Marin Nicasio +

 

Marin Nicasio +   Size 52cm..
and my first dinner-plate sized cassette, 46-37-30-24-21-18-15-13-11

Fast forward from previous article where my SOMA Stanyan was being tweaked to death in anticipation of the next ??  --- a gravel bike which really isn't so much for the sake of riding gravels. 

Huh? 

Ok, that must have elicited some head scratching but of course I'm not ruling out riding on gravel of course.. In fact would soon be doing full offroad mtb trails with the above... The whole idea of a gravel bike was because after my 10+ years hiatus of not riding on the roads, I'm still queasy these few months when piling on the torque when on tarmac. 

Hence I wanted a rig capable of meandering pavement/pcn/road.. esp those interrupted pavements with lots of ups and down or kerbs.. My mtb is pushed up as a 26er+ with only a 30t front ring so long distance riding is a draggy slower affair. The SOMA as a single speed, while very capable and relatively agile but humping down kerbs or side-winding onto grass and then back onto pavement just isn't what it is cut out to do when countering pavement traffic.

The choice could have been a HT 29er on semi slicks but then I discovered what else people are going goo goo and ga ga these days--  Gravel Bikes! 

Yet as I read more.. it seems what I want would fit more into another of these new marketing terms. An ALL-ROAD...  much like the early days when AM (ALL MOUNTAIN) was "all" the rage then before it evolved to "Enduro" these days.

From 11 down to 2 and now back to 3 sets of wheels in the house...

Anyway...

Well, looking at the entire range, from custom frames costing 2 eyeballs all the way down to sub $1K complete rigs, the filtering started with stats/ numbers on the various bikes and frames early this year...   Next was pondering whether to build another state of the art , money guzzling bike or something that is just smooth and practical that will work for the kind of intended riding. 

...Followed by more mental weaving in between choosing 650B vs 700c wheels and 1x or 2x?.

Alluded in earlier post-- the spectrum is simply too wide for Gravel Bikes (or these All Road). Just got to make a decisive cut at some point.

Back to the drawing board and calculator...

 

... The  48/18 on the Stanyan gives me a Gear Inch (GI) ratio of ~71-72 -- this translates to about ~32-34km/h (neutral wind condition) on the flats at my optimal cadence without spinning out.

A GI ratio in the high 70s or low 80s would be perfect... Something I would get if I swap the front back to my 53t and achieve a GI of 78.48... but let's leave that for later. 

Numbers wise-- that GI would roughly translate to about 35-38km/h on the road at a smooth cadence for a reasonable distance.

Ok-- so if a 1 ring setup on a gravel bike can hit that or more-- than 1x it is.. As for the rear, will just have to see which drivetrain and cassette combo it comes with...

Still not 100% convinced as it is hard sometimes to extrapolate everything in the head. My last geared road bike was more than 10 years ago and certain things can only rely on memories of how "it feels" and those were based on full roadie setup with 23c rubbers... quite diff from things talked about here with grav. bikes today...

While still mulling.. a notification came up on Carousell for a Marin Nicasio Plus, a budget bike but which I have shortlisted from looking at its geom and reviews. 

Size is right --- CHECKED
Price looks right --- CHECKED

Made an appointment with seller and took a short ride-- confirms what I thought all along.  Smiling to myself , I was thinking it' really reinventing a non suspension 80s mountain bike and slapping it on with a drop bar.  Albeit modernize a little in terms of geom angles and a dinner plate sized cog on the cassette... Honestly it really reminded me of some of my old hardtails with 1.8-1.9" tires back in the good old days on canti/ vee brakes.

Heavy, no doubt but I've never been a weight weenie, however that feel good factor of being "one" with this bike is unmistakable.. so it followed me home after a quick transaction.

 

The Nicasio+ came with 11,13,15 for the 3 smallest cogs-- and I find myself mostly on the 15 after a week of getting it. Numbers wise on the GI its no surprise. The 13t is ok but felt it would be great to have something in between 13 and 15. Again numbers don't lie -- the 79.48 GI if there is a 14t cog at the back would be right where I wanted!

Geometry

It just happen that most of the geo numbers on the Nicasio is almost similar to the Stanyan and where they differ-- it is also where I hoped they would be.. ie slacker HA and a tad longer on the center-to front on the Nicasio that happily resolves the slight toe overlap issue present on the Stanyan.

One other bonus is the sloping top tube (and one feature this bike took priority over many others on my list). The size "52cm" is actually a 49cm seat tube.. This extra 3 cm allowing me to plonk one of my old dropper seatpost with max insertion and still not be too tall. 

