NBD: Radical All Mountain Chilli Dog, Ribble Gravel 725, Cotic Solaris…

… Olympia FX-1 XC full susser, Jelenew jodhpurs and a €2,000 gold plated corkscrew from Campagnolo.

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By ben_haworth

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NBD: Radical All Mountain Chilli Dog, Ribble Gravel 725, Cotic Solaris…

Saw the new Solaris frame news this morning. I’ve always wanted to get one, just never got round to it.

I get it’s going back to it’s roots, but I loved the previous colours (metallic purple, green and orange) but the new matte colours don’t do it for me. Also being limited to 120mm fork travel and lower BB seem wrong. But hey Cy has shown he knows what he’s doing over the last 20 years, I’m only some random bloke.

Maybe if they could bring back the original price of £500 that would sweeten the deal 😄

Ref; Ribble 725 – That frame brace at the BB between seat tube and downtube looks naff

Ribble looking pricey for a frame and fork. Not far of fairlight (which is 853 with some twiddley bits) and way more Brother Cyles

Having owned a Mk2 and current owner of the Max Longshot – the new Solaris excites me. But there needs to be a hubble purple version, Cy!!!

I can’t help thinking I need a bike called a ‘Radical all mountain’ 🤔

Looks dope 😍

The details on the radical bike look quite similar to a hello Dave.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery?

Ref; Ribble 725 – That frame brace at the BB between seat tube and downtube looks naff

My thoughts exactly. There seems to be a lot of marketing hype around this, I’ve seen it in several places, and yet no mention of why that’s there. If there’s a reason, fine, but there better be a good reason why it needs it and no bike I’ve ever seen before does.

The details on the radical bike look quite similar to a hello Dave.

The marketing is less punk and more prog-rock: a confusing scatter of words and phrases in an attempt to be cool, yet only sounding really crap. 😉
(Nice paint colour though).

@Tall_Martin.
They seem similar on paper but I own both and they ride surprisingly differently. The Hello Dave is super stable but not particularly agile or maneuverable (super long reach and chain stays, and very slack HA), it’s also bloody heavy.

The Chilli Dog rides much lighter, is way more agile and easier to wheelie and pop into the air. The one complaint I have about the Chilli Dog is the paint is thin and really easily chipped, sourcing touch up paint is difficult too.

Both bikes have steep STA, are super comfortable to pedal and climb way better than I would have expected. Either are great options if you’re after a hardcore hardtail but for me the Chilli Dog wins.