Surly Midnight Special Review: If it Ain’t Broke…

Riding shots by Joe Redbeard and Eric Thompson

The early days of gravel are a world away in terms of the bikes offered in today’s market. With the recently released Trek CheckOUT being the most glaring example, it’s hard to see the outline of what technically belongs to the same genealogical tree, even if the popularization of the genre only happened a few years back. In their nascent form, gravel bikes weren’t all that different from road bikes and did some interesting things to differentiate themselves from their pavement-restricted cousins.

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The Midnight Special was released in 2018 and, though it wasn’t the first gravel bike, it was among the first with mass-market appeal. A hallmark of its time, the Midnight Special was positioned as a 650B all-road option—a confounding choice for bike shops and consumers alike. No stranger to intriguing decisions, Surly insisted on basing the design around dual-wheel size compatibility. The rest, as they say, is history. For many, it was a bike ahead of its time, and one that played a significant role in defining a generation.

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Eight years on, Surly finally updated one of its flagship models with a few minor tweaks. In my time with the newly released Midnight Special, I investigated whether this iconic gravel silhouette is still relevant in an age of suspension, 29ers, and slackened geometry.

Shining a Light on the Midnight Special

Made evident by the badge on the seat tube, the Surly Midnight Special is named after the American folk song. Many will be familiar with Creedence Clearwater Revival’s version, but the first popular recording was by Huddie William Ledbetter, better known as Lead Belly. Though he wasn’t responsible for its inception, the original song speaks to an experience similar to Lead Belly’s, as he was incarcerated for attempted homicide after stabbing a man during a fight. The song goes, “Let the Midnight Special shine a light on me,” and refers to the train’s light shining through prison cell bars. Because the train transported visitors to a prison, the Midnight Special brought hope to those serving time.

The Midnight Special was a real train, the Southern Pacific Golden Gate Limited. The locomotive got its name because it departed from Jackson, Mississippi, just after midnight to reach Parchman Prison. Likely passed along by word of mouth among African American prisoners in chain gangs throughout the American South, the song’s history is storied, complex, and ever-evolving as historians add more context to this period in history.

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Like the folk song that inspired its name, the Midnight Special has evolved in its use and meaning since its release. Positioned as Surly’s all-road bike, the Midnight Special boasts an official 700 x 42 or 650B x 60mm tire clearance, putting it firmly in the realm of gravel bikes. The frame is made of the brand’s signature 4130 Natch tubing and uses modern gravel standards, such as 12 x 100 and 12 x 142mm front and rear spacing. Using a 68mm threaded English bottom bracket, the bike is externally routed, except for the fork, and has a 44mm straight head tube. The seatpost features a replaceable external collar, an integrated derailleur hanger, a 27.2mm seatpost, and three bottle positions: two in the main triangle and one on the underside of the downtube.

Available in two complete build kits, the Midnight Special features both carbon and steel fork options. I tested the more expensive $3,500 complete with a carbon fork. The standard steel-forked complete costs $2,500. The Midnight Special is also available as a frameset-only option, paired with a steel fork.

First Time For(k) Everything

There are no significant changes to geometry, tire clearance, or standards on the Midnight Special, but the biggest difference between what’s being released today and a decade ago is the option for a carbon fork. Standard fare for most of the bike industry, this is Surly’s first time speccing a carbon component on a complete bike.

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As far as carbon forks go, this one is solid, if not a little underwhelming. A reissue of the Salsa Waxwing fork, it features an aluminium steerer, 50mm offset, and internal routing for the brake cable and a dynamo light. Although it’s important to remember that the bike is billed as the brand’s all-road model, it’s disappointing that it doesn’t have an eyelet at the crown. Two of the gravel bikes I tested last year with carbon forks—the Fairlight Secan and Ritchey Septimer—had fully threaded eyelets at their fork crowns. It made small tombstone racks easy to install and eliminated the guesswork of finding a bolt that goes all the way through the fork without rattling around and potentially damaging the carbon.

