After a stint away due to the impact of Brexit, Rose is back in the UK and has come out swinging with a fast, light and excellent-value race bike – the new Shave FFX.
Costing only €8,500 for a WorldTour-worthy spec, the Shave FFX is a competitive aero road bike in every regard.
The only characteristic that gave me pause for thought is its notably stiff ride quality, although this can be mitigated via tyre pressure or size adjustments.
All things considered, the Rose Shave FFX represents fantastic value for money for riders looking for a fast all-rounder road bike – you’ll just need to be prepared to adjust the tyre setup if the roads where you live are as bad as they are in the South West of England, where I tested it.
Rose Shave FFX – key details
- Rose’s new pro-spec road-racing bike
- Complete bike weight only 6.56kg in a size M/L, without pedals or bottle cages
- Fitted with a SRAM Red AXS groupset, including a power meter
- Features carbon-spoked wheels and Schwalbe Pro One Aero tyres
- Fast and light, but very stiff – be prepared to adjust your tyre setup to suit
Rose Shave FFX Red AXS performance
The Shave FFX was designed with elite racing in mind, and is now ridden by the Unibet Rose Rockets team on the UCI ProTeam circuit.
Given this, it should come as no surprise that it features sharp handling and makes few concessions to comfort.
After setting the saddle height and setback, I set the 28c Schwalbe tyres to my usual 60-62.5psi / 4-4.3 BAR (front-rear, and I weigh around 66kg), and hit the road.
Given many road bikes are incredibly similar in fit, handling and so on, first impressions typically count for a lot – especially when going from a ‘known quantity’ to something new.
In this case, I rode my Giant TCR Advanced Pro into BikeRadar’s workshop and left on the Shave FFX.
Fast but firm
Within the first few kilometres, it was obvious the Shave FFX is faster – or at least feels it – but will bite back more aggressively on poor surfaces.
Some of that’s to be expected, of course. The Giant TCR is an iconic road bike for its mix of low weight and ride quality, but my second-tier carbon frameset is not designed primarily for 60kph sprints at the pointy end of a pro road race.
Nevertheless, I’ve ridden plenty of pro-spec race bikes and it’s been a long time since I’ve experienced anything quite so taut and reactive. In this way, the Shave FFX’s ride quality reminded me more of the 2009 TCR Advanced SL I used to ride before upgrading to a more modern version.
That bike, with its rectangular down tube, focused almost myopically on its stiffness-to-weight ratio, because the concept of ‘vertical compliance’ had yet to enter the road cycling vernacular.
The Shave FFX is, of course, the beneficiary of almost 20 years of development, and that certainly shows.
It has, for example, deep, truncated aerofoil tube shapes throughout the frameset, slick integration with a narrow, flared cockpit (370x110mm on my size M/L test bike), and a geometry that pitches you further forward over the bottom bracket, alongside shorter-than-usual 170mm cranks.
All of which means you get a bike that’s faster almost everywhere, stops on a dime (I don’t miss the days of rim brakes with carbon wheels) and puts you in a riding position that’s both powerful and that bit more sustainable – within the limits of your own fitness, of course.
Whether it’s the frameset, seatpost or carbon-spoked wheels (or a combination of all three) making the difference, the overt stiffness was the stand-out characteristic from my first longer ride into the Mendip Hills.
Descending and then climbing back up the freshly resurfaced road through Cheddar Gorge, the Shave FFX felt fast and efficient, responding accurately to steering inputs and giving back whatever I could put into the pedals.
Away from that small stretch of decent tarmac, though, I was feeling quite beaten-up after only a few hours of riding – to the point that I stopped to let a little air out of the tyres.
Smoother is faster
As we’ve come to understand through the whole ‘wider tyres at lower pressures are faster’ trend in road and gravel cycling, though, compliance isn’t simply a matter of comfort. If your bike is rattling along rough roads, rather than absorbing the imperfections, you’re simply wasting energy, even if it might ‘feel’ fast.
