2026 Sea Otter Finds Part Five

Like most bike-related events, my first Sea Otter Classic ended up being more about the people and community, with the cool bikes, tech, and races as bait to get us all in the same place. Between interviews and photoshoots, I spent time catching up with friends, making new ones, and putting faces to names after having exchanged countless emails with many of the folks at the expo. As I make my way back north to British Columbia, I’m feeling privileged to work in an industry with so many awesome people all connected by our love of bikes.

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Although this is my final written roundup from the 2026 Sea Otter Classic, and I’ve saved some of the best for last, there are still a few more exciting pieces coming from my time before the show, plus an extra-special bike from a local framebuilder, and an exclusive first look at a new Pinion-equipped full-suspension mountain bike that showed up just after the expo. But first, here’s part five of my 2026 Sea Otter Finds series.

Tern Orox Car Camping Setup

Neil and I met up with Andrew Bernstein of Double Digital Communications to chat about some truly exciting upcoming gadgetry that we unfortunately can’t share just yet. Andrew also works with Bosch, and they had a Tern Orox longtail e-cargo bike kitted out with a hilarious collection of camping gear. More of a car camping setup, the Orox is rated for up to 463 pounds (210 kilograms) of gear, and they tested that limit by strapping on a small propane tank, a two-burner camp stove, and a water container. The pop-up table beside the bike also folds down and straps onto the other side of the rear rack.

The Tern Orox is marketed as an “adventure cargo e-bike” capable of off-road travel, gear hauling, and bikepacking. While we’re still not sold on e-bikes for remote bikepacking, for obvious reasons, we are enamored by the thought of replacing many vehicle duties with something like the Orox. The fact that it can handle off-road riding, carry loads of stuff, and travel up to 200 miles with the optional dual-battery system really makes us wonder what it can’t do. Learn more about the Orox here.

Swift Industries

We were happy to see Jason and Kelly of Swift Industries at Sea Otter, providing a welcome change of pace and attitude to what can sometimes feel like a very race-centric and tech-heavy expo. Swift didn’t have anything entirely new to share, but they did have their recently launched Luminary Collection on display, and they let us know it’s been super popular, which is great to hear.

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They also had merch on display for the 2026 Swift Campout, the brand’s annual global call to celebrate the summer solstice by spending a night camping with your bike. The exact details and dates aren’t available just yet, but the new goods are looking fresh and colorful.

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During our visit, a young woman popped by the tent with a scavenger hunt list that Jason explained was a challenge put on by the MTB and adventure apparel brand Moonspin for folks to visit all the women-owned brands at the expo. As you might know, Martina Brimmer co-founded Swift Industries with Jason at just 26, and it’s been a treat to see how the brand has evolved over the years. Find the Luminary Collection at BuiltBySwift.com.

Verum Velo X30 32-inch Wheels: No Spoke Holes?!

We met up with Charles Wells of Verum Velo ahead of this year’s event to learn more about his business, the wheels he’s offering, and some slick new 32-inch hoops he recently built up. Charles built his first wheel at a UBI class in Ashland, Oregon, in 1985, and he’s been in and out of the industry ever since. In 2018, he started a custom wheel-building business in San Diego and was well established in the community, but then COVID hit, and delivery times for hubs and other parts were pushed way back.

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At some point, a customer brought a box of hubs and rims and asked Charles to build some wheels. Like others, Charles was guilty of turning his nose up at Chinese-made hubs and rims, but to this day, he still remembers building those wheels and thinking to himself, “Wow, that was really nice.”

He started building a relationship with the rim vendor and realized they could address all the shortcomings in the good-quality rims available to him. The options are pretty much endless with Verum, and he can theoretically add even more options if he wants. Charles is adamant about building components that are durable and serviceable, even if you’re logging 15-20,000 miles a year on a single set of wheels.

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Verum’s rims look and feel like many other options out there, but one thing that sets them apart is the lack of spoke holes on the outside of the rim. The big advantage here is that customers never have to deal with tubeless tape. Charles feels tires, rims, and sealant have advanced a long way, but “the one thing that still really sucks is tubeless tape.” Building the rims with no exterior spoke holes adds an extra 20 minutes of work for Charles, but “it accrues a lifetime of benefits,” as he puts it. Charles provides a little kit to help customers insert the spoke nipples, which features a steel insert, a tiny magnet, a spoke, nipples, and little grommets to hold the nipple in place. He made a video showing the process here.