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I would’ve loved to see greater native compatibility for front racks, even if it meant using an older, non-threaded eyelet. Obviously, people still have ways to run options like the Old Man Mountain Pizza rack, but incompatibility with systems that require a crown eyelet attachment feels like a huge miss in 2026. Still, the three-pack mounts on the fork blades are useful and offer several options for mounting cargo.

Surly-isms

Fork complaints aside, the ride quality it presents, in tandem with the tubeset, is phenomenal. I realize statements like that seem hyperbolic, but I really do mean it. Part of what many of us have come to associate with Surly is value. More consistent with the models we first fell in love with than forever bikes, Surly is rarely, if ever, mentioned in conversations about exceptional ride quality. With models and price points aimed at an entry-level crowd, it makes sense that the brand would be perceived as more utilitarian than luxurious. That, however, is not the case with the Midnight Special.

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Though the Surly representatives I spoke with were insistent on keeping their cards close to the chest, Michael Groskreutz, a Surly product manager, noted that not all of Surly’s Natch tubing is created equal. Although the brand uses the name to refer to steel used on all of their bikes, the double-butted 4130 tubing on the Midnight Special feels much lighter and more high-end than what I’ve experienced on previous iterations of other models, like the Straggler or Pack Rat.

Not only is the tube spec dialed for each of their models, but also across the full eight-size run. Contrary to my perception of the brand, this bike absolutely flew when unloaded. Supple and sharp in all the right places, the Midnight Special rocketed up some of my favorite local climbs and had me questioning whether they had done more than merely add a carbon fork. Granted, the Waxwing lightened things up by a pound or two, but the rear end felt feathery and responsive when digging into turns and pushing on the bike out of the saddle.

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Part of this is down to a Surly-ism I’ve never fully understood. Now made all the more awkward by the addition of the carbon fork, this iteration of the Midnight Special features two different axle systems. In the front, you get a regular 12 x 100mm thru-axle. In the rear, however, users get the Surly thru-axle: a three-piece system that serves the same purpose but works with their lugged vertical dropout. Michael walked me through the reasons Surly has stuck with its unique thru-axle system, even though fully threaded has become the industry standard.

First, it saves weight, since the machining required to create a modern thru-axle adds material to fully threaded dropouts. Their lugged system eliminates this by putting the threads in the thru-axle itself, creating an equally safe ride with less stiffness. The Surly thru-axle also lets users with quick-release skewers use their old wheelsets without changing the hub standard by using an additional snap-on piece to make them compatible.

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Michael mentioned that the lack of complexity and materials used in the dropouts makes them cheaper to produce because the partially lugged system allows their production partners to achieve a more consistent surface for the rear flat-mount brakes. This reduces QC issues and further lowers the final package cost. It amounts to a ride feel that is meaningfully and discernibly different, even with the carbon fork. Though I’d argue there are few, if any, remaining high-quality, dirt-ready quick-release wheelsets, learning about the rationale behind their previously peculiar thru-axle system made me realize there’s more to this bike than meets the eye.

Changing Perceptions

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Part of the reason Surly sought this re-spec was to try to change the brand’s perception. Conscious of the elements I spoke to earlier, they feel their bikes are worthy of the higher-end parts and upgrades they more consistently see on other brands. The supplied build kit features the carbon fork, a mechanical 105 groupset, and Circos carbon wheels. I can respect the vision here, but it simply wasn’t fit for purpose in my neck of the woods. The build comes with 700 x 35mm tires and doesn’t clear much larger rubber in the rear, given the front derailleur’s limits. After swapping them out for 50s, I quickly replaced the cranks with a 1x system, removed the front mech, and swapped the rear derailleur with one that could handle a 42-tooth cassette. Luckily, with help from a local mechanic, the 105 12-speed system accepted the 11-speed GRX mech and worked well despite having an extra click.

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Although the bike felt fine after swapping out the smaller rubber, I was still nonplussed by the larger 700c wheels. Though it was quick, nimble, and aggressive in its handling of both pavement and local trails, the bike felt too “on rail.” It’s a surf term that relates to the feeling of cutting into a wave, typically as one rolls the board from edge to edge. It’s a necessary part of a bike’s responsiveness, but at the larger wheel size, the Midnight Special didn’t feel satisfyingly aggressive, just fast and a little too up in the air. It wasn’t until I swapped in a set of 650B x 2.25” Continental Cross Kings that the phenomenal ride feel I spoke to earlier came to fruition.

