Rocky Mountain Altitude Review

Photo: 99spokes

Overview:

For 2021, Rocky Mountain’s Altitude has received a few upgrades, including now having 160mm of travel, making this bike fall purely into the enduro category. It also features Rocky Mountain’s ride 9 system which lets the rider choose between 9 different geometry settings. I’ve so far had the chance to ride the bike in both the slackest and neutral settings.

Climbing:

I actually rode this bike with a coil shock, so this might not be a fair review. Overall, the Altitude is a great climber with its perfect seat tube angle and dialed geometry, but I did notice significant bobbing from the suspension. This might just be a result of the coil shock, but I’ve heard people who’ve ridden this bike with an air shock have had similar complaints. Either way, it didn’t really bother me that much as with the suspension locked out, the Altitude is basically a flawless climber.

Descending:

On the descents, the Altitude feels extremely fast, yet super fun on the corners. However, when riding it fast on some tech trails, I noticed this can be a very noisy bike. Anyways, in the slack position, the bike feels great on the gnarliest trails, but its annoying on tight corners, and basically impossible to hit jumps without barely gliding over them. But in the neutral setting, the bike felt great on jumps, although maybe a little less playful than something like the Transition Sentinel.

Verdict:

The Rocky Mountain Altitude is a great bike for the racer, or even the freerider, and I actually think it would make a decent all rounder for a lot of people.