Enve may still be better known for its reputation of making high-quality racing wheels and carbon components, but the American brand is increasingly leaning into being, as it describes, a “full-service bicycle brand”.
That began with the bespoke Custom Road, before launching the Enve Melee, its first mass-production performance road race bike now being used by UCI Pro Team TotalEnergies. That was then followed up with the release of its first-ever gravel bike, the Enve Mog.
The newest edition, the Fray, “rounds out” Enve’s “drop-bar road bicycle lineup”, the American company says, and sits somewhere between the Melee and the Mog as an “all-road” bike. That’s a category that has seen a flurry of launches in recent months, including the new BMC Roadmachine, the latest Canyon Endurace, Pinarello X, and Specialized Roubaix.
Like those bikes, the Fray is optimised for road riding, but its capacity for wide tyres gives it a significant edge of versatility that allows it to be used on different surfaces and terrain. The Fray can accommodate up to 40mm wide tyres – enough for some fairly tricky gravel – when used as 1x, or 38mm if you run a 2x setup. But Enve says the endurance geometry of the bike means it’s optimised for 31-35mm tyres.
Enve says the Fray takes some of the best bits of the Melee and Mog and blends it into one, however insists that the Fray “apple falls much closer to the Melee's tree”. There are design elements, including in-frame downtube storage and extra bottle cage mounts, taken from the Mog, but the tube shapes are borrowed from the Melee to make it “aerodynamically optimised”, however the fork design is all-new just for the Fray.
As you’d expect with an Enve bike, the frame is full high-modulus carbon fibre and has fully integrated cable routing, while the bottom bracket is a T47 threaded. It’s also available in seven sizes, and Enve says customers will have access to its proprietary fit calculator to ensure everyone receives the perfect fit. To that end, the brand also offers a certain level of customisation via configuration of its components, including its various handlebars, stems, and seatposts.
The new Fray initially is only available as a frame only option, though that includes the fork, headset, handlebar, stem, and seatpost. Enve says it is compatible with all SRAM and Shimano road groupsets, though says chainrings bigger than 53t up to 55t are only compatible as 1x. The frame is also not compatible with Shimano GRX 2x 48/31 (FC-RX810-2) or SRAM T-Type/Mullet.
The frame is available in three colourways, Ash, Venom, and Salt, but also comes with a fairly hefty price tag of $5,500/ €5,995/ £5,500/ AUD $9,999, and is available immediately though Enve retailers.
