Conclusion

After spending the best part of a month ripping around on our three direct-sales XC bikes, one thing is crystal clear: the current format of World Cup XC racing hasn’t just been good for the fans, the bikes are so much better for it too.

With technical sections putting more pressure on the riders to perform, their sponsors have had to rapidly change tack and deliver bikes that are every bit as fast and effective downhill, as they are up. No easy task. As such, head angles on XC bikes are finally getting slacker, reach numbers are growing and at the same time stem lengths are decreasing. It’s a similar transformation to the one that trail bikes went through over a decade ago.

And not only does this metamorphosis make XC one of the most exciting areas in bike development right now, it makes the bikes so much more versatile. Rock up to a trail centre on a modern XC bike and you’ll probably be the odd one out. Which is strange, as these bikes are in fact the perfect tools for fast laps on manufactured singletrack trails. The reduced weight makes climbing easier for everyone, while the fast-rolling tyres help retain the momentum of the 29in wheels on flatter, less exciting sections of trail. Guaranteeing that your adrenaline levels will be just as high as your heart rate.

And while racers at the highest level clearly see the benefits of dropper seat posts, most brands are still hesitant about speccing them on production XC bikes. Maybe it’s the additional cost?

But that’s unlikely, as these bikes are already expensive, so it’s not like adding a dropper post such as the Bike Yoke Devine SL at £300 is going to blow the budget. No, brands are still fixated about the headline weight of the bike and dropper posts don’t help in that regard.

Not Intense. At 13.69kg the Sniper T was the heaviest bike in the test by quite some margin. It was also the only bike to come with a dropper post fitted as standard. With 170mm drop, however, it was too much post for the Sniper’s lofty seatmast to accommodate. And it was a similar story elsewhere as Intense tried to shoehorn a pure XC race bike into the down-country category. The 45mm stem was too short for the frame proportions, the BB was too high and the SRAM NX groupset simply too heavy. So if you’re looking at the XC bikes on the Intense website, we suggest that you stick to the standard Sniper.

From the heaviest bike, we switch to the lightest: the new Canyon Lux World Cup CFR Team at 10.71kg. It’s the most expensive bike in the test at £6,649, so you’d expect it to win at the weigh-in.

For that price the build kit is 100% raceready and Canyon has pulled out all the stops in its pursuit of speed. The Lux is a seriously fast bike then, but the focus feels more marathon XC than World Cup XC. That’s not to say that you couldn’t succeed at both formats on the same bike, it’s just that the rear suspension on the Lux feels a little congested. On the plus side, this means that it won’t feel so alien to dyed-in-the-wool hardtail riders.

We had no such reservations about the suspension on the Vitus Rapide FS CRX. The combination of the Rockshox SID SL Ultimate fork and SIDLUXE rear shock deliver way more traction and control than you deserve from a 100mm bike. It’s tight and reactive to pedal inputs too, even if it’s not as stiff or direct under power as the Canyon. The Rapide FS’S real advantage though, is how it carries speed. With more active suspension, it doesn’t get caught up on roots and rocks. This offers a less jarring ride, allowing you keep your flow better and save energy too.

On steeper climbs, the longer stays make it easy to keep the front end down, without having to slide onto the nose of the saddle, which makes the Vitus every bit as fast and effective on the climbs as it is when ripping the descents. Factor in the competitive pricing and the Vitus Rapide FS CRX is our pick as the ultimate privateer’s XC race bike.