Pivot Vault gravel bike review: A novel take on comfort and performance

A more traditional approach than you might have expected from the mountain bike brand.

Pivot Cycles is a mountain bike brand through and through. Of the fifteen bikes in its catalog, fourteen of them have flat bars, and only four don’t have rear suspension. Sprinkled into the mix is a single drop-bar bike, the Vault, which first entered the lineup as a cyclocross bike back in 2015 and is now the brand’s lone entry in the gravel world.

You might think that a company with roots like that would produce a gravel bike that very much strays into mountain bike territory with hyper-progressive geometry, front suspension, massive tires, and so on – a direct competitor to something like the Evil Chamois Hagar, perhaps. Pivot has exercised a lot of wisdom and restraint with this one, though, and while the Vault perhaps isn’t the borderline-XC bike you might have expected, it’s almost certainly a better gravel bike for most people overall as a result.

• Pros: Excellent tire clearance, very good ride quality, impressively lightweight, quick and capable handling, handy in-frame storage, heaps of build configuration flexibility, mounts galore, UDH compatibility, surprisingly competitive pricing.

• Cons: “Progressive” gravel geometry may not be what you think it is, Iso Flex comfort feature is only modestly comfortable, awkward-looking tube shaping, variable in-frame storage utility, no frameset availability.

• The takeaway: It’s a great gravel bike, but it might not be what you’re expecting from a company like Pivot.

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Marching to the beat of its own drum

There are a lot of gravel bikes out there that look and feel awfully similar to each other: similar shapes, similar weights, similar geometries, similar features. You can hardly blame them, too; when someone comes up with a formula that works, it’s hard to argue, no?

The Pivot Vault is not one of those bikes.

Sure, there are some things it shares with other premium gravel bikes on the market, like the sub-1,000 g claimed frame weight (for a painted small, plus 428 g for the matching uncut fork), 700x50 mm maximum tire clearance, fully hidden cable routing, in-frame storage, and UDH compatibility.

Yep, lots of boxes ticked.

But if that’s all you see when you look at the Vault, you’re not looking hard enough because there’s a fair bit that sets it apart from the crowd.

Huh, is that unusual seat tube shaping perhaps hiding something?

Comfort is king when it comes to gravel, and there are three main schools of thought here. Some brands design the frame such that there’s a lot of flex over bumps, while others lean on shorter seat tubes and lots of seatpost extension. Still others (Trek and Cannondale, in particular) resort to various configurations of physical pivots.

Pivot instead goes its own way with something it calls Iso Flex.

Rather than have the seatpost clamp rigidly inside the frame, Pivot puts a rubber sleeve in between the two. According to Pivot, this provides some micro-suspension and vibration damping regardless of what type of seatpost is used, and without having to compromise on desirable frame stiffness elsewhere. Interestingly, Pivot uses the same rubber hardness for all frame sizes (and doesn’t even offer any alternatives aftermarket).

Yep, there’s a rubber sleeve in between the seatpost and the frame.

“When we originally worked on the first generation, we were testing lots of different durometers with the intent of offering different options, Pivot founder Chris Cocalis told me. “However, everyone picked the same one as their favorite. We had me at 210 lb (95 kg), [sponsored racer] Chloe Woodruff at 105 lb (48 kg), and one of our customer service representatives who’s state time trial champion and probably weighs in at 170 lb (77 kg). The harder ones felt like a normal rigid seat tube. With the softer ones, they just pushed through too much and you could actually feel it hit bottom (even for Chloe), so we settled on one and everyone seems to be happy with the feel. We had five years of success with the previous generation so from a material compound and durometer standpoint, we stayed similar with the new design.”

While the functionality of Iso Flex has been carried over from the original version that debuted in 2019, Pivot has cleaned up the execution. There’s still a bulge at the top of the seat tube, but it’s still smaller than it used to be.

“The way the part works and fits in the frame has been completely updated,” Cocalis explained. “The first-gen Vault was an ugly duckling and required a Center Lock rotor lockring tool to install. The new one was meant to be completely hidden from view, very integrated into the frame, and super simple to install. We didn’t want to have to explain why this thing was sitting off the top of the seat tube. It should just work and not need any explanation at all.”

