NEW BIKES

> Value sorcery

Merlin Cordite SL, Bianchi Oltre XR3 Disc, All-City Macho Man Disc, Rose BackRoad, Cube Agree Hybrid C:62 SL versus the Orbea Gain D10 LR.

At the time of writing, the Cordite SL is reduced on merlincycles.com from £1499 to the frankly ridiculous price of just under a grand. That puts this full-carbon, Ultegraequipped road machine into bike-to-work scheme territory, which is a feat that takes a special kind of magic

The secret behind this particular trick is that Merlin is using an old frame design from Ridley – specifically the Belgian firm’s 2008 Helium model – as the basis for the Cordite SL. Back in 2008, the Helium was Ridley’s lightest frameset, weighing in at a claimed 900g for the medium-sized chassis. The equivalently sized Cordite SL frame is constructed by Ridley but weighs 1200g, plus a further 380g for the carbon fork.

Some of the features hark back to the time when this Helium design was in its prime, the integrated