Having an adventure, freeing the outside and escaping consumerism is, rather ironically, quite a big industry now, so it’s no surprise to see Specialized has expanded its adventure bike range and introduced some ‘bikepacking’ luggage to meet the growing demand. The new Sequoia (or reimagined Sequoia if you’re familiar with the old road bike line) sits somewhere between the current Diverge and AWOL models, while the Burra Burra luggage is a whole new entry.
Sequoia
The new Sequoia range consisted of three models: Sequoia, Sequoia Elite and Sequoia Expert. All three share the same steel frame with the groupsets and finishing kit stepping up between each model. Specialized describe the frame as ‘built from premium, size-specific CrMo tubing’. In short it means that as the frame grows in size so does the tube wall thicknesses, which should ensure similar levels of stiffness and comfort up the size range.
The tubes look like a mix of Diverge and AWOL; the AWOLs oversized stiff touring rear end combined with the tapered modern front end from the Diverge. The geometry too is somewhere between the two. There are plenty of braze-ons to satisfy even the most ambitious traveller and all three models are disc brake only. The Elite and Expert models come with a carbon fork whereas the Sequoia has a steel fork, although all three have extra water bottle mounts on the fork legs.
The Sequoia is priced at £950 and comes with 9-speed Sora groupset, which we think would make it a rather ideal commuter if the wilderness doesn’t exactly take your fancy. A Sequoia Elite jumps to £1500, which gets you a 105 hydraulic groupset and a carbon fork. Another leap up to £2500 for the Sequoia Expert secures you a Rival 1x groupset plus Specialized’s fancy CG-R seatpost amongst other things. We should have one in to review, so keen an eye out for our first thoughts soon.
Burra Burra luggage
To complement its range of adventure bikes, Specialized has produced a range of adventure luggage under the Burra Burra (nope, us neither) umbrella. The range consists of the usual bike packing staples: seat pack, frame bag, bar bag (with dry bags) and top tube bag plus a pizza (porteur) bag.
The seat pack is available in two sizes: 10 & 20 – which, rather confusingly, are 8 and 10.5l respectively. Both come with a stabilising arm, which should ensure the bag is more stable and doesn’t suffer from the side-to-side wagging sensation seat packs are known for. This does have its disadvantages as you need tools to fit them, they’re only compatible with 27.2mm and 30.9mm seatposts and they’re not compatible with carbon seatposts. The Burra Burra 20 is £120 and the smaller 10 is £110.
The Framepack 5 (£80) is very similar to most other frame bags. It’s made of weatherproof nylon and attaches to the frame via a collection of nylon straps with camlock buckles. It only comes in one size (45cm) so it’s worth measuring up the inside of your frame to make sure it will fit.
The handlebar harness (£85) is another interesting item as it too has a stabiliser bar inside similar to the seatpack. The stabiliser bar should prevent the contents bouncing around and slowly working themselves loose from the handlebars. Specialized says its compatible with both drop and flat handlebars, although just looking at the photos it may interfere with certain Garmin or light mounts.
The harness has been designed for pairing with the drypack 23 (£20) that, unlike its confusing sister product, actual holds 23l of stuff. It’s worth noting that the drypack is only listed as ‘weatherproof’ not waterproof, which is a little disappointing for a drybag.
Completing the bikepacking line up is the top tube bag (£35), which has two weather resistant pockets. Simple Velcro attachments means it should fit almost any bike set up and, having used one in the past, they’re perfect for phones and wallets.
The final item in the Burra Burra line is the Pizza Bag (£70), which is designed to fit on a pizza rack (sometimes known as a porteur rack). Porteur racks are all the rage now and having used one on the Specialized AWOL, we can see why. Small enough to be portable but big enough to carry a decent amount of kit, we think they’re perfect for the commute.