Frame geometry is another area where the Vault is content to buck the trend.

Pivot characterizes the geometry as “progressive”, though there’s some explanation required. Whereas a growing number of gravel bikes have fully embraced MTB-style numbers with very long reach dimensions and extra-stubby stems, Pivot went with a more measured approach: long (but not too long), slack (but not too slack), and trail dimensions that range from 66-79 mm, depending on size.

“It is longer, slacker, and higher (more stack) compared to the outgoing model,” Cocalis explained. “We saw the trend with the [Trek] Checkpoint and the BMC [URS] of going way longer and so I did some testing with myself and one of our top athletes. Going as long as those bikes worked well just going down steeper stuff but you couldn’t get enough weight on the front end in sweeping, flatter dirt corners without it pushing. You really had to get your weight forward in an elbows-out MTB riding style to keep the front end planted, which was too much of a tradeoff.”

It’s long… ish.

Cocalis also contends that the Vault’s middle-of-the-road strategy offers additional flexibility in terms of sizing without forcing anyone to fully embrace a more traditional geometry or a more progressive one.

“We wanted to design a Goldilocks bike that fit a really wide range of average gravel customers, and we found this nice balance where most customers could ride the bike in their normal size with a 70-80 mm stem and a nice tall reach,” he continued. “The racer types could size down and not have such a high stack while getting back to that 90-100 mm stem length that they were used to. We also didn’t apply this same philosophy to the two smallest sizes as those riders often need to go down to a 60-70 mm stem, anyway, so just getting the fit right for those riders while managing for [toe] overlap and wheelbase were the driving factors.”

Aside from the front end, the numbers are pretty normal. Seat tube angles run between 73-75°, bottom bracket drops from 73-80 mm, and the seat tube lengths are short enough to offer good seatpost extension, but not so short that you can’t still fit a decent-sized frame bag in the main triangle. And despite the generous tire clearance, the chainstays are impressively short at just 420 mm.

The chainstays are very short given the generous tire clearance, and there’s lots of armoring to protect the frame, too.

If all of this sounds familiar to the geometry geeks out there, that’s because the Vault’s numbers are very similar to those of the Enve MOG.

“Have it your way”

Cocalis has never struck me as a fast-food drive-thru connoisseur, though he admitted to me that he “wouldn’t survive without them” given how much time he spends on the road. Officially, In-N-Out and Jack in the Box are apparently his favorites, though I can’t help but wonder if he shouldn’t add Burger King to his regular rotation.

“Have it your way” has been the slogan for that fast food chain for the last five decades, a nod to the idea that customers can get their burgers exactly how they want it. Want extra cheese? Skip the pickles? Prefer your patty really, really, really well done? Knock yourself out, and that spirit of customization rings true in the Vault.

Stock bikes come with the lines running through the upper headset bearing, but the frame and fork can also accommodate partially external routing.

Stock Vaults come equipped from the factory with fully hidden cabling courtesy of FSA’s popular ACR system – hardly surprising given that’s what most people seem to prefer these days. However, Pivot has also gone to the trouble of including more traditional ports just aft of the head tube should you prefer a partially external setup (or want to add a dropper). And while some other brands that offer similar flexibility require you to use a different fork for the privilege, the stock unit on the Vault incorporates simple (yet effective) zip-tie anchoring on the back of the non-driveside leg.

Speaking of the fork, Pivot doesn’t offer any builds with suspension, but the rigid carbon fork is at least suspension-corrected so you won’t mess up the handling should you decide to add one yourself. The axle-to-crown length is 415 mm, and Pivot recommends sticking to 30-40 mm of travel.

Sorry, no cargo mounts here.

Buyers also have their choice between electronic and mechanical drivetrains, and the dropped driveside chainstay allow for both 1x and 2x crankset options without overly impacting tire clearance (Pivot says a 700x47 mm tire will still clear a front derailleur). Dropping the non-driveside chainstay provides some visual symmetry, but also the option of an arm-mounted power meter (something that can often be tricky when clearances are tight). And while some may be bummed Pivot has opted for a BB386EVO press-fit bottom bracket shell instead of an English-threaded format, the company has a long and proven track record of doing press-fit well. Plus, the larger-diameter and wider format allows for more design flexibility in terms of tube shaping, as well as the freedom to go with just about any crankset on the market.

