TREK FUEL EX 9 29 £3,200

Trek’s short-travel 29er has a smidgen more travel than anything else here, with 130mm at each end. The all-aluminium frame means it’s also the heaviest bike on test, by a small margin. It comes decked out with kit from Trek’s in-house brand, Bontrager, along with a few trick bits of tech. This includes Formula One-derived damping and a straight down tube with internal gubbins to stop it fouling the fork.