To wrap up our Year in Review posts, here are the picks for the 2024 Radavist Product Awards.
Radical Atavism is all about telling stories, and we love to tell stories about the people who bring unique color and character to the world of cycling. Reportage is where our passion lies – but sometimes along the way, we get to try out and test a lot of innovative bikes and bike-related products. We pour our creative energy into our reviews and over the years, we’ve established a reputation for publishing thoughtful and well-researched opinions on products.
This year, we found flaws, offered our unvarnished takes, and fell in love with a lot of products, all while deciphering the world of bikes we know and love. Some of these products deserve some extra recognition as we bid adieu to 2024.
Let’s check out ten cool things that made it to The 2024 Radavist Product Awards, marked by our Mauve Sandstone Toad below!
Each of these products pushed the paradigm in a unique way by offering up something new, or by scratching our itch for reliable and robust objects. Like last year, we decided to break it down into popular categories, each representing The Radavist’s bricolage of bike coverage, starting with…
MTB of the Year: Surly Moonlander
We want to kick off these awards with what our staff viewed as an important paradigm shifter. Surly’s Moonlander was the only bike this year that begged the question: if you could ride anywhere, where would you go? This question, in many ways, is what’s at the root of Surly’s modus operandi and how people began using mountain bikes to begin with! Needless to say, we were elated to see the brand return to those humble roots with a very ostentatious mountain bike.
The totally redesigned Surly Moonlander shocked fatbikers with its 24 x 6.2” tires, long wheelbase, and a Pinion gearbox. Surly Bikes had finally returned to their roots, designing a wholly innovative and ridiculous fat bike for cyclists who aren’t afraid to get a little crazy. There is a lot to unpack with the new Moonlander fat bike and its paradigm-shifting capabilities. See Spencer’s thoughts and his bucket list adventure with the new Moonlander in the link above. Read on at the link above.
Touring Bike of the Year: Tumbleweed Sunliner
Yes, any bike can be a touring bike – but not every bike is designed for fully-loaded touring. These special vehicles are designed and engineered for the long haul. Very few bikes can handle a full load and maintain the same riding characteristics when both loaded and unloaded.
And while the Tumbleweed Sunliner might look like your standard rigid mountain bike, Daniel and the team at Tumbleweed made a number of careful considerations with the Sunliner. The brand heard our cry for more stack height in mountain bikes, ample tire clearance, touring accoutrements a-plenty, and a stunning color.
Most importantly, the very first production mountain bikes could run racks and carry panniers deep into the backcountry. The Sunliner carries the same banner as those men and women who pushed the industry into a whole new terrain. Read on at the link above.
Drop-Bar Bike of the Year: Meriwether Ponderosa
Our long-held relationships with framebuilders result in collaborations from time to time. This year, we worked with Whit Johnson of Meriwether Cycles on an all-new adventure gravel bike called the Ponderosa. We gave feedback, rode sample frames, put in some serious elevation on it, and helped develop the final model you see here today.
Not quite as heavy duty as a drop bar mountain bike, but still with clearance for big tires, a high stack height, and a ride quality second to none, the Ponderosa is a drop bar bike that is designed for long, arduous days in the mountains, and can be wielded like a broadsword in the Battle of Osgiliath.
The Ponderosa is a production-run model, made in batches in Meriwether Cycles’ shop in the Western Sierra foothills. It’s the gravel bike for people who might not want to commit to a mountain bike but still want to reap the many benefits of a lighter-duty chassis. Read on at the link above.
Bag of the Year: Rogue Panda Blue Ridge Handlebar Harness
Flagstaff, Arizona-based Rogue Panda announced its new Blue Ridge Handlebar Harness earlier this year, and after a series of rowdy overnighters, we couldn’t help but crown it Bag of the Year. We’ve tried a number of handlebar harness designs, and they are all variations on a theme. They rely on webbing and buckles, foam block spacers, or other means to keep the bags secure without flopping around and from rubbing your bike’s headtube and smashing your cables.
The Blue Ridge Handlebar Harness consists of two CNC-milled clamps made in Flagstaff. Each clamp attaches to your handlebars in either a 22.2⌀, 31.8⌀, or 35⌀ mm. 3D-printed shims allow for precise fitment. Each clamp attaches to carbon fiber poles, 12″ in length and about 1/2″ in diameter. Sewn directly to these poles are the cargo straps.
Supporting another great US manufacturer, we opted for the USA-made Austere Mfg Cam Buckles upgrade (bringing the total to $225 plus shims and shipping.) These straps are what you use to attach your drybag of choice to the cradle. May we recommend the Rogue Panda Gila size small in Ultra 200x fabric for a dry bag? You can use your existing dry bags, no worries.
All that matters is that this is the most secure system we’ve used, and it’s made right here in the Southwest. Read on at the link above.
Electronic of the Year: Coros Dura Solar GPS
The Coros Dura GPS unit grabbed headlines this summer with its claims of a 120-hour battery life. In theory, that could even be extended indefinitely, thanks to the integrated solar panel. But Travis dove deep into the drop-down menus and found the stuff below those headlines to be just as interesting.
