Apologies for using the word ‘gnarly’ in the title. And yes, I know you can ride anything on anything, and I have done most things on most bikes in the last 25 years. The question really is what is the most enduro-like bike you’d use for general XC riding?

The scenario is as follows. Here in the South Wales Valleys there’s a lot of steep ground with woodland and lots of people living nearby. So there are tons of steep tech trails carved into the hillsides – some are pretty popular and well known – for the locals, stuff like Wylie or Machen Mountain.

I have a 2007 Patriot with a fairly XC build, it weighs in about 31lbs which is acceptable. But it’s frigging slow to ride around the place. I regularly do 2.5-3hr loops on my XC bike that take in these trails, but with its 70.5 degree HA, 2.2 fast tyres and SPDs it’s not as much fun as it would be on the Patriot.

The problem with riding the Patriot though is that it takes so frigging long. It easily adds half an hour onto the ride out to the top of the trails, which is a pain, frankly. This is down to a number of things, probably. Upright position, weight, the fact I’m not too used to flat pedals, but quite likely the Hans Dampf 2.4s in Addix soft have the biggest effect.

I’m considering changing the bike, so what would be good for an hour of XC and road before some steep techy trails that I want to ride fast and confidently? A similar level of downhill capability to the Patriot would be good but just faster/easier on the XC.

my dad spent the late noughties doing xc on a rocky mountain rmx with 888’s

seen here on winnats

There are three of these left If 20.5” is any good

A mate rode singletrack 7 & torq in your sleep, solo 12hr, in 2017 on a coil shock 180mm specialised enduro evo. Didn’t come last…

Up until recently, Specialized Enduro 170mm travel both ends.

Got the spec’duro. Don’t buy it for your purpose. I’m in exactly the same situation as you ….
Giant Anthem and spec’duro. One each side of what I actually need. Such a waste of five **** grand.

Something like a Scott Spark would do the job if you prefer the XC part, or a Genius if you are in it more for the downs. Most other brands have similar types of bikes in their line up. I ride a Liteville 301 that can be built up sub-30 lb easy enough, though mine is a bit more burly that that currently. They pedal/climb really well, and with a slackset (64.5 degree head angle) and a 170mm dropper, it will get you down any of those steep trails in the S Wales valleys (it has done!)

I think you have to accept any bike is a compromise if doing multi style riding. Pick something like 170mm and it won’t be fast but will be great on descents, pick something 100 and we’ll, you know the rest.

To answer directly though, for xc I don’t want even 140mm. My 130 is way plenty

I ride XC pretty often on my Remedy 29. 65 degree head angle, 160mm coil 36s, etc etc. I’d happily go a bit bigger, but this bike’s raced enduro and the mega and is still happy to pootle in the Pentlands, it’s pretty awesome tbh.

Any modern enduro bike will be leagues better than your patriot at XC and DH.

What about an aggressive hardtail? Could be better on the ups and still good on the downs but tiring but being at its shortish rides you are doing that shouldn’t matter.

Specialized Stumpjumper (even the Evo), trek fuel, giant trance 29, new blur, smuggler.

On steep stuff it’s angles and length of bike that will make a big difference.

I’m lucky that I have a smuggler (140/115) and an enduro (170/165). Too the Enduro to fod today (away from the pedalabikeaway) as the trails we ride are pretty rough and some big impacts. Tomorrow it’s an xc/trail at cannock round the off piste stuff, so it’s on the smuggler.

One bike to do it all, stumpy Evo for me, two sets of wheels, two shock (coil, air), perfect.

How about something like the Whyte S120, seems to get great reviews, aggressive geo in a short travel lightish package.

On the other hand I only have 1 bike now, a Last Glen 140/150mm travel 29er that’s long and slack, it will get used for a it of everything.

A bunch of mtbers I used to ride with in the North Downs/Surrey Hills used to have a ‘Gnarly XC’ ride every year between Christmas and New Year, where you’d ride the most OTT bike you had for XC.

I’ve ridden a Specialized Big Hit (same one I peddled back to Arc 1800 from Bourg St Maurice after spending too long in a bar post-decent), a Dialled Bikes UK Flow (24″ wheel jump bike) and all sorts of other stuff over inappropriately long distances. It would probably kill me if I tried it these days.

