Parlee Ouray review: the best of endurance, climbing and race bikes combined – at an eye-watering price

Parlee suffered a cruel blow when iconic founder Bob Parlee passed away in September 2024, but the Bostonian brand's team is committed to securing his legacy with a swathe of new models in the coming seasons.

The Ouray (pronounced 'yur-ay') is the first of the new models, a bike that's impossible to pigeonhole. It’s simply a bike for the road.

Throughout testing, the Ouray has proved itself simply brilliant at everything I’ve thrown at it – its climbing, sprinting, comfort and handling are all impeccable.

It puts the Ouray squarely among the best road bikes available right now. The downside, at least in this range-topping guise, is the price of £14,200 / $14,990.

Parlee Ouray frame

The Ouray is a step away from Parlee’s history of lightweight bikes for racing. It still uses lightweight carbon fibre construction, but it's blended with a sloping top tube frame design, dropped seatstays, large tyre clearances and tuned compliance for all-day, all-surface riding.

All Ouray frames are made to order in the EU then painted (if you take that option) and built at Parlee’s Massachusetts HQ.

The Ouray frame is constructed as a monocoque from UD (uni-directional) carbon fibre and, with a claimed 830g weight (in a size medium), is race-bike light.

By way of comparison, Pinarello’s latest Dogma X has a claimed frame weight of 950g (without hardware) in a size medium. ENVE’s similarly pitched Fray comes with a claimed frame weight of 900g for a medium, again with no hardware.

The details are a generous 38mm of tyre clearance, all-titanium hardware, fully internal routing, integrated cockpits, a T47 threaded bottom bracket and a SRAM UDH rear dropout for future-proof compatibility. On a checklist of what to look for in a modern road superbike, the Ouray’s details certainly tick all the right boxes.

There’s even a nod to aero too, with the smooth integration of the fork and full internal routing. Alongside a broad stance to the fork up-front, there's a sculpted down tube and dropped slender stays at the rear.

Parlee Ouray geometry

The Ouray’s geometry is designed to provide predictable and stable handling, with my size-large test bike having a slightly relaxed 72-degree head tube angle and road-standard 73-degree seat tube angle.

The stack of 602mm is on the sporty side of endurance bikes, yet the reach is a little shorter than its most performance-oriented rivals at 382mm.

In comparison, the Giant Defy Advanced SL – one of the best endurance road bikes – is half a degree steeper at the front (72.5), 6mm lower in stack (596mm) and 10.9mm longer in reach (392.9mm).

The differences are subtle and, with the Parlee having a longer-offset fork (53mm compared to 50mm), the trail figure on the Ouray is shorter than the Defy – 57mm compared to 58.6mm.

That should, in theory, make the Parlee feel a little quicker reacting to steering inputs.

Parlee Ouray build

My test bike came with an optional paint finish – a custom-blended stunning metallic gold with a deep metallic British Racing Green. It's an option that adds a whopping £1,500 to the price. You can opt for the standard nude/raw carbon with bronze graphics at no extra cost.

This £14,200 / $14,990 Ouray is the flagship SRAM-equipped bike in the range, built with the excellent Red AXS groupset, complete with a power meter, and Zipp’s 353 NSW wheels. Cheaper SRAM builds are available in the shape of either Rival or Force AXS.

Alternatively, Parlee also offers Shimano-equipped builds with 105 Di2 R7100, Ultegra Di2 R8100 and Dura-Ace Di2 R9200. Prices for complete bikes start at £6,390 / $6,690, with the frameset price $5,290.

At the time of writing, there are sadly no options for builds with Campagnolo Super Record Wireless or the recently launched Super Record Wireless S, although you could build yourself one by opting for a frameset only.

On my test bike, the Zipp wheels are wrapped with Goodyear’s voluminous 32mm Eagle F1R tubeless tyres.

When we lab-tested these at the Silverstone Sports Engineering Hub last year, they put in a solid performance, producing only 1.47 watts more rolling resistance per tyre than the most efficient option, the Pirelli P Zero Race TLR.

Up-front, Parlee uses PRO’s Vibe EVO one-piece bar stem. It's an angular design with interesting features such as built-in elastomer grip sections on the tops that negate the need to wrap bar tape beyond the hoods.

Finishing the bike is Parlee’s own carbon seatpost, which is topped with Ergon’s SR Allroad carbon saddle. Parlee also includes a pair of carbon bottle cages as standard.

All in, my test bike weighs 7.8kg. That’s nearly 280g more than Giant’s similarly specced Defy Advanced SL 0, while Cannondale’s highly equipped Synapse LTD RLE weighs in at 9.25kg in the same size. Trek’s Domane SLR 7 is 8.28kg for a 58cm size.

