Santa Cruz might have been late to the 29er mountain bike market but the iconic Californian brand was an early adopter of the best gravel bike trend. Debuting in 2007, Stigmata was curiously ahead of the gravel bike awareness curve. Santa Cruz discontinued it in 2011, only to relaunch the Stigmata in 2015, as the gravel bike market rapidly became the ‘on-trend’ category in cycling.

2024 Santa Cruz Stigmata, by Aaron Borrill

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The latest version of Santa Cruz’s all-terrain and all-road drop handlebar frame features several upgrades for the 2024 model year making it better equipped than ever to cater for both the leisure and gravel bike racing spheres.

New geometry

2024 Santa Cruz Stigmata, by Aaron Borrill

Recognising the advances in gravel bike geometry, Santa Cruz’s designers have borrowed from the brand’s XC mountain bikes, shaping the latest Stigmata with slacker angles. 

The new Stigmata features a shorter headtube, set at a much slacker angle of 69.5-degrees, compared to its predecessor’s 71- to 72-degrees. Balancing the head angle change is a significant 30mm greater reach for enhanced stability. The shallower head tube profile means Stigmata is happy to accept all the latest ultra short-travel gravel bike suspension forks. Santa Cruz recommends a 40mm travel fork as ideal for the Stigmata’s geometry. 

Glovebox frame storage 

2024 Santa Cruz Stigmata, by Aaron Borrill

Storage capacity has become increasingly important, with gravel bikes being deputized into the weekend adventure touring role. This is the first drop handlebar Santa Cruz with the brand’s Glovebox downtube frame cavity, which is lockable, weatherproof and provides excellent storage for tools, spares or nutrition. 

Neoprene sleeves inside the Stigmata’s Glovebox provide all the padding and additional weatherproofing you need and, most importantly, prevent the annoyance of anything you place inside the Glovebox from rattling. The Stigmata doesn’t offer seat-stay rack mounts for those riders who are dedicated adventure bike tourers. 

To enable true all-terrain riding ability, Santa Cruz’s latest Stigmata can roll larger-volume tyres and a dropper seatpost, for those gravel bikers who always choose a singletrack detour. Tyre clearance has increased to 700 x 50c, so you’ll comfortably run a 700 x 47c gravel bike tyre, even in winter, with plenty of clearance. Riders can also fit any of the latest 27.2mm lightweight dropper seatposts, to enable the most confident descending position.  

Gravel bikes journey to very isolated locations, and the last thing you want hours from a bike shop and sophisticated tools, is messing about with complicated cable routing that disappears into a stem or headset. The Stigmata has retained a frame ported internal cabling set-up, instead of the more fashionable and complicated approach of routing shifter and rear brake cables through the stem and headset. Riders who are capable DIY mechanics will appreciate the Stigmata ‘sensible’ cabling approach. 

The latest Stigmata is a confident singletrack rider's gravel bike, available in sizes S, M, L, XL and XXL. An ideal solution for those mountain bikers who want an additional all-terrain bike with the benefit of an aero position riding posture, to tally those huge training mileages.

• www.santacruzbicycles.com

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