It’s all a matter of perspective though I guess. My ‘main’ bike these days in a Cotic Rocket with 160mm Pikes. A decade or so ago a bike with that amount of fork travel, single ring up front and ‘tough’ build was pretty much considered a Freeride/Light DH bike. Indeed I had a 2006 Specialized SX Trail that I both raced DH on and used as my ‘Alps bike’, a bike very similar in design to my Cotic Rocket.

Patriot’s geometry is a bit wrong to go uphill with. It can, but it’s a pita. Winch and Plummet. Fair dos

My Alpine 160 was a good evolution of that experience, but that’s all it was, an evolution. Less bad at the thing the patriot was pretty poor at. My alpine 6 is on a totally different level though. It’s the best climbing bike I’ve ever had. It shimmy’s up technical climbs like a rat up a drain pipe, or I can pootle it up long ascents in Spain and Austria without ever feeling like I’m winching the bike up. It’s seriously good.

Then when the going heads downhill the modern geometry and terrain obliterating chassis are pretty unbeatable, this side of a 200mm gnarpoon. It’s bloody wonderful.

My 170mm Ransom is sub 30lbs and with the right tyres pedals up really rather well and goes down much faster than I can.
Back to a genius next year though as 150mm is the sweet spot for me.

I replaced my 120mm trail bike with a vitus sommet and it’s no slower on local tame xc loops and much more capable everywhere else. Great bike imo

I personally wouldn’t ride anything bigger than my 2015 Spesh Enduro, which is about the same size and geometry as most current 130 mm trail bikes. So something along the lines of a Canyon Neuron, Yeti SB130 etc. might be a good compromise. Anything bigger is going to make the XC part of the ride more of a slog for marginal gain on the downhills.

29er hardtail with slackish head angle should do the trick. Can’t go wrong with a Sherpa or Soul.

Current Orange full sus 29ers go like shit off a shovel and have decent geometry.

Isn’t the new Tallboy billed as a DH bike for XC riders? That would seem to be what you’re after.

I think i’d go for 130 /140 travel at the back but with fox 36’s at the front. Like an orange 5, yeti SB130. modern suspension is so capable at the back you can have the climbing benefits less rear travel brings. But burly forks on the front for the descents.

What Jam bo said.

“Any modern enduro bike will be leagues better than your patriot at XC and DH.”

Thirded.

Or if you’re willing to go a bit less fast on the roughest parts of the descents, I’m really enjoying my slacked out Bird Zero AM hardtail – static head angle and reach are 63.4 deg and 436mm (medium) but at the sag I run with a 150mm Pike it’s at 65 deg and 455mm reach. Combined with a 185mm dropper there’s nothing I wouldn’t ride it down that I’d dare ride on a bigger bike, but with a 76 deg seat angle, only 27 lbs of weight and a 10-50 cassette it whizzes back up the hills.

Starting afresh I’d probably go with an equally gnarly 29er hardtail as if your legs are long enough to not get tangled in the rear wheel then there appear to be no downsides.

I’ve read several reports that bikes with super steep seat angles are bad for riding any distance in the flat….?

Over biked? Pah! Ride what you have.

The Jeffsy saved my life on the SDW.

This pic taken just after I tried to keep up with a guy on a gravel bike.😆

I simply had a loose shoe lace is all… So had to stop obviously.

Sounds like you need an e-bike.

*runs away*

I had good fun riding Machen ,Wylie etc on my old 100mm Giant Anthem 26er .Good modern enduro style bikes are great all rounders.My MK 1 Capra (165mm)certainly doesn’t give me any excuses,it’ll both descend better and be able go further than I can .

I’ve ridden xc on my heckler built up heavy with dh kit on it and a burley 4x bike.

Cotic Flare

“I’ve read several reports that bikes with super steep seat angles are bad for riding any distance in the flat….?”

I’m not sure what happens when you go beyond about 76 deg but I definitely used to have my bars too low for that angle to work on the flat, it felt like a TT bike with all my weight on the bars. With the bars up high it works fine on the flat and climbs very well.

Now that we’re seeing chainstays get longer I think we might see seat angle steepening diminishing.

