Sonder Broken Road

Hi,

I have looked at the Broken Roads for a while, as they tick a few boxes but never really found much info or reviews on them.

Decided to demo on this week, to see what I thought, with an eye to buying one. Thought I would post my thoughts here, in case anyone is in the same position!

Demo

This is based entirely on a single demo of an XL Broken Road from Alpkit Ambleside, riding over Loughrigg (for those that know the area) on a completely unladen bike with 2.8 WTB Ranger B+ tyres on Alpkit’s Alu wheels and inner tubes (I punctured one… blooming tubes!)

Me

6’3 with 35″ inseam. This means I tend to need super high rise stems to get the bars level, and one of the reasons I like the BR (it has a really long head tube).

For comparison, I have or have had in the past: a 130/100mm aggressive full sus “XC/Trail” 29er, 160/150mm 26/650b aggressive AM bike, 150/150 long travel XCish 26er, 29+/29er XCish hardtail, 140mm 26er trail hardtail, 120/120mm XC full suss

I like riding a mix of long distance bikepacking routes, local XC, super techy stuff (e.g. Lakeland passes), a bit of Alpine downhill in the summer, although my aspirations probably exceed my skill and fitness 😉

Broken Road Impressions

First impression… oh, they put 650B+ tyres on it! I have never ridden B+ before, so was kind of interested, but equally I don’t have a huge amount to compare to. That said, it still looked balanced, unlike a 26er in XL size which sometimes looks a bit like a Brompton.

There is substantial tyre clearance, even with the 2.8 rubber (see pictures below). Looking at another BR in the shop, there is also a lot of tyre clearance around a fairly big looking 29/2.4 tyre. I would be quite happy to stick a 29/2.6 in there.

It also has a pretty massive front triangle in XL form, which should be good for Bikepacking.

I was slightly disappointed by how much higher the seat had to be compared to the bars, given the long head tube and 25mm stack spacers. However, it was running a flat stem and the bars didn’t really have any rise on them. So it should be possible to get the handlebars much higher without resorting to the insane 35deg/100mm stems I have used on some other bikes.

One thing of note for bikepackers – it has bottle bosses under the downtube, which great… and it yay for a proper threaded bottom bracket!

Oh, and of course most importantly, it looks cool in raw Ti ;).

Slogging uphill

The first thing that I was really impressed with was how fast the B+ tyres rolled and span up to speed. I was expecting laboured acceleration like you get with 29+, but it really didn’t feel all that different to a 29er.

Power transfer through the frame seemed good from a couple of purposefully overgeared standing starts and from some out of the saddle sprints. It certainly wasn’t a 20lbs carbon rocket ship, but it was pretty good. Possibly helped by the lack of any sort of packs on me or the bike.

Riding uphill on the slog of a climb from the Ambleside side of Loughrigg went fairly quickly. Having done this climb on a fair few bikes, it seemed easier than most. I am putting it down to the bike being quite light. There was no flopping around of the bars either, and it was quite happy with a sit and spin approach, so it seems a fairly relaxed climber. On a few occasions, I did some stand and mash climbing too. I felt that for this, the cockpit seemed a little short. Not to the point of being a problem, but enough that I definitely preferred the sit and spin approach.

On more technical climbs, it was fairly easy to precisely position the bike. I think the B+ rubber helped here, as there was a shed load of grip available, but without the monster truck feel of 29+.

Riding along

Stable is the best word to describe this. I did a few purposefully high G turns and there was no wobbling or otherwise sketchy moments. It was also quite happy bombing over the rocky terrain of Loughrigg at a reasonable speed. I never felt like my feet might be bounced off the pedals, like I sometimes feel on hardtails with flat shoes (for reference, I was running the tyres at what felt like a medium-low pressure).

The backend felt very responsive to control inputs. Powering over big rocks was fairly comfortable too. Unfortunately its hard to tell how much was the B+ tyres and how much was was the Ti frame. From experience of Ti / Steel / Alu and 29+ tyres in the past, I think that it was a bit of both, but I can’t really be any more objective than that.

The one thing I did notice was a slight tenancy to want to keep going in a straight line on flattish ground; it definitely preferred to be leaned more than turned. I didn’t ride it on any narrow forest singletrack, but I suspect it would be more evident on that sort of riding. Not sure if that is the frame or the tyres to be honest.

Riding down

This is where I was really surprised. It felt super playful. It was just as happy to bounce from rock to rock and catch bits of air at the slightest provocation as my 150mm AM rig. I genuinely didn’t think that a 100mm hardtail would feel this happy to “mess around” on descents.

Again, it felt quite stable blasting through rock gardens; more like riding a trail / AM rig than an XC bike. I guess the reasonably slack (for a 29er) head angle helps here.

Unfortunately, it felt so fun, that I kind of forgot it wasn’t tubeless and got a snakebite while bombing over some rocks. Tubes should be outlawed.

I didn’t have the opportunity to ride on any really steep stuff, which I suspect is where the 100mm travels limitations will lie. I also didn’t have a chance to hit any real jumps (bouncing off bedrock was the most I could find).

The seat does go down really low though, so getting right off the back of the bike and giving it a bit of body language was easy.

Overall, it was really fun; I expected it to be a stable, slightly boring mile muncher (which is what I am looking at it for really – a long commute and bikepacking). However, it was pretty damned fun to ride over rocky terrain.

Overall

I went into the demo not really sure whether I wanted the expense of buying another frame for what could be marginal gains. However, I was quite impressed to be honest, and have come away more inclined to buy the bike than when I went in.

Things that I would like to change (wondering about one of Alpkit’s custom frames)… support for 120mm forks, bottle bosses on the top of the top tube (long legs = no standover issues!), a more dropper friendly seat tube (I get 27.2 for fixed seat post comfort, but you can just step down 31.6 to 27.2 with a shim, so why not have a 31.6?)

Oh, and as a side note, the Sonder saddle it had was horrifically uncomfortable for me (I normally use a Selle Italia C1 or a Brooks C17)

Pictures of the bike and the tyre clearance:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/u8mtHu1B0v5z1WYG3

Hope this helps someone!

Excellent writeup! I was looking at the sonder bikes in Ambleside a few weeks ago and they look really good 👍

I have inadvertently ordered one. Whoops.

Nice write up 👍 Revised model has 31.6mm seatpost apparently

*raises hand*

Ive had mine for a while now and love, easily the best bike I’ve owned and is more fun than any I’ve owned including my Cotic Soul with 130mm forks.

I was slightly disappointed by how much higher the seat had to be compared to the bars

More seat post equals flex, equals comfort. Same reason it’s a skinny diameter.

support for 120mm forks,

Unless something has changed it already supports 120mm forks but in 650b+ mode only, 29er is 100mm max.

FWIW, I bought mine for travel and generally exploring places and initially fitted rigid carbon forks (less weight for hike a bike). This has worked so well I’ve yet to feel any need for any suspension at all and this is riding in Scotland, Perthshire, Cairngorms albeit not necessarily on the steepest routes available. The other thing I’d say, is that the fun is primarily to be found in 650b+ mode, it works really well as a 29er but the ride has less “hooning” factor.

Im very, very, VERY happy with this bike.

Oh, and Rekon+ on mine they’re bloody great as well.