Pinkbike Gear Awards - The Winners

Gear Award Winners

One thing became clear as soon as we sat down to choose the nominees for the 2013 Pinkbike Gear Awards: there were brand new products that blew us away with their performance, existing designs that saw revisions that improved them to near perfection, and a few unexpected breakthroughs that took us completely off guard. Another thing was quickly evident as the discussions began to narrow down the possible contenders: this wasn't going to be a relaxed discourse, with the debate heating up to the point where sharp objects needed to be hidden and awkward apologies were made the next morning amongst ourselves. It didn't get any easier when it came time to pick a victor for each category, but what's a little blood between friends, right? Now that it's all said and done we might look back at it fondly in a few months time (when we're speaking to each other again) and think of it as a team building exercise, even if the guidelines for the awards have been seared into our brains deep enough for us to remember them on our death beds... the nominee doesn't have to be new for 2013, and race results don't count for more than real world performance under the average rider. After all, these awards are for you, not the sponsored professional. And with that we present the winners of the 2013 Pinkbike Gear Awards.

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Downhill Bike of the Year

GT Fury

Our reader polling shows that the very large majority of you spend much more time on mid-travel trail machines than on full fledged downhill bikes, but that certainly doesn't stop this ultra specialized, long travel category from being the headliner of this year's Pinkbike Awards. After all, are you more interested in reading about the new and eminently sensible Toyota Corolla or how the 1.2 million dollar Pagani Huayra handles at speed? We'll take a graphic novel about the Huayra over a short paragraph on the Corolla and its trunk space, thank you very much, even if the chance of us ever driving one hovers somewhere between nil and zero. Functionality is so boring when sat beside radical... So here we are, with a bike that, given its first-season success under the Vulcan and his seemingly unstoppable sister, most would say was the only real choice to wear the Downhill Bike of the Year crown. Our decision isn't based solely on race results, though, because "rideability" - how the bike performs when put under a more average rider or racer - should carry just as much weight in this decision as pure results do, and the 220mm travel GT is at the pointy end of an already incredibly capable but tight field in that regard. After all, just because Gee can put time in on the best racers in the world doesn't mean his steed is The Best, but only that it helps an elite athlete save a few tenths, or maybe a couple of seconds at most, in a three minute race. The ability of a good race bike to give that small but also massive advantage to a competitor is key, but what good is that to an expert level rider who would take an extra minute to ride the same distance? The Fury, with its incredibly intuitive geometry and well rounded suspension, truly will allow a weekend racer to go faster, which is why it is our top pick for 2013. Not mincing words our words here, are we?




Talk about things changing in only a short amount of time. GT was committed to a new design as soon as the Atherton siblings signed on the dotted line, and the three of them were so confident in their new employer’s ability to deliver a fresh and potent package that they didn’t mind spending a year aboard the previous Fury, a bike that was admittedly behind the times when talking of geometry. Their faith was repaid in full and then some when the new Fury came into being, and both Gee and Rachel delivered on their end with a slew of top results. Wins came right out of the gate, and it's not a stretch to guess that the folks at GT's East Coast headquarters had a handful of justifiable hangovers throughout the 2013 race season, even if the year didn't quite end on the high note that a lot of us were expecting it would after the first few World Cup rounds. Gee might not have taken the World Cup overall when it was all said and done, with a slip up in Norway and a mentally strong, incredibly quick Steve Smith pipping him at the end in glorious fashion by winning both the race and the championship, but Atherton’s early dominance and obvious comfort on the brand new bike straight out of the gate speaks volumes for what GT has been able to do. And let's not discount Rachel’s accomplishments, with her laying waste to the women’s field while staying healthy and consistent. Victory for GT didn’t only come between the tape of a race course, though, as Kyle Strait rode his own Fury to a Rampage win on what is arguably the burliest course in the history of mountain bike competition. It's the kind of year that marketing departments have wet dreams about, although having your top racers and riders winning some of the biggest events of the year trumps any sort of clever ad campaign in our minds; one of those cases of actions speaking louder than words.


