#!markdown
Yessirreee on the Banshee point. Small company, forward thinking, but also
backwards compatible. I have said many times that their Rune (at least in a
size medium as such that I have) is nearly identical to Santa Cruz's much
lauded Nomad 3 with no difference any greater than 0.5 degrees or 4 mm.
However it proceeded the SC buy two years and is way more versatile. Yeah, its
a about 1.5 lbs heavier on average than the Nomad built up, but one has to
decide if that weight loss is worth more than $1500.
I could have easily moved my 26″ stuff over to my Banshee last year, but after
demoing many 27.5 rigs I felt there was enough of an improvement to make the
leap. Yes, I had ridden tons of 29'ers over the years and hated all of them
until riding a Kona Honzo several years ago. The geometry differences were the
key and now 29'ers can make sense for someone like me that does not want to
ride something with XC-esque twitchiness. Did 27.5 bikes capture that geometry
zietgiest? Maybe and perhaps 26″ bikes with more modern geometry would have
done well without increasing the wheel size. I guess we'll never know.
April 23, 2015, 9:18 a.m. - Raymond Epstein
#!markdown Yessirreee on the Banshee point. Small company, forward thinking, but also backwards compatible. I have said many times that their Rune (at least in a size medium as such that I have) is nearly identical to Santa Cruz's much lauded Nomad 3 with no difference any greater than 0.5 degrees or 4 mm. However it proceeded the SC buy two years and is way more versatile. Yeah, its a about 1.5 lbs heavier on average than the Nomad built up, but one has to decide if that weight loss is worth more than $1500. I could have easily moved my 26″ stuff over to my Banshee last year, but after demoing many 27.5 rigs I felt there was enough of an improvement to make the leap. Yes, I had ridden tons of 29'ers over the years and hated all of them until riding a Kona Honzo several years ago. The geometry differences were the key and now 29'ers can make sense for someone like me that does not want to ride something with XC-esque twitchiness. Did 27.5 bikes capture that geometry zietgiest? Maybe and perhaps 26″ bikes with more modern geometry would have done well without increasing the wheel size. I guess we'll never know.