Given this, I dropped my tyre pressures a whole 10psi / 0.7 BAR for my next ride and felt much happier for it. The rough edges of the ride were smoothed out, and I could focus instead on the bike's many excellent qualities.
| Frame size | XS | S | M | M/L | L | XL |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Seat tube length (mm) | 435 | 470 | 492 | 512 | 537 | 575 |
| Top tube length (mm) | 508 | 527 | 544 | 562 | 584 | 612 |
| Head tube length (mm) | 110 | 120 | 135 | 155 | 180 | 205 |
| Head tube angle (degrees) | 71.5 | 73 | 73.25 | 73.25 | 73.5 | 73.75 |
| Seat tube angle (degrees) | 75.5 | 75 | 74.5 | 74 | 73.75 | 73.5 |
| Bottom bracket Offset (mm) | 72 | 72 | 72 | 72 | 72 | 72 |
| Chain stay length (mm) | 410 | 410 | 410 | 410 | 410 | 410 |
| Wheelbase (mm) | 969 | 975 | 985 | 998 | 1,015 | 1,038 |
| Reach (mm) | 375 | 385 | 392 | 400 | 412 | 430 |
| Stack (mm) | 515 | 532 | 547 | 567 | 591 | 616 |
| Fork offset (mm) | 44 | 44 | 44 | 44 | 44 | 44 |
| Recommended rider height (cm) | 155-166 | 165-175 | 1 74-1 81 | 179-186 | 183-193 | 191-200 |
Because the Shave FFX has clearance for up to 35mm-wide tyres, going up a size or two – as the pros are now routinely doing for Spring Classics – is also an option, and one I’d likely take advantage of if this were my bike.
I don’t want to appear too critical of the Shave FFX on this stiffness point. It is overly stiff for my tastes, but it’s also fair to say it can be easily modulated with tyre pressure or size adjustments, and that the abysmal state of Britain’s roads clearly exacerbates things.
Flawless spec
In terms of build spec, the Rose Shave FFX is unimpeachable. €8,500 is a lot of money, but if you want a WorldTour-worthy build, this is one of the cheapest ways to get it.
The latest Giant Propel Advanced SL, for example, costs £10,499 / $13,500 / €11,999 with a similar spec, while you’re looking at £11,499 / $13,499 / €13,499 for an equivalent Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL8.
Only other direct-sales brands, such as Canyon can compete. The Aeroad CFR AXS costs £8,499 / $10,499 / €8,999.
Of course, with the likes of Giant and Specialized, you can walk into a brick-and-mortar store to see the bikes, get sizing advice and so on. But if you know what you’re looking for and are happy to have the bike delivered to your front door, there’s excellent value to be had here with the Rose.
UK availability
One sticking point for British readers is that, although Rose has now re-entered the UK market, the Shave FFX is not yet available to purchase through its website.
When I asked Rose about this, it said, “We really want to make it happen this year”, but it couldn’t guarantee that at this point.
Unfortunately, Brexit and the related duties importing things from the EU can now entail is still holding things up, it said.
“We are still figuring out how to do it in the best way, and not have €2-3,000 in customs duties added on top [of the price]," Rose explained. That would seriously dent the bike’s competitiveness from a pricing perspective.
How I tested the Rose Shave FFX Red AXS
I tested the Rose Shave FFX on the rolling roads around South Bristol. Across both short blasts and longer rides, I looked to test the bike’s speed, handling and comfort on a variety of roads and types of terrain.
Although the bike came set up with lightweight TPU inner tubes, I converted to a tubeless setup prior to testing to avoid any unnecessary punctures.
At 183cm tall, and a weight of around 66kg, I tested a size M/L Shave FFX, which fit me well.
Rose Shave FFX Red AXS bottom line
The Shave FFX Red AXS is a good reminder of why we were so sad to see Rose exit the UK market back in 2020.
It’s fast, very light, fun to ride and great value, making it an attractive competitor to other all-rounder aero bikes, such as the Canyon Aeroad CFR and Giant Propel Advanced SL.
The ride quality is stiff, bordering on uncomfortable on rough roads, but this can be tuned via adjustments to tyre pressures or size, so it wouldn’t be a deal breaker.
Ultimately, the Shave FFX is an out-and-out race bike, and while smoother is undoubtedly faster in most scenarios, riders who want their road bike to give back everything they put in will find plenty to like here.