Charles showed us some fresh 32-inch wheels he recently built up for Neil to test, which use 36 Alpina (an Italian spoke manufacturer) bladed 0.9mm-thick spokes and their x30 rim platform in a new 32-inch diameter. The rims have a 30mm internal width and an asymmetric profile that improves the bracing angle of the spokes, in turn making them last longer. Charles has been finishing basically all of his wheels with a wire tie and soldering on the non-drive-side spokes, a method carried over from track bike riders who wanted stiffer wheels. It also reduces spoke movement, which is one of his main objectives when building wheels.

You can read more about Charles’ venture into the world of 32-inch wheels on his website, VerumVelo.com.

BTCHN’ Bikes Bandito: A Small-Batch 32-Inch Gravel Bike

The Alpina in Part Three wasn’t the only production model BTCHN’ Bikes’ was showing off at Sea Otter. Hanging out at the Shimano booth was a titanium prototype of the upcoming Bandito, a 32-inch steel gravel bike that will be available this spring.

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The Bandito isn’t a scaled-up 700c gravel bike, but a completely new platform designed to maximize the unique attributes of 32-inch wheels. Like the Alpina, BTCHN’ is teaming up with Falconer Cycles to offer a small batch of stock sizes, all made by hand between the two shops. We don’t have many details yet, but we do know that the size large has a 70.5° head tube angle, a 73.5° seat tube angle, 442mm chainstays, and clearance for a 120mm dropper post.

Two build options will be available, including an upgraded titanium BTCHN’ brop bar and an upgraded carbon wheelset. We’ll be sure to share more when the official launch happens. Until then, you can see more from BTCHN’ at BTCHNBikes.com.

Ian’s Surly Moonlander

Ian works on Surly’s events team and has owned his Moonlander since before the Moonlander existed. He rides everywhere on it, including in the Arrowhead 135 in Minnesota, up the massive climb to this year’s Sea Otter every morning, and off far too many drops that are a little beyond the bike’s rating.

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At some point, he bent the fork, and the engineers at Surly decided it was best to cut the front end off and add a tapered 44mm head tube. It’s been great ever since. According to Ian, it “jumps like a dream,” which is hard to imagine just by looking at it. He painted the head tube once already, but it was winter in Minnesota, so it started rusting pretty quickly.

Ian says the Moonlander is for customers who want to “ride terrain and trails that don’t exist.” He added, “The only thing I would say is that you have to accept you aren’t ever going to get over 10 miles per hour. And the only limiting factor with this bike is your legs.” Ian’s Moonlander was set up with the stock Molenda 24 x 6.2″ tires, custom bags made by his brother, and a Surly Rear Disc Rack with a DIY plastic fender ziptied on the back. Because the Moonlander uses the same 12 x 197mm hub spacing front and back, Ian has another cog pre-installed on his front wheel, just in case.

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Surly doesn’t have any complete Moonlander builds left online, but they appear to have some framesets, and your local Surly dealer might have something kicking around. You can read Neil’s Moonlander review here to learn more.

Suntour Raidon 32 Fork + Quarry Cycling Co. Alder 32

Although Fox’s prototype 32-inch fork is exciting, we’re equally enthused to see more affordable 32-inch components hit the market. At $350 USD, the upcoming Suntour Raidon 32 fork is one of those offerings. It features magnesium lowers, a Suntours 2CR cartridge with two-stage compression adjustment and adjustable rebound, and options for 130mm, 120mm, or even 80mm of travel.

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They are also working on a higher-end AXON-WERX version for their professional riders, so they can be ready if the UCI starts allowing 32-inch wheels and suspension forks. They see Raidon as a great option for anyone who wants to try a 32-inch bike without making a massive investment in the technology.

The Suntour fork was set up on a handmade 32-inch bicycle from Quarry Cycling Co. in Lisbon, Wisconsin. The small framebuilder specializes in custom, handbuilt, steel hardtails, and the Alder 32 they built for the show has some unique details that caught Neil and me off guard. They design their own dropouts and yokes in-house and have them machined for each build. It gives the bike a pretty interesting look, quite different from the smooth 3D-printed components we’ve been seeing a lot of recently. Another awesome detail is the cast pewter head badge, which is finished with a small piece of alder wood. Hence the name, Alder 32. The top cap is a machined outline of the state of Wisconsin.

We reached out to Alder’s owner, Jim Day, and he let us know that the Alder 32 is built up using lighter tubes and yokes/dropouts than their flagship model, the Stave. The paint is all wet paint, not powder coat, including all the lettering and graphics. The frame displayed at Sea Otter only had a downtube bottle mount, which was a custom request, but the plan is to include two bottle mounts (one on the seat tube and one on the downtube) with under-top-tube storage as an option. The frame has boost hub spacing, a 73mm threaded bottom bracket, and is designed for 100-120mm of suspension. It looks like Quarry is taking 32-inch bikes seriously, as they already have a made-to-order 32-inch hardtail, the Rage Bait 32, listed on their website.

