Im American but go to Colombia every year and now I want to buy a bicycle there. Since most roads out in the hinterland will be dirt, I'm thinking a gravel bike is what I should be looking at. Here the local brand is called "Cliff" and right there there's a sale on their "premium" gravel bike.
BICICLETA GRAVEL CLIFF CROSS – BIKEHOUSE
I'm hoping you all can offer your opinions on whether this is a good value at just under $900 USD. I understand its a beginner bike but I am a beginner. Im looking at bikes in the US as well (I was thinking of buying a Cannondale Topstone 3 before I became aware of the Cliff bikes) and my local bicycle shop has those for around $1400. If the topstone is worth the $500 more than the Cliff, I'll buy that one. Thanks
by Appropriate-Price73
1 Comment
I want to say go for the Cliff bike, the two things that might hold me back are the tire clearance and the gearing. I was trying to see what the max tire clearance is on the frameset, all I’m seeing is it mentions 700×38. If that’s about the max tire size it can take (which, eyeballing the tire in the fork, might be true), I’d probably pass. Running 700×45 is more the way to go, unless the gravel roads there are super smooth.
And then the crankset is 50/34. That’s more of road bike gearing. Just depends how hilly it is there. If the terrain is pretty flat, like Florida, should be good. For a lot of hills, you’d probably appreciate some lower front gears, like 46/30.