New $1,599 steel frameset available from August

By Jack Luke

Published: Friday, 19 April 2024 at 02:25 AM


The Ritchey Montebello is a new lightweight, fast randonneur-style steel frameset for long-distance riding, spotted at this year’s Sea Otter Classic in California. 

Featuring 36mm tyre clearance with full-cover mudguards/fenders or 40mm without, the bike also has mounts for a front rack and dynamo lighting – key accessories for serious audaxers. 

Ritchey marketing manager and keen audax rider, Fergus Liam, tested a prototype Montebello at Paris-Brest-Paris – a gruelling 1,200km randonneur event that runs every four years.

The bike is designed to fit full-cover mudguards. – Jack Luke / Our Media

Full figures weren’t available at the time of writing but the geometry is slightly more relaxed than the Ritchey Road Logic and Road Logic Disc, to better suit endurance riding. 

Ritchey Montebello - seat cluster
This seat clamp design is used across several of Ritchey’s bikes. – Jack Luke / Our Media

The Montebello is built with Ritchey’s proprietary triple-butted steel tubing, with the brand’s signature fastback-style seat cluster and custom thru-axle flat-mount brake dropouts. 

Ritchey Montebello - drop out detail
Weight-reducing cutouts were added to this latest iteration of the dropouts. – Jack Luke / Our Media

The latter were updated last year and are now used across all of Ritchey’s road and gravel disc framesets.

Ritchey Montebello – paint detail
Ritchey dubs this handsome sparkly finish ‘Tapatio red’. – Jack Luke / Our Media

The custom-forged 1-1/8in head tube is machined to reduce weight. Headset bearings fit straight into cups on either end of the head tube.  

The frame is paired with the all-new Brevet fork, which will also be available separately. 

Ritchey Montebello – Brevet fork
Unlike the similar WCS Adventure Fork, the Brevet fork is slightly slimmer and only features two threaded bosses. – Jack Luke / Our Media

In addition to mudguard mounts, the rack features two threaded bosses on the outside face of each fork leg. These can be used to mount a rack or additional bottle cages. The brake cable is routed externally but dynamo cables are routed internally. 

Ritchey Montebello – cockpit detail
The silver finishing kit is a great match for the red paint. – Jack Luke / Our Media

As with Ritchey’s other bikes, the Montebello is only available as a frameset. It’s expected to be available from August in all territories for $1,599 (international pricing TBC).

Ritchey Montebello key details