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Wheel Size and Geometry

Having moved away from the wheelsize since relocating to from Florida to North Carolina, I was initially skeptical of how I’d feel about 650Bs after seeing the benefits of 700c/29” wheels in more technical, mountainous terrain. I was pleasantly surprised, though, as they performed exceptionally well on the Midnight Special. Not only did the smaller wheel size help lower the bike and make it feel more grounded, but the wider contact patch of the 2.25” tires made better use of the fast, responsive handling at the front end. Instead of the rail-to-rail feel of the 700c wheelset, the 650Bs offered a more responsive ride and provided greater control and grip.

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Despite the apparent optimization for the smaller wheel size, I think the Midnight Special performs well with both 650B and 700c wheelsets. Many of the bikes the Midnight Special inspired adopted the versatility it pioneered, often marketing themselves as capable of different but cogent ride feels across both wheel sizes. That said, save for the Fairlight Secan, few of the gravel bikes I’ve ridden over the last six years feel like they’re truly meant to run both wheel sizes. With short chainstays, a middle-of-the-road BB drop, and a neutral trail number, the Midnight Special is the closest to a proper dual-wheelsize bike that I’ve experienced.

Surly Midnight Special Geometry

Based on the numbers, the Midnight Special might be more aggressive than some riders are looking for. Still, for a production model with enough granularity across its eight-size run to dial in a specific fit, the handling characteristics and clearance available at both wheel sizes position it as a solid option for anyone who falls within its scope. Though 650B may no longer be an attractive wheel size for many, it’s what allowed these kinds of bikes to fit such large tires and make the geometry numbers work before designers found solutions at the bottom bracket and chainstays, along with 1x systems being widely accepted as the standard in gravel. The slightly smaller wheel diameter of the 650B tires at 2″+ width was crucial in making the bike as capable as it is, while also feeling grounded at 5’9″. Taller riders, however, may very well enjoy the benefits of the larger 700c wheels without the sharper, up-in-the-air feeling I spoke to.

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Equally at home on trails and the road, the Midnight Special maintained a sharp, responsive, in-control feel across all the terrain I traversed on it. From singletrack to long, smooth descents, it held its line well, despite having a short wheelbase relative to others in the same space. Surprisingly, despite hearing it was a consistent issue from other owners, I experienced no toe overlap at the 650B x 2.25″ width. There aren’t any quirky ideas with the trail number, like on the Bassi Belmont, or any specific characteristics that make the bike ideal for one style of riding over another. It’s an aggressive, road-style gravel bike that can accommodate a variety of fits.

Bikepacking with the Midnight Special

That sense of control carried over when I packed on gear for an overnighter near home. Biasing the load toward the rear with some panniers and the SCSW Love Handles strapped to a Velo Orange There and Back Rack, I kept the weight relatively light in the front. Packing only a quilt and some lighter kit into the two fork-mounted dry bags, the Midnight Special responded well to this rear-end bias. I put that down to the super-short chainstays and the lower BB height from the 650B wheels.

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Flying down the Stony Knob Connector Trail, I never felt out of control or sketched out like I tend to on gravel bikes with this short of a wheelbase. The Midnight Special held its line well and maintained agility in the rocky, rooty sections of my trip up Southern Knob, a small mountain at the southernmost point of the Pisgah Ranger District. Complete with eyelets near the dropouts, the Midnight Special has the mounts we’ve come to expect from Surly, even as an all-road bike. I’d venture to say that, paired with the steel variant, this could easily serve as a long-distance tourer and something I wouldn’t hesitate to pack the pounds on. The bike still felt lively and fun when loaded down, and it’s probably the most fun gravel bike I’ve bikepacked on since I joined the site.

• Model Tested: Surly Midnight Special, 54cm
• Actual Weight: 26.4lbs
• Place of Manufacture: Taiwan
• Manufacturer’s Details: Surly

Further Reading

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