The other thing is the ETT (effective top tube). Yes I know these days everyone talks about Stack and Reach more than TT lengths but for me calculation revolving around ETT has been ingrained for 20+ years and its hard to change..  525mm ETT has always been my magic number on a road bike-- this one is perfect, but is is the same for gravel geom vs a RB geom? 

Drivetrain : No idea of what the Microshift Advent drivetrain is like and looking at the price point online-- I have an initial bias. But to my surprise, by now I'm actually liking it a lot..

Did some tuning up as usual with any bikes I first get my hands on... only had to give the H-screw a couple of 1/4 turns to solve a jumpy niggle on the smallest cog.. I must say it has been flawless so far (and Im quite demanding in the aspect of drivetrain --coming from mostly XT, Ultegra and XTR, in the past).

Brakes : Mech disc brakes have come a long way too. I think my last mech disc brake was back in early 2000s Even these budget Mira now gives quite a good bit of stopping power. Most importantly-- rotors on this used bike ain't warped. Again all it took were minor adjustments to perfect things up.

Tires : It didn't come with the stock WTB as advertised on Marin website but instead with a pair of 1.75" Panaracer Gravel Kings. I consider these closer to road tires due to the smoothness of the thread and lack of grippy sideknobs than a true gravel/ off road rubber.. But GKs are known for holding decent speed on the roads.. Let's see....

By the way this is also my first 650B/ 27/5" bike. Having resisted when the entire world went 27.5" with MTB and stayed faithful to my 26ers.

Diameter wise, the 650B with 1.75 is similar to 700c on 28-35c but should give much better float and comfort.. But the question is how much will that have to be compensated for when trying to maintain speed on the tarmac? Surely it will feel "slower" than the Stanyan now?

There are still many questions and naggy thoughts on my mind at the beginning.. 

 "Zhng" Time

The bar I talked much about on the Stanyan-- has made it here too. The stock Marin 12 degree flare was ok but somehow I didn't like the bending at the hooks. While waiting for the new Controltech gravel riser... managed to find some matching SOMA bar tape right around the neighborhood when the whole world seems to be out of stock :).  I thought putting on the dropper would be easy enough.. Sure.. plonking a tube into another tube is not hard.. its the frigging tweaking with the lever which is simply not meant for drop bars.. .

Yes yes... 22.2mm , 24mm, 31.8mm.. all the diff diameters and diff clamp sizes. Something will always not fit and need some DIY. and for something that will fit nicely, I wasn't about to shell a 100 bucks USD.

 

To hack it all up... an after market lever with a clamp from a phone holder and a bit of Dremeling to fit a different sized screw later...

... with a little help from a wooden aromatherapy ball to improve the lever pressing ergonomics later... after an all out off road session as seen in pics below.

 TADA..........

Matching things to the hilt, I've even pulled out those super nice Berthoud Cycles bar end plugs gifted to me years ago. 

Everything just happen to go together color wise on this one...

Ok-- I'm trying to be "different" as usual... but as  always, form follows function and  it's all for practical purposes. A bell these days is indispensable especially since I'm zipping in and out on pavements and PCN on this bike. This is temporary until I can get my hands on the Knog Oi deluxe small later on.

 

 

 

And here is how it all fits nicely on the cockpit without excessive hand movements when hands are on the reach of the bar..

Ok time to ride...

 ... on a sidenote, was still contemplating on a mod that would involve panniers and racks that can be a  quick on/ quick off the bike depending on the mood of the day and a few other small blings.  

Ride Feel and summarizing...

Ok its not final-- latest change not shown here is going back to SPDs -these are simply more efficient pedaling over flats. Ironically I swapped out my spd to flats for riding mtb 12 years ago and thought I would never live to use SPD ever again! Yet in the world of gravel bikes where most are actually using flats-- I'm back on clipless.

Been a month and have put about 400km on it by now. including using it on my regular rabbit loops cardio training previously pulled by my Stanyan in the daily 1.33km x 20 laps. So it gives me a good idea how the 2 compares now. While I prefer the relatively stiffer feel of 700c wheels on the SOMA for a quicker spin up (and of course its also on 28c tires), the 1.75 Gravel King here isn't too shabby. But on long weekend rides up and down pavements and alternating with grass and road-- as it was intended of this bike, obviously that is where it shines over my singlespeed. 

Gravel? No problem of course-- pics above of ride at Chestnut and later in BT in full muddy splendour pretty much says its all doable though I did have to revert to my old XC ways of riding as opposed to my usual mtb bomb-away mode...

