When I make my yearly trip to Denver, I always bring my road bike. It's my annual chance to suffer on the kinds of gradients unavailable in the glacier-scoured lands of northeastern Illinois. In advance of this year's trip, Specialized hooked me up with its new gravel bike, the Diverge Pro 4, so I brought it with me to challenge it in ways not possible on the fastidiously groomed gravel trails of suburban Chicago.

In contrast to the Specialized Turbo Creo 2 we reviewed a couple of years ago, the Diverge Pro 4 is strictly human-powered. Specialized calls it "the ultimate getaway vehicle," designed with input from off-road adventure riders, scientists, and racers. It's marketed as the only gravel bike you need for racing, adventure, and distance rides. While I can't speak to its racing performance, I can say the Diverge Pro 4 is a blast on any kind of gravel and does well enough on the road.

Priced at $8,249, the Diverge Pro 4 is designed for rough trails and technical descents, both of which unfolded below me at the summit of an is-it-gravel-or-is-it-single-track climb in Douglas County, Colorado. I took a deep breath, and down I went. The descent was rutted and slightly more technical than anything I'll ever run into around Chicago, but I had enough time on the bike to realize that if I had trouble on the descent, it wouldn't be the bike's fault.

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