Easy to maintain (non integrated!) winter road bike

Instead of a defy get an aluminium contend with a 10 speed tiagra groupset and hydraulic discs…ride it and worry a bit less.

I have 2 defys. Recently bought the bottom of the range new one with tiagra and swapped all my good parts from the old one onto the new frame. It built up In to a lovely bike

The old 2020 frame now has the new tiagra parts on it and the new wheels . Whilst tiagra works fine, the wheels and tyres that come on bottom of the range Defys are truly hateful things. Bomb proof but heavy and suck all the joy out of the bike.

What’s your budget? If its 4k get the spesh crux with carbon wheels and axs rival I saw the other day. Would be perfect for a winter bike and can take off road as well

As a Sonder fan boy I would recommend the Camino Rival 1, AXS.

I have the Ti version and its effortlessly easy to maintain and can go anywhere.

Camino Al Rival1 AXS XPLR

I’m looking for something similar at he moment, but I’m not fussy over frame material.

Kinesis R2 – the square geometry doesn’t work for me as I’m 6ft but with normal sized legs so need a lower stack height or shorter seat tube otherwise it looks daft with a tiny seatpost.

Fairlight Strael – lovely, expensive, wish it had removable guides for a Di2 upgrade.  I can’t afford Di2, but a frame that expensive would be kept long enough to want to do it at some point.

Trek Emonda – no guard mounts even though there’s probably room for them.

CAAD13 – guard mounts, but for a race bike the rats-nest of cables is looking a bit retro these days.

Ribble do a steel Endurance 725 with Tiagra which I have been wondering about buying as a winter bike, mainly as it’s in a really nice British racing green colour tbh.

Annoyingly small tyre clearance IIRC? The CGR 725 could be a better shout if you want to run 28c or larger and guards.

Agree on the threaded BB. Easy swap at home if it’s not spinning great anymore.

My CAAD-X has a BB30 BB, I think it’s probably the fastest to swap of any of my bikes, although I did have to buy ~£30 of tools to make it that easy.

I’d prefer threaded HT2 cranks on all my bikes because despite recent history Shimano still make IMO the best compromise of  cost / stiffness / reliability / creak free cranks.  But those BB30’s is fine. The FSA cranks (threaded 24mm BB)  on my road bike are creaking though ………….

Fairlight Strael ticks every box, except the confort comes from steel.

Is the correct answer if you wan the best looking frameset for mechanical group sets.

Most bikes, even if they do have internal routing, are not “full” routing including through the headset bearings. My road bike has partial integration – the bars hide it all, it pops out briefly to skirt the headtube and then it’s internal everywhere else. Never had any issues with it to date. And as @ton mentioned, internal cables are pretty bombproof, keep everything out of harm’s way.

+1

Although depending on the design you should be able to replace the lower headset bearing without doing much more than disconnect the front brake on even the most integrated designs. And upper bearings last forever (just smear the seals with a waterproof grease) so it’d be a non-issue.

Camino Ti would be my suggestion too, although not in a recommend what you have way as my winter/commuter/gravel bike is Cube NuRoad which ticks none of your boxes other than Tiagra.

Why is an integrated bike deemed hard to maintain? My road bike has Di2, hydraulic disks, pressfit BB and is now 4.5 years old, still on its original BB and headset and the Di2 has obviously had no maintenance and the brakes just the odd change of pads.

It’s all hidden / integrated cable routing, gets used year round and washed regularly, I really don’t get the desire for a “winter” bike nowadays. Di2 or AXS gearing = zero shift cables to look after, hydraulic brakes = a set of pads every once in a while and the occasional bleed. Screw in or Pressfit BB makes no difference, they both wear out, both are dead easy to change, both are cheap to buy.

Decent wheels with good quality hubs are obviously important, mine runs on carbon DT Swiss with 240’s, they just keep on spinning.

 I really don’t get the desire for a “winter” bike nowadays.

