My Bikepacking Bike – Cannondale Topstone

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In this video I run through my OG bikepacking bike. The Cannondale Topstone I’ve been using for over 5 years now.

Check out my winter off-road bikepacking bike I have here: https://youtu.be/xpGWSNCQcv0

Timestamps:
00:00 – Intro
00:29 – Cannondale Topstone 2019
00:47 – 105 Gearing
00:53 – Osyemtric Oval Chainrings and gearing
01:34 – The Wheels and tyres
02:20 – The handlebars before
02:39 – The Bikepacking setup
03:18 – The state of it…
03:34 – What’s new for 2024?
05:11 – Summary

#bikepacking #bikepackingsetup #bikepackinggear

it occurred to me that I’ve taken this bike all over the world in all conditions in many of my bike packing films but I’ve never actually shown you it in detail this is my new and improved canondale top Stone out of all the bikes I own this is the one I’ve used the most this is my go-to bike packing bike and it’s literally been everywhere it cycled from lanzen to Jonah gr the North Coast 500 the Atlas Mountains in Morocco Iceland California and many more and I absolutely love it I bought this bike in 201 19 summer 2019 for £700 and at the time it was an absolute bargain when I first got this bike it came with some pretty na components and Shimano Sora 9speed which was okay but naturally since then I’ve made a lot of improvements I started by adding a 105 hydraulic group set from another bike 175 mm cranks and I fitted my o symmetric oval chain rings to this I’m a massive fan of oval chain Rings been using them for well over 10 years now so I don’t plan on changing I know a lot of you have asked about that and I will be doing a video at some point explaining why I love oval chaining so much but this is my go-to setup on pretty much all my bikes you might be wondering why I fitted Road gearing to this given that it’s a gravel bike well at the time Shimano grx wasn’t that widely available and I already had this on another bike so it made sense to swap it over there’s only been a couple of times where I felt like I really needed more gearing on this especially when it’s heavily loaded going up some really steep grally climbs but on the whole the 105 group set with the long cage rear deria has been fine for most things I then fitted some hunt Mason X 650b Wheels to this because this is a 2019 model it was before most gravel bikes got really fat tire clearance so as a result the tire clearance on this isn’t anywhere near as good as you get on most gravel bikes nowadays but by running 650b Wheels it allows me to run 1.9 in tires which is what I’m running here pan aaser gravel Kings and for most things that’s absolutely fine there’s always a lot of debate about 700 C and 650b but I’ve actually been using mostly 650b on this bike even on my road trips even the North Coast 500 I use 650 BS on there and when you’re running semi- slick tires like this you hardly notice it personally and the added puncture protection is what I’m after the last thing I want is to have loads of punctures when I’m out on my Adventures until very recently I just had some basic gravel handlebars on there and some Arrow bars that my dad gave me that he had in the garage pretty basic but for most things it was absolutely fine I liked having multiple positions on the bike to keep myself comfortable this year though I have changed the handlebar setup which I will talk about in a second for my bike packing setup I pretty much used the same thing time and time again it’s mostly a top peak setup I’m not sponsored by top peak it’s what I’ve been using for a long time because for my filming setup it works really well at the back I have a topique MTX trunk bag and that’s fitted to a top peak MTX rack which is screwed into the frame thankfully this has paa eyelets I then have have a top peak mid loader frame bag a topak top loader top tube bag and normally I haven’t fitted it on this occasion I use a front loader rollup bag as well I found for most things that allows me to carry pretty much everything I need from my filming equipment to my camping equipment and everything in between this bike has done way more than a 700b bike should ever be asked to do but it has handled it like a trooper it’s been literally everywhere and it’s gone in all conditions it’s starting to get a little bit beaten up unfortunately if you have a look there’s plenty of scratches plenty of scuffs it’s still going strong but I’m conscious that it’s probably not going to be able to take this sort of abuse for a very long time given that it’s an aluminium frame eventually if you start wearing into the frame or it gets battered about a bit there’s a chance that you could weaken the structure of the frame so I’m going to keep using it for as long as I can but I’m conscious at some point it’s going to have to go to the great bike shed in the sky so what’s new for 2024 I’ve been using this setup for quite a while there are a couple of things I want to show you firstly looking at the forks I fitted some old man Mountain axle packs because these are old Forks you can’t fit anything to them there’s no like cage mounts or anything like you get on most modern gravel bikes so as a result I fitted these axle packs which allows me to add bottle cages or in this case an old man Mountain titanium King cage which allows me to put some dry bags on there and strap it to it or some really big water bottles if I want to carry more when I’m going out to the desert for example they screw into the through axle so I can leave them on all year not really notice them and just swap the cage depending on what I need and lastly I decided I wanted to improve the cockpit setup and make it a little bit more comfortable so I’ve added a red shift suspension stem and seat post and as well as that some red shift kitchen sink handlebars and quick release eror bars and all of their grips as well to give me maximum options for different positions on The Handlebar I’ve also widened the arrow bars I used to run them really narrow which was fine when I used to do time trials and race and things but now I just want to go fast and be comfortable I’ve extended that so it’s about shoulder width which might not look as aesthetic but it’s much more comfortable so that’s it that’s my canondale top Stone out of all the bikes I’ve owned this has probably been the one that I’ve enjoyed the most for what I paid for it has been unbelievably good and it’s taken me to some incredible places I love it so much and I really will be sad to let it go when it eventually gives up the ghost any questions about the bike please let me know I’m sure there’s something I’ve not mentioned stick them in the comments and I’ll do my best to answer thank you so much for watching and I’ll see you in the next video