Revel El Jefe Bike Packing Bike Check - w/ Tydeman Newman

Is This The Ultimate Bike Packing Rig?

This spring, I was fortunate enough to travel over to Italy to take on the Tuscany Trail, a 450km (280-mile) bikepacking route through the breathtaking Tuscan countryside. And what better way to celebrate a dream-worthy trip than building up a brand-new bike for the occasion?

The crew at Revel Bikes was kind enough to send over one of their El Jefe titanium framesets, a purpose-built, adventure-ready ripper of a mountain bike. Let’s take a look at this unique build that I pieced together just in the nick of time!

The Build

When putting together my Revel El Jefe, ease of access to parts was my utmost priority. Generally, when I’m building a new rig, I spend ages obsessing over the perfect setup and running every single option through my head. But when your frame arrives a mere three days before you are set to fly to the other side of the world, you take what you can get!

At the center of this bikepacking rig, the clean lines of the titanium El Jefe frame create the perfect starting point for a rad build. I’ve owned a decent share of aluminum and steel bikes over the years, but this was my first time logging miles on a titanium frame. Damn, is it nice! The El Jefe perfectly blends comfort, stiffness, and weight savings, a trifecta that so few metal hardtails actually get right.

At 6'1", I ride a size Large. The bike fits me beautifully with a front-end setup that is slightly longer and lower than stock configurations. One of the coolest details of this frameset is the adjustable chainstay length. Revel designed the El Jefe with 15mm of sliding adjustment at the dropout, allowing you to alter the chainstays from 420mm to 435mm. I opted to run these all the way back at 435mm for maximum stability. 

Most of the parts on this build were cannibalized from my previous hardtail, a ripping fast Cannondale Scalpel HT that I’ve cobbled together in various ways for different adventures. Carrying on that Cannondale legacy is the Lefty Ocho fork, set to 100mm of travel. Despite the El Jefe being designed around a 120mm fork, the shorter travel allows my front end to sit lower and steepens the head tube angle, making the handling a bit more aggressive and "racey."

I was highly skeptical during the build phase about whether the remote lockout would be an unnecessary burden while bikepacking, but it turns out that a bit of stiffness goes a long way when the bike is fully loaded. The ability to lock out the fork meant one less thing bobbing and swaying around on long tarmac climbs.

My wheels were also carried over from the Scalpel: a set of Cannondale HollowGram carbon hoops wrapped in Wilderness Trail Bikes (WTB) Macro 2.4" Fast Rolling tires kept me rolling through the endless white roads of Chianti. I am a huge fan of these tires and was incredibly stoked to make it through the entire trip with zero flats or issues.

For the drivetrain, I went with a trusty SRAM 12-speed XX1 Eagle groupset that has seen its fair share of trail miles. Liam Woods ran this group on a few of his bikes before passing it down to me. I’m running XX carbon cranks with a 36t chainring up front, which made it a little easier to keep pace with the gravel bikes on the flats, paired with a 10-50t cassette out back to spin up the punchy Tuscan hills.

As for stopping duties, I used a set of SRAM Level Ultimates paired with 160mm CenterLine rotors. I’ll admit I’m not the biggest fan of these brakes for my usual downcountry trail shredding, but they make a perfectly adequate brake for cruising gravel roads. That said, I did notice the rear brake tended to get quite hot on some of the longer descents, likely due to the added weight of all my gear. Next time, I’ll look into boosting the rear rotor size to a 180mm to better manage the heat, especially if I take on a route with longer, steeper descents.

For navigation, I relied on my Hammerhead Karoo 2. This is the older version of the Karoo, but it still performs great. The bright, high-contrast maps and various battery-save settings make it an ideal choice for adventuring into the unknown. My only real gripe with the Karoo 2 stems from the lack of a dedicated smartphone app to act as a “middleman” between my mapping software and the headunit. I ran into a few issues trying to connect the unit to Wi-Fi just to download routes; something that is easy to plan for at home, but becomes a major headache when you are stranded in the middle of a tiny, rural Tuscan village.

