If I have been an actual biking journalist I’d most likely be selecting a “Bike Of The Yr” proper now, which might most likely be the Rivendell Roadini:
Not solely is it versatile and comfy, however it’s additionally certainly one of (if not the) final remaining regular non-custom highway bike nonetheless in manufacturing wherever on Earth.
However who the hell needs a motorcycle like that in 2025? The place’s the downtube storage compartment? Are you able to even put a suspension fork on there? And the way the hell are you imagined to cease it with out disc brakes?!?
So let’s select a Bike Of The Yr higher suited to the fashionable shopper from among the many many new fashions I’ve featured in 2025 regardless of by no means having ridden them and even seen them in individual.
Right here goes:
Ari Bike Shafer 3.0
This daring new gravel bicycle fills me with satisfaction, for at a time when antisemitism is as soon as once more rearing its hideous head in Western tradition, the Ari Shafer stands tall and wears its heritage resolutely on its sleeve.
Oh wait, no it doesn’t:
So “Ari” is brief for “Fezzari,” and Shafer is a path in Utah?
That’s probably the most goyishe factor I’ve ever heard! Screw them, I take all of it again. Although it does have “rider-centric geometry,” and it’s about time, too, as a result of I purchased a motorcycle with pet-centric geometry just lately and it was a complete waste as a result of my cat gained’t even trip it.
The New Surly Straggler
In 2025 there appeared to be no center floor between plastic-and-electronic technical wonders and self-consciously retro boutique choices. Enter Surly, an organization that way back ditched the utilitarian for the soporific. Not solely did they discover that center floor, however in addition they constructed a Consolation Inn on it, put a Do Not Disturb signal on each door deal with, and rocked us all gently to sleep.
Significantly, this factor is deeply and profoundly boring. If Skechers Fingers Free Slip-ins™ have been a motorcycle, the brand new Straggler could be it. The one factor even mildly provocative about it’s the aesthetically unappealing hot-dog-in-a-hallway fork/headtube junction:
However even that’s boring, for the reason that goal isn’t to offend you, it’s merely as a result of* they couldn’t be bothered to please you.
*(And for suspension fork compatibility, making this maybe the one bicycle on this planet that will look higher with a suspension fork…with the doable exception of the Trek Y-Foil, although I understand it’s extremely controversial to recommend a Y-Foil can ever look good.)
Canyon Grizl
Unveiled with a lot fanfare, and Jesus-carrying, the Grizl is every thing the Straggler will not be. Besides boring. They’re each very, very boring. However the Grizl is a unique sort of boring. It’s not khaki pants boring; it’s the boring of somebody who’s making an attempt too laborious to not be boring. It’s boring doubling over on itself and giving itself fellatio. It’s boring just like the handsome standard one who will get invited to all of the events and wears all the precise garments and will get heaps and plenty of textual content messages and but has no actual persona is boring, and I guess the Grizl cries itself to sleep each evening as a result of deep down it is aware of how really boring it’s, identical to the handsome standard individual does.
Aethos 2
5 years in the past now, after they launched the Aethos after years of promoting misshapen bicycles, Specialised had the audacity to fake they invented highway bikes with spherical tubes. Now there’s an “Aethos 2,” and it’s “impossibly responsive, supple, and elegant.” This raises an essential query:
HOW THE HELL CAN SOMETHING BE “IMPOSSIBLY RESPONSIVE?”
Wouldn’t “impossibly responsive” imply it’s unable to reply? There’s one other phrase for that, you realize:
It’s the epitome of the impossibility of response.
Trek CheckOUT
The bike firms have educated the media effectively, and when Trek unveiled the CheckOUT you wanted waders to make your method via all of the drool. After all, despite the fact that you may’t ever hope to say its full title ten instances quick, the Verify TrekOUT is really a exceptional bicycle, as a result of it’s simply probably the most store-bought factor on two wheels ever. From the strategically edgy paint job to the Travis Bickle-inspired sliding downtube-mounted drawer tracks to the rear rack that comes crooked straight from the manufacturing facility, the Trek CheckOUT is like spending $1,490 $745 for a pair of patched denims:
By the way in which, that’s an excellent deal on these denims! So I purchased two. I truly saved cash!
Issue One
Hideous in each method, it’s the bicycle we deserve, and I don’t imply that in a great way.
Between the Issue One and the Ethos 2, the bike trade appears decided to insult you at each flip.
Subsequently, I’m hereby giving the award to the Kent Filth Runner:
All it wants is a pair of Rene Herse tires.
