Good workhorse of a bike. High versatility: good daily commuter even in wet weather w not bad mechanical disc brakes, able to keep up with roadie group rides, easy on hills with 50-34 compact crank and 11-32 cassette (Gestalt 1 model), very capable on dry pack fire and farm gravel roads. Smooth ride despite being full aluminum frame including forks. Very comfortable for long rides with endurance geometry, plush saddle and flared drops in the handlebars. Good rolling tubeless ready schwalbe g-one speed performance tires. Big room and clearance for even wider, knobby tires up to 35c. Rack mounts and eyelets can turn it into a proper tourer.

At £600-£700 pounds for the overall spec and build, it’s a bit steep. Frame finish and color (light blue) gets dirty easily and make scuffs more apparent. FSA headset not durable and started to creak early, had to change out after 8 months covering about 5000kms in riding in varied tropical wet weather conditions. Heavy stock wheelset makes accelerating and sprinting feel sluggish. Bought another set of road specific wheels for road riding and kept the stock wheels w knobby 32cs Kenda small block 8s for adventure riding on trails. Heavy stock crankset as well, swapped out for an ultegra 6800 for more stiffness and lighter weight.

Overall a very versatile platform, jack of all trades. Good if you intend to only have 1 bike, but you will need to invest in various minor upgrades to if you want to get better at specific areas, whether if it’s road riding, touring or gravel.