The all-new Marin Alpine Path is an alloy enduro transformer. It’s a whole departure from the earlier technology bike, absolutely adopting the very best of contemporary enduro mountain bike tech, plus a lot adjustability to essentially dial in your excellent setup. And even to allow you to change the character of your bike, because the you alter the place you trip it.
With all that adjustability mentioned, the brand new Marin Alpine Path is already a killer bike out of the field in its customary settings. So let the tinkers tinker, and let the remainder of us simply hop on and hit the paths…
2024 Marin Alpine Path 160mm alloy enduro bike
Marin calls the brand new 170mm entrance / 160mm rear Alpine Path their “boldest and most succesful” mountain bike ever. It’s solely actually 10mm extra journey entrance and rear and a 1/2° slacker head angle, however this new bike absolutely embraces rowdy enduro driving in its new aluminum guise. Sure, that’s proper. The brand new 2024 Marin Alpine Path is now aluminum solely base on delivering a high-value to the rider – there’s no carbon model. And the best way Marin described it, there’s not likely any purpose to make this bike carbon.
As an alternative, this new Alpine Path is constructed to be the burly bike you’ll be able to take to the bike park, shuttle as much as shred your native hills, pedal up for some all-around all-mountain good occasions, and even strap on a race quantity and hit the enduro circuit with it.
So, what else is new?
Tremendous Adjustable
Adjustability is the important thing buzzword right here. This new Marin Alpine Path was designed to adapt to the rider, terrain, and their model of driving. They are saying there are 12 geo combos you’ll be able to set the bike up with.
Good for the tuner geeks amongst us.
Up entrance meaning the bike begins with a Zero-offset headset. Or you’ll be able to drop within the angle-adjust higher headset cup and alter the top angle by +/-0.75°.
In the course of the bike, on the high of the seatstay the place they meet the rocker, a easy flip-chip enables you to swap between the usual mullet setup with a 29″ entrance/27.5″ rear wheel. Or swap in a 29″ rear wheel (not included) for a full 29er setup with nearly unchanged geometry.
Then, out again the place the chainstay closes in on the rear axle, one other easy flip-chip enables you to choose a Excessive backside bracket/Brief chainstay size for extra agility or a Low/Lengthy place for extra stability. BB peak varies 7.2mm and chainstay size adjustments 7mm. Each of that are comparatively small adjustments that may tweak the bike’s dealing with to your liking, with out doing something too drastic.
The suspension-tech-adverse don’t want to fret although.
It’s nonetheless tremendous good within the out-of-the-box preset place, too.
Downtube storage
The Alpine Path’s downtube glovebox is named the Bear Field. The massive opening within the hydroformed alloy downtube makes room for a custom-made waterproof bag to hold your spares contained in the body. A TPU tube, instrument & inflator, for instance. The Bear Field door itself is “double-sealed” to maintain water out, however simple sufficient to function and nonetheless safe. And serves because the mounting level for the one bottle cage mount on the body.
However, there’s additionally an additional set of bosses above the rocker hyperlink the place you’ll be able to mount an exterior instrument provider or gear strap.
Tech particulars
The brand new 160mm Marin Alpine Path is now a correct 4-bar suspension design because of transferring the rear finish’s pivot onto the chainstay. They name it MultiTrac 2 LT – gen 2 and Lengthy Journey. The replace permits Marin designers to “cut back anti-rise, permitting for higher chassis management whereas braking, extra mid-stroke help, and higher really feel at backside out” to coincide with the bump up in journey. A bonus within the suspension redesign was the choice so as to add the chainstay flip-chip.
The bike contains a absolutely 6061 aluminum body, and a correct headbadge. All full bike builds come arrange with a blended mullet 29″ entrance & 27.5″ rear wheel combo. However all sizes and all builds can merely swap in a 29″ rear wheel and flip the chip to go full 29er.
The bike now contains a bigger diameter 34.9mm seatpost for greater & smoother dropper journey, inner cable routing with self-sealing rubber gasket guides, and a brand new UDH. Plus, there’s a 73mm threaded BSA backside bracket, ISCG05 tabs, Enhance thru-axles, and post-mount disc brakes.