Niggles:  I don't like the front feel. The fork somehow translates some pretty harsh sensation. If there is one big dislike on this bike-- this is it. Maybe its just the combo with this tire or something. I can't really figure out. 

and the few "old" standards.. again the fork-- which runs on straight 1 1/8" steerer while most forks these days are tapered. This would make trying to swap to an after market fork even harder as most do not produce straight steerers these days ( I think...)

The other is QR-- While it works well enough but again it would have been great if Marin has put on through axle (TA) front and rear. Not many people go for QR now and if building a set of wheels, it would mean getting hubs that can have adapters that will take both QR and TA for future proofing and easy swap with other frames.

Having said-- even with these niggles, the Nicasio+ at its listed price point is still pretty attractive and yes it has been holding up to the rigors Im still putting it through.

State of things as itis now.. 17 May...   and putting back the rear rack it came with or maybe my Surly rack and add on 2 khaki colored canvas panniers?   Hmmm...

For now -- will just be riding the hell out of it. If I can be 90% happy with a cheap bike-- then transposing all the same numbers onto a dream custom build with a good builder would be the next probable course of action ;)

 

 

 

SOMA Stanyan: Road-Commuter-"Gravel" transition..

Different Angle But Same Same (all reach measurements when seated to various positions on the bar). well almost.. maybe ~0.5cm +/-

 

SOMA Hi-Riser Stem, it's a misnomer if you ask me. More of a hi-stack @ the steerer in the rear to compensate as the rise is actually a -ve 15 deg. And the reason for the change?-- Purely aesthetic after some final tweaks to settings and finding the "perfect" fit on this bike.

 

Well, this is where it all ended up by now.... Took out the old trusty SOMA Stanyan and dusted if off a few months back... when I had to change up my training routine to reduce running mileage but need to keep up the cardio workout. 

At the same time I was contemplating the idea of a new bike. Totally lost!. Never mind the new stuff/ technology which is mind boggling-- but whole frigging categories of biking which I have never heard of. (these aren't exactly new but been around for a while). It just shows how frigging long I've really been out of touch with all things related to biking.

 

Stumbled upon this Gravel bike thingie... Shimano even has a dedicated gruppo-- the GRX for it now!  My knowledge of things, Shimano stopped at Durace and XTR-- and my workhorse in the past (and still in use) are mostly XT on my existing mountain bike. The only other complete bike around the house apart from the Stanyan here... 

Anyone that Googled "gravel bike" will be blasted with a wide array of description these days.. Took me a while to figure that its really about building a 1/2 Fcuk "do-it-all"  Bike-- you can be closer to a traditional cyclocross or more of a "mountain-bike with drop bars. Really, the spectrum is so broad-- its pointless to try and pigeon hole it.

By 1/2 Fcuk-- of course I don't mean its crappy-- some gravel bikes will cost both my kidneys and probably installments of body parts that my grandkids would still be paying for after my demise.

Just that if you are going purely for speed on the road-- you will never be able to beat a tricked out road bike, while it travels well on hard pack and light gravel which as the name suggest. Due most time to the wider tires that can be accommodated and wider gear range and all these new fangle-dangle components like flared riser drop bars made for such riding... yet it will be outclassed by mountain bikes in  full mtb territory.There is nothing like some good ol' 2.4-2.6" rubbers running sub 20 psi to pillage and plunder our meek local offroad Teletubby trails.

Let's face it-- try riding one down a rock garden at full speed with 2 foot rocks and you'll probably be shitting your pants before the front wheel even rolled off the rocky descent.

So ... what exactly is it good for.  in our local context, riding fast enough on the road, for an all day long ride, and then scoot off into some unpaved tracks or light trails which would stump skinny tire road bikes.. Pop a little on and off if you are riding a lot on the pavements as many of us are kind of wary about riding fully on the roads these days.. yes, it would be an awesome do it all rig. Just don't expect yourself to be the next Brumotti in terms of tricking out on what can be done on a bike with drop bars for us mere mortals.

 

Anyway enough of gravel bike description for now..above should  give an idea of what is a gravel bike if that is what you started looking for for when reading my excessive bitching here.

Next was to compare the Stanyan geometry with some of these gravel bikes and whaddaya know! The Stanyan was designed as a light touring/ commuter capable machine 10+ years ago (its already discontinued for 10 years by the way)-- and the geometry!  ALMOST the same as many of the gravel oriented rigs of today! 

If I was willing to lose my fenders, tire clearance would go up to 35 (so says the SOMA website but Im sure it can accomodate 37 or even maybe.... just maybe 40c on my 700c wheels..

 Anyway, with the new revelation-- it means I can set it up to mimic some of the things on a gravel bike and see if I really want a new bike

Ok maybe the fork rake would be a tad lesser than modern gravel bikes. And the 73 deg HA is definitely considered as steep. Still, it should work in general. As said, I'm not taking some kicker for a 6ft air time send off  when riding a bike like this. Flat gravelling about-- 69 or 73 HA shouldn't feel much different.