Presumably to have a bike set up with full guards all the time?

I used to have a “wet” and a “dry” bike rather than summer and winter ones.

Geometry has not moved on.

My mid 90’s steel race frame still has passably current geo!

I really don’t get the desire for a “winter” bike nowadays.

I like to try and keep as much mud and road grime off myself and the guys i ride with as possible. So proper, full fixed guards and mudflaps FTW. They won’t fit on my summer bike.

I also use lower ratios in winter than summer.

Would you consider a used bike?

I have a now 10 year old Trek Crockett 7 that I use for winter road riding as well as gravel riding these days. Bought it 6 years ago. It’s set up with Rival 1×11 which is totally fine. It’s “old” but could very much pass for a modern bike visually…has partially internal cables but none of this handlebar routing stuff and it’s easy to route.

The geometry is similar to that of a generic road bike now, rather than a modern slacked out gravel bike. Chucking 30mm tires on it and it rides amazingly. Nicer than newer gravel bikes with skinny tires on for road duties, but can still put 40mm tires on and have a thrash offroad.

Only thing I don’t like compared to modern disc bikes is that it’s QR not TA. Pain in the arse to be quite honest – enough that I am considering getting a new fork for it. Other than that I absolutely love it and hope it hangs around for a few more years to come.

I like to try and keep as much mud and road grime off myself and the guys i ride with as possible. So proper, full fixed guards and mudflaps FTW. They won’t fit on my summer bike.

I also use lower ratios in winter than summer.

The first bit I get, but the 2nd? Do you ride totally different roads on this here winter bike?

https://www.ribblecycles.co.uk/bikes/road-bikes/cgr-bikes/

Chose your material

Do you ride totally different roads on this here winter bike?

They’re covered in gravel, mud, leaves, rain and ice, so i go slower. It’s also winter, so i don’t tend to go at 100% even if it’s dry.

The big ring and the top half of the block is pretty much useless.

This was even the case living in the UK.

I really don’t get the desire for a “winter” bike nowadays

1. Mudguards

2. It may be a false economy by buying a completely new bike, but grinding my 250 quid cassette through winter slop gives me the shudders. Likewise the rest of the drive train. My jockey wheels cost over 100 quid to replace, my chain rings the same

3. Wheels and tyres..super fast thin carcass tyres and 60 mm carbon rims are not ideal for Scottish winters

4. And here is the main one. Keeping my best bike for glorious summer days makes it all the more special when I get to use it. So much so I actually have 3 road bikes, a defy with guards and cheap tiagra kit for winter, a really nice defy with lots of carbon for most of the time, and an sworks tarmac with all the trimings for special days out

That said, I totally appreciate that one nice bike can be ridden all year round if it’ll take Mudguards and will be much cheaper than 3, even if you have to replace expensive parts

I used to have a “wet” and a “dry” bike rather than summer and winter ones.

This is the route I took.

Winter use of anything in the Pennines be it on the road or off brings gunk and much.

I struggled with this and decided to go the wax chain route.

Setting up is not the great faff that some make out but I have found the rewards huge.

Going out and coming back with a completly clean drive front and rear is going to keep we waxing away in the future.

With flat top chains and cassettes rising I think its going to save me a lot of money as well as making cleaning so much simpler.

I’d just pickup a 2nd hand carbon disc road bike and use for winter. They are selling for peanuts at the mo. I recently picked up a carbon Merida Scultura Disc with Ultegra group for £750 off FB marketplace.

I wouldn’t overthink the whole integrated / pressfit thing. For me, road groupsets, BB’s etc last for yonks with close to zero maintenance. I’ve just changed the chainrings, cassette and rear mech out on my winter bike after over 12000 miles use.

90% of people I ride with also just use clip-on mudguards. Then you aren’t stuck with mudguards on dry winter days… And you aren’t limited to looking at specific bikes / frames. But I get that some people love mudguards…

Do you ride totally different roads on this here winter bike?