Lastly, thick rubber protectors on the chainstay & seatstay preserve any rattling chain noise to a minimal. And a giant downtube protector retains rocks from messing up your paintjob. Plus, slightly mini-mudflap on the chainstay yoke retains rocks & particles from chewing up the swingarm or messing with the principle pivot bearings. Plus, all of those rubber protectors are a pleasant canvas for Marin to indicate off their California forest inspiration.
Preliminary Setup
Whereas I like the flashy pink & blue of the top-tier bike, I used to be pleased to get some moist path time on the second-tier Alpine Path XR (eXtra Rad!) earlier this yr. I sort of really feel like that is the proper construct for an aluminum enduro bike. It mixes the very best massive journey suspension RockShox has on provide, with the lower-cost dependability & efficiency of a mid-tier mechanical drivetrain and the pleasantly-powerful DB8 brakes. You’ll by no means fear about bashing this construct by way of gnarly rock gardens, or hucking it off some sketchy drops. And that’s exactly what the brand new Marin Alpine Path desires you to do.
I rode the massive bike in its inventory Mullet wheel combo setup, Low backside bracket / Lengthy chainstay flip-chip setting, and center place zero-offset headset cups.
Meaning 63° head angle, 78.3° seat angle, 442mm chainstays, and a 345mm backside bracket peak (or 20mm BB drop from the centerline of the axles – 14mm drop from the 27.5″ rear & 31mm drop from the 29″ entrance. #geometry)
First Rides
In that setup, the bike felt nice. A strong start line. Tremendous succesful when issues acquired steep and slippery (the paths and rocks have been further greasy for my check rides). However nonetheless a lot agile for climbing technical trails too. It is a fairly burly (learn: heavy) bike, so it doesn’t zip up the climbs. The brand new alloy body is claimed to be 200g heavier than the shorter journey/older Alpine Path Carbon body. But it surely was composed and slowly however steadily saved going again up the hill so I may bomb down once more. It feels lighter than it really is.
Marin describes this extra secure setting mode as “Quick” and it appeared excellent for the bermy trails interspersed with massive chunky rocks.
I may think about swapping to the upper BB/shorter chainstay place on my steeper, extra technical native trails. And would positively wish to check out a full 29er setup. (Which manages to maintain geo the identical, solely barely slacking the seat angle.) These two adjustments are tremendous easy (assuming you’ve a spare 29″ rear wheel). And could be enjoyable to play with. Headset adjustment is a bit messier. I’m pleased with the 0°, and altering means swapping higher cups which takes a bit extra time. However the routing is all old-school inner by way of the frames, so cup swaps are fairly simple too.
2024 Marin Alpine Path – Pricing, availability & choices
The brand new Marin Alpine Path is available in three full bike builds spec’d round efficiency suspension, and in a single frameset. All function the identical Collection 4 Aluminum MultiTrac 2 LT body, all in 4 extremely adjustable inventory sizes (S-XL).
The alloy body equipment sells for $1850 / 1900€ with a custom-tuned RockShox Tremendous Deluxe Final coil shock (size-specific spring weights). And it certainly would be the start line for probably the most {custom} builds.
In order for you ready-to-shred out-of-the-box, the $3200 / 3500€ Alpine Path 1 is a strong enduro start line. This brown & blue bikes will get a Fox 36 Rhythm fork & {custom} tune Fox Float Efficiency air shock, plus a Shimano Deore 12sp drivetrain and TRP Slate EVO 4-piston brakes with mega 203mm rotors.
Step it as much as the $4600 / 5060€ Marin Alpine Path XR that I test-rode in bushed aluminum silver and black for a barely extra gnarly construct. Right here you get the killer RockShox Zeb Final fork paired to a Tremendous Deluxe Final coil shock out again. A no-nonsense SRAM GX Eagle mechanical groupset rounds out the bullet-proof construct with SRAM DB8 Stealth 4-piston brakes & 200mm rotors.
Or go full enduro race in Marin workforce pink & blue on the $5400 / 5945€ Alpine Path XR AXS. Which has an actual weight of 37.14lb/16.88kg. Right here you get the identical RockShox Zeb & Tremendous Deluxe Coil Final suspension, however upgraded to a SRAM GX T-Sort AXS Eagle digital drivetrain and Code Bronze 4-piston brakes.
All three bikes and the frameset can be found beginning at present by way of your native Marin supplier bikeshop. Though fast availability is a bit restricted on some sizes.
