Gravel’s New Arms Race: Eight Unreleased Bikes, Wild Wheels, and a New Groupset from The Traka 2026

If Unbound Gravel used to be the place where the cycling industry debuted its most ambitious hardware, that crown has quietly shifted to Girona, Spain. The Traka 2026 wasn’t just a race — it was a full-blown technology showcase, with eight new bikes spotted in prototype or freshly-launched form, unreleased wheels, secret tyres, and even a surprise new Campagnolo groupset. Welcome to gravel’s fashion week, where everyone is stressing about their carbs in a very different way.

The Overarching Trend: Bigger Rubber Wins

Before diving into the hardware parade, it’s worth understanding the engineering thesis driving virtually every new gravel bike at The Traka: frame aerodynamics are becoming secondary to tyre size. Multiple brands confirmed that fitting 2.1–2.2″ MTB-width rubber can yield double-digit watt savings in rolling resistance — far outpacing the single-digit aero gains from a more exotic frame shape. The industry has internalized this, and the result is a generation of bikes designed from the fork outward to accommodate massive tyres while staying as aero as possible everywhere else.

The Eight New Bikes

🔴 Ridley (Unreleased) — The Headline Grabber

The most-talked-about bike at the event was a fully disguised, unreleased Ridley gravel machine that essentially transplants the front end of the Noah Fast 3.0 aero road bike onto a chassis with MTB-scale tyre clearance. The bottom bracket is enormous — visually dwarfing the chainring — and the fork is wide enough to swallow 2.2″ tyres with ease. Spotted on Pieter Potters during the race, the bike is reportedly codenamed “RS2” (Rally Sport 2, perhaps?). Aero improvement over the current Kanzo Fast is modest in absolute terms, but that’s not the point. The rolling resistance argument for going bigger on tyres is the real performance lever here.

🟠 Canyon Grail CFR (Prototype)

Canyon wasn’t exactly hiding this one — multiple prototypes were spotted at the start/finish and around the Canyon stand in different sizes and cockpit configurations. The new Grail CFR shares proportions with the recently launched Endurace CFR road bike but with dramatically greater tyre clearance and a chunky downtube around the bottle zone, presumably to maintain structural width next to wide-section tyres. Some builds used Canyon’s new aero cockpit; others ran a more traditional setup. Announcement imminent.

🔵 BMC Kaius (New Launch)

The new Kaius keeps a surprisingly slender frame aesthetic despite its wide fork — it accepts up to 55mm knobbies, though the demo builds were rolling slick Continental Terra Competitions, which gave it a deceptively road-ish look. Standout details include hose routing through covered recesses (a significant service improvement over the previous generation), a strap tab on the underside of the downtube for securing a mud stick or snack pack, and an integrated cockpit that BMC has clearly spent time refining. The front end in particular is visually striking.

🟢 Factor Sarana (Just Launched)

Designed explicitly for ultra-distance events like the Traka 560 and Unbound XL, the Sarana has the most aggressively dropped seat stays in gravel — a comfort-focused geometry choice that also helps open up mud clearance. The rigid fork is suspension-corrected, so riders can swap in a bouncy fork (as Unbound XL winner Rob Britton was running) without compromising geometry. Tyre clearance maxes at 57mm. Spotted with new 46mm-depth Black Inc. gravel wheels. A bike built for suffering gracefully over 20+ hours.

⚫ Factor Aero Gravel (Unreleased — Different Bike)

Separate from the Sarana and easily the most visually extreme bike at the event, this unreleased Factor aero machine borrows its fork unmistakably from the ONE road bike. The fork legs are so wide that a 3″ tyre would likely fit with room to spare. The design philosophy mirrors what’s happening in road cycling — hyper-aero at the front, weight-conscious further back. Multiple riders were spotted on this bike at the finish, which suggests it’s deep into final testing.

