Gloria All-Road Titanium frameset

'Keep it simple but do it well' is a saying that can be used in many walks of life, and it's definitely apt for what has been achieved here. There's no 3D printing in the Gloria Titanium All Road frameset, or massively manipulated tube profiles, but that hasn't stopped the designers creating a fun-riding and comfortable do-a-bit-of-everything road/gravel bike at a very good price.

> Buy now: Gloria Titanium All Road frameset for £1,249 from Gloria

Not sure what an allroad bike is? Check out our guide to this emerging road bike category – plus a selection of the best.

Gloria Titanium All Road: Ride

With the large tyre clearances on offer it's easy to think that the Gloria All Road is a gravel bike just by looking at it, but with the geometry sitting more towards the roadie side of things, this is very much a bike that is at home on the asphalt, while still being capable on the rough stuff.

There is a feeling of neutrality through the whole bike – it feels composed and really planted, giving me a lot of confidence when I was heading away from the road.

The handling is quicker than a gravel bike but it never felt twitchy on loose surfaces. Even at speed through a little bit of singletrack that I use, I never felt out of control on it. It took a little bit more concentration, sure, but even when hopping over tree roots and the like it was just a lot of fun.

I rode the Gloria on my 30-mile gravel test route which has a bit of every surface going, including grass, mud and some chalk; on these softer, more slippery surfaces I would have been better off on a pure gravel bike with slightly slower steering, but everywhere else it behaved brilliantly.

However, I spent the majority of my time riding the Gloria on the road, and for longer routes I nicked the wheels off of my Fairlight Secan, fitted with 38mm GravelKing Slick tyres, so that I could get the most out of it performance-wise.

The All Road feels very much like an endurance road bike, as in decent performance but without any twitchy handling or a too-aggressive riding position. In fact, the geometry is really good.

Alongside the Gloria I was riding Ribble's take on a titanium allroad bike, thoughtfully titled the Allroad Ti, and my biggest issue with it was the front-end geometry, which is very tall and gave me a position that just felt wrong throughout the bike.

In contrast, the Gloria feels spot on. The front is taller than most road bikes, but I could still get into an aero crouch should the need arise without feeling too stretched, and my centre of gravity was in the perfect position. Unlike the Ribble, I felt a part of the bike rather than just being perched on it.

The geometry also meant I was comfortable, which, paired with the natural ride comfort found with a quality titanium frame, meant long rides never became a chore. The Gloria is definitely a mile-muncher, and if I was to have one in my fleet of bikes it would definitely be the one I'd grab for long days out in the saddle or audaxes.

On our scales this 56cm model weighed in at 9.43kg, which is decent for this build with 40mm-wide gravel tyres. It's no sprinter, but it feels nippy and never sluggish when you ask it to get a move on, and it's a capable climber too.

Gloria hasn't gone for massive tube profiles or an oversized bottom bracket junction, but stiffness through the lower half of the frame is plentiful.

The front end is, too, thanks to an oversized, tapered head tube and full-carbon fork, which has plenty of lateral stiffness.

In terms of the ride overall, the All Road is really good, and pushes to the limit exactly what an allroad bike is capable of. If you are a road rider who dabbles in a bit of gravel, or want the option to, the Gloria is one of the most capable allroad bikes out there.

Gloria Titanium All Road: Frame & fork

Gloria has its frames made in China from 3Al/2.5V (3% aluminium, 2.5% vanadium) Grade 9 titanium alloy tubing. It has a claimed weight of around 1,800g, which is fairly typical for a titanium frame, especially an allroad one. Gloria offers a 'lifetime' 25-year warranty to the original owner, so it's obviously comfortable in backing its product long term.

The lack of paint on a titanium frame means there is nowhere to hide any filling with putty or sanding of the welds, which means anyone creating a titanium frame needs plenty of skill, especially as the material itself is not the easiest to work with. The Gloria looks neat and tidy throughout.

Is it in the same class as high-end offerings from the likes of Mason or Enigma? No, but at this price point the finish quality is very good, and tidier than that found on Spa Cycles' Elan Ti, for instance.

As standard the frame is sandblasted, but if you use Gloria's online bike builder you can go for a brushed (polished) finish if you want, which will cost you an extra £150. You can also have anodised decals for an extra £150.

A lot of frames these days are becoming electronic groupset only, but the Gloria isn't one of them, offering ports for the entry and exit of mechanical cabling. Cable and hose runs can also be dictated by which fork option you select.

There are plenty of options available, all of which are full carbon fibre with a tapered steerer and 45mm tyre clearance. You can choose between no cage mounts or cage mounts and dynamo routing for no additional cost, while the option to allow for the running of your hoses internally through the head tube is an extra £100.

All of the forks get mudguard mounts, as does the frame, and you can add rear rack mounts and have three bottle cage mounting points, plus a set of top tube mounts.

For the bottom bracket Gloria has specced a BSA threaded system which has proven to be a reliable design over many years. When the need arises to replace one, you can easily do it at home with a single tool and parts can be had relatively cheaply. All ideal for a bike that's likely to see a fair amount of road spray, salt, grit and mud.

A neat addition is the universal derailleur hanger (UDH) which we've seen in the mountain biking world and is making its way over to the road and gravel side of things. Basically, it's exactly as its name suggests. The frame is designed to use a rear mech hanger that you can just pick up from your local bike shop or online regardless of the make or model of your frame. You could carry it with you on rides and swap it out should you crash.

