XCmtbJason: 2014 Salsa Warbird Review

Salsa just released a sneak peak at their 2014 lineup today. This is something I’ve sort of been nervous about, only because I’ve been thinking “ what if I should have waited until 2014 to by a Warbird instead of buying my 2013 Warbird?” My thoughts were: What if the new colors are super awesome? what if the components are lots better? And worst case, what if there’s an important frame improvement…? Oh the horror… Well to be honest, I wasn’t all that worried about it, I happen to really like my 2013 Warbird 1 and with the few tweaks I’ve made to it, it’s nearly perfect.

First thing you’ll notice is they added a 3^rd bike to the lineup. A much needed entry level price point I would suspect as it has Sora components and a few other downgrades, but don’t let that bother you, if this is your price point you’ll still love the bike. The yellow color is super awesome, I like it! My final thought, even though I don’t know the price point, the 2014 Warbird 3 likely puts the Warbird at a price point that allows a lot more people to acquire one, kudos to Salsa for this addition, Gravel races just got a lot safer and more comfortable for a lot of rider’s!

For me here’s the big comparison, how does my 2013 Warbird 2 stack up to the new 2014 Warbird 2? This verdict is: this year Salsa got all the details right, pretty much all the complaints I had for 2013 are fixed for 2014. This list is very short, and I’m pretty sure my issues were caused by late design/production parts availability. First the biggest issue, (remember I called this the “Shame on Salsa” error) the narrow rim issue of 2013 is now solved by replacing the Sun Assault rims with Stan’s Iron Cross rims. Interesting… Exactly the same thing I did! Next issue, which is major (but minor) is the 105 STI shifters, which were advertised on last year’s bike should actually be delivered on this year’s bike! That’s it, perfection. One bonus for me, I like my Orange color better than this year’s red. Red is still a nice color, but I’m glad I went ahead and bought the 2013 orange!

And for the flagship Warbird Ti. Thank you for painting it! I personally do not like plain Ti bikes, it’s too 90’s looking for me and just plain boring! Painting some parts, and leaving other parts raw Ti is perfect, show off the fact it’s Ti, and yet put some pizazz to it. Personally, I would have liked an actual color over just black, but still I like it! Now the fork paint scheme… Wow! If only there was a few more blue highlights in the frame, then this bike would have been incredible. From a component standpoint, I’m not sure how the previous HED Belgium rims compare, but it seems likely the Stan’s Iron Cross rims shown for 2014 are better. Other than that an Ultegra grupo is the cat’s meow!