Test: The first Campagnolo Ekar component group specifically designed for gravel bikes amazes with 1×13 gears and many small and large surprises. In the practical test by Velomotion, the new shifting proved to function perfectly and a harmonious gradation that offers many possibilities.
When Campagnolo invited to the new product presentation in March 2018, there was wild speculation in advance. Gravel was a hot topic at the time and hopes arose that the Italians would finally venture off-road with a special group. Finally, the new 2×12 road bike group was shown – one more sprocket, which made the gear steps narrower, okay. When asked about off-road, junior boss responded Davide Campagnolo was cautious at the time - if you look at what his company is publishing today, you can imagine that things had already been started in 2018.
13-speed, one chainring: turning away from pure teaching
Hardly anyone can remember Campagnolo's mountain bike groupset today - which makes it all the more sensational that the traditional company is now deviating from pure teaching and presenting a group that is tailored to the still relatively new Gravel segment. Not to mention what the new Campagnolo Ekar is capable of: it is the first mechanical groupset to be equipped with thirteen sprockets, outperforming the corresponding competition from Sram and Shimano by two gears. And as the first of the big suppliers, Campagnolo comes out with a final sprocket with only nine teeth.
Campagnolo Ekar: thirteen sprockets, three stages
13-speed, and the smallest sprocket with only nine teeth. You have to let that sink in first; First of all, however, it should be said that the chain runs smoothly over the mini sprocket. And the jump from 9 to 36 and back isn't too big with a smooth pedaling frequency either. In general, this is what makes the group interesting for gravel bikes and beyond: The Campagnolo Ekar deliberately avoided MTB-style cake plates and, with 9-42, 10-44 and XNUMX-XNUMX, presents three cassettes that are quite closely spaced.
The most compact sprocket package of the Campagnolo Ekar is called "Endurance" and looks like this in detail:
9-10-11-12-13-14-16-18-20-23-27-31-36
So five jumps in the fast range - and that's one more than all eleven-speed road bike cassettes from Shimano except 11-25 and 12-25. Even the smallest ring of the Ekar offers a gear ratio of 400%; combined with a 38 chain ring, the result is a fast gear above 4:1 and a nearly 1:1 translated mountain gear. This is a cassette that seems made for brisk pace and would also be the first choice for cyclocrossers where conventional gravel rings are too coarse - or maybe even for endurance road bikes on the road?
Let's continue with "Gravel Race" = 9-42:
9-10-11-12-13-14-16-18-21-25-30-36-42
This is the cassette on the test bike, again narrowly graded in the upper area and wider from the 18s - a ring that actually works on any terrain where you ride faster than about 7 km/h. With a 38 blade you can still pedal quite fluently at this speed.
"Gravel Adventure" with 10-44 is not really graded more broadly, but translated a little shorter:
10-11-12-13-14-15-17-19-22-26-32-38-44
The largest wreath lacks a fast gear, but it offers a little more leeway on the mountain. Again six sprockets in one gradation stand out; the mountain gears are not graded differently than with the 9-42 wreath. Combined with a 40 chainring, the longest gear is again 4:1, plus a noticeably "stocky" mountain gear of 0,91.
For these three sprocket sets, Campagnolo offers four sprockets with 38, 40, 42 and 44 teeth, with the largest being recommended for "e-road and e-gravel". The test bike had the smallest chainring fitted; Of course, we didn't lack gears either uphill or downhill. Which leads to the question: How does the Campagnolo Ekar actually drive (or shift)?
Pinarello Grevil: The off-road aerobike
Campagnolo presented Velomotion a Pinarello Grevil is available, which belongs to the "Gravel Race" category in terms of rider posture and general appearance: Thanks to the long stem, you sit quite stretched out and with a noticeable overhang; the bike is stiff and easy to handle, with an aero look. If it weren't for the wide, strongly flared handlebars, you'd feel like you're on a racing bike. The Campagnolo levers feel familiar with a slim body and curved brake levers; What is new, however, is the thumb button: on the Ekar it is curved downwards, with which Campagnolo responds to the criticism that has been voiced time and again that the button is difficult to reach from the lower link. It is no longer that, and we believe that the new form should also be applied to the Vicenza street groups.
