The all-road, AKA gravel, segment is populated by an increasing number of brands and each has its own take on what the category means. Raleigh was one of the first companies to embrace the concept and develop a purpose-built machine in the Tamland. Raleigh is taking things on step further by rolling out a new gravel/all-road bike inspired by the steel-framed Tamland in a much lighter carbon chassis.
The Roker is named after weatherman Al Roker (for whatever reason, Raleigh saw fit to name gravel bikes after forecasters)
The Roker has frame geometry that is very similar to the Tamland. Compared to a traditional road bike, these two models have slacker head tube angles, longer chainstays and lower bottom brackets. In the case of the Roker, that means 71.5-degree head tube angles on most sizes, 440mm chainstays and bottom bracket drop that goes from 77.5mm on the 52cm frame up to a still quite low 72.5mm on the 62cm frame.
The Roker has similar lines to Raleigh's RXC family of cyclocross bikes, with an arching top tube and slender seatstays.
The Roker has plenty of clearance for Clement's 40mm-wide MSO treads
Like the Tamland, it comes with a third set of water bottle bosses on the downtube's underside and 40mm wide tyres on all models. It also has internal cable routing and is Di2 compatible. It also features front and rear thru-axles — 15x100mm in the front and 142x12mm in the rear.
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While the Roker has all the amenities of a modern carbon all-road bike, the company chose to stick with a trusty 68mm threaded bottom bracket shell, instead of one of the more common (and potentially creaky) press-fit standards.
Raleigh offers the Roker in six sizes across four trim levels, from the top-end $5,299 Roker LTD, shown here kitted out with Shimano Ultegra Di2, to the $2,499 Roker Sport, which comes with Shimano's 10-speed Tiagra group. (UK and Australian pricing was not immediately available.)
