Hey.
New to this sub but I have a debate.
I am fairly new to biking, I picked up this specialized Allez on FB for 300 and I am loving it.
I recently moved to Texas, and there are not many bike trails around my area. But… there are lots of gravel trails.
I recently got some money for my birthday and have been looking at getting a gravel bike. My options are Poseidon X, a Poseidon Redwood, or a Cannondale Topstone.
Let me know if your guy’s solutions and thoughts.
My budget is around 1,200
by _robkeller
6 Comments
The topstone is a solid bike, i rode it for almost 5k miles until it was stolen. Pain points are the hubs and the brakes. The hubs aren’t serviceable but if you’re not riding and/or leaving it out in the rain you’ll be fine. The brakes are ok, but kind of difficult to adjust.
The main reason to pick one or the other is tire width and mounting points i.e. things inherent to the frame you can’t upgrade your way out of.
Those other bikes seem like they allow wider tires, which is advantageous for extreme gravel, not that the max of 40 mm on the topstone underperforms, but stock i think it comes with 37mm maybe can’t remember. Also definitely go tubeless because those radlers pinch flat like crazy.
Mounting points: topstone’s gottem. You can mount a good rack (i had Tubus) and fenders. Nice for commuting and bike packing.
Had the same debate. Chose Topstone. Am Happy.
Former redwood owner here – just sold it today.im also a current Allez owner (2015 comp) I think it’s a great platform, but you’re going to find 3-5 things you’ll want to immediately upgrade. If you want that done at a shop, it’ll probably get to about the same price for the same bike. Off the top of my head – seat, tubeless tire (and maybe new rims) and compression less cable housing all felt needed to make the bike run the way I wanted. That probably bring costs close to even.
From personal experience, I just didn’t ride the redwood because it felt sluggish compared to my Allez. I’d say go topstone personally but I haven’t ridden one. I also think with 32c tires you might even get away with building up the topstone and selling the Allez if you want more money to play with
its a interesting that all 3 have nearly identical components in drive train and brakes.
the topstone and X will give you a a carbon fork. The redwood has a big alum fork and more tire capacity with cost of more weight.
The topstone and redwood have through axle, the X would need to have the through axle upgrade for that, which brings the price closer to topstone.
They all have could use better brakes. ebay has pairs of trp/hyrd for around $140 for that.
I would think the wheels are comparable, but the redwood is setup for more trail terrain than you probably need. Getting fair 700c wheels with gravel tires would bring the cost closer to the topstone. (though you’d be sporting with 650 and 700 wheels)
To me, the value balance is about an even toss.
If you have REI where you live, they carry Cannondale.
You can get their credit card for 5% back. And they do coupons of 20% off several times a year.
So total, 25% off. I did this with a carbon Cannondale Topstone. It has been an incredible gravel bike.
REI also has a solid return policy. So if you hate the bike for some reason you can return it.
Edit: they’re showing the Topstone 4 at $1175 full price. So with their card the bike would essentially be $880 and you’d get back $294 to spend in store. (So… Bike bags, helmet, whatever accessories)
Well the second one is a completely different bike than the other two