Cycling

Not sure if this is against the rules of this magazine, so please let me know. Back in the Reddit days, we'd post photos of our new bikes and title the posts "NBD" (new bike day).

I used to ride a 2016 Trek Émonda. I loved that bike, though sometimes I wished it was a bit more versatile when riding with the kids, on rough ground, etc. Anyway, at the height of the pandemic, in a bout of depression, I decided to just sell it. I almost immediately regretted it.

I’ve been looking for a replacement for a couple of years, trying to find something perfect, but not rushing. I wanted something that was more versatile, with more tire clearance, so figured I’d jump on the gravel bandwagon. I have weird body proportions (6’1“, but with a really long torso and an inseam of less than 32”, so finding a fit can be difficult. I wanted a bike with a stack of 600mm+, a reach at 400mm+, but also a standover as low as possible (like 770mm or less). Even with the wealth of gravel bike choices available right now, that didn’t leave a lot of options.

I decided to go with a 58cm Knolly Cache Steel, which I had to order in to my “local” Knolly dealer. It looked to be everything I wanted, and as a bonus, it’s Canadian-made, and it’s steel!

Some points:

• The frame is gorgeous. Lots of beautiful bends and elegant welds.
• I debated over going with a 1x or 2x drivetrain. I decided on the 2x, because I was nervous about running out of gears. I’m already glad that I did. I tend to push higher gears than others, and even with the 2x, I find myself riding in the highest gear somewhat regularly.
• I picked the grey colour, which in real life has much more of a blue/purple hue than expected, and the red lettering is much more of a hot fuchsia. Still, it has sort of a fun ’80s vibe.
• While this bike is a good 5 pounds heavier than the Émonda, and the tires offer more rolling resistance, in practice it doesn’t feel much slower than my old bike.
• Ordering a bike online can be very nerve-wracking when it comes to fit, especially for someone like me with weird body proportions. I had a good idea of what I was looking for from a geometry perspective, but one thing to note is that many dimensions can be measured in different ways from manufacturer to manufacturer. For example, the 58cm Cache has a listed standover of 717mm, but that number is so low partly because of the way Knolly measures: they measure right at where the top tube and seat tube connect (so not really where you wold stand over the bike), and I suspect they don’t take tire height into account, which in this case adds about 50mm+ to the actual measurement.