Let’s first agree on one thing: there is no such thing as a bike that can do it all well. Sure, you can pedal a downhill mountain bike up a paved mountain road, and you can ride a road bike down singletrack. But we all prefer a specialized bike for the task at hand, right?
This Specialized bike is clearly most at home on rough roads, be they dirt, stone or your local back route that has fallen into disrepair. On smooth asphalt, this adventure machine feels more sluggish than a normal road bike, but it is certainly game for long blacktop miles if that's where you take it.
On the other end of its spectrum, the Diverge can be rallied on low-key singletrack, provided the trails are dry as the slick tyres don’t offer any bite. (Swapping in file-tread cyclocross numbers can do wonders, but clearance is limited.)
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Within these bookends, the Diverge represents the new breed of adventure road bikes.
Low-slung and stable
A very low bottom bracket (76mm drop) and a high-and-short cockpit combine with a very slack front end (51mm rake) for a noticeably stable ride. This characteristic shines on dirt descents where washboards or loose rock would make handling challenging on a standard road bike. Spinning on the raked-out fork, the big front tyre just mows steadily along, like an icebreaker through thin ice.
To continue the boat analogy, the big 32mm tyres at low pressure let you float serenely over choppy surfaces, with the CG-R post soaking up the bigger hits and the fat handlebar perch dispersing the load under your palms. For the more adventurous, the Diverge can handle some of the kinds of trails you’d enjoy on a hardtail mountain bike.
A divergent set of builds
A tale of the tread
Bottom line: a good steed for rowdy riding
You can read more at BikeRadar.com
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