Fresh Produce | Colin's GRX test steed the Scott Addict Gravel

After having a taste of the new 12-speed GRX groupset in Bend, Oregon, last year, Shimano sent one out for us to test, and after a long wait, we finally have it bolted onto a worthy testing steed, the Scott Addict Gravel Tuned.

While there were a few hiccups involving headset parts, we finally had a complete bike to ride — thanks to some problem solving by the the workshop legends at Just Ride Nerang.

The frame

We have scored an all singing, all dancing, Addict Gravel Tuned to serve as the canvas on which to set the new GRX 12-speed mechanical groupset. Whereas in our more recent reviews of the Avanti Gran Durance and the Focus Atlas, we’ve noted they’re more akin to a Subaru Forester than Brendan Semenuk’s WRX rally racer, the Addict Gravel is very much designed to be the latter.

The Tuned version of this frame is made from the Swiss outfit’s top-end HMX carbon, and is claimed to weigh 930g for the frame and 395g for the fork. Dressed in the GRX components, it tipped our scales at an impressive 7.95kg.

For a gravel bike, 7.95kg is impressively lightweight, and there are still places to shed grams without pulling out the dremmel and going full weight weenie.

Borrowing a bit of design language from its roadie cousins that sport the same, Scott makes claims about aero optimising this and that, nearly every tube is a truncated airfoil. This is also the reason that Scott has opted to run the cables through the upper headset bearing. While wind tunnel data shows that cleaning up the cockpit does make a substantial improvement to the drag coefficient. The novelty of any watts saved disappeared when the sandpaper had to come out to open up the channel in the compression plug to stop it from squishing the gear cable.

While the dropped seat stays are all too familiar nowadays, the Addict Gravel fork’s drastic kink just below the crown is meant to provide vertical compliance without sacrificing lateral stiffness. Scott has also opted for a D-shaped seatpost to help take the edge off square hits. While this does mean you’re locked into the Syncros version that comes with the bike, we do appreciate that the Swiss brand has resisted the urge to use an internal wedge-based seat clamp.

Even with the competition focus of the addict gravel, there are still mounts for a third water bottle, a snack station top tube bag, and even full coverage fenders, which reduce the max tyre clearance from 45mm to 40mm.

While the seat clamp on the addict gravel does use a wedge, it is so much more user friendly that the hidden internal ones we see on a lot of drop bar bikes.

Plenty of room for decent-sized tyres and mud. These 40mm Conti Terra Trail tyres measure 41.7mm at their widest point on the RX880 wheels.

While we have the bike set up in a 1x configuration, it can accept a front mech if that’s what floats your boat, and the Addict Gravel is even designed to accommodate 180mm rotors at the front and 160mm at the rear.

I am a big fan of the subtle logos and not-so-in-your-face branding Scott has employed for the Addict Gravel. However, it seems the paint they have opted for is quite fragile. The inside of the chainstay already has scratches from where the chain settled as I was measuring it to chop the extra links. Given that someone in the market for this bike is going to subject it to a constant stream of airborne grit and rocks, we think this would be a good candidate for something like Ride Wrap.

At the moment, the bike is finished with a set of non-flared Syncros Creston 1.5 alloy handlebars. While the clamp on the new GRX levers has been designed to suit an 18º flare this provides a proof of concept that you won’t have any ergonomic issues on a standard drop bar. Even still, we’ll be aiming to rectify this soon.

Scott hasn’t adopted a UDH hanger, so you wouldn’t be able to run Transmission on this bike. It also means should you snap one, finding a replacement will be a bit more time consuming.

It appears the paint Scott has used is quite fragile. These scratches are from where the chain settled on the frame while I was measuring to cut the excess links.

Scott Addict Gravel Geometry

Compared to its predecessor, Scott has followed the trend of adding a bit to the reach via a longer top tube, while pairing it with a shorter stem. But, everything is relative of course. While Scott has lopped 10mm off the stem, it’s still 100mm long on a size M.

While lots of brands are spec’ing stumpy stems on their gravel bikes, Scott is still recommending a 100mm stem for a size M frame. However, given the aggressive nature of the Addict Gravel, it feels about right with the position it creates.

This does create quite a long and low, aggressive riding position.

The head angled sits at 71º while the seat angle is 73.5º — both unchanged from its predecessor. The chainstays have grown by 3mm, and the BB drop has been increased by 4mm. That second one is quite a difference and should lead to the rider feeling like they are very much IN the bike, rather than on top of it. The fork rake sits at 50mm and creates a trail figure of 69mm, it should be stable at cruising speed but still pretty reactive when it comes time to navigate a tight bend. So far, I’ve only pedalled it around the block, so we’re still very much in the realm of assumptions.

No doubt about it, the Addict Gravel is very much on the racy end of the gravel spectrum.

The groupset | Shimano GRX 1×12-speed

I have been salivating at the pile of GRX boxes sitting on the end of my workbench for some time. Check out the story from the launch for a full rundown of what’s new and some first impressions.

Shimano sent out the 1×12 long cage groupset, which the brand has dubbed “Unstoppable.” To hit the 51T cog on the cassette, the GRX rear mech utilises a SGS long cage derailleur. The only difference between this version and the derailleur that’s labelled “Unstoppable”, which maxes out at 45T, is the derailleur cage. While the parallelogram accepts both the SG (medium) and SGS (long) derailleur cages, Shimano AU said it won’t be stocking them individually.

The new 12-speed GRX all laid out. Looking at it separate from a bike, it’s an interesting mix of influences from both Shimano’s road and MTB components.

With that, we have the 10-51T cassette on the back, which is Deore XT Cassette, bolted onto a set of Shimano RX880 carbon wheels. With a 25mm internal width and depth, these hoops tipped our scales at 1,430g, and they are one of the few gravel wheels that accept the Microspine freehub needed to accommodate the 10T small cog.

We’ve finished them with a 160/140mm mix of Shimano’s new CL rotors. This new rotor design will eventually replace the MTB and drop bar discs across Shimano’s range.

The crank is unchanged from the previous GRX 810 groupset, and Shimano sent us the 42T chainring.