First Look: Avanti’s new 27.5 Torrent

Last week Avanti’s new medium wheeled incarnation of the Torrent showed up in its 2014 livery. So far Avanti have got this bike pretty spot on, we rode and loved its original incarnation as well as last year’s move to 12mm rear axle, so we are quietly confident that the move to medium wheels is going to add another notch in the Torrent’s bedpost. Apart from the wheel size there’s not a massive amount of change going on. The cable routing for the dropper post routing has been refined (the bike, however, doesn’t come with one). The head tube has been squashed down for a much lower handlebar position as well as offering a lot more range if you were planning on changing the fork at all.
The Torrent 2 is the top spec’d in the line and comes in at $4449. To get the bike to that affordable some of the shinier options out there have been passed over but that doesn’t mean the bike is not going to perform well. Out back you have the Kashima-less CTD Fox Float Evolution.

Shimano Deore stoppers and the DT Swiss 12mm axle keep the bike stiff and under control. When we first pulled the bike out of the box we where a little disappointed that it didn’t come with a dropper post. But after a group ride on the weekend where five guys had five different brand posts we have realizsed droppers are a bit of a personal preference item and being able to select the one you actually want is a good thing…

Kenda rubber and Mavic Crossride wheels do the trick.

Avanti’s in-house component brand Zero fits out the cockpit with a mix of SRAM X7 shifters and Shimano Deore brakes.

The Spoke team is pretty divided on the colour scheme of the bike… Me, I’m in the pro camp.

Avanti’s tried and true Trulink 4 bar suspension system.

A very nice touch is E13’s new TRS crankset complete with the hand adjustable APS bearing pre-loader.

And some very tidy cable routing for the rear brake…