Pivot is very generous with accessory mounts on the Vault, too.

There’s heaps of tire clearance all around.

Tend to get thirsty on longer rides? Larger frames have space for four water bottles (with three inside the main triangle), but smaller ones can still carry three. There’s a spot behind the stem for a top tube bag so you’ve got easy access to your snacks, and underneath at the other end are three threaded holes to attach a tool kit. And instead of using gram-shaving as an excuse to delete features, Pivot has even proudly retained the ability to keep yourself dry with front and rear fender mounts if the ground is wet (what a concept).

There are no cargo mounts on the fork blades, though, and Pivot doesn’t approve the use of any bolt-on rear racks, either – but hey, you’ve got to draw the line somewhere.

Secret menu

There’s one big catch to all of the Vault’s build flexibility: You’d have to start with a bare frameset to make the most of it, and Pivot unfortunately doesn’t sell it that way – at least not at the moment.

“We are not currently selling the Vault as a frameset due to low available inventory,” explained Pivot product marketing specialist Patrick Ribera-Kay. "We are prioritizing complete builds until more on-hand inventory is available.”

It’s a shame Pivot doesn’t offer the Vault as a bare frameset currently, but that’s only because it can’t seem to make enough of them.

If you can manage to find a bare Vault frameset from an authorized retailer for a DIY project, retail price would be US$2,900 / €3,000. Otherwise, there are five complete build options, which – as you’d expect – are preset with the most popular configurations, including 1x drivetrains, 40 mm-wide tires, and hidden cabling (which goes through the headset from the factory, but not the stem or bars).

The entry-level model starts at US$4,200 / €4,300 with a Shimano GRX/SLX wide-range “mullet” mechanical groupset, aluminum bar, and DT Swiss ER 1600 aluminum wheels. Next up, US$5,500 / €5,500 gets you a SRAM Force AXS XPLR groupset with a Zipp carbon bar and the same DT Swiss aluminum wheels, while adding another US$500 / €500 bumps you up to a Force AXS/XO Eagle AXS Transmission mullet setup.

That same SRAM Force AXS XPLR build is also available with Reynolds G700 carbon wheels for US$6,250 / €6,400, while the same wheel upgrade on the SRAM Force AXS/XO Eagle AXS Transmission build nets you the flagship build for US$6,750 / €6,900.

The Reynolds BL G700 carbon wheels are usefully wide at 25 mm internally.

Sorry, Pivot wasn’t able to provide official retail pricing in UK or AU currencies.

Notably, Pivot doesn’t bother with a truly premium SRAM Red AXS XPLR or similar build kit at the high end, or with a more affordable SRAM Rival AXS XPLR setup for customers that might want an electronic drivetrain at a lower price point – and apparently demand for Shimano GRX Di2 isn’t sufficient to justify that option, either.

Pivot sent the top-end version for this review with a few minor tweaks. I’m often in between sizes, and that was again the case here. I opted for the small frame size instead of the medium, which Pivot graciously outfitted with a longer-than-standard stem and a zero-stack Token headset to achieve my preferred bar position (something regular customers would likely have to do at additional cost).

Fully built (but without pedals or accessories), my otherwise-stock test sample came out to 8.36 kg (18.54 lb).

Slice and dice

I tested the Vault in several different configurations: totally stock as supplied with the standard 40 mm-wide WTB Vulpine tires; with the second set of 45 mm-wide Vulpines tires that Pivot also included; with some 50 mm Schwalbe G-One RX Pros; and finally with a more speed-oriented dirt-road setup that consisted of Light Bicycle’s ultra-wide Falcon Pro WG55 aero carbon rims with Challenge Getaway TLR tires.

I’ll cut to the chase: Regardless of the wheel-and-tire setup, the Vault is an excellent gravel bike that’s well-suited to a pretty wide range of usages – but it’s also not entirely what I thought it would be.