You could certainly make it work, however for long distance touring the rear end will be a bit too short.

One thing that also doesn't get any mention, is that you can fit drop handlebar extensions to flat XC bars.

Good touring bikes often have more attachment points for gear than gravel bikes do.

Depends on what surface you are touring on! The majority of tour divide peeps use a mtb because of comfort and that's actual gravel

@@jon_underscore the salsa journeyer has a million bolts everywhere. Some brands are better about it than others

I mean francis also has sponsorships from garmin and scott. Just something to keep in mind.

I'm an avid road cyclist, but want to get in to something off road. So yeah this is useful to me without being new to cycling.

@@happykanye he’s got sponsorships but so far haven’t seen him say that a Scott foil is going to magically make you super quick or that it’s next thing since sliced bread. He’s sponsored but doesn’t live and breathe them.

​@@thebudgetcyclist4310yep most GCN vids are ads, sometimes set in some interesting context... Some times not.

GCN was also like that, before Eurosport bought them few years ago👍

Like a fat tire bike?

@@parvapatel6335 that or something like a salsa Fargo or surly ghost grappler.

Bridge Club, Brother Cycles Big Bro, Ogre

As a gravel bike rider, I completely agree with you. I used a hardtail with different tires for it.

The way I see it, with an XC bike you can put thinner/slicker tires, different bar and just lock the suspension and you have a gravel bike. You can never turn a gravel bike into a capable mountain bike.

For bike packing I always pick my Gravel Bike. For single tracks off course a Hardtail

@@Qlickyyour comment summs it up perfectly!

I am in Croatia at coast in south , and I cannot remember any significant gravel road here . Nice MTB hardtail and you can even commute in city , better than with any other bike . It's bike for all purposes , and most people like that - to be able to just jump to sidewalk , to ride in really bad roads , to just go in parks and nature . And 99% of people do not need 10 kg carbon mtb hardtail , they would be good aluminium , 14 kg bike , and bike will be durable and safe to ride for decade or longer . I hate to see that guy in video was so desperate and frustrated when he saw that his bike is 'heavy' at 10 kg . I have seen too many people here ( Dubrovnik ) who buy great bikes and then they are not riding it . I have 1000$ MTB and I like it . Bike riding does not suppose to be easy as walk at park at slow pace . It's heavy sometimes , I just jump off my bike at uphill and walk beside the bike . Why would I spend all my energy on one impossible hill .

Exactly!! Over here in Canada we have thousands of KM of gravel roads… where a gravel is the perfect tool.

Horses for courses, yes. I don't see gravel bikes as gravel surface specific though. I think of them as meant for smooth off road withouth very steep climbs/descents or technical sections. Whether the tracks are gravel or more clay based it goes down to tyre choice, I think. I live in the UK and I find most off road riding hardly justifies a MTB, apart from comfort. It is mostly flat with the odd hill in between and hardly any big boulders, except perhaps in Scotland, Wales, and the odd bit in Northern England. I am able to ride slick road tyres in most of flat off road tracks, unless it is winter. I never found myself unable to ride off road with my gravel tyres, even when I was living in an area with rolling hills. It is not the most comfortable ride though. I come from a mountaineous region in sourthern europe where even a hardtail is often lacking off road, let alone a gravel bike. 1800m of elevation over 75k is very much the norm and there are rocks and boulders everywhere. Gravel bikes are only suited to forest tracks, which means most riders have road or MTB only. MTB are definitely more suited and more comfortable off road, although they are also more costly to maintain due to suspension forks and/or shocks, which I don't think many realise and could perhaps been highlighted. Unless the terrain asks for one, I prefer a drop bar bike with wider tyres. More versatile and easier to maintain. I don't think hardtails and gravel bikes are comparable at all, they are just suited to different terrains.

I like to ride my gravel bike on my local trails. I am under biked and it's awesome!!

@Andrew Brown There is plenty of gravel in the UK.

Thanks so much for watching 👊

You can fit drop handlebar extensions to flat bars, the only benefit is aerodynamics against a headwind.

@@JP-hr7ch uhm, okay. But I just switched from dropbars to flats, so I don't need that 🙂

@@jensthimmvalsted1000 LOL It's just a potential option, but whilst aerodynamically functional in a headwind, they're not aesthetically good looking at all :(

​@@JP-hr7ch my GT grade that I converted to flat bars looks pretty good.

@@johnfowler4820 Ye flat bars always look better.

I'm still used to mtb harddtails with 20-10 old geo and I even find them too steep and twitchy, but I have to say it was intoxicating jumping on a road/hybrid and feeling what it was like on a bike so light that a single pedal stroke would let me coast up an incline and slice back and forth through turns with barely any mass to feel in the way, but good god that feels dangerous to someone used to knobs that hook into everything for traction. The hybrid/gravel rocket feeling offroad is addicting if you got the privilege of places to use it but I always have the fear that slick/tiny knob tires will suddenly give out and send me into a guard rail/ditch

What will happen if you attach skinny tires to mtb ? How will it perform on right road with zero elevation ?

@@sauravbasu8805 I used to run a rigid MTB on 26, "28mm slicks, probably 2-4mph slower on the flat than my road bike.

What about a rigid 26er?

