Posted by: michel77
I toyed with the idea of selling my Chromag for a while thinking maybe I'd like to get something more geared towards longer XC rides, gravel, bikepacking, etc. Then I read the feature on Skyler's Daambuilt on bikepacking and that was a bit of an eye-opener. I mean I always knew you can ride whatever bike on whatever trail, but the hardtail (with some tweaks) started making more sense again with the added benefit that I can now keep using it on the local trails :)
I've had some more XC bikes I've used for bikepacking and surprisingly the more aggressive geo hardtail seems to be fine for long non-techy rides [aka gravel grinding]. I need to string together a few 12hrs saddle time days, but it's looking promising. That said I'd rather tour singletrack anyways. Gravel or paved sections to connect a singletrack loop are fine. I'm less excited by days of gravel grinding. I'll do that here on the island because it's what we have, but if I am going to travel to tour I want to shred. For that the new HT is amazing compared to the older more XC bikes I've used.
Your Chromag looks great for bikepacking. Maybe get some faster rolling tires [Rekon?] if the trip favours speed over ultimate grip, but that's all I would do.