I want to know who the pinhead is in the Specialized engineering department who seems intent on making Specialized's BBs lower with each iteration of every bike. The 2017 Diverge was near perfect aside from tire clearance and somebody had to try and make it possible to touch your heel down while pedaling on smooth road on the 2018 version. Maybe somebody regraded all the dirt roads and singletrack in Silicon Valley around their HQ and they forgot about pedal strikes, or perhaps Flintstone brakes are making a comeback and they want to get ahead of the curve. Regardless, I'm definitely going to need a thorough demo before I can convince myself to purchase what had been the leading candidate for my next bike. It's one thing to clip the ground with a pedal on a mtb, but getting surprised that way when in the drops at 30kph is not on my bucket list.
I did test ride the Sequoia Expert and came away feeling underwhelmed. Maybe it was the Cannondale Slate and the SuperX with 29x1.8 Renegades that I had as points-of-comparison yesterday, but the Sequoia felt sluggish. (Perhaps I shouldn't hop on such toys when shopping for an all-day do-it-all bike but they were there and ready-to-ride.) If I do go for a Sequoia, I would definitely be putting a lighter wheelset on it. Shedding a pound per wheel would certainly liven it up. I did get spoiled by that Lefty, however, so I do need to see how the Future Shock compares.