clamp and cable connectors

Ritchey Break-Away cross frames designed for cantilever-style brakes are made out of custom heat treated cromoly tubing and come a with carbon fork. The Outback model framesets are all carbon and are designed around disc brakes (mechanical or hydraulic). Both styles come in a wide range of sizes.

Ultegra build

Outback with Di2 and hydraulic brakes

These bikes are semi-custom since they come to us as framesets. Here are a few of the builds we have done over the years (click on the thumbnail images to enlarge them).

Steel framesets run $1500 so complete bikes usually run between $2400 and $4500. The Outback frame is $3100, so a whole bike would usually run between $4000 and $5500. Have donor parts from an old bike or a dusty corner of your garage? Bring in what you have and we’ll sketch out a build list.

We believe in these bikes.  Both Paul and Jaime ride their Ritchey Breakaways daily, and hope to travel some day with them…

Marin Nicasio

Marin Nicasio

Steel is real.

That’s what everybody says, steel is real. Really comfortable, really affordable, really smooth riding and classic looking.

The Marin Nicasio has a steel frame and fork and it may just be your next favorite bike. The Nicasio is outfitted with a Shimano Claris drivetrain, Promax mechanical disc brakes, durable 32-spoke wheels and 30mm puncture resistant (but still nice riding) tires. It has a familiar smooth ride that reminds us of road bikes from the 1980′s. Actually, the price reminds us of the ’80′s too. It’s under $800.

Bicycling magazine named the Nicasio “One of the best 17 road bikes of 2018″

Masi CXRC

Masi CXRC Expert

If you’re only going to have one bike to do it all, this Masi is a great choice.

A great commuter bike for riders in the Pacific Northwest, the carbon frame won’t rust.  There is no paint to chip off (it’s bare carbon with a few decals impregnated into the carbon).  The disc brakes work great in the rain, and with no brake wear on your rims your wheels will last a lot longer.  The bike will also handle a wide range of tire sizes and still have room for fenders.

Take your commuter fenders off of the Masi and you have a great cyclocross racer with the 33mm knobby tires. Put 42mm wide tires on it and you can ride rutted logging roads and gravel in comfort for hours. Switch out the entire wheelset for a fat 650b setup and you’ll have a drop-bar mountain bike.

This is a comfortable bike with performance and adaptability to spare.

Masi CXGR

Masi CXGR steel

Cyclocross bike or gravel bike or disc-brake road bike?
Masi has a family of bikes that fit into all of these categories but are defined by none of them.
Masi’s CXGR series are just good bikes that do everything pretty well.
The idea behind the CXGR bikes is that you can blur the lines of different road bike categories and make a versatile and fun bike. Take a long haul touring bike and make the handling sportier. Take a cyclocross bike, lower the bottom bracket height for better on-road manners, then add rack & fender eyelets. Take a road bike, install disc brakes and give it some beefy tires and rims so it can handle a tough urban commute.

With the stock 40mm wide 700c tires you get better handling in the gravel and mud than a typical cyclocross set-up, without the bouncy (and somewhat slow) feel from truly obese 650b wheels.

Masi  Randonneur

Masi Randonneur

This is a great bike for century rides, long commutes, short commutes, dirt roads, gravel paths and just regular road rides with your friends.

This is a bike designed perfectly for the vast majority of Pacific Northwest riders.

If you can get over your whole “I might need a bike for a triathlon someday” delusion, this is the bike for you. Fenders and cromoly tubing may not be very aerodynamic, but they sure make your bike ride a pleasant experience.

This bike has randoneering frame geometry, meaning that it’s a road bike with touring geometry that has been tweaked just a bit. The bike is comfortable for really long rides, and it will carry all of your gear without becoming too squirrely. The wheels are the 650b size with 47mm wide tires and Masi has still managed to fit fenders on the bike. The frame is made out of cromoly steel, which delivers a springy, compliant ride quality.

The Randonneur has everything you want. It comes with stainless steel fenders, a compact crank (with a 32/48 tooth gear range), classic style, Shimano Tiagra components and TRP cable-actuated disc brakes.

Masi Randonneur Elite

I just said the Randonneur has everything that you want.  If I’m wrong about that, and what you want includes a really bright generator headlight and Shimano 105 components, then check out the Randonneur Elite.

The dynamo light puts out what looks like 1000 lumens, certainly enough light to make you swear off rechargeable lights for good. The Shimano 105 parts pack an extra cog onto the rear hub (compared to the Tiagra 10-speed stuff) and you get an even lower low gear.

Velo Orange Polyvalent

V.O. Polyvalent

Gravel! Disc Brakes! Steel! Retro! 650b!

Oh my god, there are so many bicycle buzzwords today. If you’d like a bike that has them all (except “electric”), consider this Velo Orange Polyvalent.

It rides beautifully loaded down with stuff as well as bare bones like you see it in our photo. The bike is actually cool (sorry Rivendell, no matter how hard you try nobody will ever consider your bikes or tan corduroy pants cool), and the attention to detail is fantastic.

Velo Orange has all of the attachment points and frame angles figured out to make touring a breeze. The tubing is nice quality, so the bike ends up a bit lighter than a Surly (and the finish is better looking and more durable as well).

Available as a frameset or a complete bike.

Colnago Prestige Cyclocross

Colnago Prestige cyclocross

Colnago and racers like Sven Nys and Wout van Aert have been at the top of the cyclocross world for decades.