And locking out the fork when climbing to prevent the bob when pedaling. An XC hardtail is far more versatile because it can ride road (not as fast, but can do it) and handle far rougher terrain. If you're talking versatility, the hardtail beats a gravel bike every day of the week. What it comes down to is expectations. Where I live, it's fairly flat. So I just use my fixie as a single speed for roads. Gears aren't that necessary. If I'm riding somewhere and I don't know what the roads are going to be like, then I take the XC bike with 100mm suspension that I converted to single speed (again, flat terrain) with XC tires with smaller knobs than the ones on the bike in the video. It's basically my, "I don't know what road conditions are like and I'm riding in an area where hopping onto a curb at a moment's notice might be necessary" bike. I'm not worried about speed, so a gravel bike is fairly useless to me. Plus, that "slack" 69 degree head angle is far more stable at speed on the few downhill spots I find, or when I'm sending stairs because I'm cutting across a plaza.

I can attest to the back wheel of a gravel bike losing grip on a steep downhill and sweeping away from under you like a tablecloth trick under the silverware. Luckily I fell next to the sharp rocks and not on top of them. By aero bars you mean like the TT kind of aero bars?

Yep, something for the flats so you can get your body forward.

I went with tt bars on a 2016 giant xtc. Bike packing, commuting. Very useful for distance & for boosting av. speed!

What is your opignion on Schwalbe Thunder Burt tires as a choice for XC hardtail...

​@@stefanlukic7272 love thr Thunder Burts! Have always ridden them on my xc full sus Cannondale Scalpel. Finished 23rd overall at Dirty Kanza one year. They're fast, with good traction and stability. Just ordered another set for my new Trek Super Caliber. I will also ride my Super Caliber on gravel 100%.

👋

That's what has me considering a gravel bike too (in my case probably building something budget using older parts), I think I'd enjoy a road bike for long distance but... this is probably a pretty global thing, but around where I am in the US, there's a *lot* of rough roads. You'd think a 4-lane mini-highway ("stroad") would be nice and smooth and fast, but there's potholes and crappy patch jobs and ripples at stoplights, etc etc... I wouldn't dare trying to take on some of these streets without a bit more grip and cushion, at least at my skill level. Way nicer to be a bit overbiked for rough terrain when you don't know the condition of the roads ahead, and having that option to say "I'm not touching that" when you come across some 60MPH highway route all of a sudden and you've got some gravel trail nearby as a safer route. Likewise I'm coming from usually riding an MTB, so that's also a factor. Gravel bike is the good compromise for someone with a MTB background looking to pick up a bit more speed without going all the way into a road bike.

I ride MTB and Road and I really hate that there is so much prejudices against the other in both worlds.

the tools are the same btw ;)

@@5amba True enough, the tools don't actually change (unless it's something super-specific). Mostly just parts

@@5ambait’s all riding

What a boss! "Gravel" goes way back 🤯🤯

Didn't they release a gravel bike with 70mm travel suspension on the front a while back? I'm sure I remember these guys or maybe gcn doing a video on it.

@@davidmidcalf3470 now you mention it, I do vaguely recall that now. I think that’s all it would need, or less even, just to stop the biggest jolts on the wrists. I’ve just ordered a suspension seat post for my gravel bike too, so I’m hoping that’ll take good care of my undercarriage too 😂 but only time will tell!

how long was your commute overall? I'm killing myself on whether to get a gravel or mtb for my new bike. I have trails 10-30 minutes away from me (on bike). Have ridden MTB most of my life, but my mtb is 23 years old so not too different from a gravel bike in terms of thin (flat) handlebar, smaller wheels. I threw some cheap front suspension on it years ago. I'm trying to decide between an xc flattail like the trek x-caliber or procaliber, or an equivalent gravel like the trek checkpoint. If I go with the MTB I'm going to opt for slimmer wheels, probably ~50-55cm / 2 to 2.3nch range, get some bar clips for hand positions, maybe slim the bar a little.

@@osafoca 26km each way, 52km in total

knobs definitely do add resistance - the gap created by those cuts creates a sort of non-smooth circle to repeatedly push over. if we imagine a smooth circle rolling turning into an octagon, or even a square, we would intuit that chunk-chunk-chunk effort as you push the shape off the virtual flat area created by having multiple contact points instead of just one perfectly centered one (like a 120 psi road slick). plus, because they're softer, your watts are going into deformation instead of stiffly efficient forward motion

@@BrennanLetkeman there are quite new studies debunking this myth. "Cuts" of contact patch created by knobs in fact decrease rolling resistance. Empty space between the knobs does not add additional resistance. Road slicks work great for road cycling because a wide, unified contact patch creates better stability on the flat, hard tarmac and reduces power losses when accelerating (knobs bends). So yeah, an extra knobby tire with the same pressure and the same width as a slick tire will have lower rolling resistance. If you don't believe me then find some gearhead and ask him how gas mileage on his car changes when switching from average tires to slicks or semi-slicks. In cars we're dealing with much greater powers and obvious indicator of gas mileage, hence the difference is more visible

That doesn’t make sense.

@@JimmidNicholls Illustrative all the Road Party video series, clinging on the drops for dear life

That would be my Salsa Fargo

​@@arcoulant87 I have a Salsa Vaya with Red shift suspension stem. Great addition on bad roads. I ride gravel most days. A lot

@@Mosely2007 Yes I to have a redshift stem when I use the straight fork and they are very good

Agreein the drops of a wide flared dropbar for better control.. that's the way to ride trails on a gravelbike 👍🏼

I ride trails with 380 bars, no flare just fine