Going the distance
Merida Scultura Endurance 7000-E £3500 Gravel-curious mile-muncher
The Scultura has been Taiwanese bike-maker Merida’s lightweight road option for many years. The new Scultura Endurance moves far more into endurance territory and into the realm of rough-road riding with generous tyre clearances, comfort-oriented geometry and, as a bonus, mounts for proper mudguards. It joins bikes, such as the Specialized Roubaix and Trek Domane, in blurring the line between a conventional road bike and full-on gravel machine. The Scultura Endurance 7000-E is the top model in the range and, no, it’s not an ebike – the ‘E’ denotes an electronic Shimano Di2 groupset. More affordable models feature lowerspec builds but get the same full-carbon frameset.
Modern looks
The Scultura Endurance is built around a carbon frame weighing a claimed 1124g including all hardware. The matching fork comes in at a claimed 411g uncut. The geometry leans toward the more chilled-out end of endurance road, with this medium test bike having 380mm of reach and 584mm of stack and a tall front end. As Merida considers this bike to be unisex, there’s no separate men’s or women’s version.
The frame, in particular the seat cluster, is somewhat reminiscent of the Canyon Endurance CF, but the Scultura Endurance features fewer straight lines and the top tube flows into a distinctive bulge in the head tube. The seat clamp is a wedge-style item that lurks under a rubber cover in front of the seatpost. Everything about the frameset is up-to-date when it comes to standards. Flat-mount brakes are virtually a given now, as are 12mm thru-axles front and rear. The direct-mount rear derailleur is nice to have too, because this design makes rear-wheel removal and installation easier.
Like so many new-for-2021 bikes, the Scultura is endowed with very tidy cable routing.
The cables run underneath the stem before disappearing into the upper headset cover. As ever, this adds some mechanical complexity, but it looks super clean and has the side benefit of making it easier to run a fashion-forward bar bag. Key to the Scultura Endurance’s appeal is its ample tyre clearance. Merida fits 32s, but it’ll take 35s and, even better, there are mudguard (fender) mounts too – still a relative rarity on bikes of this ilk. The rear seatstay bridge can be removed if you’re not running fenders for a cleaner look.
We have mixed feelings about the frameset’s matt finish, which looks great but, as is typical for this type of paint, tends to show marks easily. The black sections on the frame are decals applied over the paint, and they seem more vulnerable to minor damage (such as rubbing against another bike in the car) than a fully painted finish.
The Scultura’s ride is smooth… and at the same time the fairly upright geometry favours relaxed riding over distance
This top-of-the-range Scultura Endurance 7000-E boasts a full Shimano Ultegra Di2 groupset barring the chain, DT Swiss P1850 Spline DB23 wheels and entirely in-house finishing kit. There’s little to complain about, although while the DT wheels are tubeless-ready, the 32mm Continental Grand Prix 4-Season tyres aren’t, so you’ll need to shell out for new rubber if you want to ditch the tubes. They’re also ‘only’ 18mm internal width – wide by traditional road standards, but not wide enough to take maximum advantage of the larger tyres the Scultura’s frameset accepts.
A nice touch is the compact multi-tool tucked in a case under the saddle. It’s handy to have it permanently attached to the bike, although the tool’s design is one that doesn’t work particularly well for saddle height adjustments as it tends to foul the seatpost. This medium bike weighs 8.4kg without pedals, decent – if not exceptional – for an endurance bike with chunky tyres and discs.
Comfort first
The Scultura Endurance lives up to its name with a ride that’s well suited to long days out. You don’t get the sense that the frame is adding gobs of compliance, but even with my more diminutive fit there’s enough seatpost on show to add a bit of flex and, more importantly, you’ve got those squishy 32mm tyres to absorb bumps. As a result, the Scultura doesn’t match Specialized Roubaix comfort levels, but the ride is smooth and doesn’t wear you down on broken tarmac and light gravel. At the same time, the fairly upright geometry favours relaxed riding over distance. That position means it’s never going to feel racy (although one could size down for a more aggressive fit), but the Scultura is stiff in the right places, feeling taut under hard efforts and accurate when you’re navigating bends at speed. Shimano’s Ultegra Di2 groupset is as brilliant as ever, and fans of loud freehubs will appreciate the DT Swiss rear hub.
If there’s one disappointment, it’s Merida’s tyre choice. As well as not being tubeless-ready, the Grand Prix 4-Seasons are heavy (340g claimed, each) and, while it’s hard to assess meaningfully without rolling resistance data, they feel draggy and slow. They’re the sort of worthy, durable
It’ll never feel racy, but the Scultura is stiff in the right places, feeling taut under hard efforts and accurate navigating bends at speed
tyres we’d fit to an all-weather commuting bike where puncture protection took precedence over performance, but they don’t do justice to this bike. For mixed road riding and light gravel, we’d swap them for a set of Continental GP5000 TLs and reap the benefits of a proper tubeless performance tyre. But, as it comes, the Endurance can do a passable impression of a gravel bike. Tyre choice is always an important factor with gravel riding, yet as long as you’re not on excessively slippery or loose terrain, the Merida is happy to dabble off-road on fire roads and gravelly paths in standard form, and with knobblier rubber it could do even more.
We also rather fell out with the rear brake cooler, a feature on many Merida bikes. Mounted between the caliper and the frame, this heatsink reduces heel clearance by around 5mm on the left side. This tester has a somewhat heels-in pedalling style so, as a result, we repeatedly caught our shoe on the cooler’s surprisingly sharp edge, making a gouge in a new pair of Shimano S-Phyres. We asked Merida if it’s possible to remove the heatsink and apparently it can be replaced by a 4mm spacer. The brand says Shimano’s higher-end Ice Tech-equipped brakes (with specific rotors and pads) run sufficiently cool without assistance, but it’s preferable to retain the heatsink with cheaper options and SRAM groupsets.
The Endurance 7000-E is competitively priced for its spec. Key rivals include the Canyon
Endurance CF SL Disc 8.0 Di2, which is currently £100 more expensive and lacks the Merida’s tidy cable routing and mudguard mounts, plus takes a maximum 30mm tyre versus the Scultura’s 35mm. The Giant Defy Advanced Pro is another competitor and, while the 2021 Advanced Pro 2 costs £500 more than the Merida and has a mechanical Ultegra groupset rather than Di2, it does come with fancier carbon wheels, a significant upgrade over the Scultura’s alloy rims.
Go-anywhere bike
The Merida Scultura Endurance is a likeable and versatile bike that has a lot to recommend it. It’s comfortable, handles nicely, offers mudguard mounts where many rivals omit them and takes chunky tyres if you want them. The spec isn’t perfect, but a tyre upgrade would make all the difference, and even in stock form it’s a great allround ride. If we were shopping for a posh winter bike we’d be sorely tempted by the entry-level £2000 model with Shimano 105, but we wouldn’t feel cheated by any of the range.