OTSO WAHEELA C

A balanced ride with all the options to customize

This year I had decided to race the Skull 120 and up until April, it looked like the event would happen. I did my intervals and trained as if I was going to do a demanding gravel race in Eastern Oregon. Maybe it was just race nerves, but I felt like I needed a special bike. Racing will do that to you. Looking at my quiver of bikes, I easily had two bikes that could be ridden in that race. My Parlee Chebacco is a real jack of all trades, but realistically it covers the road and smooth gravel side of things remarkably well. It’s gotten me through a Stampede, which is a 120 mile all day gravel affair. But realistically, there is only one remotely technical section in the White River Wildlife Area. So, yeah, a drop bar bike with 42c tires is ideal. For more rugged rides, I turn to my Seven Sola SL titanium mountain bike. With a rigid Enve fork, I took on the first ever Grinduro. With a suspension fork, I’ve taken it bikepacking over some pretty demanding terrain. I’m not much of an underbiker. I prefer to be comfortable and not get thrashed on long rides. Maybe I’m old fashioned, but I believe in using the right tool for the job.

So, what is this new category of bike? Is there really room for another bike in the quiver that is somehow as light as a road bike, but has enough clearance for cross country mountain bike tires? Much has been made about bikes like the OPEN UP. They’re exactly what I just described, but if you opt for the rugged tires, you have to downsize to 650b. But what about the rest of us, who don’t want to downsize to 650b? We’re used to rolling 29ers on our mountain bikes, and we want to run the same wheel size when it comes time for rugged gravel events. The Otso Waheela C isn’t the only road bike with clearance for 2.1 tires on the 29er format. If you look at the bikes of the Tour Divide, you’ll see plenty of rigs designed for riding fast on dirt roads with the occasional bit of tech riding. Bikes like the Salsa Cutthroat dominate this category. The Tour Divide is a good reference for this category, since the focus is on covering as much ground as possible as quickly as possible. Roads are often smooth dirt roads, with a hefty amount of vertical gain and bikes must be equipped for the occasional technical challenge.

What I appreciate most about the Waheela C is how thoughtful Otso was when making this bike. The first aspect is the ability to run a wide range of gravel tires, from your standard 35c size all the way up to 29 x 2.2 or so. So, ideally you have two wheel sets for this bike and you can swap them out depending on how fast or how rugged your ride will be. The second point worth mentioning is the adjustable geometry in the form of a Tuning Chip rear dropout system. By flipping he chip you effectively change the wheelbase and the height of the bottom bracket. So, with the chip in the back position, you can gain stability and comfort, and with the chip in the front position, you get crisper handling and greater responsiveness. I like that they’ve thought about details that will give you more functionality from a single bike. That is the kind of Swiss Army knife thinking that we’ve come to expect from the folks at Wolf Tooth. Want to go bikepacking? No worries, they’ve given us all the mounting points for racks and bottles. Want to mount cages on your forks? Yeah, you can do that. Bolt on feed bag? Yeah, it has mounts for that too. 

What about drivetrain choices? My test bike was spec’ed with the new GRX 2x drivetrain and it was great. My only complaint came from what felt like a lack of power in the braking. My preference is to have the road bike gearing options on my gravel style bike, so I personally think 1x is the right thing for mountain biking. Want to run Di2? (I have Di2 on both my road bike and full squish mountain bike and it rules) Waheela C allows for internal cables and is compatible with 1x and 2x drivetrains both mechanical and electronic. All of this choice is what you get from a smaller bike maker. I really appreciate it. When ordering your bike, you can dial all of these details in and the bike will be built for you in their Burnsville, Minnesota shop. Oh, I almost forgot. Want to run a dropper post? Yeah, you can do that too. The base model that I rode runs about $3600, but if you want to trick it out and add carbon bits, like an Enve seatpost and wheels, you can do that too. 

Rides like a dream

Enough about the spec and details. How does the Waheela C ride? It rides exactly how I wanted it to. The best compliment I can think of is that it’s balanced. I mean it’s comfortable on smooth gravel and when the trail pitched downward and got more technical, I felt balanced on the bike. The way OTSO describes it, while many gravel bikes put extra weight over the front wheel, the Waheela C geometry centers the rider over both wheels. The first time I tackled a certain nortoriously rutted descent on one of my training rides, I realized how well the Waheela C handled chunky trail. They also tuned the ride perfectly in the sense that it rear triangle is compliant enough that it tames rough terrain, but when it’s time to get out of the saddle and sprint up a hill, the bike responds and is rigid enough to feel like a bike that likes to go fast. The carbon bikes are built in Taiwan to OTSO’s specs. If you’re worried about the bikes durability, rest assured the bike comes with a 5 year warranty. I’ve been nothing but charmed by the folks at OTSO. They seem like good trustworthy mid Western folks.

Road bike speed with room for BIG tires!

Like I said earlier, my big gravel race got canceled like so many things in this pandemic year. So, instead we stuck pretty close to home and got creative. My friend Josh designed a wicked urban gravel loop that starts and finishes on our doorsteps. The loop takes on overgrown levees with hidden potholes. It has a bit of pavement, then sandy washy doubletrack, then barely there singletrack, then chunky railroad rocks. You get the picture - it has everything imaginable. The Waheela C handled every bit of terrain with speed and confidence and always was up for more. I ran it with both the Schwalbe Racing Ralph/Racing Ray 2.1 combo as well as the new Hutchinson Touraeg 42c tires. I have to say, I most loved the confidence of the 2.1 tires, especially in the railroad chunk. I know when I’m able to do a race like the Skull 120, the Waheela C would be the perfect bike. I want efficiency and I want a bike that can be set up to handle more mountain bike style terrain, and I want to feel light, like I’ll float over rough terrain all day long. I’m convinced this is the kind of bike that more people should have, especially as gravel riding embraces different terrain, and folks push the limits of what gravel day rides look like, you want a versatile bike with lively handling, a balanced ride, and all the options to change as your mood or ride preferences change. You want a bike like the Waheela C that lets you experiment and tune your ride, because no two rides are identical. Choose a bike that lets you adapt and ride all kinds of terrain. The Waheela C is a sweet option that more folks should check out. Wolf Tooth/OTSO does it again!