GT GRADE CARBON PRO
Innovative design means the Grade is fast yet flexy
While GT Bicycles’ has its roots in dirt, from racing BMXs to innovative mountain bike designs, it has also dabbled in the road market. For the 1996 Olympics, GT provided the US national team with a bike that pioneered some radical ideas on aerodynamics; the brand also sponsored long-running US road teams Saturn and Jelly Belly. And who could forget the shiny glory that was Lotto’s titanium Edge team bike back in the 1990s? Although GT hasn’t produced a high-end road bike for a while now, it’s maintained a great range of entry-level machines. The advent of gravel seemed like the perfect opportunity for GT to make a move once more in top-ofthe-range drop-bar bikes.
The original Grade launched back in 2014 (although it was called the 2015 model). It was a ground-breaking machine that took three years of development from conception to prototype. The team at GT had identified a trend away from traditional race machines to those with a more comfortable ride and position. GT designed the Grade to be raced at a gran fondo yet also ridden off the
beaten track, thanks to disc brakes and large volume tyres on the spec list. The bike was aimed at the competitive sportive rider who wanted to expand their horizons way beyond tarmac.
“This new model keeps all the performance of low weight with the robustness that GT has been known for over the years,” says product director Patrick Kelly, “plus hi-tech materials to make the bike do many different things when the forces of riding are applied. When you honk on the pedals of the new Grade it goes forward with lightning acceleration but when you’re seated and hammering in the saddle, the new decoupled triple triangle and flattened seat tube really increase the movement at the seat...”
The issue remains for road riders looking to get into gravel that they may favour brands they recognise. “I agree,” says Patrick. “I think many riders looking for a gravel bike might overlook the Grade in favour of what they see as more established road brands, however they should look at our tech and experience. Our tech is what made the Grade your Gravel Bike of the Year...”
Going rogue
The latest Grade took four years to develop. Patrick explains: “The original Grade was somewhat ahead of its time – GT went rogue back in 2015 when introducing the first Grade. GT was at the forefront of this emerging gravel scene and became the first brand to develop disc brake-equipped carbon gravel bikes. We helped push the gravel/all-road, more extreme endurance bike forward, but as these bikes have matured we needed to address some aspects of the original Grade.”
Some of those changes are to be expected, such as flatmount discs front and rear, and thru-axles, which are now expected on a bike of this type, as are simple things such as Di2 compatibility. But add in the requirements of more frame bosses and even bigger tyre clearances, and the challenge grows when you want to maintain the essence of what made the original Grade such a great bike on all surfaces.
Triple triangle
GT’s triple triangle is a brand signature. It has featured on its mountain bikes for decades, on its road bikes in their heyday (like that beautiful titanium Edge) and it is present on the Grade too. However, there is a difference as the long, low dropped seatstays are no longer bonded to the seat tube. During the development of the bike, GT’s engineers found that by leaving the stays unbound by the seat tube they were able to increase compliance greatly through both the seatstays and the seat tube. Both of these frame elements have some smart design at work. First, the seatstays are by far the thinnest you’ll see on any current production carbon bike. Like the original Grade, the stays are solid in construction (not a hollow tube like most carbon tubes). The technology here is
GT’ STRIP LE TRIANGLE IS A BRAND SIGNATURE. IT HAS FEATURED ON ITS MOUNTAIN BIKES FOR DECADES AND ON ITS ROAD BIKES IN THEIR HEY DAY
called DFD tech and it combines glass fibre with carbon. Glass-fibre rods used in the stays have a similar strength to carbon but with a far lower modulus, meaning that they flex far more freely than carbon, which is usually stiff. These glass-fibre seatstays are finished with a final carbon layer to add impact resistance.
With the original Grade, the amount of deflection created was in excess of 10mm (just in the frame), but on this new model it’s even greater, thanks to the clever seat tube design. The seat tube has a bi-directional taper at the bottom bracket (BB), which means it morphs from a tube shape at the top into a flattened section. This flat section means the seat tube acts like a hinge, allowing for increased fore-aft movement, while the big down tube and oversized chainstays and BB ensure drivetrain stiffness is maintained.
The final component of the new Grade’s flexi-comfort design is the top tube. Its flat, broad, yet shallow shape restricts the amount of lateral movement, while the shallow depth allows it to flex. The top tube has a downward kink where it joins the seatstays and it flexes here by arching upwards, following the same path as the seatstays. It’s almost as if the kink is trying to straighten as the frame moves. The result of this, Patrick tells us, is that you can achieve as much as 30mm of travel at the saddle, meaning that the Grade can cope with pretty extreme off-road terrain. Cleverly, this movement is only activated when you hit objects with the rear wheel, so we found that when you’re just riding along the bike feels smooth without any annoying ‘bobbing’ of the saddle when you’re seated and pedalling enthusiastically.
Flipping forks
The Grade also features a chip in the fork dropout. Mounted almost horizontally, this chip can be switched around to alter fork offset. “The 15mm of adjustability lets riders go from 55mm to 70mm of fork offset,” says Patrick. “The former is perfect for gravel race days, while the 70mm offset is ideal when the Grade is loaded up with cargo for a bikepacking adventure.”
Maximum MPG
With all this talk of baggage, it’s no surprise that the Grade is fully ‘MPG’, as GT calls it –that’s Mounting Points Galore to the rest of us. The bike features no fewer than five possible positions for bottle cages (three on the down tube, one on each fork leg). Aside from this camel-like watercarrying ability, the Grade also has bosses for mudguards with a removable bridge on the back, racks front and rear, and even a bento box mount on the top-tube.
The carbon Grade frame has actually gained a tiny amount of weight over the previous generation, up to 980g from 965g for a size large. But when you factor in the myriad of new bosses, the increased tyre clearance (up to 42c from 35c on 700c wheels, and even bigger for 650s), internal routing for Di2 and a dropper post, plus the addition of a 12x142mm through-axle for the rear hub, the extra 15g is quite impressive.
As you’d expect, being predominantly a dirt brand, GT has paid particular attention to the brake spec. The flat mounts are set for 160mm rotors, but adaptors are included that enable you to fit 180mm rotors. That’s a first for any drop-bar bike, but when the bike is fully laden at its 280lb weight limit we think the extra security of huge brake rotors may be worth serious consideration.
Racy ride
This Grade is quite a sporty machine but the original Grade was more upright and relaxed. A lot of the firstgeneration gravel machines had geometry like this, most from small and custom builders. GT’s Patrick Kaye told us why they decided the new Grade should put on its sports kit: “As the gravel-style bike sector has grown the bikes have also evolved... we’re seeing much more racing happening right up to pro level, and the Grade can compete in anything from a one-day gravel race up to a trans-continental epic.”
On the large (58cm) bike the stack is down to 612mm from 627mm, the reach is extended to 400mm from 382mm, yet the wheelbase is up to 1055mm on the Grade carbon to account for bigger tyres. When compared with a sporty endurance bike (Giant Defy, Cannondale Synapse) those numbers look very familiar – it’s part of the reason the Grade feels so very, very good on the road.
Innovative, lightweight, sporty, smooth and hugely versatile this bike is built for gravel but is happy on the road. A superstar set to be as influential as the original.
INNOVATIVE, LIGHTWEIGHT, SPORTY, SMOOTH AND HUGELY VERSATILE, THIS BIKE IS BUILT FOR GRAVEL BUT IS HAPPY ON THE ROAD