🇨🇦 Guava Ace (New)

Canadian national champion Ben Perry raced the Traka on the new Ace from Guava, decked out in full national champs livery. The build was top-tier throughout: twin-sided Gabaruk power crankset in red, Industry Nine hubs, Muc-Off high-flow valves with contrast nipples, and Quoc shoes with Maple BOA dials at the finish line. Perry came home 4th. The head tube was conspicuously logo-free — not yet officially announced.

🟡 Felt Breed (New)

Adam Roberge was one of the very few riders at The Traka running Shimano, aboard the new Felt Breed with a hybrid XTR/GRX drivetrain — a configuration that’s become common at Paris-Roubaix for similar reasons (cassette range + shifting reliability). Four 750ml bottle cages, all full. Suspension-corrected fork with 50mm Continental Dubnitals running close to the legs. A pragmatic, no-frills race build on a sharp new platform.

🔺 Argon 18 (Unreleased)

Spotted while the Cyclingnews journalist was attempting to have a quiet beer — the Argon 18 prototype checks the same boxes as the Ridley: aero, massive tyre clearance, oversized bottom bracket shell. The forks have a distinctive squared-off rear profile, and on a small size, the fork is nearly as wide as the head tube is tall. Notably absent: frame storage, which every other new bike seems to include. The paint scheme, however, is excellent.

Components Worth Watching

Campagnolo Record — 13-Speed Wireless Returns

The surprise groupset reveal at The Traka was a new fully wireless Campagnolo Record. Positioned a tier below the eye-wateringly expensive Super Record while retaining much of the aesthetics and feature set, Record goes 13-speed and brings back the thumb buttons that Campagnolo briefly abandoned. The machined cassette (the entire assembly save the largest sprocket carved from a single billet) is a visual statement. This is Campagnolo’s play to make wireless electronic shifting accessible below the Super Record price point.

Enve G SES Pro — Taking the Fight to Zipp

Enve showed up with wide, deep gravel wheels clearly aimed at Zipp’s dominant position in the aero gravel wheel segment. Labelled “G SES Pro,” they’re wide enough to support 50mm Dubnitals properly. A second, even more extreme version was also spotted — deep, wide, and slightly asymmetric in rim profile — though it turned out to be Lightbicycle rims wearing Enve stickers. Still, the genuine Enve product looks serious.

Schwalbe Maxxis Aspens “ST” — Unreleased Tyre

Chad Haga was spotted on an unlabelled “ST” variant of the Maxxis Aspen — a tyre that doesn’t yet officially exist. The presumption is a faster, slightly narrower casing in the mold of the Continental Dubnitals (which took full MTB rubber and optimized it for gravel-speed use). Haga was tight-lipped. Given how well the standard Aspens perform at gravel widths, an ST version could be a significant product.

Fara GR4 + New Schwalbe Thunder Burt Speed

Simen Nordahl Svendsen’s spare Fara GR4 was running new Schwalbe Race Pro Thunder Burt Speed tyres labelled as 2.1″ — another unreleased tyre. The GR4’s two-piece cockpit design is unusual, splitting the bar somewhere between a Cervélo S5 bar and a Coefficient setup. Round seatpost (dropper-compatible, more vertical compliance than aero options). Frame storage on trend, though inaccessible mid-race.

The Wider Picture

A few macro observations from scanning the whole field:

• Drop-bar MTBs are here to stay — multiple builds with suspension forks and 29″ wheels were competing seriously, not just touring.
• Single-sided clipless pedals are a growing trend, with both Look and WolfTooth DEL variants spotted on race bikes.
• Suspension-corrected rigid forks are becoming standard on bikes designed for ultra-distance, allowing fork swaps without geometry penalties.
• Shimano is a rare sight — SRAM and Campagnolo dominate, with XTR/GRX hybrid builds being the main Shimano presence.
• The Specialized Roubaix as gravel bike made an appearance via former WorldTour pro Daniel Oss, proving you can under-bike The Traka if your legs are good enough.

The Traka has arrived. If you want to see where gravel cycling is headed in the next 18 months, Girona in early May is where the industry tips its hand.

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Source: Cyclingnews tech gallery by Will Jones, published May 2, 2026. The Traka 2026, Girona, Spain.

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