We wouldn’t need to make any ceremony of the 2013 Pinkbike Awards if they were based solely on race results, but that's about as far from the truth as it gets. The best downhill bike on the market can't just be the best downhill bike for Gee and Rachel - it has to be the best for you, the consumer. We've spent plenty of time on rigs that have been ridden to a World Cup podium by inconceivably focused and insanely fit racers, but you know what? It turned out that those very bikes, while still being incredible machines, weren't exactly inspiring under the average downhiller who might be literally 25% slower down a challenging track compared to a top racer. Let's swallow our pride for just a moment and admit that you might actually be faster aboard a different bike than what your favourite racer uses, what is most visually appealing to you, or even what won on Sunday. The single pivot, aluminum framed Fury certainly took some Ws on a lot of Sundays this year, but it's also a machine that you can take to the bike park and instantly feel at home on. ''The GT's rangy cockpit had us feeling as if it was the first downhill bike that has fit us properly,'' we said in our exclusive July review of the bike. ''This view was only cemented by back to back laps on machines with more conventional geometry numbers, with the Fury's roomy front end making those other bikes feel a touch awkward.'' And now, six months removed from those words and having spent even more time on the Fury, that same opinion is even more of a certainty to us. Comfortable, confidence inspiring, and an all around weapon on a DH track, the Fury deserves the title of Downhill Bike of the Year.

www.gtbicycles.com

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Mountain Bike of the Year

Specialized Enduro 29

While the winner in the previous category might have been somewhat expected by many readers, things are a bit more wide open when it comes to choosing the Mountain Bike of the Year. After all, a proper do-it-all bike has to be an all around bad ass, not just a long-travel rig that lets you spank your friends on their trail bikes when things get rough - there's plenty of those on the market - but also have good enough climbing manners that you're not going to be hating life when you're earning your grins. All three of our nominees tick both those boxes without much question, but only one of them takes it to the extreme by having the dual personalities of a downhill bike and a trail bike combined into one machine that can be ridden at unholy speeds pretty much everywhere: Specialized's 155mm travel Enduro 29. Proponents of the other two competitors might very well say the same thing about the Bronson and Process 111, two bikes that challenge the notion of how and where a mid-travel bike can be ridden, but the Enduro 29 stamps its authority over the Bronson in a way that can't be matched by anything but a true downhill bike when the terrain gets serious. And what of the 111, a short-travel machine that we said might be ''the best handling mountain bike we've ever ridden''? Its melding of progressive geometry and cross-country length travel is able to distort reality for an expert level rider, but the margin of error on the 111 is about as wide as the edge of a sheet of A4 paper - not exactly a forgiving personality for those without experience. The Enduro 29, on the other hand, is a bike that will have pretty much any rider feeling as if they are channeling Troy Brosnan when it comes to pointing it down trails where one would be more likely to see downhill bikes and full face helmets.



There would be at least a dozen bikes to choose from if the only prerequisite for top honours was for the winner to be a demon on the downs, but as the title suggests, that isn't the case, with the Mountain Bike of the Year having to be a machine that can be ridden up, down, and especially across the mountain. It's here where the Enduro 29 shows its secrets, with a climbing prowess that we don't normally associate with a bike of the Enduro 29's travel and angles. Specialized's big wheeler doesn't care what you expect of it, though, and the bike is able to scale some seriously technical climbs with plenty left in reserve. And that's what makes the Enduro 29 so special in our minds - any bike in the same travel bracket can be pedalled up a challenging climb with enough body English and know-how, but the Enduro manages to perform the same task with less of a scene. This is where the battle was won for the Enduro 29, although the best we can do when it comes to explaining the bike's performance on the ups is to say that Specialized has managed to combine just the right geometry numbers - chain stay length, head angle, bottom bracket height, as well as front/center measurements - to create its genre defying climbing abilities.