 

Thus the experimenting started -- bigger 28c tires were next... Hitting out the "gravel" hard and fast at Coney and then. yes, doing the unthinkable/ stupidity of checking out BT trail (actually it was ok- only hindrance is the 48/18 singlespeed ratio which obviously wouldn't make it on the steeps without thunder thighs-- something I definitely lack in the first place). Coming down is definitely sketchy but all those XC riding skills from decades ago kick in and it was pretty much about careful line choosing (but of course speed wise I was riding like some pussy that day). 

In fact on BT's hard-pack, rolling was much easier than the  loose rocky sections of T15.

Over the next few month, its just one long ride after another, mostly on roads during the weekend and exploring wherever I go.. Shall not go into details of the places here but from unpaved to old paved but broken roads.. this good old singlepeed took everything in its stride. I stayed off long full off road ride after the last BT romp while still mulling whether to get a new dedicated gravel bike.

Before I go on.. let's state for the record that the last drop bar road bike I rode was 11 years ago.. In between then to now I've only been on mtbs.  A long hiatus from the roads and so for every ride since the start of this year, it had been a re-discovery of everything related to drop bar and 700c wheels. 

Yes-- it also meant breaking out my old funky smelling padded shorts only this year and having to buy new ones after these old ones simply disintegrated after a couple of use.

The real work done when back home stemming from my pedantic self was getting all the numbers down.. Getting ready for the next bike.

 Why Why Why?--- Because numbers don't lie 

"Go for a professional bike fit..." I hear someone shouting in the background.. 

Some might spot and say -- "that is too much steerer, you need a bigger frame..."

Been riding long enough to know what works and what not for me. Short arse inseam and forever caught in between sizes-- its the Curse of the Bicycle-god that I have been living with for over 40 years of riding.

Decided no "slam the stem" on an all rounder setup-- pedaling hard on unpaved paths and hitting some step downs at speed  with a low front end is a really stupid idea. The hell with looking cool.

Somehow things work out to a old skool-ish ratio with the handlebar ~1" lower than the seat.. The real hard part here after trying out with umpteenth stems later is to find one that is still high enough but doesn't impart that dorky aesthetic of a upward rising angle to reach that optimal bar height.

Biggest positive change? The bar. The old Nitto Randonneur while perfect on the drops was simply too scrunched on top.. 

Started looking at these newer flared bars... then saw these even newer ones with riser. 

Riser-drop Bar-- "What and OXYMORONIC name!"..  I was just thinking but then hmmm it might just work to push the bar height up since my steerer is limited.

Tried a few at bike shops like the SOMA Condor I and II,  , Surly Truck Stop Bar etc... somehow either the length, rise, reach or angles stop me from buying.. till I stumble upon the Controltech CLS FL16 GRAVEL Riser. Put a 40cm on the SOMA... (40 here is hood to hood.. C-C is 49cm)

Pros and Cons.. It has a funny rise that starts right around the center after the stem is mounted, leaving little space for extension mounting. At its highest point of the rise (where my bar tapes started).. its a very gradual taper all the way to the start of the bend where the reach starts. 

This part is where it felt different from all the other riser drop bars I have tried and gives me the most ergonomic wrist to palm transition when holding behind the hood.  I was paranoid at first how the increase in the C-C (49cm) compared to my previous C-C of 42 on the Nitto would affect. It was all a worry over nothing as the only difference was a significantly positive feel in leveraging the bar when holding the ends.

Cranking out 48/18 from a dead stop - -any singlespeeder will appreciate that your top end doesn't feel retardedly slow or squeezed for space while your legs are putting torque on the cranks simultaneously... something that my old Nitto Rando bar was doing to me.

Most time while back on the hook, the width is actually between 42-44cm which is just perfect.

From here I can sense that this bar will also work well on unpaved/ off road conditions- -but maybe the slightly wider 42 cm (C-C @ 51cm) might even be better...

armed with all the numbers.. now I have a good feel of exactly what I want in my next bike...

The search continues--  The Gravel Bike Hunt!

and just a recap of how the Stanyan has served me thru the years

(1) First built after patiently waiting for various parts over 9 months that seen this setup hit the many nite rides at TMCR. (2) Then the ridiculous but head turning "monster ratio" craze of a 62/16 before (3) transformation into a grocery/ commuter bike for the next 7-8 years. (4) Recently defaulted back into my regular cardio training rig once again. Fenders and racks stays.. its a signature by now.