{"id":538388,"date":"2026-03-13T19:31:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-13T19:31:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/538388\/"},"modified":"2026-03-13T19:31:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-13T19:31:12","slug":"32-bikes-get-real-at-absa-cape-epic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/538388\/","title":{"rendered":"32″ bikes get real at ABSA Cape Epic"},"content":{"rendered":"

The 32\u2033 hype is inching closer to reality every week. But this week will be arguably the biggest test yet for the big (but not biggest<\/a>) wheels. Half of the Honeycomb 226ers team will race on the Stoll P32.<\/p>\n

Yes, half. Cape Epic is the iconic mountain bike stage race that is always raced as a duo. Stoll\u2019s P32, while gaining notoriety as the first production 32\u2033 bike<\/a>, is still so rare that only half of the team gets to ride one. Also, we can\u2019t go any further in this story without noting the irony of a team with 26ers in their name being the first to race a 32\u2033 bike. Anyway, on with the news\u2026<\/p>\n

The big wheels aren\u2019t the only interesting thing about Felix Stehli\u2019s race rig. The Stoll is outfitted with an 100mm\u00a0Intend Samurai fork<\/a>, also one of the first official 32\u2033 compatible components. But that fork has the digital burl of RockShox Flight Attendant hanging off its crown. While Intend does make the Samurai compatible with some RockShox damping cartridges, this is the first we\u2019ve seen with Flight Attendant hanging off of it.<\/p>\n

Cape Epic\u2019s obviously quite excited to say that it is the first major race to play host to the 29 vs. (and with) 32\u2033 debate. A French publication did have a 32\u2033 prototype at a UCI race in Spain this spring, but Honeycomb is the first professional team to take the big wheels to a big race. And eight days of South African singletrack is a big race. So big that Stoll\u2019s founder travelled from Switzerland to the Cape to support the team. Hopefully Stehli has some spare tires and spokes with him.<\/p>\n

Can a 32\u2033 bike get rad? Cape Epic follow cam finds out<\/p>\n

Cape Epic\u2019s so excited to have the Stoll that organisers couldn\u2019t wait until the race started. They crept up behind Honeycomb\u2019s Stehli and Marc Pritzen, who is racing on a 29\u2033 Stoll, to follow the team for a practice lap on the South African singletrack.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ll let you dissect that follow cam footage below to try decide whether 32\u2033 are worth it or not. Armchair engineers ready. Set. Go!<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 32\u2033 hype is inching closer to reality every week. But this week will be arguably the biggest…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":538389,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[569],"tags":[228721,172475,228722,64,63,784,109740,85,172477],"class_list":["post-538388","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-2026-cape-epic","tag-172475","tag-absa-cape-epic","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-cycling","tag-mtb-gear","tag-sports","tag-stoll-bikes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538388","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=538388"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538388\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/538389"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=538388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=538388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=538388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}