It wasn’t particularly gnarly but I used to race xc and marathon on my stumpy FSR. That version had 5″ travel which was big for it’s time. Did alright. Top 30 in the national champs, decent times in the K100, won a couple of local races.

Something where you can lock out or lock down the fork and shock make a difference (Fox Talas).
Frames needn’t be heavy these days but light strong is expensive. Wheel and tyre choice is important. It really depends how heavy you are and how you ride. I got away with running stan’s crest wheels. I had switched to race tyres when needed which made a difference but you sacrifice a lot in terms of grip and strength when you do that.

bikes with super steep seat angles are bad for riding any distance in the flat….?

That would have to depend on the top tube length / reach.

If it’s not made longer at same time as seat angle is made steeper then you’ll end up more sit-up-and-beg.

If it is, you won’t notice much difference.

Note: I am not a bike designer.

Similar situation…ive a 160mm enduro bike and 29er hardtail and enjoy xc but with a few trails chucked in; enduro bike seems too much for the xc aspect & the hardtail seems too little for the trail aspect. Weight and wheels/tyres make a big difference but ive settled on the idea of a mid-travel lightweight bike such as a SC 5010…in fact ive pretty much narrowed it to the 5010, just got to save up the pennies. If theres any other mid travel (120-140) lightweight carbon 27.5 frames that I’d be interested to hear.

I’ve ridden xc on my heckler built up heavy with dh kit on it and a burley 4x bike.

Obviously it’s physically possible, the real issue is what was it like?

I don’t actually mind riding the Patriot up and along, it just takes so much longer than my XC bike. I’ll always keep an XC bike of course, I’d only take a long travel bike.when I specifically want to do the big descents. I just don’t want it to take so long.

In the spirit of recommending what you have

Orbea Occam AM – preferably last year’s model with 27.5 and 150 travel.

It complements my XC bike pretty well, you notice the difference in climbing/road ability, but not half as much as you’d think. A proper fork/shock lockout helps, obviously.

But one of the main limitations on some modern trail/enduro bikes is max chainring size. Occam can only take 32, which might not be enough for ‘making progress’ on road.

It doesn’t sound like what you want is an xc bike – as effectively you’re wanting to ride it like enduro. Steep / tech trails but that you ride between them. Just what you have is a bit too slow between them, or on the flip side too steep / xc to enjoy the steep stuff.

So you need to decide what compromise you want – it sounds like you’d compromise a bit more on the downs to make the ups a bit easier?

That said, you Patriot is pretty old now and more modern but shorter travel bikes are likely to out decend it anyway, as well as out do it uphill.

The likes of a Bird Aeris 120LT / Whyte T130 and other stuff like that would probably do a great job for you. 140mm forks / 130mm back end but with quite progressive geometry – without being hugely long and slack is likely a good place to be for your riding.

Either that or a similar travel 29er with decent but not mental geometry.

Looking at it from the other perspective- how gnarly a bike do you actually need- as said above length and angles will get you down most stuff these days.

I’ve an Aeris 145, but when I tested the 120 I felt that it would go anywhere the 145 would, with as much control, albeit with not quite the same ultimate speed.

EDIT: aagh, never refreshed the page before posting and joe’s written basically the same as me.

Looking at it from the other perspective- how gnarly a bike do you actually need- as said above length and angles will get you down most stuff these days.

I’ve an Aeris 145, but when I tested the 120 I felt that it would go anywhere the 145 would, with as much control, albeit with not quite the same ultimate speed.

EDIT: aagh, never refreshed the page before posting and joe’s written basically the same as me.

Funnily enough I also have an Aeris 145LT and it does get me round a 50km ride, but I’d imagine a 140/130 bike would probably get round a bit quicker overall. That said I live for the down sections so I’m happy to drag round 170/160mm travel and a 64 ish degree headangle etc for that.

If money was no object I think I would also get a 140/130 trail bike – preferably one a few lbs lighter than what I have – for the big days out in terms of mileage.

riding both the heckler and 4x bike were fine as it was only local xc just a bit slower although I only ride for fun. Didn’t really notice the extra weight. The 4x bike although burley is actually quite light and is good for general riding too. It’s very similar to hardcore hardtails of today although it has a 69 degree head angle.