ORBEA TERRA M20-D 17
£2799 › All-roader first from the Basque race brand
Historically Orbea has been a race-focused brand with a long association with professional cycling, and numerous world and Olympic champs piloting its bikes. The new Terra is somewhat of a departure, being every inch a gravel bike. With only a handful of events in Europe to suit this type of bike, Orbea has built something that’s more about the fun of riding, and that’s fine by us.
Orbea claims an 1190g frame weight for the Terra. As this one’s built for toughness not lightness that’s a decent compromise weight wise. Orbea backs up that toughness claim with a lifetime warranty. The bike’s versatility comes to the fore when you see the mudguard and rack mounts included in the frame’s construction, allowing it to just as easily take on bike-packing duties, daily commuting or gravel riding and racing. With the right tyres you could even consider cyclo-cross.
The Terra’s tyre clearances have been optimised for a 40mm gravel tyre down to 28mm for road duties. Even though our test bike is running fat Schwalbe G-Ones and a very gravel-friendly 48/32 chainset with an 11-32 cassette we were hugely impressed with the way the Terra covers tarmac. Aside from the buzz of the tyres when cornering and the slightly sluggish acceleration, compared to racing slicks, the Terra is a great companion for road riding.
The traditionally shaped frame means a solid basis, and the stiffness through the drivetrain makes for a responsive ride. Up front the slightly longer fork is designed to offer flex in its lower two-thirds, taking the sting out of rough roads and heavily rutted trails. Orbea has concentrated on small sections of the frame to help absorb vibrations, with a special layup, using its ‘Dynamic Structure’ design, at the head-tube, seat-tube/ top-tube joint, above the rear dropouts and at the fork dropouts to
Orbea has built something that’s more about the fun of riding
smooth things as you bounce along. We can’t vouch for the slightly secretive design, but on broken and rougher dirt surfaces the Terra is impressive. It doesn’t jar or jolt but doesn’t feel soft either.
The Terra is part of Orbea’s MyO program so you can choose options on some of the finishing components, gear ratios and, more interestingly, the paint scheme. We love the ’90s-inspired fluoro touches on our Terra, but if you have more modest tastes there are plenty of options for you.
Ride-wise there is a lot to like about the Terra, and as a gravelbased machine it’s one of the best we’ve tried for covering grit and gravel quickly, and it’s impressively light for a bike of this type at just over 9kg, but in terms of value we do have some reservations.
At just under £2800 we’d have expected Ultegra, and while we can happily forgive the down-spec to FSA’s Gossamer chainset as Shimano doesn’t yet offer a gravelfriendly 48/32 option, the entrylevel FSA Energy bar and stem and Mavic’s highly competent yet still entry-level Aksium disc wheels do come across as a little below the otherwise highly impressive Terra’s pay grade. That said, the Terra does meet the needs of the fastest gravel riders, and with a switch of tyres you would also have a superior on-road machine. With the current fad for looking for a single bike for all solutions the Terra should be on everyone’s shortlist.