It's better in single steps
The function of the button is also slightly different. It only shifts in steps of one, unlike the higher quality Campagnolo road groupsets; but what seems like a step backwards makes a lot of sense, especially off-road: even when things get rough, shifting gears is impossible. The button can be pressed firmly, and the heavier gear "clicks". The shift lever positioned behind the brake lever needs to be operated a little more sensitively: In the area of the small sprockets, it can change up to four gears at once, and since the lever travel is quite short, it can happen that you skip a gear at first. For this reason, shifting under load is also easier if you select higher gears; Bridging five teeth when pedaling uphill can sometimes be accompanied by an audible crack. Of course, once the chain is in place, the drive runs extremely smoothly – even on the smallest sprockets. You definitely don't have to worry about feeling the narrow angle of wrap of the chain negatively.
Those who are used to Campagnolo will have no problems with the Ergopower (here for the first time in the singular), and those who otherwise ride other systems will quickly get used to it. You don't even have to get used to the disc brakes that were once developed together with Magura: they are not overly snappy, so you can brake very safely even on slippery surfaces; If you grab something harder, you can decelerate to the blocking limit. The curved brake levers are close at hand; you can use an Allen key to get them a scant centimeter closer to the handlebars.
Harmoniously graded
So click into the pedals and go. When starting off, the chain is somewhere in the middle of the sprocket pack, maybe on the 18th - with so many gears it's easy to lose track. But it doesn't matter, because it quickly becomes apparent that nothing is missing. With 38×16 you crank along at almost 30 km/h with a cadence of 90, the jump to 14 corresponds roughly to that between 50/19 and 50/17. From here you can shift up as usual without the gear jumps being unusually large. In the opposite direction, the Campa wreath is graded like conventional Gravel cassettes - so no unpleasant surprises. Sure, five to six teeth is a big difference, but these gears are shifted at a speed where optimal frequency is no longer important. On the other hand, with 38/42 you can also climb extreme inclines, which of course is also the fault of the Pinarello Grevil: The streamlined bike weighs just 8,7 kilos without pedals, so it’s pretty light for a gravel bike. The Conti tires, which are already tubeless mounted, bite into the loose ground with low air pressure, while on asphalt they roll extremely light-footedly thanks to the reduced profile and "Black Chili" rubber compound. Crossers and road riders only have to get used to the quite strongly flared handlebars, which somehow belong in principle, but actually don't have to be in the "Speed Gravel" category.
In view of its very good function, many users will no longer necessarily wonder how Campagnolo actually implemented the wide cassette with the small sprockets. Of course we do, especially since it's clear: It wasn't easy.
Let's start with the freewheel body: In order to accommodate 4 and XNUMX sprockets, it is a good XNUMX mm shorter than conventional Campa freewheels; are the two smallest sprockets near positioned on the freewheel body. They are part of a quad sprocket block that incorporates the lockring and sits only halfway on the freehub. Behind it is a block of nine, which is milled from solid and screwed to an aluminum support. The 10-44 cassette is built a little differently: a block of three with a separate lock ring plus a block of XNUMX sprockets. Blocks of three and four can be reordered as spare parts; in the event that one of the small sprockets is worn out, the entire cassette does not have to be replaced at once.
The chain that goes with the 13 ring has become even narrower and now measures just 4,9 mm (11-speed: 5,5 mm; 12-speed: 5,15 mm). It is closed with a chain rivet pin; A connecting link will also be available from autumn, a Campagnolo novelty.
Strong rear derailleur for large sprockets
The rear derailleur has also been redesigned, which is only available in one length (shift rocker 78,5 mm) and is a little less dainty, as is typical for Gravel. The lower jockey wheel has two teeth and now a total of 14; as with the 2×12, the bits on the upper wheel are longer to guide the chain more securely. The rear derailleur has a strong spring, which prevents chain slap; The narrow-wide profile of the teeth on the chainring also ensures that the chain of links fits securely.
