Unveiled at Eurobike 2024, the Parlee Taos is the brand's 'fastest yet most forgiving' gravel bike to date – and we've got our hands on one for review.
The Taos builds on Parlee's decade of experience making gravel-focused bikes, but takes a new direction that’s off-road focused yet very versatile.
Parlee’s history of making bikes built for adventure started with the Chebacco road bike in 2016, although don’t expect to see much of that original approach in the Taos.
The frame is longer, with a massively sloping top tube, slacker head angle and 50mm tyre clearances. Parlee claims the construction is torsionally stiffer than the Chebacco, yet has more compliance.
The frame
The frame has been configured with a monocoque construction that uses a blend of uni-directional carbon fibres. This creates a meticulously crafted frame with a claimed weight of 980g (size medium).
Don’t believe the Taos has been meticulously crafted? Well, just look at the finish.
Parlee has chosen to leave the made-in-the-EU carbon fibre frameset raw finished. You can see for yourself every ply, join and orientation of the carbon on show underneath a transparent waxed finish.
The finish means you'll get no paint chips or scratching – just wipe the bike down and occasionally give it a re-waxing to keep it looking pristine.
The frameset hits all the right modern gravel notes: big tyre clearances, a clever down tube storage port, internal routing, a UDH rear dropout, T47 threaded bottom bracket and in-built frame protection in high-impact areas.
Race and recreation
Parlee claims the Taos is its most versatile bike. If you want to go a bit more extreme, the frame geometry is corrected for a suspension fork, so it won’t alter the ride should you want to add a bit of travel. It also has stealth routing if you want to fit a dropper post.
The frame can be used with 1x or 2x drivetrains. It sports fender/mudguard mounts, and with top tube bag mounts and internal storage, it could easily serve as a long-distance touring bike.
The fork has a flip chip dropout, so if you want to run the Taos as an all-road bike rather than pure gravel, you can tighten up the wheelbase and steepen the head angle. When run with smaller tyres, it has a more road-biased ride.
The build
Our first look at the all-new Taos is with this second-tier build. It combines SRAM’s Force shifters, brakes and 1x XPLR 42-tooth crankset, paired with a mountain bike X0 Eagle AXS Transmission rear derailleur and broad 10-52 cassette.
The bike rolls on Zipp’s new 303 XPLR S wheels, with the 45mm tyres from Zipp’s collaboration with Goodyear.
The cockpit is FSA’s latest version of the gravel-specific K-Force AGX carbon bar, matched to an FSA SMR II stem. At the rear is Parlee’s own lightweight carbon seatpost.
The contact points are Ergon’s SR Allroad Core pro carbon saddle and matching Ergon All Road bar tape. Two Parlee carbon bottle cages finish things off.
You can choose from six frame sizes that can be built in standard or tall configurations. You can then select your desired cockpit dimensions (including bar width, stem length, seat and seatpost configuration), and either a standard build or your choice of wheels, tyres, drivetrain and accessories.
Our size-large test bike tips the scales at 8.82kg (with two bottle cages).
This 'standard' Force build is priced at £9,360 / $9,890.
