One could be excused for confusing that Donnelly – the tire company formerly known as Clément – is debuting two all-new, race-ready carbon bikes. But the G//C for gravel & C//C for cyclocross bikes continue the racing development Donnelly has been pouring their heart into over the last decade. From developing cross, gravel & adventure tires, to tubeless wheelsets, the Donnelly team breathes drop bar racing, so developing their own bikes seemed a logical step. Updated with weights!
Donnelly carbon G//C gravel & C//C cyclocross bikes
Since 2009 company founder Donn Kellogg has designed & produced a wide range of conditions-specific cyclocross and adventure gravel racing tires. Those airport code named tires have developed a strong following, suiting a wide range of terrain. While not making tires, Donn & brand manager Brandon Dwight can be found at the races, competing on the bike or supporting those who are racing. So they felt that developing a set of “world class frames” was just a logical next step.
To make that huge leap, the company brought Rolf Singerberger of RS Development onboard. Rolf brought with him years of bike design experience from running development at both BMC & Merckx. His management and experience with carbon frames is what got the project off the ground.
Donnelly G//C gravel carbon race bike frameset
The G//C gravel bike will be the first to see its official debut racing the Dirty Kanza this weekend under pro crosser Jamey Driscoll.
The hi-modulus carbon G//C gravel frame blends geometry to come to a happy medium of gravel race or even weekend group road ride handling.
That gives the bike a 71.5° head angle paired with a slightly taller headtube, 67mm of BB drop, 435mm chainstays, and a 73.5° seattube.
The 12mm thru-axle, flat mount disc gravel frame was designed to fit a 45mm tire on a 700c wheel, or to be able to run a 650b wheel with up to a 50mm/2″ tire. It also gets full rack and fender mounts, in addition to a third bottle cage mount under the downtube.
The gravel racing G//C frameset will sell for $2000 with a five size range (XS-XL), and comes only in a gloss sand tan finish. Frame weight including all the alloy bits – hanger, cable guides, front derailleur mount, and even all the bottle & rack bolts like in the picture above is claimed at 1280g for a medium. The uncut carbon fork adds another 490g.
Donnelly C//C cyclocross carbon race bike frameset
The C//C cyclocross bike will also be floating around Emporia at the DK200 expo area in Donnelly’s booth. But it will be a couple of months ’til cross season is underway for its racing debut.
The hi-mod carbon C//C cross frame promises precise race-specific geometry with 72°/73.5° head/seattube angles & 64mm of BB drop, efficient power transfer through 425mm chainstays, and plenty of mud clearance around the tires for racing in any conditions.
It’s said to have the same 45mm tire clearance (and 650b compatibility) as the gravel frame.
Frame weight for the cross bike also includes the alloy bits – rear derailleur hanger, cable guides, front derailleur mount, and the bottle bolts at 1090g for a medium in black, plus 530g for the uncut carbon fork. Unsurprisingly (although nice that they shared it with us), that light blue requires a good bit more paint and adds another 40g to the frame & 10g to the fork.
While many cyclocross bikes are too stiff to cross over even for training, Donnelly claims the C//C is more vertically compliant in the rear end to make it comfortable on long distance rides as well. The frame gets a 12x142mm thru-axle rear paired to Donnelly’s won hi-mod tapered steerer fork, also with a 12mm thru-axle and flat mounts for disc brakes. While the cross bike builds are 1x only, the frame has a removable front derailleur hanger and traditional under the bottom bracket cable routing or is Di2 ready.
The C//C cross frameset will sell for $2000 for frame, fork, internal headset, and seatpost clamp. It comes in five stock sizes (XS-XL) and two color schemes – all black or an “Amy D blue” that we suspect will share a bit of the proceeds with the Amy D foundation to support young women racers in honor of late cross racer Amy Dombroski.
Complete Bike Builds & Availability
Besides the bare framesets of each of the new bikes, Donnelly will also be offering them in complete builds spec’ed with SRAM groups, FSA components, and of course Donnelly’s own Ushuaia wheels & appropriate tires – tubeless ready X’plor MSO 700x40mm for gravel & tubeless ready MXP 700 x 33mm for cross.
Both the G//C Rival and C//C Rival completes will sell for $3000 with the standard Ushuaia wheels. The G//C Force and C//C Force will sell for $4000 and upgrade also to Ushuaia SL wheels. Donnelly weighed a couple of complete bikes in their office for us, with a G//C Force coming in at 8.6kg/18.9lb and a C//C Force at 7.9kg/17.5lb.
Framesets or complete bikes can be pre-ordered now directly through Donnelly’s website. The frames will be available to customers by the end of June either consumer direct or through select bike shops. Complete bikes will be available by mid-July.