Depends on your local council.  Reading and Oxfordshire are pothole central, Hambleden , Dolsedean An stonor Valleys are rougher than gravel tracks thanks to ‘underground’ streams flooding them (and it’s almost summer!)  Going upto the Yorkshire Dales is like going to another country with it’s nice smooth tarmac!

Geometry has not moved on.

I think we’ve hit the tipping point where it definitely has.

At the sharp end race bikes are ~1″ longer than they used to be, I was looking at a new Merrida and it has 20mm longer reach than my CAAD, and a 120mm stem.  And my CAAD was aggressive for 20 years ago.  And saddles have got shorter/blunter to exploit that further.

At the every-day middle-ground, tyre clearance, 28mm is now considered tight, before disk brakes 28mm required long-drop brakes.

Those stating they have a wet and dry bike, surely the dry bike never sees daylight as it perpetual winter in the UK these days. My bike is dirtier after the weekends ride than it was in February!

The easiest bikes to maintain have electronic shifting. Probable SRAM AXS is the absolute easiest for maintenance just charging the mech batteries and replacing the shifter coin cells every now and again totally eliminating gear cable faff.

For winter I would ideally run bigger tyres. On my summer bike it’s 28mm width so I’d be wanting to run 32mm at least. So that takes you to hydraulic brakes which are what you would want anyway.

Headsets and internal routing yes I can understand your concern here and there’s no advantage in hiding the hoses from the wind on a winter bike.

Threaded bottom bracket yes makes sense although once your set up with the tools press fit is easy enough.

Like anything else in this world you may be better off compromising a bit. If it were me I’d probably buy a Giant Defy with AXS Rival. I’d live with the press fit BB.

That’s why 2 road bikes really isn’t enough

one for dry days, one for damp days (most of the riding I do) when you don’t get much spray to merit mud guards, but the bike still gets filthy, and one for wet days.

op, push the boat about a bit and treat yourself..

😆

(Not so) stealthy nudge but there’s a nice Mason Definition 2 for sale over in them there Classifieds 🙂 – pretty good winter / summer / wet / dry bike

I wanted one bike for fitness and commuting all year round for the road. I wanted mudguard / pannier mounts, lightweight ish carbon frame, room to run big road tyres (currently running Gp5000s in 30c but in hindsight I could have gone bigger as they don’t feel at all slow), slightly higher front end due to bad lower back sometimes etc. Didn’t want it to be astonishingly expensive.

Your requirement for UDH on a road bike seems a bit of an issue – I don’t think many bikes have this. I’m not sure it’s really needed unless you’re desperate to try and run Transmission.

On the bb I think all 5 road bikes I’ve had have been bb30 or some kind of pressfit. None have really had an issue with bb wearing out prematurely or creaking etc.

In the suggest what you have I bought a Dolan GXC frame only and built it up myself.

It’s running road kit rather than gravel – Ultegra di2 / Hunt wheels / various carbon bits. Rides really nicely – compared to the caad12 I had before it smooths out rough roads better, is a similar weight give or take, feels fast and efficient and handles quite well (until I put 2 heavier panniers on it which dulls the handling).

No integrated headset – but it does have internal routing. Wasn’t too bad to route the di2 wires / hydraulic cables through. I think they have some quite well priced full builds too and allow some customisation of build kit.

The cheapest build is £1799 and comes with 12 speed Shimano 105 which I think is pretty decent.

https://www.dolan-bikes.com/dolan-gxc-carbon-disc-gravel-bike-shimano-12s-105-r7120/

I did pay a bit more for a  ‘custom colour’ but there are a few free paint colours for the standard price. The dodgy coloured saddle has now been replaced – it matched the bike I had before.

I really don’t get the desire for a “winter” bike nowadays.

I think “gravel bike” has largely filled the niche that “winter road bike” used to occupy.

