MTB-inspired features make Merida’s second Silex unrecognisable
Words James Spender Photography Tapestry
Merida could have halted the marketing campaign for its latest Silex after Matej Mohorič won the 2023 Gravel World Championships on one. By the Slovenian’s own admission – never mind his bike sponsor’s amazement – he wasn’t really supposed to win, and it might be fair to say the Merida Silex wasn’t supposed to win either. But then, that’s the thing. Merida says the Silex has been designed to be way more capable than the average gravel bike and has introduced some fairly radical features into the second generation of the model to ensure it lives up to its billing.
The headlines are as follows: max tyre size 700c x 45mm (or 42mm with mudguards); dropped chainstays; 1x and 2x-compatible; multiple fork and frame luggage mounts; dropper post-compatible; option for fully integrated cables with an FSA ACR/SMR cockpit (though as is, cables are all but hidden thanks to the bike’s Wire Port headset); 180mm disc rotors as standard; internal front dynamo hub routing; alloy Silex frame version. Carbon frame weight a claimed 1,220g, alloy frame 1,900g, fork weight 580g.
But honestly, those are the least telling elements of the Silex. Rather, this bike is best understood through its geometry.
‘It’s mountain bike-inspired,’ says the Silex’s product manager, Hannes Noller. ‘That means the top tube is long and the head tube angle is slack. We’ve made it so you could swap in a short-travel suspension fork and it wouldn’t upset the geometry.’
In numbers, that means a size medium Silex has a 580mm top tube and 69.5° head tube – which is a full 1.5° slacker than the outgoing Silex. Add in 430mm chainstays and the wheelbase comes out at 1,082mm. Compare those numbers to an aggressive hardtail mountain bike and you start to see the Silex’s leanings.
Furthering that mountain bike feel is the 80mm stem, which is the same size across all frame sizes. This brings the overall reach back to something that fits conventionally despite the stretched-out frame dimensions, while sharpening up the handling too. The Silex’s fork has a 45mm offset, meaning trail is a huge – and otherwise slow-handling – 87mm, so short stems tend to quicken up how handling feels, as a small movement of the bars elicits a greater turn of the wheel when compared to a longer stem.
Complementary components
The new Silex is offered in a six-bike range and gearing is unilaterally low, using sub-compact 2
