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Honestly looks pretty good. Sometimes 29/27 mullets look a little weird because the jump in sizing. This looks just slightly bigger. The bike looks pretty proportional.

I think the thing you are overlooking here is that motor/battery tech will continue to evolve which will keep the sales units moving, especially with enthusiasts. That coupled with the shorter life cycle of drive units and batteries and high cost to replace will make selling the old rig and buying a freshie feel like the smart move. Not excited about that part personally, feels like we're matching up to other consumer electronics with short replacement intervals.

Was lucky enough to ride a full 32" bike recently and, hate to say it, my first thought was, "Hmmmm wonder what a 30.5" wheel would be like". The 32" bike (a hardtail at that) made mincemeat of a steep, technical rocky climb that was a lot, lot harder on a 29er full suspension bike. It was comparatively easy on the 32". I was genuinely surprised at the difference. Where it lost out was the corners, no where near as fun or agile feeling. I'm 6ft 1 so don't generally worry about tyre clearance issues, but on certain bikes, for...

Sure, that's what the short travel acoustic bike is for. I don't know about other people, but I rode lt enduro bikes because they were the fastest thing around for descending while still being able to pedal up the mountain. I was somewhat horrified to find myself cranking out faster descending times on the e-bike much of the time. Kind of ruined lt enduro bikes for me. I suppose it matters what the definition of "hardcore" means in the original comment. It sort of sounded like the intent was that e-bike riders are just muppets puttering down the blue trails...

Pretty popular here in western canada. And a blue trail here is like a double black pro line in california 😁 Long travel acoustic enduro bikes are definitely being replaced by long travel e-bikes, regardless of the rider's "hardcoreness" or the trail difficulty. It'd be a different story if there was a performance hit, but they tend to be faster descenders, in addition to being able to self shuttle back up the mountain. More laps, more performance. Hell, I ride my e-dreadnought at lift service bike parks just as often as I ride my acoustic dreadnought v2 or dh bike...

Statement from Atherton Bikes regarding the fire at their HQ: Statement from Atherton Bikes | 11 October 2026 We are devastated to confirm that there has been a fire at Atherton Bikes HQ and factory in Machynlleth. Mid and West Wales Fire and Rescue Service have been incredible in their response and have brought the situation under control. Most importantly, we can confirm that nobody was injured and everyone is safe. We are still working to understand the full extent of the damage. We recognise that this news will be particularly concerning for customers with bikes on order. We anticipate...

How do you know how much power they have if you just felt them in the pits?

I’m confused. Don’t we all possess the ability to fully review a bike and/or components from the classic showroom brake lever pull?!

@Between The Tape with a really thorough handlebar flex / comfort test https://www.vitalmtb.com/features/does-handlebar-compliance-actually-im…

When this happened with Pivot it was all the forums were talking about. Orbea has been lucky to avoid the scrutiny!

Now that is a tech rumor!

New Specialized Enduro will drop early summer of 2027. It will come specced with a genie zeb fork. It will have a Genie vivid air, that is mounted vertically directly in front of the seat tube. The rear layout will look similar to a 2012 era Demo 8, but with a link that comes around the seat tube to the top of the shock.

For the current saint brakes, the calipers are beefed up but they actually have the same size pistons as XT and XTR - just a slightly different servowave ramp built into the lever. If the new saint brakes get released and it turns out that they also have the exact same size pistons as XTR, I'll be very disappointed in Shimano. We have waited far too long for these saint brakes to end up having 5% more power than XTR.

I've got a few things that come to mind scrolling these pics, and I'm curious what others think - Is Shimano off the back because they aren't introducing wireless/electronic Saint when SRAM just launched XX DH AXS? I get that some peeps don't like electronics, but XX DH is the obvious comparison to make, and it seems like Shimano is setting themselves up to be at a disadvantage when you consider ease of setup, clean cockpit look. No clutch. Di2 XT/XTR have racked up a reputation for being loud and dropping chains at the chainring since they seem to cause...

all the proto shimano parts from whistler - https://www.vitalmtb.com/forums/hub/all-prototype-shimano-parts-whistler

Smoking the chainring (+ chain) against a rock can do that. It's not a case where it snapped out the start gate or something where it broke from pedaling torque.

Not sure, they're supposed to have two MTBs in the works, but they might be spacing out the releases or reordering them since they just released an updated Melee