Finishing out the build is a hodgepodge of random components I had scattered around the home workshop: a Race Face Next carbon seatpost, ENVE M5 carbon handlebars, Leatt XC pedals, King Cage titanium bottle cages, and my go-to Trail One Hells Gate grips. I am so serious about these grips that I refuse to ride a flat-bar bike without them!

The Bags

I am relatively new to the bikepacking world, but from what I can gather, baggage strategy is the equivalent of picking the perfect tire tread: everyone you ask will give you a different answer, and there really isn’t a single setup that works for everyone. That said, I’m slowly dialing in my preferences, and this is by far the most comfortable and capable setup I’ve ever ridden.

Thanks to the accessibility of the route, we were able to pack considerably lighter than on any of my previous adventures. We forewent the stove, extra water capacity, instant coffee, and dehydrated meals in favor of freshly made pasta, wood-fired pizza, mid-ride espresso, and cold beer. It was quite the luxury!

Front Setup

Starting at the front, I ran the Tailfin Bar Cage and Medium Bag system. This is the more utilitarian of the setups they offer, and it packs a serious punch. The Bar Cage is a super rad, rigid system that provides a rock-solid mounting point to hang gear off your bars without any sway.

Previously, I used a flexible strap-on handlebar harness from Revelate Designs. The Tailfin design was vastly superior, allowing the bike to steer and corner much closer to normal. Without a massive bundle of gear flopping around, I could accurately predict how the front end would react to rough spots or loose corners.

I dedicated the front bag entirely to my sleep system. Stuffed inside was my sleeping bag, inflatable mat, liner, pillow, wash bag, and half of our tent. To save space, my dad and I split the tent components, each carrying half to equalize the weight, a tip I highly recommend to anyone bikepacking as a duo!

Strapped to the top of my front bag, I kept a small Revelate Designs cockpit bag to carry daily essentials. This is where I tucked my gloves, phone charger, external battery pack, snacks, and a cycling cap for quick access.

Frame & Rear Setup

Stretched out inside the front triangle was a Revelate Designs Half Frame Bag. This is where the lack of cooking supplies and dehydrated food really paid off. The sleek shape allowed me to still fit two 24oz water bottles in their standard cages (though it did require a tight squeeze to get them in and out). In this bag, I kept items I needed throughout the day but didn't require instant access while rolling: my tool roll, a spare tube, chain lube, a Ketl Mtn. Breakwind Ultralight Windbreaker, chamois cream, and physical route maps.

Finishing things off at the back of the bike was my trusted Revelate Designs saddle bag. This was easily the piece of gear I was most indecisive about before the trip! After past adventures, reducing the uncontrollable sway of a rear seatpack was high on my priority list. I went back and forth trying to decide if I should buy one of the new integrated Tailfin rack systems. In the end, I stuck with what I owned, and it turned out great. With the simple addition of a few heavy-duty Voile straps to cinch the harness down tightly against the seatpost, the bag worked like a charm.

This rear bag was reserved exclusively for my trip clothing, an area where I definitely over-packed! I had all my favorite Ketl Mtn. casual apparel tucked away: Shenanigan pants and shorts, a Departed Henley, Nofry sun shirt, and a SierraLoft puffy jacket. I also brought duplicates of almost every layer, a last-second packing panic addition that I didn't actually need!

Finally, strapped securely to the outside of the saddle bag were my trusty slip-on Vans. I’m pretty sure I’ve owned at least one pair of checkerboard slip-ons since the day I was born, so there was absolutely no way I was traveling around Italy without them!

Final Thoughts

Both this beautiful titanium build and the Italian scenery have cemented my desire to lean heavily into multi-day dirt adventures. I still have a few competitive goals left to tick off on the XC racing circuit, but I doubt it will be long before I’m planning my next bikepacking getaway aboard the Revel El Jefe!