Singular Swift MK5 review

• Brand: Singular Cycles
• Product: Swift MK5
• Price: £950.00 frameset (complete bikes from £2,550.00)
• From: Singular Cycles
• Tested by: Benji for two months

Earlier this year I had a confusing time on a Singular Peregrine dropbar gravel bike. To cut a long story short, the bike was completely beautiful but I just don’t get along with dropbars. Sorry. So here is a lovely Singular with ‘correct’ handlebars. This looks like the sort of gravel bike I can get behind or, better yet, on top of.

While Singular (which is basically one guy called Sam), makes no claims that the Swift is a ‘do-it-all’ hardtail, it/he does claim that “lightweight, well-proportioned, nice handling steel mountain bikes continue to be relevant for many people’s modern riding”. And that’s a statement that is hard to argue with. Well, apart from trying to decode what ‘nice handling’ means. What may be nice handling along biscuit-buff, shallow, swoopy terrain, is perhaps not quite so nice if transposed to say, Helvellyn in the Lake District.

In the UK at least, the higher-end hardtail market is somewhat split into two camps: carbon cross-country race ‘rigs’ (for some reason we have to call them ‘rigs’) that try to kill you on anything that isn’t a hideously steep grass climb, and slack ’n’ low-slung hardcore hardtails made out of some sort of metal.

The Singular Swift is neither. The Swift is a gravel bike. This is not to damn it with faint praise. Quite the opposite. The Singular Swift has always been a bike ideal for gravel riding. It’s nippy. It’s comfy. It has loads of luggage options.

Where the Swift has a clear edge over any and every dropbar gravel bike is when the tracks become narrow. Where dropbar bike are amusing and exciting in a white-knuckle ‘oh shit’ sense on singletrack, the Swift does the thing that mountain bikes do: radiate intense joy and strangely calming pleasure.

As Jimmy Cricket used to say, “…and there’s more!”. If you do want a bit of amusing/exciting/white-knuckling/oh shitting type fun, the Singular Swift can be thrown into a bit of off-road tekkers and it won’t break itself or kill you. You may have to reposition your helmet and possibly repair a puncture, but you won’t crash and die. Probably.

Anyway, back to the ‘nice handling’ thing. If there is such a thing as ‘speed trundling’, the Singular Swift excels at it. It’s a momentum machine. It’s not perhaps great at stop-start cut-and-paste stomp stomp stomp riding. Hard pedal, hard brake, hard pedal, hard brake sort of stuff is not its forte.

It’s much more like a dropbar bike in its predilection for keep on keeping on-ness. It’s wonderful on doorstep rides where you know the lay of the land and you can hop on the Swift and not need to slow down or get off (for obstacles, unrideable bits, gates, stiles, etc.) until you arrive back at home. Just spending quality time gliding around the nicer bits of your area.

In terms of frame and fork ‘feel’, the Swift strikes a nice balance of being pleasingly untwangy and ‘stout lite’, without being unduly harsh or unforgiving of rider input error. It has a nice degree of confidence and calm predictability that is often missing from rigid mountain or gravel bikes.

Overall

At nearly a grand for a frame and fork, it’s hard to make a good value claim for the Singular Swift MK5. It is a niche bike. From a small outfit. Such things are never going to make much monetary sense. But as we all know, sense has no place in mountain biking. And the Swift is certainly a way better option than a carbon gravel bike in my opinion.

Singular Cycles Swift MK5 specification

• Frame // Singular custom drawn steel
• Fork // Cromoly
• Wheels // Hope 29 Fortus 30W SC Pro 5
• Front Tyre // Mezcal III 29X2.6 XC Blk Anthracite G2.0 Black
• Rear Tyre // Mezcal III 29X2.6 XC Blk Anthracite G2.0 Black
• Chainset // Hope Evo, 165mm
• Brakes // Shimano BR-M7110/BL-M7100 SLX, 180/180mm
• Drivetrain // Shimano SM-CRM75 SLX 12spd
• Stem // Thomson 50mm
• Handlebar // Thomson Elite
• Grips // Odi Ruffian lock on
• Seat Post // Pro Koryak
• Saddle // Brooks C15

Geometry of our size XL

• Head angle // 69°
• Effective seat angle // 73°
• Seat tube length // 505mm
• Head tube length // 140mm
• Chainstay // 450mm
• Wheelbase // 1,187mm
• Effective top tube // 650mm
• BB height // 75mm BB drop
• Reach // 468mm

Singular Cycles Peregrine Mk3 review