It used to be a thing because it’d have long drop caliper brakes (to get around the mudguards), quite often a collection of hand-me-down parts from the last year’s good bike and so on; it was a different beast to a “good road bike” which would not have clearance for bigger tyres or mudguards.

Obviously disc brakes, bigger clearance etc even on quite race-orientated road bikes have largely negated the need for a specific winter road bike; a gravel bike does all of that and more.

For me one of the things i’d consider, and will probably be shot down here, is that i find road tubeless at anything above 60psi a bit rubbish, maybe because i live somewhere with lots of bits of flint on the road.

So my winter “road” bike is a titanium Reilly gravel bike, with two sets of wheels, one with true 42c off road tyres and for winter road miles, mudguards and slick 35c tyres.

I find 35c is still fast enough to clip along on the road, but at 55-60psi in them, the sealant actually seals the holes unlike at higher pressures in 28c tyres i’d run in summer. Having tubeless that works is a big win in the winter.

I think crazy-legs has it.

The Gravel revolution has killed off a lot of the trad ‘Winter’ bike market.

With most frames now having lots of clearance,it’s easy to chuck a set of guards on for the bad weather.

(IMO) if you then have another set of wheels , it makes them more of an all year round/doitall bike.

I actually have 3 road bikes

Those are rookie numbers. I have separate winter and non-winter fixed road bikes. That’s before you start on the best bike, race bike (for racing), training bike and gravel/Cx. We’ll skip TT bike(s).

I don’t actually have a _geared_ winter bike that takes full mudguards. But another Ti frame could do a job. Enigma Echo in a 54 to match my fixed wheel. 🤔

before disk brakes 28mm required long-drop brakes.

Nonsense. I’m running Dura Ace 9000 callipers with 30c GP5000s on my Defy SL. No mudguards as it has no mounts for them anyway. It’s a 2013 frame.

I think we’ve hit the tipping point where it definitely has.

In some niches, maybe. But anything designed for broadly the same purposes (so that excludes a lot of current gravel, road plus, endurance bikes, because they didn’t really exist in the 90s) has broadly similar geo to their 30 year old counterparts.

Both my old but proper race bikes, that i raced (bought in 2001 or 2) have very similar geo as the 2023 race bikes i was looking at (but i bought an endurance bike as i’m 50 and never going to race again).

At the sharp end race bikes are ~1″ longer than they used to be,

Longer, or steeper, or set up for a more forward position? Some are also longer in the wheelbase to get the bigger tyres in, which isn’t really geometry driven, the key points for position are (essentially) unchanged. (Stack/Reach).

I’m running Dura Ace 9000 callipers with 30c GP5000s on my Defy SL.

That’s MASSIVELY dependant on the frame and fork. I’ve seen 9100/9200 brakes struggle to clear 28’s on some frames and 9000 that’ll “clear” a measured 32 (bit close for my liking, but not my bike).

I thought 30c was enough for any roads I’m riding. And it is.  To be honest, I was surprised how much clearance was there when I looked closely!

11 year old carbon frame and forks. Hand built wheels, DA9000 calipers,  and 30c GP5000s  plenty of clearance

Those are rookie numbers

those are the ones I use for my typical road riding! I also have another fully guarded winter roadie which hasn’t been used in a while, a single speed, a tt bike, a cx bike set up as another road bike. Plus obviously a gravel bike and a couple of mtbs

tbf I prefer the ‘owning bikes’ bit to the ‘riding bikes’ bit..

I thought 30c was enough for any roads I’m riding. And it is.

It’s not round here, which is why i eventually admitted that another head down, arse up road bike (to add to the 3 i already have) was probably a bad idea.

So now it’s discs, and 34 mm clearance on my best bike (but no guards) and 28s with guards on my winter bike. Cos when it’s winter I’m going nowhere without a tarmac base at the bottom of the mud and grit. In the summer, anything is game. Hence 34s (though it’s only 30mm on there now i think).