Gloria offers the All Road in five sizes: 50, 52, 54, 56 and 58. For a bit of context, you are looking at effective top tube lengths ranging between 519mm and 574mm.

Our 56 comes with a 560mm top tube and 160mm head tube, with stack and reach figures of 600mm and 382mm respectively. The head angle is 72.5 degrees with a 73.5-degree seat angle, and the overall wheelbase is 1,017mm.

Gloria Titanium All Road: Finishing kit

In terms of finishing kit there are loads of options available on Gloria's website, including all sorts of titanium components and bits and pieces to customise your frame and create a build to suit your budget.

Our All Road is built up with SRAM's Rival AXS wireless groupset which uses a 2x chainset and a 12-speed cassette. With smaller chainring sizes than those offered by Shimano on its road groupsets, SRAM's chainsets work well with the crossover between road and gravel.

Using Gloria's online bike builder, you can spec either a 46/33-tooth chainset or a 48/35T, and pair it with a 10-33T or 10-36T cassette depending on what sort of terrain you are mainly going to be riding on.

Mat reviewed the latest Rival groupset a while back, so you can head over there to get the full details if you wish to. I've used it on a lot of bikes since its launch, and while it's not quite as refined in performance as the newer Red or Force, it is still very much a joy to use.

I like the way the shifting works with its single button per lever design, and the fact that the batteries are swappable between mechs – ideal should you ever get caught out with waning battery life.

The gear shifts are always crisp, and SRAM's hydraulic braking systems are very good in terms of the amount of power on offer and feel at the lever.

For the rest of the finishing kit Gloria has specced Zipp components for the stem, handlebar and seatpost. It's an all-aluminium alloy setup and I'm a fan overall. The handlebar is a great shape with its shallow drop and there is plenty of stiffness for hard out-of-the-saddle efforts. The same can be said for the stem.

The seatpost is easy to adjust and offers a snug fit in the frame. The saddle is a Selle Italia X-1 that I got on with fine thanks to its neutral shape and firmish padding.

The wheels we have here are Gloria's own, with 45mm deep-section carbon rims mated to a pair of DT Swiss's 350 hubs. At 24mm wide internally (30mm externally), the rim profile works well with the 40mm-wide tyres fitted, but they'll easily take narrower slicks if you want to press the All Road into pure road duties. They'll take wider, too, to exploit the Gloria's 45mm tyre clearance.

As I said above, I rode a mixture of light gravel trails and road, and the wheels performed really well whatever the terrain. They have plenty of lateral stiffness and took any abuse without complaint.

DT Swiss's hubs always seem to offer great reliability – well, the ones I have owned have at least, and the speed they engage is also impressive.

Gloria has gone with WTB's Byway tyres, which are decent performers across multiple surfaces. Their tread is light, so they aren't really suited to anything too loose or muddy, but they coped fine on hardpacked canal paths and my local hardcore-covered byways.

They are a bit sluggish on the road, but that's a price worth paying for the versatility of being able to dart off down a track without worrying about it.

Gloria Titanium All Road: Value

Gloria offers the All Road as a frame only (£949), a frameset (£1,249) and complete off-the-shelf builds, starting with mechanical Shimano 105 and a DT Swiss alloy wheelset for £2,699, or £2,999 with 105 Di2. Changing that spec to include the same carbon wheels that we have here and a titanium stem and seatpost sees the price rise to £4,299, while Ultegra Di2 with the same build but FSA's ACR hose-integrating stem and Schwalbe One tyres costs £4,899.

There are plenty of 1x options available, too, including 'mullet' setups, where the largest cassette sprocket is way bigger than the chainring, if your riding is going to be more gravel based.

Our build, created by the online configurator with SRAM Rival 2x, Zipp finishing kit and carbon wheels, comes in at £4,399.

For comparison, the Ribble Allroad Ti that I mentioned earlier isn't available as a frameset only but starts at £3,499 as a full build with 105 mechanical and Mavic Aksium wheels, while the 105 Di2 model I reviewed was £4,099 with the same wheels. It's nowhere near as versatile as the Gloria either, more a road bike with large tyre clearances sort of design than a true crossover between road and gravel.

The Spa Cycles Elan Ti MK2 that I reviewed last year matches the Gloria All Road for tyre clearance and mounting points. It costs £1,450 for the frameset, and £3,175 as a full build with 105 mechanical.

Dolan's GXT is a titanium roadie-based gravel bike with 50mm of tyre clearance and plenty of mounting points. I thought it was very good when I reviewed it back in 2022. As a frameset it costs £1,899.99, while the three builds on offer are all Shimano GRX. The 2x RX610 version costs £2,499.99 and the GRX RX810 is £2,999.99; going 1x drops £100 from both of those. (There's also a 1x GRX RX815 Di2 option, for £3,398.98.)

On the whole, I think the Gloria represents really good value for money.

Gloria Titanium All Road: Conclusion

Taking everything into consideration, I think the All Road is a very complete package. Blending geometry similar to that of an endurance road bike with tyre clearances of 45mm means it is more capable than most allroad bikes, plus it gives you a better outcome than using a pure gravel bike on the road, if that is where you are likely to spend a large amount of your riding time.

The price is really good, too, whether as a frameset or a complete build; that doesn't matter if the finish product rides like a dog, but here that really isn't the case. Thanks to well-designed geometry and a comfortable ride quality, the Gloria is a lot of fun.

> Buy now: Gloria Titanium All Road frameset for £1,249 from Gloria

Verdict

Pushes the limits of what's achievable on an allroad bike, at a very good price