The fact that we are possibly seeing a prototype gives rise to the question of who (which brand or brands) might be pulling the trigger on a line of gravel/adventure bikes featuring front suspension. We can assume this with some certainty since Fox doesn't make anything unless they get orders for a fork or rear shock.
The second conclusion we can draw here is that some big brand, or brands, are behind this. Once the Fox Vanilla 29"er fork came about, the 29"er segment found its legs and the rest is history. This despite the fact that Rock Shox made a token Reba 29"er fork to give the segment some legitimacy. I say this based upon what we can learn from the past.īefore Fox Shox made a fork for 29"ers, the entire segment of wagon wheelers was doomed to be nothing more than a small niche market. If this is for real, you can expect a major sea change in the volume and intensity of the marketing behind the gravel/all road/adventure bike segment. What is most important about such a possibility is the ramifications of the shock's mere existence. Telescopic front suspension forks aren't anything new. ( See their story here) I won't get into the technicalities of such a device. Now I see that yesterday " Bike Radar" broke a story about a possible gravel fork from Fox Racing Shox. Let's not forget that Cannondale went on its own path, (again) with the Oliver Lefty fork for similar reasons. So things like ISO speed decouplers and Lauf "forks", (I hesitate to call that visual assault to the eyes a fork), are things deemed necessary to ward off the incessant banging hands take on chunky gravel roads and rougher pavement. The jack hammering action of the handle bar is really bad with the current crop of ultra stiff, cyclo cross/road racing carbon fork designs being foisted as "gravel forks". Riding gravel roads is akin, many times, to being on a two wheeled version of a paint shaker. What looks like a Fox prototype shock could be a gravel specific design.
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