Bike for a Sydney Commute - Is CX the Best Option

[4xsama]

Hi,

I am after a commuter bike for Sydney. I work in the CBD and commute from Ashfield (about 10km). I'm thinking a CX bike could be the go.

I had a Bianchi Sempre 105 and quite liked the direct power transfer (as opposed to a MTB - I also have a Pivot 429 but don't want to flog it and myself on a commute. I don't want a flat bar bike or a cheapo with low end components.

My max budget is around $4k. I'd rather not spend it all. The brief is is discs and 1x. Discs for obvious reasons and 1x for the reduced faffing with another bit of mech (and it looks cool - shallow reason I know). There are a number of bikes in the range but the Canyon Inflite has grabbed my attention. For $4k I can get a carbon SLX 8.0 Pro Race but for $2,600 I can get an ally SLX Pro Race. Is there; a) any better options out there with 1x and disc's and 2) any real reason to get a carbon bike over an ally one.

I wouldn't discount another road bike either but see a CX bike (with disks, 1x and the bigger tyres) as a fairly obvious choice.

Cheers

[Thoglette]

There's a few threads on this already. I'Ill repeat the key points mentioned.

CX is heading the right direction but the geometry tends to be aggressive and there's no option /room for mudguards. Nor for racks (of any kind). And you're stuck with 32mm max tyre width.

Between CX bikes and full-on-tourers there's a range of bikes which are categorised variously as "all-road" or "gravel grinders" or "Randonneurs". They vary from mass produced full-crabon things like the Specialised Diverge to all-steel things like Peter Weigle's one-offs and everything in between.