Parcours Alta gravel wheelset review: A decent jumping-off-point into carbon gravel wheels

Getting your first pair of carbon wheels is one of the landmark purchases in any cyclists life. It’s a lot further down the line usually than getting clipless pedals or lycra shorts, and for some of us it is one of those purchases that’s just over the horizon. Maybe when you see the prices for the best gravel wheelsets it’s not hard to see why. The Parcours Alta gravel wheels, here in a new iteration compared to the 650b set we reviewed recently, represent a slightly more attainable entry point compared to the premium offerings from brands like Zipp, Roval, Cadex et al that make up the most part of our list of the best gravel wheelsets.

Is more mid-range carbon a good choice then? Well, I’ve been running these wheels with a range of tyre options to update our list of the best gravel tyres. I’ve done fast summer gravel miles through to more recent excursions through slop, and over rocks and roots. Read on to find out how they have held up, and whether or not you should part with your cash and buy a set. 

Design and aesthetics 

While I’m sure we have all pretended that performance is always the number one metric that’s considered when making a purchase, I like to start with aesthetics. Wheels, gravel or otherwise, have visually matured somewhat over the last handful of years. Even the brasher branding of Zipp and Hed (to name just two) has been toned down a smidge from the giant logos of yesteryear. At the other end of the spectrum, newer brands without such an established brand identity have been able to play around with extremely minimalist aesthetics. Hunt and Reserve spring to mind here, as does Parcours. 

If you’re not going to slap large logos on the rim sidewalls, there’s not a great deal of other options to play with. Parcours opts to use a black-on-black scheme, playing with texture rather than colour. The rims themselves are flat, matte black, though devoid of the raw carbon look that some other matte options offer, while the logos are a high gloss, with a slight glitter flake to the gloss coat that you only really notice in direct light. I’m not a fan of having big logos everywhere on my bikes, so I am consequently quite fond of the aesthetic package here. My only slight bugbear is that the logos don't align with the valve, but that’s hardly a criticism that’s going to hold you back from a purchase if everything else is decent.

One thing I really like, but nobody will ever see unless you show them, is the rim tape. It’s a dark transparent orange-brown and puts me in mind of 1980s Mcdonalds' ashtrays. I’ll admit, it’s an odd thing to reference in a bicycle wheel review, but it’s where my mind goes every tyre swap nonetheless.

Away from fast food nostalgia, the vital statistics are as follows: 36mm deep, 24mm wide internally, 33mm wide externally. A hookless setup reduces tyre compatibility somewhat, but not greatly, as it’s becoming as normal as hooked rims. 28 Sapim CX-Ray spokes front and rear hold the tension between the Parcours hubs and the rims, leading to a total weight of 1,500g for the pair, 685g of which is up front. The rims themselves have a modern shape too, a wide U-shape rather than a sharply tapered point. Centrelock discs and 12mm thru-axles keep compatibility on point, and adapters are available, as are dynamo builds with an upcharge.

The hookless portion of the rim utilises a more flexible resin than the main body, the theory being it has no real impact on wheel stiffness, but in the event of a hard impact with a rock, it should allow some more resilient deformation to occur before any failure. There is a lifetime warranty with them too, but if you routinely try and ride them up sets of concrete stairs on flat tyres to try and test the IMPACT+ technology out, you may well find yourself on the wrong side of the small print.

Performance 

Upon arrival, before even mounting any tyres, and only a half minute or so after getting nostalgic for ashtrays that I’d never even seen in real life, I noticed a moderate problem with my wheels. It’s purely a quality control issue, and had no material impact on the wheel itself, but the key spoke was in the wrong place. Without delving into wheel building techniques too far, this just means that the valve on one of my rims was in the wrong position. Instead of being betwixt two parallel spokes, allowing easy access with any of the best bike pumps or the best CO2 inflators, it was stuck between two converging spokes, meaning you couldn’t fit an in-line CO2 inflator in there for example, and larger pump heads were a tighter squeeze. It’s cosmetic, and if I didn’t build wheels myself for fun it probably wouldn’t have gotten noticed, but I do, and it did. 

To reiterate, this doesn’t have any impact on the ride characteristics, but if it does occur on your wheels, you should send them back. I put this down as a one-off, but then one evening while aimlessly doom-scrolling Instagram (as is my right) I noticed 2022 Parcours-sponsored athlete Chris Hall had the same issue on his set of Altas, also on the rear wheel. Once, and you can put it down to an error, but twice isn’t a great showing from a QC point of view. 

Picky QC issues aside, I have enjoyed my time on the Alta wheels. They’re taped well, and accept most tyres that I like to run pretty easily. The only times I’ve had sealing issues is when the small ceramic beads that come with Squirt sealant get clogged on the outside of the bead, leading to it deflating and unseating. In all other respects, they’re pretty dreamy to set up. The tape has started to lift a little at the end, but I put that down to constantly being sloshed with what I imagine are relatively abrasive beads.

Mounted up with some rubber they definitely felt like a step up in speed and aerodynamics compared to the stock 650b wheelset on my Fairlight Secan. Naturally, the added rollover of a bigger wheel size will have come into play, but despite not being top-end carbon wheels they’re still svelte in terms of weight and will have that desired transformative effect over what we’d all think of as a ‘standard’ set of alloy wheels.

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I am not a particularly heavy rider, but I do run my tyres pretty low on pressure and my usual gravel trails along the Cornish coast are frequently beset by rocky sections. I haven’t gone out with the intention of breaking the rims because that would be dumb, but the rims have become overly familiar with terra firma on multiple occasions with no ill effects, either to the rim or to the trueness of the wheel.

They’re stiff enough, without being harsh. Some degree of compliance is desirable for a wheel that can see a variety of lumpy surfaces, but they don’t feel quite as snappy as the Black Inc 34 wheels on the Factor Ostro Gravel I have also been using lately. In actual fact they felt like an excellent pairing for the Fairlight, which also offers more flex than you’d get on something race-focussed; horses for courses, if you will, but don’t go thinking of the Altas as a ‘workhorse’ wheelset. The hub engagement isn't the quickest, but it’s also not something that has forced its way into my consciousness while riding. 

Value 

This is where the Parcours Alta come into their own a little; they’re noticeably more affordable than many carbon wheelsets, especially those around the 35mm depth. They come in at a hair under £900, and I think they represent really quite good value. They don’t come stock on any bikes that I know of, so they’re well and truly an ‘upgrade’ wheelset, and they certainly make for a more affordable upgrade compared to the bigger names. Enough to make the bike feel different (better), without breaking the bank.

Here’s the thing; diminishing returns is a real thing. If you look at our wind tunnel test of the best road wheelsets the differences between them in terms of wattage are minimal. With a set of Altas, you can get yourself a big jump in performance, a reliable package, and better aerodynamics, and all at less than half the cost of a set of something like the Roval Terra CLX, or just a hair more than my car's latest repair bill (I'm fine, honestly). 

On paper, they’re not ‘better’ from a performance standpoint than more premium wheels, but for the majority of riders, these will probably be a better use of your cash. Hell, if we’re talking purely hypothetically from the standpoint of a bike with basic alloy wheels and a rider looking to go as fast as possible then a set of these, with the change spent on a personal trainer, coach, nutritionist etc would probably see a faster end result than just slapping some Zipp 303 Firecrests on and hoping for the best.