5: Brifters! My first ever brake lever shifting bike. Maybe my second ever even riding one. I thought they were genius when they came out, I was just too poor and riding fixed all the time.
4: 1×12 drivetrain. Ratio upgrade kit for 10sp SRAM shifters is pretty cool. I needed the shop to make the internal swap.
3: Left lever controlling the dropper post. Awesome. 1000% awesome. 200mm OneUp silver dropper is pretty and pretty similar in feel to 190 and 175.
2: 180mm cranks. I usually ride 175s, but I got these beautiful XTR square tapers at the museum swap meet, along with some other cool stuff like the XTR skewers (from Jeremy Sycip’s booth). If everyone is cutting down to 165s, that’s my cue to go the other way. Maaaybe there’s a little more pedal strike stacking up the smaller tires (48s) with the longer cranks and the 80mm BB drop.
1: This killer new Fitz Porcorosso!
This is a fancier modernized version of the 2019 Fitz Supermoto (seriously thought that bike would be on the blog here oops). That bike was pushing the limits of downtube length, and fork offset with the straight blade forks, Tubing makers have stepped up and made butted tubes longer for modern geometries, and I relaxed into letting John do curved blades.
I also relented on internal dropper routing. I think it’s stupid (longer cables, heavier housing, holes in your bike), but external dropper choices are limited to one PNW 31.6 175mm. Once you (I) relent on the internal routing for the dropper, you’re sending a cable down the downtube. Once you can’t run everything under the top tube like a proper Bontrager setup, then you’re open to running MOST cables down the down tube. And running full housing, and treating it like a decorative border instead of hiding it. Another difference from the Supermoto.
Geometry is longer, less “front load low trail” and more “bikepackery.” When John built the Supermoto, I was like “I don’t want zits all over my bike, I don’t do that bikepacking stuff.” So then I immediately started doing bikepacking stuff with it. This bike has All The Zits, including frame bag mounts. There’s like $500 worth of extra mounting points. So far no dedicated frame bag.
And… fancy!! The Supermoto was purposely purposeful, but the Porcorosso might need to replace my Frances as the prettiest bike imaginable without being overwrought. Curved top tube, polished stay eyes, stainless Fitz gusset, stainless dropouts, fancy Illusion Cherry sparkly paint. Curved fork. People like those.
PS: I like those Ortlieb snap-on bags, too. REI had a big sale, and they worked out.