X Fusion McQueen RC HLR £549.99

While the McQueen is an all-new plus tyre chassis, it shares its high-control Roughcut HLR internals with other proven X-Fusion forks, making it a standout buy for the money. While a disappointing number of ‘plus’ forks only just take a 27.5x2.8in or 29x2.4in tyre, the wide-stance McQueen will handle 27.5x3.25in or 29x2.6in rubber and we’ve had no clogging issues running a fender. That does make it around 10mm taller than average, but the internal ‘pin push’ system lets you set the travel anywhere from 80mm to 140mm in 10mm increments if you need to tweak geometry. The ‘LockX’ axle works OK. It’s a reasonable weight for a Boost fork too. The wide stance means the 34mm legs still track and communicate traction accurately, and it’s fine anchoring hard with a 200mm rotor. Offering both low and high-speed compression damping adjustment, the RC HLR damper is impressive too. It takes the solid mid-stroke carving support of X-Fusion’s RL2 damper (£449.99 in the McQueen chassis), adds far better sensitivity and removes spike issues on big hits. The result is a fork that’ll near as dammit match the big names in the roughest terrain for several hundred quid less.