Redshift

We love the Redshift crew, and although it took us most of the show to find a time to swing by their booth, we’re glad we did. We were stoked to hear that their recently launched Mousetrap pedal adapters, which Nic reviewed here, were totally sold out by the time Sea Otter came around.

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They had thousands made, and they were snatched up quickly. Erik, Redshift’s co-founder, explained they’ve always focused on developing products that people want and can benefit from, and the Mousetrap proved their intentions. If you ride SPD pedals but sometimes find yourself in flats, then the Mousetrap pedal adapter might be for you. The glass-filled nylon composite platform clips into one side of the pedal, providing a sturdy platform for riding in non-clipless shoes.

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The crew was also displaying their newly launched Top Shelf Handlebar, their lineup of suspension stems, and a bunch of other parts, all designed to keep you comfortable on your bike. They also gave us a sneak peek at some upcoming prototypes, but we promised to keep our mouths shut. Stay tuned.

OPEN WI.DE. 2.0

As Lenny and Mark at OPEN Cycle put it, OPEN has worked hard to stay small. There are just six people on the OPEN team, so everyone who works there wears many hats. The original OPEN WI.DE. was released 10 years ago at Sea Otter, so it was exciting for them to be back showcasing the next generation of WI.DE. When it was first released, OPEN said it provided rider position to go fast, and the tires take care of the terrain. They haven’t lost sight of that with the WI.DE. 2.0.

Despite a somewhat racier look, the WI.DE. 2.0 has an impressive 29 x 2.6″ tire clearance, which is quite unique for a bike of this genre. There is in-frame storage (with two included bags in the downtube) and integrated cargo slots on the AC/DC+ (Aero Cargo Double Combo) fork that allow cargo bags to be mounted directly without adding a cage. The WI.DE. 2.0 still has the single dropped chainstay from the original model, but they’ve taken it a step further by dropping 2x compatibility and increasing tire clearance.

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The WI.DE. 2.0 includes a one-piece carbon bar and stem, the OPEN B.A.R., which is available in 10 sizes with four stem lengths within each width. Under the top cap is a nifty bit of tech that allows up to 15mm of stem length micro-adjustment to dial in the fit. The OPEN WI.DE. 2.0 is going into production now, with medium and large sizes available in June/July, and other sizes coming in August. You can learn more at OPENCycle.com, and we’ll share more when it’s available.

Look: G85 Cezal Gravel Bike, X-Venture+, and Trail Fusion Pedals

We originally stopped by the Look booth to check out their new pedals, but they also launched a brand-new gravel bike at Sea Otter, the G85 Cezal. It clears 50mm tires in the back, 2.2″ up front, is suspension-corrected for 60mm gravel forks, and has cable ports for electric and cable-actuated drivetrains. Look was honest with us and let us know it’s not really designed for heavily loaded bikepacking; it’s intended for racing, but they’ve had athletes tackle short, light overnighters on the bike without any issues.

We also got to take a look at the new X-Venture+ pedals, which Neil is testing right now. It’s a hybrid pedal with an SPD-style clip on one side and a flat platform on the other. There are two versions: the $99 X-Venture+ pedals pictured here are made of Aluminium and have a gripper flat side, while the $60 X-Ventures have a larger body and less grip. Check them out at LookCycle.com. Their $60 Trail Fusion pedals (on the right) also look nice for the price and are available in a range of fun colors.

Tailfin: Something To Come

Hidden in plain sight in the ECHOS Communications area, Tailfin didn’t have its own booth this year, but it did have its full collection of lightweight rack and bag systems on display, along with an exciting new product that they asked us to tease but not reveal too much about.

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Expect more soon, but Tailfin’s upcoming release is particularly exciting for anyone who has been holding off on trying their rack system. That’s all I can say now, so stay tuned. Explore their racks, bags, and accessories at Tailfin.cc.

Surly Giveaway Bike

Wheels Manufacturing is supporting our 2026 Sea Otter Classic coverage this year, and they had the amazing idea to give away a bike to one lucky reader. With Surly’s help, they put together a stunning Karate Monkey as a giveaway. The bike is set up singlespeed and kitted out with an assortment of US-made Wheels MFG parts, including the SOLO-HG Single Speed Conversion Kit, a direct-mount chainring, a BSA bottom bracket, and more. The bike’s total value is over $2,000 USD!

The giveaway is open from April 13th to May 31st, 2026. No purchase is necessary, but you must submit your email address. The giveaway is open only to those who sign up at the sweepstakes page and who are 13+ as of the date of entry. The sweepstakes is only open to legal residents of the United States, excluding New York, Florida, and Rhode Island. All entries must be received by May 31st, 2026, 11:59 PM. Visit WheelsMFG.com to enter.