Although the Coros Dura’s battery-life claim is rightfully its most attractive feature, it’s also the feature we thought about the least while using it. After almost two months of use, we hadn’t yet fully drained the battery. Even on two- or three-day trips riding from sunrise to well past sunset, you’ll not likely need to charge the Coros Dura until you get home.
But if you do need to charge it mid-journey, it’s fast. We clocked that it took just 10 minutes for every 8% recharge, whether it was plugged into the wall or into a mobile battery bank. One reason is that we’re living in the era of USB-C, but the other is that the battery on the Coros Dura isn’t actually that big. It’s 960 mAh.
We could go on and on about this head unit, and I don’t think we’ve ever said that before on this website, so be sure to read Travis’s full deep dive into this exceptional piece of cycling tech. Read on at the link above.
Tool/Accessory of the Year: Wolf Tooth EnCase Hand Pump
We love dual-purpose products like the Wolf Tooth EnCase pumps, which allow you to store EnCase tools inside the pump, rounding out Wolf Tooth’s EnCase catalog. Typically designed to fit inside your handlebar ends, EnCase offers storage solutions for things like Allen key bits, chain breakers (plus tire plugs), spoke wrenches, and more.
If the goal is to store all your ride necessities inside your bike frame and components, EnCase is your ally.
The EnCase Pumps build upon this methodology with two clever use cases. First, they’re solid, functioning, and capable pumps. Second, you can store a Wolf Tooth EnCase system inside the pump. The smaller pump (40 cc) holds one EnCase bar kit (i.e., Hex Bit Wrench or chain breaker and a tire plug tool), while the bigger pump (85 cc) can fit both EnCase multi-tools or the EnCase Tire Plug Tool.
After a full season of riding and many flats being plugged with Dynapluggers, the Wolf Tooth EnCase pumps were put to the test. Read on at the link above.
Tire of the Year: House of Looptail Snake Belly Tires
One tire dominated the market when it came to the mountain bikes of the early 1980s: the Snake Belly. House of Looptail just reissued this classic pattern with the original Japanese tire manufacturer, Panaracer. In our decade-plus of documenting early 1980s vintage mountain bikes, most memorably being the museum-quality specimens from Velo Cult, Vintage MTB Workshop, Noah Gellner’s private collection, and Second Spin Cycles, Snake Belly tires adorned many of them. In 1979, a brand called Cycle Pro had Panaracer make the original Snake Belly tire for 20″ BMX bikes and, soon after, 26″ BMX cruisers.
Founded by industry veteran Wakeman Massie in 2023, House of Looptail worked with Panaracer to design and manufacture the closest to original form Snake Belly tires by using the original pattern drawings and new dies. These 2.125″ tires will clear a variety of vintage mountain bikes, and because Panaracer makes them, they feel great at lower pressures, offering side bite in loose conditions, and pedal smoothly over hard-packed surfaces. Some might even call these tires “supple.”
Sure, these tires are a specialty niche product, but we’re a specialty niche website. And one that values both the taxonomic history of bikes and how that history influences our modern age of cycling. The fact that a company re-issued these cult classic tires demanded the highest award this website offers.
Read on at the link above.
Component of the Year: Vivo Enduro Derailleur
Back in April, John found Vivo Cycling’s Instagram account, on which the brand displayed a US-assembled CNC rear MTB derailleur. It is big. It is blingy. But it was still affordable-ish, thanks to Vivo’s global supply chain of machined parts. We reached out to get ahold of a prototype of the Enduro derailleur for review and have still been riding it ever since.
This unit is stunning, machined from 7075 aluminum, with eight bearings pressed into the pivots, plus bearings on the pulley wheels, and a pronounced spring that provides tension. There’s even clutch adjustment. It’s all held together by titanium hardware and is completely rebuildable.
All this for a 320-gram unit that’s just as good – if not a bit smoother feeling once the chain wears in the aluminum pulleys – as the bigger brands. The first few rides were a bit noisy since the pulley wheels are aluminum and the chain had been previously used, but that went away rather quickly.
In typical Radavist fashion, we looked in depth at this derailleur and answered the question: “Why did it take thirty years for someone to make another US-assembled CNC derailleur?”
Read on at the link above.
Drivetrain of the Year: Shimano CUES 1×11 Drivetrain
While it’s easy to get swept up in the high-tech releases each year, there’s something warm and fuzzy feeling about good, solid drivetrains that require no batteries or proprietary drivers. With Shimano releasing CUES to replace Alivio, Acera, and Altus groupsets, is it possible we are getting something better?
CUES unites all the parts under its umbrella with the same flat cable pull ratio and chain pitch across 9, 10, and 11-speed drivetrains. Spencer Harding devised his own mix of CUES parts to fit his touring demands at a low price point. Check out what he found and his thoughts on this new parts offering from Shimano at the link above.
Apparel of the Year: Curious Creatures Scramble Ramble Short
Who wears short shorts? Blix Croell and Spencer Harding tested the Curious Creatures Ramble Scramble short ($139), a unisex mountain biking short made by Curious Creatures, to see if casual cycling apparel can be both gender-inclusive and full-featured.
When we began discussing the coveted Apparel of the Year award, we all had one resounding answer: the Ramble Scramble short. We’re looking forward to what the brand has up its sleeves for 2025!
Read on at the link above.
Let us know what products or bikes you’d like to see more of in 2025!