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Testing the new blue forkPHOTO GALLERY BELOW
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On the eve of the U.S. National championships RockShox has quietly put a new cross-country fork into the hands of its top sponsored athletes. Reports put at least four riders onto the new fork for the upcoming Mount Snow, Vermont event. The championship race will not be the first competitive event the fork has seen, it is currently being raced in the European Transalp race by Karl Platt.
Gary Fisher-Subaru’s Jeremy Horgan-Kobelski has had one of the new forks for roughly a week. He was shipped the fork to ride during the week leading up to the national championship race, and had it mounted to his training bike. Before the week’s end the fork will come off his training bike and travel with Horgan-Kobelski to be installed on his race bike in Vermont. He seemed happy with how his initial rides on the new fork have gone.
“It’s better than Sid,” he said. “That’s all I can say.”
Both riders and RockShox representatives are tight lipped about the new product. Though there are less than a dozen rumored to be in existence in the world, a handful of riders will likely have the new fork during next weekend’s national championship event. The majority will be racing in the men’s event, but not all. There are no official technical details to report on, and at this point none are known beyond SRAM’s doors.
“All I can say is that it’s a new BlackBox fork,” said Eric Schutt, SRAM’s mountain bike PR manager.
A good look at the fork does, however, give way to some interesting details.
The most striking features are the larger stanchion tubes, presumably 32mm, and the bulge on the lower legs, which look to be adapted from the Lyric and Totem trail and freeride forks. On those forks, the added material surrounds the main bushing and prevents stretching in the critical bushing area.
Looking even more closely a cutout is noticed behind the disc brake mount, which is now of the post-mount variety. And the cutout draws attention to the lower, which, when viewed from below, reveals that the lower third of the leg is hollow. Sid World Cup’s carbon crown and steerer is gone, in its place is what looks like a three-piece CNC machined aluminum version. The three defined pieces being: The crown, steerer, and a third aluminum part just below the headset race’s seat. The CNC manufacturing method is likely only for these prototype forks. When, or if, this fork ever makes it into production the crown will presumably be forged.
As for internals, the top of the right leg sports an adjuster that looks like Motion Control with an external gate adjustment, but who knows what is really inside. Horgan-Kobelski’s bike also had a standard Pop-loc remote. At the bottom of the right leg there appears to be a rebound adjuster. The left leg sports two air valves; the upper has a positive chamber etching and the lower a negative, though, like the damper it is impossible to know what’s really inside.
We have no information regarding the weight or travel of the fork.
As the rest of you out there, we are also looking forward to seeing and hearing more about this new blue fork.
