What is a Factor Aluto? I just took David Millar's unreleased gravel bike for a test ride and here's what I thought

This week, as over five thousand gravel cyclists descend on Emporia for Unbound Gravel 2025, there are unreleased bikes everywhere. 

To say the event has become a launchpad for new tech would be underselling it. After just two days on the ground here, I've seen no fewer than seven new bikes, a new groupset from Campagnolo, and a list of interesting tech hacks in proportion with the USA's bigger-is-better approach to life. 

The latest of those new bikes comes courtesy of Factor, in an all-new bike called the Aluto, and will be ridden by Factor's Brand Director, David Millar, on Saturday. 

Yesterday, when revealing a different Factor gravel bike – that one that will be ridden by the CEO, Rob Gitelis – I hinted that a second bike was here from the brand. 

At that point, Millar's bike was sitting in Kansas City Airport, having been delayed en route, but following a late delivery and expedited build I caught up with Millar and the bike on Friday morning. 

He tells me that the bike is designed to be more of a multi-purpose, versatile machine rather than a highly focused race or adventure bike. Even just looking at it, there's clear attention to its weight, with relatively thin tubes throughout the frame. He didn't have a final production frame weight available, but he was at pains to highlight how well the bike handles.

In fact, he went so far as to offer a test ride to let me experience it for myself. 

He said Factor's internal description for how it handles is 'bright', and that it comes courtesy of the carbon fibre layup just as much as its geometry.

The bike will boast an official tyre clearance of 47mm, but he'd squeezed in a pair of 48mm Rene Herse Oracle Ridge tyres ahead of the race this weekend; a move that he may regret if the sticky peanut butter mud doesn't dry out in time. 

My test ride, albeit short and on a bike set up in Millar's long and low racy position, immediately confirmed that the Aluto will offer agile handling and a comfortable ride quality that's a little more forgiving and playful than the hyper-specific Ostro Gravel race bike. 

My immediate impression, however, was just how light it felt, both when picking it up and when flicking it up onto kerbs and navigating tight turns. 

Even with the chunky 48mm tyres and in Millar's large frame size, the bike was more akin to a road bike in the hand. It's too early to know for sure, and we don't have an exact weight figure for the frame or this full bike, but it could be a bike to rival the Specialized Crux with that lightweight, 'flickable' handling characteristic.  

Millar explained that the Aluto is a little like the brand's O2 VAM road bike in how it fits into the wider lineup. When I reviewed that bike, I described it as a racy featherweight, adding that it's probably not a bike you'll buy if data-driven race performance is your goal, but one that is a joy to ride. 

I won't profess to having been able to discern those sensations in just a few short kilometres of riding, but I can see where he's coming from and am looking forward to spending more time on the bike once it launches.

The focus on weight doesn't mean it totally ignores aerodynamics though, and the eyeball wind tunnel (aka looking at the tube shapes) confirms some aero touches have been added. For example, there's a slight hourglass shape to the head tube when looking at it from the front, and both this and the down tube are profiled with a slight squared-off trailing edge. 

Up front, there's a one-piece integrated cockpit, with cables routed internally for a nice clean front end. 

The seatpost is round, making aftermarket swaps easier than a proprietary D-shaped design. The seat tube itself is round, too, although there is a slight curve toward the bottom where it wraps around the rear wheel. 

There's a storage door on the down tube, using what looks to be the same locking mechanism as the recently launched Monza, and a pair of bolts on the underside for a third bottle. There's another pair of mounts atop the top tube for a bag or spares pouch, and although Millar is using a SRAM 1x groupset, there's a mount for a front derailleur too. 

The one detail Millar didn't give away is the intended launch date of the bike, but given Millar is happy to divulge details like its name and tyre clearance specs, we're pretty confident this one's closer to production than the other Factor bike we covered yesterday. 

You can be sure that Cyclingnews will bring you the details whenever it does launch.