Kinesis Tripster AT first ride review

I’m not really a bikepacker either. Too many straps and buckles, too much fiddling, and I don’t really like the idea of ending a long day’s ride with the prospect of having to erect my own house and eat dinner out of a bag with a spork. 

However, I recently found myself needing a serious gravel bike for an overnight trip into the desert outside Tucson, Arizona, where I needed to carry five liters of water, tools, food, a change of clothes and a bunch of other stuff. So I borrowed this Kinesis Tripster AT, size XL, in fetching Matcha Green, from the lovely people at Kinesis. 

First (and only) impressions

First things first – I loved it. Its geometry is way more race-focused than my super-slack Marin Gestalt, and the more tucked body position and narrower bars just cried out for fast pedalling. I love any bike that begs to go fast as soon as you get on it, and for an alloy frameset, it feels very light and tight.

The Farr Alloy Aero 42 bars are a revelation too. They’re the perfect sweep for me, with a flare that’s very comfortable for cruising and braking, plenty of space for brakeless bar holds and the aero bar extension out front gives tons of room for the stuff a serious gravel bike needs. There’s space for all kinds of different bike bag setups (including my own modest Victory Chimp cylinder bag), plus lights, navigation devices and more. You could perch a full-grown human up there even, for inadvisable post-pub transport. In all seriousness, I’m buying a set of these bars for my own bike – they’re fantastic. 

Circles of life

The Boyd Reiver Carbon wheelset comes with Challenge GRAVINE XP boots in 700×45, with XT Ice Tec rotors, and they’re light, not too rigid and very capable in all but the softest sand of the desert trails. I rode this bike on roasting hot tarmac, sand, jagged sandstone rocks, hard-baked dirt and some early summer Sussex mud, and generally felty planted, grippy and confident. Might have put some beefier tyres on eventually, for a little more off-road comfort, but that’s a preference rather than a criticism. 

Storage wars

There can often be a kind of absurd arms race between brands to put as many bolts and attachment points on these bikes as possible, irrespective of how useful they are, and I’m not a regular bikepacker, but there’s more than enough ways to get gear on this bike for me. Mounts for bottle cages or bags on both forks, bolts on the top tube for a bag, two bottle mount points on downtube/seatpost tube, another set underneath the top tube, and more on the rear triangle. I carried a litre of water on each fork, two more litre bottles on the frame, and another on a rear bag mounted on an Old Man Mountain rack, but you could run almost any frame/rear/bar bag combo you wanted here. 

Shifting sands

The drivetrain’s a solid, reliable Shimano GRX 12 spd on a 40t chainring, with 10-42t on the back, and I appreciate the bigger range than my Gestalt on the many, many sand patches and ultra-loose section of climbing my desert ride serves up. There’s a lot of places that require hamster-wheel pedalling just to stay upright, plus a 2hr+ 20km climb at the end of the day, and this setup does the trick nicely. 

I’d be tempted on a wireless shifting upgrade if I were to own the bike, but that’s just because I like to keep my hand exertion to a minimum of longer rides, and this setup worked just fine. 

Hard to fault

Overall, I loved this bike. It’s fast, light, comfortable and easy to climb on, without ever feeling skittish or unsteady, and it handled everything I threw at it without a murmur of complaint. 

In an ideal world, I might extend the stem for a slightly longer reach, or monkey with stack height to dial in my riding position, and maybe take some steps to slightly soften the ride with bigger tyres, but it’s hard to imagine any kind of big gravel day out or terrain that this wouldn’t be fun to ride on. Plus it’s a small UK brand, run by people that really love bikes, and their builds have some seriously great components (those bars!), all chosen to take the kinds of muddy, wet punishment UK gravel rides are guaranteed to dish out. 

It was only mine for a little bit, but I hated giving it back. 

Geometry of our size 58cm (XL)

• Head angle // 70.5°
• Effective seat angle // 73.75°
• Seat tube length // 580mm
• Head tube length // 195mm
• Chainstay // 440mm
• Wheelbase // 1,075mm
• Effective top tube // 580mm
• BB height // 70mm BB drop
• Reach // 400mm