Still, There’s no denying it’s a huge price tag.

Compared to Pinarello’s similarly pitched Dogma X, it's £900 more expensive, but the Parlee comes with a power meter, a custom paint finish, and the ability to customise the fit components to your tastes.

Specialized’s SRAM Red AXS-equipped S-Works Roubaix also undercuts the Ouray at £12,000, but again that’s without a power meter or custom finishing.

Giant’s sublime Defy Advanced SL 0 matches the specification closely, but undercuts the Ouray more significantly at £11,499.

As one of the largest bike manufacturers in the world, though, it’s fair to say Giant has far greater economies of scale than a small, independent brand such as Parlee.

Parlee Ouray ride impressions

The Ouray is hard to fault when it comes to on-road performance.

The heart of the bike – the frameset – provides a foundation that’s at once very light and stiff, yet very forgiving. There is a feeling of tautness when it comes to how it responds to input.

Rise out of the saddle and stomp hard on the pedals and the Ouray responds in kind – there's a sense the bike is working with you, accelerating efficiently with little resistance. It's a joy to ride the Ouray with maximum effort.

Pitch the Parlee into a corner and it works with you. It feels solid and secure, yet layered with the supple, big-volume Goodyear F1s, it cools road chatter and absorbs imperfections. Add the low friction of Zipp’s Cognition V2 hubs on the 353 NSWs and it’s very special.

The V2 hubs' disengagement when freewheeling is instant as the two sides of the clutch are pushed apart. The reduction of mechanical drag is something you can feel.

You get a sense of the freehub letting go and it feels like a boost as you hit the apex of a corner. Re-engagement, which according to Zipp is quickened by the use of a wave spring made from Sylomer (a kind of vibration-reducing elastomer), makes for increased exit speed. It means you can maintain your speed with less effort.

The overall weight is low compared to many more all-road adjacent endurance bikes, although it's not a match for the featherweight Giant Defy Advanced SL 0. The taut efficiency of the frameset and the lightness of the wheels – 1,304g a pair with tubeless tape in place – make the Ouray a serious climber.

High-cadence, low-torque climbing, or big out-of-the-saddle efforts at maximum power, are met with an addictive willingness that had me seeking out climbs on every ride.

The PRO Vibe Evo integrated bar has a great shape to the drops. With an 80mm reach and 135mm drop, it eschews the trend for ever more compact drop shapes.

The bar neatly integrates the shifter hoods with a smooth transition. The integrated pads on the tops are a smart idea and fitted the heel of my palms well.

I’d have liked the optional out-front mount on my test bike because wrapping quarter-turn mount bands around the broad stem compromised the aesthetics somewhat.

As with any integrated handlebar, size options are more limited than separates.

There are 12 size combinations, with effective stem lengths of 95mm, combined with bar widths of 38, 40 or 42cm – or 105mm, 115 and 125mm with a 38, 40, 42 or 44cm bar.

Fortunately, Parlee offers a choice of bar size as standard, and the 125mm x 44cm combination felt spot-on for my fit.

The Ergon saddle isn’t one I’ve had much experience with before, and any new saddle sparks some apprehension because you’ll be spending a lot of time sitting upon it.

I’m happy to report that this well-padded and standard-length perch didn’t upset me. The compact padding distributes pressure well and it’s a pleasant place to be. I’d still prefer my favourite road saddle, the Specialized S-Works Power with Mirror, but that’s likely true of most riders.

Parlee Ouray bottom line

The Parlee Ouray is simply brilliant, and all the road bike I’d ever need. It’s smooth over poorer road surfaces, very fast, light, agile, a rewarding climber and confidence-inspiring with its handling.

Parlee has successfully combined the lightness of a climber, the comfort of an endurance bike and the speed of a race bike – there’s even a bit of aero thrown in for good measure.

It’s an old-school take on the performance road bike, harking back to a time when roadies had one bike for everything before the day’s brands pushed sub-genres such as climbing, endurance, race and aero into our buying choices.

The elephant in the room, however, is that £14,200 / $14,990 price tag. That can be reduced by £1,500 if you omit custom paint, and cheaper builds are available. Whichever way you cut it, though, it’s an expensive proposition.

On the other hand, if local manufacturing, finishing and extensive customisation options matter to you, the Ouray is a great way to get a fantastic all-road bike that feels unlike any mass-produced bike out there.

I’d opt for one of the more modest builds and get 99 per cent of the performance for less.