All-City Super Professional Sora review: a capable commuter bike with greater ambitions but one spec flaw

All-City bills the Super Professional as a commuter-plus machine that's "well-versed in gritty urban commutes", with its wide tyre clearance enabling you to "swiftly and elegantly tackle gravel jaunts".

Despite not having a lengthy history, All-City's bikes have impressed us in the past. I took the Zig Zag for a spin in 2020 and senior technical editor Warren Rossiter was equally impressed by the racier Mr Pink back in 2018.

The Minneapolis-based company’s Super Professional frame is handmade in Taiwan – and extremely neatly, too. The beauty is more than just skin deep though, with the frame coated to keep rust and corrosion at bay.

The bike I tested, with a nine-speed Shimano Sora groupset, costs £1,999, with Shimano 105 and frameset-only options also available.

All-City Super Professional Sora frame details

The undoubted stars of the show are the All-City’s steel frame and the Whisky Parts straight carbon fork. Both are finished in a sparkly ‘Hollywood Violet’ colour that looks fantastic.

The steel is All-City’s own ‘Select 612’ that's actually the tried-and-trusted 4130 chromoly that’s been used in bike frames for many years.

It’s not an exotic or higher-end steel, which you might expect on a bike costing £1,999, but the handmade frame is finished to a very high standard, with extra touches that add to the cost.

All the bottle and rack bosses sit on neat little rounded diamond-shaped fittings, which may not be necessary but look great – as does the metal All-City head badge.

The All-City name and logo are sculpted onto the seat collar and rear dropouts, and the rear dropouts are designed to take All-City’s own 2-for-1 dropout that enables you to run the frame as a geared or singlespeed bike.

Both the frame and fork have thru-axle fittings and there are all the usual fittings for racks and mudguards at the front and rear.

These include bridges between the chainstays and seatstays, both of which are threaded to take traditional full-length mudguards.

My test bike came with 35mm tyres fitted and there's bags of clearance. Both the frame and fork are designed for gravel tyres up to 45mm wide – or 40mm tyres with mudguards.

This brings gravel riding into the All-City’s scope.

One further factor that isn’t visible, but is a very welcome addition to the frame, is that it's ED-coated.

ED coating – or electrophoretic deposition coating to give it its full name – is a layer of corrosion protection just 10-35 microns thick that's applied to the frame using electricity.

It adds to a bike's cost, but is generally very effective at helping to keep rust and corrosion at bay.

All-City Super Professional Sora geometry

The All-City’s geometry sits in the touring/gravel/allroad area, while maintaining some more road-bike like elements.

The 1,020mm wheelbase isn’t up there with that of the Genesis Tour de Fer 20 I've also tested, which is around 6cm longer in an equivalent-size frame, but it still favours stability over speed.

By contrast, the 72-degree head angle is reasonably aggressive, certainly compared to full-on gravel bikes such as the Marin Gestalt X10, with its super-slack 67.5-degree head angle, and the Merida Silex 200 (69 degrees). Both of those bikes are much longer, too.

The 73-degree seat tube angle skews the All-City’s geometry towards old-school road bike territory, although a road bike would have a much tighter wheelbase.

The result is geometry that looks as though it’ll offer a balance of reasonably sharp handling on the road and the ability to take in some light off-road surfaces.

With that sort of wheelbase, you wouldn’t want to tackle anything too gnarly, but the wide, grippy tyres should offer good control.

All-City Super Professional Sora spec

The Super Professional is available as a frameset only for £1,100 (£1,299 in this striking ‘Hollywood Violet’ colour) or as a complete bike from All-City’s UK supplier Ison Distribution.

The bike I tested is based around Shimano’s nine-speed Sora groupset and cable-actuated disc brakes. For £2,699, you can get it with Shimano 105 and hydraulic brakes.

Here, Sora pairs a 50/34T compact crankset with an 11-32t cassette, which delivers a very decent 29-124in gear range.

I’d have gone all the way with an 11-34 cassette, which would drop the bottom gear to 27in. It's a marginal difference, but we all know what Sir Dave Brailsford thinks of marginal gains…

An alternative would be a sub-compact 48/32T crankset because I feel a lower bottom gear is always a more welcome companion than a higher top gear.

How many times do most of us spin out on a 50x11 pairing? I can’t even remember the last time I did so on a 2x setup, so I’m guessing not that often.