Colnago makes the best performing, most stylish and safest cross bikes in the world.  Great handling with the best forks ever made for cyclocross, flat sections integrated into the frame for shouldering the bikes, and perfect tubing choices for weight and ride quality.

In cross, safety is paramount, and Colnago is one of only a handful of manufacturers to have achieved the ISO 9001 quality certification. It’s nice to know that your 17 pound cyclocross bike isn’t going to fall apart while you are attempting that scary flyover or hopping a barrier.

Works with internal Di2 wiring or traditional cables

The Prestige even gets used on the road occasionally. The UAE team raced  Paris-Roubaix and the Tour of Flanders on their Prestige Cyclocross bikes!

Think that a Colnago Cyclocross bike is too fancy for you?  Consider this:  At $2200, Prestige framesets run about $200 more than Felt’s top of the line, but Colnago makes theirs in twice the size increments and they come with headsets and a Colnago coffee mug.

Surly Long Haul Trucker

Surly Long Haul Trucker

Planning a tour that will take you off of the beaten path?
The Long Haul Trucker from Surly might be the bike for you.
Surly makes their loaded touring bikes out of tough steel tubing and finishes them with thick paint that will handle weird adventures and lots of abuse.
The Trucker has mounts for front and rear racks, fenders, and 3 bottle cages. Available as bare frames, Surly’s are easy to customize (they come with road-bike style drop bars, our pictured bikes are customized with upright bars for a long adventure across Russia).

Custom Long Haul Trucker

Are you really tall or really small? The Trucker comes in a frame size that will fit (and in 26″ or 700c wheel-size options).
Sure these bikes can be a little strange-looking (especially the tall versions with the small wheels), but sometimes you want something a little different, something a little less “corporate”, or something a bit more personal.

Available with disc or rim brakes.

All-City Space Horse

All-City Space Horse

You might be a rider who likes the idea of a steel touring bike.
You read Bicycle Quarterly and understand the appeal of wide road tires, generator lights and Brooks saddles. 400 kilometer long brevets with the Seattle Randonneuring club may be in your future, or you may just want a nice bike for commuting.
There are a few bike companies out there who understand what you want. Kona makes the Rove and Surly has the Long Haul Trucker, but you may want something a little more unique. It looks to you like a new Rivendell might be the way to go, if not for a few quirks about their design philosophy (old-fashioned cantilever brakes, quill-style handlebar stems).

All-City has it all figured out. This bike takes disc brakes and uses modern handlebar stems and headsets. The Space Horse frameset gives you the all-day comfort of the Kona Rove and comes in the versatile frame-only option like a Surly, without the goofy Rivendell quirks. The Space Horse is made from springy double-butted cromoly tubing. The fork has a fair amount of rake (so it will steer well with bags and other gear on the front end) and has a beautiful flat-plate crown.
Buy the Space Horse as a frameset or have us build it up with your favorite parts (the pictured bike came out for less than $1600).
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Surly Straggler

Surly Straggler

Call the Straggler a “gravel bike”.

Call the Straggler a “cyclocross bike”.

Call the Straggler a “commuter bike”.

Maybe you should call the Straggler “My bike”.

Surly has made a versatile and fun bike here with the Straggler. The handling and performance characteristics are squarely in the cyclocross world. The bike has a little bit shorter wheelbase than the Long Haul Trucker, so it climbs and sprints better than a dedicated touring bike.  There is ample room for fenders and fat tires, and there are accessory mounts all over the bike.  The cromoly steel frameset is durable and rides great.  The Straggler is the most “modern” road bike that Surly offers, as it comes equipped with both STI shift levers and disc brakes right out of the box!
Available as a frameset or a complete bike in over a dozen sizes.

Retrotec and Inglis Cross

Retrotec Triple model

Twin model cross

Interested in a cross bike or a commuter that will turn heads?

Want something just a little different, maybe with disc brakes or a single speed?  Do you want fender mounts, rack mounts, a custom light bracket, or more room for wide tires?

Maybe you’re just too damn tall, and your current bike was made for a shrimp.  You want to go custom this time.

Retrotec triple style

Disc brake or cantilever

Get precisely what you want.  Have Curtis make an Inglis or Retrotec cross bike specifically for you.

If you can imagine it, chances are that Curtis can build it.  He utilizes many different techniques (lugs, tig welds, fillet brazing) and many different tubing styles to make your dream bike.

About our website…

Buy it now

You may have noticed that many of the bikes on our website are lacking prices.
We also seem to be missing an “add to shopping cart” button.
These omissions are purposeful.
We like bikes. We like you. We want you to ride a bicycle that works well, fits you correctly, and is appropriate for the kinds of riding that you like to do.
We can’t make all of this happen through a website.
If you want a new bike, come in to Classic Cycle. Talk to us. Touch the bicycles. You can ride around Winslow, and see what the different models have to offer.
Come in to the shop and try out the bikes that interest you. Ask for our opinions and get some concrete facts. With us you’ll know who is behind the product review.
Sit at our bar and watch bike racing on the television or experience a bit of our little museum.
Spend some time here so Jaime can show you clothing and accessories that will resolve the little issues that nag at you while you ride.
Paul will assemble your bike with the same attention to detail that went into building bikes for two Olympic Games and countless professional racers.
Leave the UPS guy alone. He can’t help you put that mail-order bike together…