When I think of new products that the world needs, yet another plastic road bike is roughly the 17,000,000,000th item on the list–and yet, here we are:
Four decades ago, a musician named Prince told us all what it sounds like when doves cry:
Today, this is what it looks like when a media embargo lifts:
On your marks…get set…REVIEW!
[LOL the pros and cons.]
It’s not like I have anything against Pivot. They’re a well-regarded mountain bike brand. But that’s exactly what’s so puzzling about all this. Like, why? Being a successful bike company is improbable enough, and they seem to have done well designing mountain bikes, so why tempt fate by making road bikes of all things? This is exactly why Vito Corleone didn’t want the family expanding into narcotics:
When you’ve got a good racket going who the hell needs the risk!?!
And say what you will about drugs, but you can understand why Sonny wanted in, because at least they’re exciting–unlike…“A Race Bike For Humans?”
But I ask again…
After years of refining performance near the top of the mountain bike world, Pivot Cycles has extended its range into drop bars with the new Pravia road bike. After unveiling a gravel bike in recent years, the Pravia is the final piece of the puzzle for the vaunted off-road brand’s evolution into the drop-bar world.
WHY!?!
I guess they just have to show you that they can even though nobody asked for it, like Seth MacFarlane’s recording career:
As for that whole “A Race Bike For Humans” gimmick, the idea is that it’s “approachable:”
Pivot has positioned the Pravia as a WorldTour-level race bike, with a few attributes that make the bike a bit more approachable to everyday riders. That split personality, more than any clear standout quality, is the name of the game with the Pravia road bike. Or, as Pivot says of its nascent road machine, “a race bike for humans.”
Which is probably just another way of saying you can get the bars a little higher:
“We saw what the marketplace lacked: a bike with race-level frame stiffness and handling, but geometry designed around real riders and the positions they can actually sustain,” Pivot said about its entry into the road market. “With decades of carbon engineering expertise, we purposefully crafted this bike to be what so many riders are looking for.”
Isn’t that like every “endurance” road bike or whatever they’re calling them nowadays? Didn’t I review a bike like this back in like 1986?
I don’t know. But I do know that if you want this particular Race Bike For Humans you’ll have to dip into The Human Fund:
Because this baby ain’t cheap:
For our long-term test, we will be testing the SRAM Red-level build, the top-spec option Pivot is offering. As a stock build, we weighed the bike at 16.95 lbs (7.89 kg) for a size 58cm frame ready to ride without pedals, computer mount, or cages. That build will retail for $ 11,999 USD.
The Pravia will also be available in two other SRAM builds. The Pro Force build will go for $8,999 USD, while the Ride Rival builds are $5,999 USD. Frame sets are also available for $4,499.
I guess when they said it was “approachable” they didn’t mean the price.
This particular story sure left me with more question than answers, but fortunately there was also an advertorial to clear everything up:
It’s quite the hagiography too:
For this project, he tapped into the innovative spirit at Pivot, like when the brand pushed into 29-inch wheels early, or developed a fat bike. “Pivot is our brand, and wherever we decide to take it we can compete in those categories,” he said.
Really? Pivot were early to 29ers? According to 30 seconds of popular search engine jockeying their first 29er was in 2010. Gary Fisher had already been doing 29ers for like nine years. I mean even I had already been riding one by then!
Also, are they really going to pretend they have a secret magical way of making the crabon that nobody else has figured out yet?
He walks us through the carbon layup development process. It took two years to get all the different sizes correct, and the 56 size around took at least six rounds of development to get the weight and ride quality where they wanted them. But it’s actually the smallest sizes that are the hardest to develop. Cocalis also talks to us about how Pivot’s Hollow Core Carbon Molding process for creating carbon frames differs from other brands. He calls it the most precise way to make a carbon frame.
Oh please.
At this point the biggest challenge in crabon bike manufacturing is making a quiet downtube storage compartment:
Cocalis talked us through his decision to include downtube storage, a move that isn’t always perceived as being for performance bikes. It was also a massive development process to get a downtube storage door that “doesn’t squeak, doesn’t creak, doesn’t leak,” and that’s before trying to hit stiffness and weight targets. It’s part of the reason they needed six rounds of layup development on the size 56 frame alone.
The downtube storage compartment is really the only way to differentiate one modern crabon bike from the other, sort of like how people choose an SUV based on which one’s console fits their Stanley the best.
And what kind of bike for humans doesn’t allow you to use mechanical shifting?
Cocalis then discusses the decision to go all-in on electronic shifting. As he puts it, the Pravia is a high-end bike built for a rider that’s not interested in mechanical shifting.
See, as everyone knows, cable guides completely ruin a bicycle’s ride quality:
And making it electronic only means not sacrificing ride quality, performance, or weight to build in cable guides and stops. “It is definitely a performance minded decision,” Cocalis said.
If they wanted to save weight and not sacrifice ride quality by adding extra frame material then why not give it rim brakes instead of dicks?
I dunno, if I were building a bike for humans it would probably be more like this:
Omitting the downtube storage compartment entirely and using a high-tech piece of equipment called a “bag” that can be switched out for a different size and style in seconds–or even omitted entirely–is what I call the very definition of a performance minded decision.