How often do I find myself wishing for a slightly lower bottom gear? Pretty much every time I reach the 11 per cent climb on the ride home from town.

One of my potential routes home would take me up a short 25 per cent section, which I pass on altogether.

Most of the other components are courtesy of brands that Ison distributes, which is handy, and takes in a whole raft of Genetic-branded parts.

The wheel and tyre pairing is well chosen, and will tackle tarmac as well as more challenging forays onto rougher surfaces.

When Ashley tested the Halo Drove Line wheels earlier this year, he described them as "something of a Swiss army knife" – and I think he’s right.

They’re not light, but unless you’re trying to beat your personal best on your commute, I believe a few extra grams is neither here nor there.

This is even more true if, like me, you’re carrying a few extra kilos…

What you want from wheels for day-to-day use is good ride quality and toughness, and the Halo Drove Line wheels offer exactly that.

They have a 21mm internal measurement and 26mm external width, which as Ash says, "is right on the money for a progressive design".

This makes them suitable for tyres from 25-45mm wide, with All-City going for rubber bang in the middle of that range, in the form of the 35mm Halo RXR tyres.

For road riding, my chosen tyre width is around 30-32mm, a size that offers good comfort and performance without a noticeable weight penalty.

The slightly wider 35mm size is excellent for poor tarmac – the sort we’re all too familiar with in the UK – and will also cope with light gravel riding.

This was the first time I’d ridden Halo tyres – and they’re high-quality performers.

As Katherine Moore noted when she tested them, the RXR tyres sit somewhere between endurance road bike tyres and dedicated gravel rubber, making them ideal for rougher roads and hardpack.

However, their tread – combining a tougher, longer-lasting centre strip and softer, grippier shoulders – works pretty well on smooth tarmac too, so they’re pretty versatile.

Very neatly, the low-profile centre tread is made up of a chain of ‘H’ symbols, with patterned shoulder channels for off-road grip.

The brakes are TRP Spyre’s cable-actuated discs, which are fine without being inspiring.

They're consistent in all types of weather and can work with dinked rims – but on a bike costing £2,000, I’d have liked hydraulic disc brakes, or perhaps TRP's hybrid Hy/Rd.

While it’s not exactly comparing apples with apples, Boardman manages hydraulic brakes on its ADV 8.9, which costs £800 less.

The Spa Cycles Audax has a Shimano 105 groupset and a higher-spec steel frame, although it comes with rim brakes rather than discs. It was priced at only £1,265 when I tested it last year, and I liked it so much that I bought it.

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All-City Super Professional Sora ride impressions

What’s not to love about the combination of a steel frame, carbon fork and 35mm rubber? The answer is pretty much nothing.

Okay, it’s going to be carrying a little more weight than a carbon road bike, but I’m never worried about a little extra mass.

The All-City isn’t that heavy, and its low gearing will ameliorate most of the effects of gravity when you hit the hills, where it’s a reasonably decent climber.

And while you won’t throw yourself into descents like a Tour de France rider, control is very good when you’re descending. You’ll have to hold back a little more than on a bike with hydraulic brakes, though.

The All-City Super Professional Sora was perfect on my old 16-mile surfaced commute, getting me up to cruising speed niftily and keeping me there comfortably.

In addition to that, it coped just as well on what was by now a very muddy towpath.

Control was very good from the tyres and the handling reasonably lively. It carries weight pretty well too, with no obvious flex from the rear end, even with loaded panniers.

However, it’s the overall smoothness and comfort that I’ll remember the All-City for. It’s forgiving over rougher surfaces, sumptuous on smooth tarmac and it stays that way all day.

All-City Super Professional Sora bottom line

I put in a lot of very enjoyable miles on the All-City, both commuting and on bigger days out – and it’s a real treat.

Skinny steel and fairly wide rubber is a combination that promises oodles of comfort, and this is exactly what you get.

The wheel and tyre pairing is excellent for a variety of surfaces, the Shimano gearing as good as ever with a very good range, and the braking is consistent. However, for this sort of money I’d have liked a hydraulic setup.

The Super Professional would make an excellent short- or long-distance commuter bike, with the ability to be more adventurous come the weekend, where even light gravel trails are within its abilities.

It looks great too, in its striking and sparkly ‘Hollywood Violet’ finish.