Sea Otter is here for another year of breaking new tech trends in mountian biking and, increasingly, gravel racing. With Avinox dominating headlines with its crazy-powerful motor last week, this weekend appears to be all about seeing who has new big wheel bikes and components hiding in their booth.
Whether you’re excited or apprehensive, the big wheel future is looming and looking unavoidable. Godspeed, all.
Finn Iles x Brembo
Before we wade into the weird world of big wheels, Finn Iles’s Specialized Factory Racing S-Works DH was showing in the combined Brembo and Ohlins booth. Brembo? Yes, Brembo. The Italian motorsport brand is officially expanding into mountain bikes. The bright red levers and calipers have featured prominently on Iles’ and Loic Bruni’s bikes for a little while. Now the GR-Pro brakes are going public. And in more colours than red. But the red and yellow Ohlins / Brembo combo does look pretty fast. As does the less-prototype-y version of Iles’s DH race bike. Can’t wait to see that in action in a couple weeks in South Korea!
Fox x Ari 32″ full suspension prototype
After a year or so of mostly smaller brands and boutique builds, and just a single tread of 32″ Aspen’s from Maxxis, the dam looks like it’s about to break. The big players are here. Fox partnered with Ari to show off its RAD prototype 32″ fork. It’s a full suspension bike that really doesn’t look that weird, at least in that size. Sitting on it and rolling around the grass doesnt’ feel that weird, either. But also, pretty weird. The bars are in the right place, but the visual feedback of the wheel is odd. It just looks like its way out there. Talking to the Fox humans, several already have a ton of time on this fork and the spec is getting pretty dialed. 32″ really is here.
Revel bikes shows the future, and the near future
Revel Bikes is back, in a big little way. The brand’s reigned in it’s pre-collapse structure to something more sustainable and closer to what it’s founders intened. Which isn’t surprising, as the original co-founder, Adam Miller, is back and brought a few other founders back on board too.
The brand’s booth mixed very soon to be released bikes, just a little blurred out, and some more futuristic projects. The latter included a titanium full suspension 29er with 3D printed bikes that is stunningly smooth but, apparenty, so prohibitively expensive to make it’ll never see production. Or at least not any time in the near future. It’s part of Revel’s “Concept Labs” program where the brand experiments with prototyping in a more public-facing way. That included a 32″ hardtail and a 32/29 “mega mullet.” Neither is headed to production yet but, like everyone seemed to be at Sea Otter, they’re working on things.
Prevelo outfits the other future with new FS rig
While 32″ are the industries future, groms are our collective future. Prevelo is outfitting the children with a new full suspension bike fit to shred. A sparkly black paint scheme is one option, and this isn’t actually a prototype anyomore. Prevelo says FS was its most requested product behind pink bikes. Having fullfilled the latter demand, they’re now offering a FS too. With upgrade options like Heir components and shocks tuned to each wheel size, Prevelo is here to get your young shredder riding in style.
Maxxis keeps pushing 32″ with five new tires
Maxxis is perhaps the brand doing the most to push the 32″ standard, at least publicly. The Aspen was the first mainstream 32″ tire to drop. Now Maxxis is up to five treads, including the new Aspen ST and a non-XC option: a 2.4×32″ Dissector. That was showing on a wild Btchn’ hardtail, resplendant with all sorts of titanium goodies.
with parts to match
Mechanical shifting
And a stylish silver dropper from PNW Components
Ibis Ripmo AF purple shredder
Why don’t we end with a pallet cleanser. This stunning purple-pink Ibis Ripmo AF was stunning and also possibly one of the least expensive mountain bikes on display at Sea Otter. A polite reminder that you can make a really awesome looking, and riding, bike with just readily available stock parts. They don’t even have to be crazy expensive. A silver dropper from PNW and silver rims make this one stand out, and compliment pink parts from Title nicely. An aluminum Ripmo AF frame from Ibis does everything you need it to. Mechanical shifting, via SRAM Transmission, works fine, no batteries required.
Whatever happens next, your current mountain bike will still work just fine for having fun in the woods.