As is usual with gravel rear derailleurs, the Campagnolo Ekar changer is also equipped with a blocking function that is intended to make wheel removal and installation easier. When the rear derailleur is turned backwards, a small button pops out and it is locked in this position. However, the spring of the shift rocker is still active; To make it easy to install the wheel, you have to push the shift rocker forward a little with your hand to relax the chain.
Is the Campagnolo Ekar the lightest gravel group?
Campagnolo has always been synonymous with lightweight construction (aside from certain parts from the late 1980s), and according to the factory specs, the Ekar is no exception. The weight of the complete group is given as 2.395 grams, although we don't know in which configuration; on the other hand, the Shimano GRX 800 1×11 weighs just under 2.780 grams in Italy, the Sram Force 1×11 2.470 grams and the Sram Force AXS 1×12 2.627 grams. We don’t want to judge how fair the weighing was here – that with the Ekar At least our test bike proves that a light gravel bike can be built.
Three new wheelsets
Since the special 1×13 freewheel body does not easily fit current wheels, Campagnolo is offering three wheel sets for the Ekar: a Campagnolo Shamal with carbon rims (v. 35 mm deep/h. 40 mm), which is said to weigh 1.585 grams two Fulcrum wheel sets with aluminum rims, which are also available in 650B. The Rapid Red 300, which is installed on the test bike, weighs 28 grams in 1.690 inches and comes with rims that are 24 mm wide on the inside; complete with rim and tires, our wheel set weighs exactly 3.500 grams, which is a really good value. The Rapid Red 900 with an inner width of 22 mm weighs 28 grams in 1.950 inches. All wheelsets can be ridden tubeless. With an adapter ring, older sprocket sets can also be mounted on the 13-speed freewheel body; older Campagnolo or Fulcrum rear wheels can also be upgraded to 13-speed with a conversion kit consisting of an axle, freewheel body and small parts.
Campagnolo continues to stand for emotion and precision
With so many details, the emotions are of course a bit too short. Anyone who can still remember his first seven-speed freewheel and Campagnolo's first notched down tube shifter will be fascinated by the fact that 13 sprockets actually fit on a cassette - and that they all work smoothly, chain skew or not. Also: Despite all the complexity that the 13th sprocket requires, Campagnolo has for the first time succeeded in simplifying the Ekar, which points beyond the Gravel segment - as already indicated, the narrowly graded 9-36 sprocket also has potential on the road . In order to use the Pinarello Grevil as a racing bike, you only need different tires for carefree riding, whereas on an eleven-speed gravel bike you inevitably struggle with the gradation of the cassette. In any case, the traditional manufacturer from Italy can be attested to have a good hand when it comes to harmoniously graded translations.
So why does Campagnolo lead such a niche existence on the German market? The bicycle manufacturers rarely specify the groups of the Italians - there is a lack of demand, it is said again and again. The problem behind this is that Campagnolo has become increasingly less well-known: While the older generation grew up with the noble shine of Italo components as a matter of course, cyclists around thirty often only know Shimano and then maybe Sram. That's a shame, because Campagnolo has more to offer than a traditional name and most recently the youngest Tour de France winner. For example, components that can be repaired in the event of wear and defects, for which the company has its own customer service workshop in Leverkusen. And of course material that combines an emotional design language with precise function.
Back to the Ekar: Campagnolo is offering the complete group, which is now available in stores, for 1.725 euros - a whopping sum, given the functional advantage that the group offers, but quite acceptable. In any case, the price should level off well below that. Complete bikes for around 4.000 euros should therefore be possible, although the sample bikes that Campagnolo has built are rather luxurious. In any case, the Ekar deserves a prominent position in the gravel segment - Velomotion in any case, hopes that bicycle companies and cyclists will take advantage of the opportunities offered by the new group.
