JIMMER’S SANTA CRUZ TALLBOY C S £5,599

Our art editor has hit paydirt with the Tallboy and is ready to slay the rough stuff

The 120mm-travel

Tallboy shares DNA with Santa Cruz’s 144mm Hightower and 160mm Megatower, with the same silhouette and similar geometry. In a short-travel package, this adds up to a proper blend of bigbike attitude and small-bike efficiency.

First up, it’s stunning – a true showstopper in its ‘Flatte Earth’ colourway. This S build has a decent spec, too, including a Fox Float DPS Performance shock, with a three-position lever to switch between settings, and a 130mm Fox 34 Performance fork. You get SRAM’s solid and reliable GX Eagle drivetrain, plus their G2 R brakes with 180mm rotors and a RockShox Reverb dropper post. Race Face AR rims come laced to DT Swiss 370 hubs. It’s good to have a knobbly Maxxis Dissector tyre up front for grip, because the lowprofile Rekon out back will keep me on my toes! A 42.5mm Burgtec stem and 800mm bar finish off a sorted cockpit.

The Tallboy uses Santa Cruz’s patented VPP (Virtual Pivot Point) suspension design, in its latest lowerlink-driven configuration. You’ll have to be patient with me until I’ve done enough miles to fully understand it!

A flip-chip allows you to adjust the BB height and seat tube and head angles.

After a few rides on some good tech trails, the Tallboy is already paying dividends. In the ‘low’ setting, it has an 18mm shorter effective top tube length than the NS Synonym TR I rode last year, so I’m pushed right back on the saddle, but that doesn’t seem to affect climbing much. It’s certainly not as ‘racey’ as the NS, though, with uphills all doable but no longer a breeze. Out of the saddle on long XC traverses, it’s again slower, but there’s little pedal feedback and it’s way comfier.

On my local descents, which are pretty spicy at this time of year. It’s like I’ve turned up the dial a few notches. I’m amazed by the confidence the bike instils and the speed I can carry, despite its shorter reach and wheelbase; I’ve been hitting drops much faster, with little regard for the amount of rear-wheel grip.

The only change I’ve made has been to swap out the grips for some ODI Ruffians so I could fit a Wolf Tooth EnCase System Bar Kit One multi-tool and chain tool in the bar ends, because there wasn’t space for my usual Topeak Ninja Tool below the bottle cage. www.santacruzbikes.co.uk