We put two lightweight big-hitters from the David and Goliath of European brands head-to-head to see which comes out on top
HEAD-TO-HEAD BIKETEST
Have you everbeen tempted by something a little more niche, exotic or different, only to stick with the tried-and-trusted when it comes to actually parting with your money? Bikes are a serious investment, so following that more mainstream route is by no means a bad thing. But what if you were to find a machine that was a bit different, from a brand that your mates haven’t even heard of? Would it give you an edge? That’s what we’re exploring in this test of lightweight enduro bikes.
Now, there’s a reason why big manufacturers such as CUBE are household names. They’ve earned their place in the market and pump out quality bikes across every cycling category you can think of. Fellow German brand LAST, on the other hand (what is it with Germans and capital letters?), are far, far smaller. However, we’ve always been impressed by the well-considered design and impressive ride characteristics of their bikes, which is why we wanted to include them here. You could say this is somewhat of a Davidand-Goliath test, then. The might of CUBE versus the ‘boutique’ appeal of LAST.
Over the following pages, we pit LAST’s lightweight enduro rig, the TARVO MX, against CUBE’s Stereo One77 C:68X SLX 29, to see how they compare. Alongside their German heritage, the bikes share a number of similarities, including lightweight carbon fibre frames, Fox Factory suspension and Schwalbe tyres. Both sport the same amount of front and rear suspension travel, too. For modern day enduro rigs, they’re surprisingly kind to the scales, as well, making them a perfect match for a head-to-head battle.
As for the differences, well, there’s quite a bit to talk about here, too, but we’ll save the bulk of that for the reviews themselves. It’s hard to ignore the pricing, though. We were hoping to have the top-spec CUBE Stereo One77 to test, but that didn’t work out. Even if we had, the LAST would still have been more expensive, just going to show how the buying power of big brands can play to the consumer’s favour.
Getting the measure of these bikes took some time. Not because they took long to set up, but because of the demands placed upon modern enduro bikes, which have all the expectations for trail bikes piled onto their saddles, yet also need to exhibit close-to-downhill-bike performance on the descents, or they’re going to struggle on a big enduro day out.
To put this p