So there you have it, a 29er is our pick for Mountain Bike of the Year. We'd be lying if we said that the choice of a big wheeled bike didn't give us pause at first, as deep down we all wanted a 26er to take the crown when we first sat down as a group to discuss the contenders. God knows that it would make for a, shall we say, more receptive audience if that had been the case, but it soon became clear that the top three nominees would consist of two 29ers and a 650B wheeled bike regardless of how many times we went over it - it was just that cut and dry. If anything, the Enduro's victory proves that there is room for all three wheel sizes in the big picture, and that we can't let prejudices make decisions for us.


www.specialized.com

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Suspension Product of the Year

RockShox Pike

2013 was a big year for suspension, with new options for both the front and rear of our bikes that allow us to ride faster and in more control than ever before, which is exactly what suspension is supposed to do in the first place. FOX and Cane Creek both debuted new shocks aimed at the mid-travel market, with the former's Float X design meant to bring air suspension to a new level of performance that was once reserved for long-stroke coil shocks, while Cane Creek decided to focus on improving climbing by adding damping to both the compression and rebound stroke when their new Double Barrel Air CS's climbing aid is activated. It was RockShox that made the biggest impact this season, though, with a completely new fork from the ground up that offers what can only be described as a leap forward in suspension performance compared to other mid-travel offerings currently available. It is, of course, no coincidence that RockShox hit this one out of the park, as the engineering team behind the Pike realized early on in the project that riders were taking their trail bikes to unheard of speeds on terrain that was once reserved for shuttling with downhill bikes. They knew that called for a completely different approach compared to their previous offerings, and put the necessary resources towards a fork that would be up to the task. Mission accomplished, RockShox.


The result is a fork that doesn't compromise its action when looking at its entire performance envelope: supple off the top with enough sensitivity to erase the type of chatter that can affect traction, but with enough control throughout the stroke to have one believe that RockShox has been able to squeeze two completely different dampers - one for low-speed control and the other for hard hits - into the fork chassis. This is, of course, not the case, but it speaks volumes for what the minds behind the Pike have been able to accomplish. It isn't just us that have been won over, though, as the Pike's performance has garnered it near universal acclaim from both professional test riders and the general public alike. It's not just its on-trail manners that make this murdered out slider a winner, it's also how RockShox has been able to execute the design. Take a Pike apart and you'll find that it is a relatively simple beast, with it being about as far from a Swiss watch in complication as you can make a modern mountain bike fork. This means that it doesn't require anything but the proper tools, some instructions, and a dash of know-how to strip it down and perform a rebuild, which gives both us and the average consumer more confidence in the product.


www.sram.com/rockshox

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Component of the Year

SRAM XD Driver Body

You'd be forgiven for thinking that we're off our rocker for choosing the XD driver body as Component of the Year. After all, there are a number of other options to pick from that have also made a big impression in 2013, with all of them being far more visible than the usually concealed XD unit. Step back and evaluate its impact on drivetrains that many of us use, though, and you'll begin to see our reasoning. It is one of the essential components of SRAM's XX1 and recently released X01 setups - the wide gearing range of both wouldn't be possible without it - and both drivetrains have been so influencing that some frame manufacturers now offer bikes that will never even be able to accept a front derailleur of any kind. How's that for making an impact?


In all fairness to Shimano, the Japanese giant first debuted their Capreo freehub body many years ago, with the stepped design allowing nine and ten tooth cogs of the day to be fitted, and comparing the XD driver body reveals that it utilizes the same theory. All similarities stop after you move past its stepped profile, as SRAM's design is a completely different animal besides that fact. SRAM also did something else that might be unexpected from such a large brand: they offered the driver body design to other brands through an open licensing agreement that allows them to use it so long as they adhere to its technical attributes. That meant that companies like Mavic, Easton, DT Swiss, and many others, could design and build their own driver bodies around the existing XD template so that riders can use XX1 or X01 with a large number of different wheels that are available today. That's a win/win for everyone involved.


www.sram.com