My Custom-Built Salsa Cutthroat

The Cutthroat is Salsa's ultra-endurance mixed surface bike inspired by the Tour Divide. It's designed and built to cover long distances with speed and comfort. Making it perfect for the rides I'd like to take on in the coming year. Fun little detail, Cutthroat doesn't refer to a violent criminal, but the cutthroat trout that is common along the Tour Divide route. 

Cutthroat Checking in for the 2025 DAMn

I got this Cutthroat frame late in 2023, with plans to build it out over that winter. Then my 2024 adventure calendar got overly full and I didn't have time or budget to focus on the new build - link to my 2024 Year-In-Review. Fast forward to early spring 2025, I refocused my energy on getting this Cutthroat built up for my 2025 events. I worked with the crew at Tonka Cycle & Ski, where I got the frame. I let Brett at Tonka know that my goal was to make this a "Minnesota" bike, building it with as many components from Minnesota companies as we could. 

We went around and around on some details, like the drivetrain. I really wanted a SRAM 2x road bike drivetrain (meaning it has two chainrings), but it was causing headaches to find a crank set for the road bike groupset that would fit the mountain bike bottom bracket on the Cutthroat. At the end of the day, I decided to opt for the more standard Cutthroat drivetrain, a mountain bike set up with one chainring (or 1x). I'm loving this mullet set up more than I expected ... for those non-bike-nerds, mullet means it's a mountain bike gearing & derailleur with road bike shifters and brakes, business in the front and party in the back! 

The 10-to-52 PARTY in the back!

As I worked with Brett at Tonka on the components, we agreed on the latest SRAM Red shifters. When I saw that the package included polished aluminum brake calipers bodies, I thought that'd make for a nice accent to the whole bike. I had been thinking about picking a bright anodized color for accessories, but hadn't settled on a color yet, so it was an easy decision. We worked on getting all the accessories in polished metal finishes, like the hubs, the handlebars, stem, steerer spacers, even the bar ends. I really enjoy the retro look this bring to a very modern gravel bike.

SRAM brake caliper

Salsa bars & Whiskey stem

Wolf Tooth bar-ends

My other color pick was the Salsa Gel Cork bartape in dark brown to both give a nice throwback esthetic and to play off the tan walled GravelKing SK tires.

For the bags, my early plan was to get brown waxed canvas top tube and half frame bags from Cedaero. Cedaero makes bags to fit the Cutthroat, based on frame size and are designed to match up with the Cutthroat's mounting bosses, meaning very few straps, making for a very clean setup! Before placing an order, I'm very happy that we made a tenting trip to the North Shore. We were camping at Split Rock, just north of Cedaero in Two Harbors; so we stopped into their shop to look at the options in person. I picked the Squid Ink (black) RX30 bags. These bags are better matches for the other bags I already have and I'll use on this bike, like Revelate 16L Spinelock saddlebag. Bonus, RX30 is 100% post-consumer recycled materials. 

Cedaero Cutthroat half-frame & top tube packs

Nerdy Details & Specs (* = Minnesota-based companies):

• Frame: 56 cm 2023 Salsa* Cutthroat frame is a good match for me at just under 6 ft tall. This frame is a little smaller than my road bikes (58 & 57 cm); but larger than my last gravel bike (54 cm). 
• Shifters: SRAM Red AXS HRD levers including the extra blips (bonus buttons) that I found I can use the change pages on my Garmin Edge 1040s. It's nice when you're in a good low body position or on rough roads, allowing you to change the page while keeping your hands in place on the shifters. I want to look into what other functions I can do with my buttons, I've only programed 4 of 10 button options! 
• Drivetrain: SRAM X01 Eagle AXS rear derailleur and 12-speed cassette ranging from 10 to 52 tooth. 40x52 gearing makes for a great stump-puller! I really enjoy the electronic shifting, it's responsive and just works. This is my first bike I've used Silca's wax system, Tonka cleaned and waxed the new chain with the build and I've been loving it! 
• Cranks: SRAM XX1 cranks in 170mm with Quarq DZero power meter & Wolf Tooth 40-tooth chainring*, and Crank Bros Eggbeater 3 pedals. I kinda backed into the shorter crank trend, because we couldn't get 172.5mm cranks, and I'm finding this is an improvement for my knee comfort and possibly getting better/more power than the 172.5 cranks on my other bikes. 
• Wheels: Berd HAWK27* rims, with Berd spokes and Onyx Vesper* hubs rolling 29 x 2.1 Panaracer GravelKing SK Plus. Berd spokes are very unique spokes, they are a fabric spoke and are like a wet noodle out of the wheel. But in the wheel, with tension, they offer great comfort over all kinds of nasty conditions and they are light! BONUS Berd is based just a few blocks from my house! 
• Cockpit: Salsa Cowchipper* bars and Salsa Gel Cork bartape* and Whiskey No 7 Stem* 120 mm and -6°. 
• Saddle: Brooks C-17 carved saddle on the Salsa Guide Carbon seatpost *
• Bags: Cedaero Salsa Cutthroat V2 Half -Frame Pack* and Tank Top Pack*. 
• Bottles: B-RAD Double Bottle Adapter* and I love the look of the new Camelbak steel water bottles to go with the polished metal accent on the bike. 

The bike weighed in at 9.7 kg (21+lbs) when I picked it up ... just a little heavy than my road bike!

Bike fit with GO PHYSIO

I can't say enough good things about a bike fitting with Paulie at GO PHYSIO. In addition to being a Doctor of Physical Therapy (DPT) and bike fitter, he's an ultra-endurance rider. I've worked with Paulie on some oddball bikes, and he doesn't flinch at fitting a drop-bar fatbike or a gravel tandem! I wanted to get the Cutthroat to Paulie as soon as it was ready (and it was still not fully built when I brought it in) so I could use the Cutthroat on the DAMn just a few weeks after it was fully finished. 

Spinning the Cutthroat on the GO PHYSIO trainer

My 2025 DAMn was a totally different effort than I have done in the past, but the point here is that I was happily and comfortable on my bike for 16 hours of riding. Link to DAMn blog. 

A fun final detail (but hard to get a good picture) is The Tour Divide route is on the bottom of the downtube. 

I look forward to some epic adventures with this bike!