Foldable Bikes Party: Kona goes after the trail market in a big way

Friday, 23 September 2016

Kona goes after the trail market in a big way

http://ift.tt/2dgJnR3

Kona is one of the most iconic mountain bike brands in the world, with its history stretching back decades. Over the years it has created legendary bikes, such as the Stinky DH bikes, and while Kona still has a strong gravity line-up, it's also pretty handy when it comes to trail and XC bikes.

We spent a bit of time out in Austria this summer looking at Kona's new trail bikes and reckon these are the five most important in its lineup.

Hey hey, HeiHei

The HeiHei line has recently been Kona’s XC platform, with the 100mm format being designed to shred XC race courses at the highest level. For 2017 we’re now seeing the previous alloy frames being joined by carbon models, while Kona has also popped longer forks and droppers on some models too — to give them a more trail orientation. As such there are now nine HeiHei models, covering everything from World Cup XC to trail centre fun.

HeiHei Supreme 29

Price: £7,899 / US$7,999 / AU$TBC

At the top of the HeiHei tree is the Supreme model, which comes in both trail friendly and WC ready formats. They both share the same carbon frame, which uses Kona's Fuse Independent Suspension system – this gives the carbon rear triangle a little bit of flex, negating the need for a pivot by the dropouts and save weight. Kona claims that the frames weigh 1,800g, which is pretty competitive.

Kona clearly hasn’t forgotten its roots, as the bikes both have decent geometry for a race-focussed bike

Both the trail and XC versions are controlled by the RockShox Monarch XX shock, which comes with a hydraulic lockout called the Xlock Full Sprint. This also actuates the lockout on the RockShox RS1 fork. While both frames have 100mm of travel, the XC ‘Race’ version has 100mm travel up front while the trail based version has 120mm. Trail riders will be happy to see the KS Lev Integra dropper on the non-Race version too.

HeiHei Trail DL

Price: £5,999 / US$5,999 / AU$TBC

Happy Honzo

Honzo CR Trail

Price: £3499 / US$3,499 / AU$TBC

Big Honzo DL

Price: £2199 / US$2,399 / AU$TBC

Wo + Honzo = Wozo

Price: £2,099 / US$2,399 / AU$TBC

You can read more at BikeRadar.com

via BikeRadar All the latest from BikeRadar.com http://ift.tt/2daGyjN

Foldable Bikes Party