SCOTT FOIL 10 DISC

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“VERSATILE” DOES NOT jump to mind when you think about aero bikes. Fast? Sure. Purpose-built? That, too. Finicky? Sometimes, with convoluted cable routing and tight tire clearances.

But given its charms, and the fact that the rim-brake ver-sion of Scott’s Foil won the 2016 Paris-Roubaix—a brutal race that stiff-riding aero machines are not generally suited to—you can plausibly argue it’s the most versatile of the current crop of bikes in its class.

Scott’s Foil series uses a truncated airfoil-tube shape, sometimes called a Kamm tail, that’s popular among bikemak-ers because it offers many of the advantages of aerodynamic frame designs with a better ride than conventional airfoil shapes. The Foil Disc is as stiff as non-aero race bikes and, once up to speed, seems to hold that momentum with less effort, like a lot of good road bikes in its category do. There are other bikes that balance those ele-ments well, like Trek’s Madone, but what sets apart the Foil Disc isn’t pure aerodynamics or stiff-ness, it’s what it does that a lot of similar bikes don’t.

Primarily, it’s more comfort-able than most aero road bikes I’ve ridden. We tested a prepro-duction model of the Foil Disc 10, but the only difference in the 2018 version is the switch to the newer 8000-series Ultegra group, which would knock about six ounces off the weight of our tester. Whether it’s due to the carbon fiber layup, the 28mm Continental tires, or some mix of the two, the Foil Disc expertly dissipates the buzzy sensation of rough pavement, and even han-dles bigger jolts and bumps well. Those tires—which measure closer to 30mm on the Syncros rims—likely factor in there and also expand the Foil Disc’s range to include most dirt roads.

The result is a bike that man-ages to roll together several qualities—speedy! comfortable! adventurous!—that seem incon-gruous. Of course, this versa-tility has its limits—it’s still an aero race bike and not a gravel bike, for example. And your defi-nition of comfort should include a long and low racer’s position.

But if you want a perfor-mance road bike that’s versatile enough to tackle training crits or dirt-road diversions, that pays attention to aerodynamics without sacrificing all else to it, then the Foil 10 Disc splits that difference as well as it does the wind.