Norco Valence Tiagra

I don't think I've ever been more conflicted about a bike than I am about the Norco Valence Tiagra. On the one hand it's carried me comfortably though a period of fitness-rebuilding following a broken leg earlier this year, all the way to the first century I've ridden in years. On the other hand, I had to change some significant components to get it reliable and comfortable.

Light frame, with spot-on handling

At the heart of the Norco Valence Tiagra is a light, sportive-orientated carbon fibre frame. It has a claimed weight of around 1,000g; that would have been unimaginable in the frame of a £1,000 bike just a couple of years ago (the bike is currently on discount at £960 with importer Evans).

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It also handles really well. Point it into a corner and it sticks easily to the line you want with no fuss or grumbling. It's not quite as sharp as a race bike, but it's a lot better than some sportive bikes I've ridden which had to be fought into corners. The Valence goes where you want it.

It's a versatile frame too. There are hidden mounts for mudguards and the brake mounts are positioned so that there's room for 28mm tyres and mudguards. That means that rather than just being a summer cruiser, like many carbon bikes, this is a machine you can use year-round.

I was amused to find aluminium water bottle bolts. In terms of weight saving, we're talking a trivial number of grams, but with carbon headset spacers as well you have to give Norco props for saving those grams where it's easy to do so.

Ride: upright and cruisy

The Valence's tall head tube, 100mm stem, seatpost with no setback and short-reach compact handlebar combine to give a very upright riding position. If sitting upright's not your thing then you'll need a long stem and a setback seatpost to get a more conventional riding position.

I think the in-line seatpost is a serious speccing error. Not only does it position you unconventionally far forward, but it's extremely stiff. To get my position right I swapped in a 25mm setback 3T carbon post from another bike. As well as putting my bum where I wanted it, it took the sting off the Valence's back end. Win-win.

The handlebar has a very short throw from tops to brake levers. To get my right position on the hoods I fitted a 130mm stem, which looked a bit silly, but worked. I have short legs and a long back so I'm used to having to do silly things to get the fit right, but a 130mm stem is a bit excessive in my opinion. A longer-throw bar would allow the 110mm or 120mm stem I'd expect to use.

The Valence's 56cm top tube in this nominal 55.5cm size means it should fit normal people just fine.

Once I had my position right, I found the Valence an easy and comfortable ride. Over six weeks of riding it carried me gradually increasing distances, past the psychologically all-important 100km mark, and eventually to a 161km audax in the lanes of Essex.

A few stompy bits on that ride, playing silly buggers racing into downhill bends, revealed the Valence to be a solid platform for big efforts. Pound on the pedals and the fat bottom bracket area doesn't budge.

On climbs, it best rewards steady, seated efforts rather than out-of-the-saddle attacks. This is a bike for siege tactics on hills rather than shock and awe blitz.

Tiagra shifting: solid & reliable

I'm a big fan of Shimano Tiagra gears. For the group's modest cost, its shifting is solid and reliable. It doesn't have the light 'snick' action of Dura-Ace or Ultegra, but the gears clunk firmly into place. As Shimano's 105 group has crept up the price scale in recent years, Tiagra has taken its place as the dependable, affordable performer in Shimano's line-up.

The Valence has the 2015 10-speed Tiagra 4600 group, which has now been replaced by Tiagra 4700. A major difference between the two is that the new version routes the gear cables under the handlebar tape. The cables on the Valence exit from the inboard sides of the brake/shift levers, which may not be as tidy but makes them a lot less sensitive to cable preparation.

Norco has gone for a very wide range of gears here. The 50/34 chainset is paired with a 12-30 cassette giving a range that should get up you up anything. The downside is that the gear range is gappy. Here's the gear chart:

To get all the way from 12 to 30 teeth necessitates some gaps in the gear range and they're most noticeable when you're riding tempo on the flat; neither the 50x17 or 50x15 were quite right for me. I swapped in an 11-25. That's much more suitable for the rolling terrain of Suffolk and north Essex, and the flats of Cambridgeshire, but if I lived somewhere hillier I'd cheerfully put up with the gaps. Credit to Norco for making hills easier for less fit riders.

Unimpressive brakes

The Tektro brakes are spongy and imprecise, and simply fail to slow the bike down with the authority even of Shimano's Tiagra brakes. A switch to Ultegra brake pads with metal pad holders would almost certainly help here.

Woeful wheels

You don't expect world-beating wheels on a sub-£1,000 bike, but the wheels on the Valence I tested were rubbish. There's nothing wrong with the Alex rims, Norco own-brand hubs and Sapim spokes, but the wheels were under-tensioned to the point where I had a spoke in one wheel go loose while riding. Another snapped at the thread.

There's no excuse for that. The snapped spoke I'll put down to a freak manufacturing error, but tensioning wheels isn't rocket science and there's no better way for wheels to fail quickly than too little tension. Insist the wheels get properly tensioned when you buy.

>> Check out our guide to the best sub-£1000 road bikes here 

I do have to give credit to Evans for dealing straightforwardly and honestly with the problem, though. Spokesperson Chris Snook told me: "Unfortunately it sounds like you have been unlucky, but it is something that does happen from time to time. It's not common or one that is exclusive to Norco. On occasions [like this] the wheels would/will be replaced under warranty for an equivalent spec – in this case likely to be a Shimano RS010."

If I were a paying customer and the replacement wheels arrived quickly, I'd be perfectly happy with that.

The wheels are shod with 25mm Continental Ultra Sport tyres, decent knockabout rubber but nothing terribly special. Good to see 25mm tyres as stock and there's room to go bigger – up to 28mm with mudguards and even bigger if you don't mind risking a wet bum. Going fatter makes the Valence's already smooth ride even comfier, and with 28mm tyres I finished that 100-mile ride feeling fresh enough that I almost wished I'd entered the 200km distance.

Conclusion

There's a very good, smooth-riding, easy-handling frame at the heart of the Norco Valence Tiagra, with a bunch of thoughtful touches like the hidden mudguard eyes and aluminium bottle cage bolts. It's an enjoyable frame that would make a great basis for a super-commuter, day tourer or audax bike but for the poor wheels and a daft seatpost.

A setback seatpost isn't going to cost you too much to swap, so that's easily fixed. While you're at it, you should shell out the extra for a buzz-reducing carbon fibre post, or 28mm tyres, or both. I actually saved weight with the tyre swap, so it's all kinds of win.

With those things sorted out, I thoroughly enjoyed riding the Valence and especially having it carry me across longer and longer distances.

Verdict

Very good long-ride bike marred by poor wheels and seatpost