Jamis released a new Renegade this past year, and the shop brought frames in to build them up. This one went together late last summer with miles on it through the fall. Steve went in expecting not to like it — and came back from the first ride thinking it’s a good bike.
Where the Renegade Fits
The new Renegade follows the current gravel trend of a longer reach and taller front-end stack. Steve’s way of placing it: at the racy end of gravel you’ve got bikes like the Cervélo Áspero, Time ADHX 45, and Bianchi Impulso. At the other end you’ve got something like the Salsa Cutthroat, which is getting very mountain-bikey with drop bars. The Niner RLT 9 RDO sits in the neutral middle.
The Renegade leans toward the mountain-bikey side — but not all the way there. Steve sees it fitting the rider who found the Cutthroat enticing for its comfort, fit, and all-around capability, but wasn’t ready to go that far: not ready for mountain bike tires, and not wanting a gravel bike that felt that mountain-bikey. The Renegade gives some of that same fit and feel while keeping a roadish gravel bike character.
The Ride
Steve went into the first ride expecting not to like it — figuring it might be too long, and that he wouldn’t like how it steered and rode. He was wrong. By the time he got home from that first ride, his take was simply that it’s a good bike: comfortable, stable, and rides well.
Sizing — Why a 54, Not a 56
Steve is 5’10” and would normally ride a 56. The stack on the 56 is very generous, and as these bikes get longer, the 56 starts to feel like a big bike. So the shop set this one up as a 54, for a couple of reasons: the stack is still generous enough that there’s no fit issue for him, and the slightly longer-feeling 54 lets his kids (5’8″ and 5’9″) share it since they ride a lot of gravel. As it turned out, the 54 fit him really well.
Fit advice if you’re 5’9″–5’10”: Don’t blanket-assume you’re a 56 — sit on a 54 first. These longer gravel bikes come with short stems (a stock 54 ships with a 70mm; this build runs an 80mm) and zero-offset seatposts. If you jump to the 56 you always ride, you can box yourself in trying to shorten things up, since you’re already on a fairly short stem for a drop-bar bike.
The Frame
The frame has three-pack mounts on the fork legs for fork packs, two bottle cages inside the frame plus down-tube mounts above the bottom bracket, and bolt-on top-tube mounts. There are no rack mounts in the seat stays, but you can run an Old Man Mountain rack with a Robert Axle kit (Jamis lists the part numbers), so rear cargo is still on the table — just with limited rack options. It takes fenders too.
Cable routing enters through a small bolted-in panel on the top of the top tube, so you can route either side; the front derailleur housing exits a grommet on the back of the seat tube and the rear runs out the top of the chainstay.
On the headset: A lot of new frames are going to the integrated-headset style. This one isn’t — if you ride a lot of gravel and need to service the headset, you can do it without pulling all the cables. Steve thinks bikes should still be made this way.
Wheels & Tires
HED Emporia GA Pro wheels with 45mm Challenge Strada Bianca tires — a tire Steve really likes. They measure out close to 48mm set up. The frame is rated for 50mm, and there’s plenty of clearance at the seat stays, chainstays, and fork; the tight point is the backside of the seat tube. Steve wouldn’t run a 50mm tire in a muddy event, especially an aggressive one.
Drivetrain
This is an older 11-speed GRX 800 setup, run as a 2x — equivalent to Ultegra on the road side, with an 11–34T cassette and that light Easton EC90 carbon crank. It came off an old bike the shop had set up as a 1x for someone, and they moved it onto this build. As Steve puts it, this isn’t a drivetrain review — it’s not what you’d spec now with all the 12-speed options out there. Worth noting: the shop’s 15-year-old still likes running a 2x on gravel.
A comfortable, stable gravel bike that swings toward capability
The new Renegade sits at the comfortable, mountain-bikey-leaning end of the gravel pendulum without going all the way to a Cutthroat. For Steve at 5’10” on the 54 with an 80mm stem and zero-offset post, it’s a comfortable ride that isn’t too upright. A customer who came in for a Bianchi Arcadex ended up on a Renegade because it fit like a glove out of the box. The steel S2 is on Steve’s short list to review — he expects it to be a popular bike.
Want a Renegade Built Up?
We carry Jamis at Maklin Bike Shop and can do a custom build or spec one of the stock builds. Reach out and we’ll talk through it.