Helinox Chair Zero LT and Table Zero LT

Also in the ECHOS booth, Helinox had their newly released Chair Zero LT and Table Zero LT on display. Suitable for bikepackers, the Chair Zero LT weighs just 1 pound, 3 ounces, and features the brand’s GhostGrid material, a 7000-series DAC alloy frame, TPU-molded corner pockets, an integrated pocket for essentials, and mesh paneling for airflow. The Zero LT offers a weight capacity of up to 265 pounds.

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Announced with the chair is the Table Zero LT, the lightest table in their lineup. Advertising a trail weight of just 8.5 ounces and a weight capacity of 22 pounds, the Table Zero LT also uses the brand’s GhostGrid ripstop material, proprietary DAC aluminum alloy, and a compact, collapsible frame with a foldable tabletop. See the full LT series at Helinox.com or on REI.

RSVR Hydration System

The RSVR Hydration System takes a traditional hydration bladder/vest and strips away all the excess, literally. By prioritizing aerodynamics and weight distribution, the brand has created a hydration vest that removes excess bulk, sloshing, inefficient storage, and unnecessary weight.

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As you can see in these photos, the vest’s body is the hydration bladder, which they say stores more fluid in less space than conventional designs and weighs less than all competitors. The RSVR harness with a 1.8L bladder weighs only 320 grams (0.7 pounds). It has a TRU Zip Waterproof Closure, it’s made from hydrophobic materials to reduce sweat absorption, and it’s customizable depending on how you’re using it. Combine an RSVR front vest with a 2.8L bladder for a full-day out, or go light with their front harness and 1.8L bladder. Weird and funky looking? Maybe. Functional? Possibly! The RSVR hydration system is launching on Kickstarter soon. Sign up to be notified of the launch here.

Old Man Mountain

We’re always happy to see Chris Kratsch and Katy Bryce, co-founders of Old Man Mountain and Robert Axle Project. Not only do they make some of the best rack systems and bags in the business, but they are also warm and welcoming, always finding time to catch up and chat about things outside of bikes and gear.

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They had their newly launched Manzanita Cradle on display, designed in partnership with Salsa Cycles, which explains the similarities to the original Anything Cradle. The aluminum cradle works with 35mm and 31.8mm handlebars. There are six M5 mounting points on the cradle itself for lights, GPS devices, and more, and OMM offers two dry bag options: a top-loading or side-loading, depending on your handlebar style and preference. They also had their FliP Bags and the new 12L Atlas Pack that I reviewed here.

Slug Bicycles Gasser: Restock Coming Soon

Slug Bicycles in San Francisco launched the Gasser last year, but they’ve been out of stock for a bit. Displayed at the ORE Engineering booth, the Gasser on display is essentially a preview of what’s to come. The titanium hardtail is made from custom-butted 3Al-2.5V Ti tubing, has a distinctive 3D-printed yolk and UDH compatibility, and offers clearance for 29 x 2.6″ tires.

The Gasser has a 66.5° head tube angle, a 74.5° seat tube angle, 440mm chainstays, and rack mounts and three bottle cages on all sizes (S–XXL). The build for Sea Otter was kitted out with a soon-to-launch rear rack in collaboration with Mica, their own bikepacking bags, and a new build kit specced around a 130mm fork.

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The Slug Gasser restock arrives in early May. You can read more about it here or visit SlugBicycles.com for more info.

Salsa Fargo 32 Steel

Coming full circle with our 2026 Sea Otter coverage, when Neil published his review of the new Fargo 32, I shot a few photos of the builds they had on display to include in the web feature. I had more photos than we needed, but after seeing these photos again and again over the last week, I decided to wrap things up with another little gallery. After all, this might be one of the most stunning Salsa builds I’ve seen.

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I originally thought the paint job on this steel Fargo 32 was some sort of special Sea Otter prototype, but it’s actually just the stock paint job kitted out with a special build kit. The stunning chameleon-style paint job shifts drastically with the light or the angle from which you view it. At times, it’s a dark, rich purple, and other times it’s green. In any case, it’s a beautiful bike, and it certainly popped against the patch of sand we found to shoot footage.

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As Neil mentioned in his review, the steel Fargo 32 isn’t exactly available yet, but it’s coming this fall and will be offered as a frame and fork for $1,799. You can read more about the Fargo 32 at SalsaCycles.com.

For more bikes, gear, and interesting finds from the 2026 Sea Otter Classic, explore the #SeaOtterClassic tag.

Further Reading

Make sure to dig into these related articles for more info…