Hi everyone, I’m new to gravel biking, so I was hoping for a bit of buying advice. I’m located in Canada.
I’ve mountain biked all my life, so I’m more familiar with that, but I’m going to school over the winter and will be commuting by bike. I wanted to get something better for the road, but it rains a lot where I am, and I want something more versatile than a purely road bike, so I decided a gravel bike would be right for me.
I’ve been looking at what’s available on the used market, and the main two options are those in the post title. A 2016 Cannondale Caadx and a 2011 Rocky Mountain Solo CX. Does anyone here have some advice to help deciding between the two? Or just experiences with one or the other.
It will mostly be ridden on the road, but there are a lot of logging roads around me, so I intend to do some actual gravel biking. The Cannondale is $700 CAD ($515 USD) and the Rocky Mountain is $650 CAD ($480 USD).
Both say they are in good mechanical shape. The Rocky Mountain was ridden more in the past, but has been in storage for about 6 years. The Cannondale Has been ridden infrequently since 2016 apparently.
My understanding is that the Rocky Mountain is a bit of a better bike, but is just older. Which is probably why they are around the same price.
I’m aware that both models have recalls out, but the Rocky Mountain recalls only effect 2010 models I think, and the Cannondale recalls only effect those bikes with disc brakes.
Image of the bikes: [https://imgur.com/a/gcAjGBr](https://imgur.com/a/gcAjGBr)
Thanks in advance for any advice!
by makeshiftswift