sniper pro build (similar price) is 24.6 pounds for the medium, not the large. this norco here is a size large. no doubt the intense is light and i hear you about overall weight. i'd love to see your 5010. my medium 5010 is 27.5 pounds (edit form 28, i just re-weighed it) with reserve wheels and exo casing tires. edit/addition: having ridden the sniper, the revolver feels more "stout" overall as well. that may not be what an XC rider is looking for all the time, but the revolver did feel like a more robust bike than the sniper.

the optic seems hard to beat for any rider not needing big travel but not wanting to roll all the way into xc territory.

for everyone complaining about color choices and who didn't take time to read above or the comments below you can see the INTERACTIVE version of these graphs here https://www.vitalmedianet.com/index.php/mtb-trends-2019/ - i couldn't embed the interactive version here, so they were screencapped. i understand the color criticism, but take 2 seconds to read the text at the top.

LOL dentists. but, link to the complete PDF of survey (not trends) is in the article above already.

#fortheloveofthegame (all the past surveys since 2012 have been on our site for free).

like the article says, hit the link to the market trends page. it's interactive. you can turn things on or off and highlight specific data. way easier to see.