The green and white Scott 29″er was a newcomer to the 29″er world. Is it a good first effort? Read on for some thoughts from us on this aluminum rig.

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Grannygear’s Thoughts: Coming off of the Hei Hei, the Scott felt like a missile. It was a 19” size (I had been riding XL/21” bikes all weekend) but it still was a very decent fit for me as I kinda’ waffle between L and XL sizes. Hydroformed aluminum may be getting lost in the shadows of the tower of excitement over carbon frames, but don’t sell shaped beer can technology short just yet. It can have surprisingly good all around performance and hit a price point that high quality carbon cannot touch. The Giant XTC 29er 1 has shown me that and the Scott just confirmed it. Run your hand over the down tube and you can feel the shape change along its length. The Scale had a standard dropout Reba and no tapered head tube. However, it had Avid Elixir brakes and an XT rear dérailleur. After riding all the thru-axle QR Fox forks and tapered head tubes, I wondered if I would feel that in the performance of the Scott. Nope. The Scale has a very stiff and accurate front end. The rear end was tucked underneath very nicely and I never measured the rear stays, but the nicely bent seat tube allowed for a short back end that made it easy to pick up the front wheel and place it where you wanted it and it climbed like a scared rabbit. It was light, stiff, fun, fast and quite competitive in a world bristling with carbon wunderbikes. In fact, if it was my money and I had groceries to buy, I would buy this as a race bike in a second and put the money saved into my kid’s college fund or something. Not only that, it looks great too.

Guitar Ted’s Thoughts: I had heard about Scott entering the 29″er ranks and because of their jaw dropping lightweight carbon steeds, I figured that a carbon hard tail 29″er might just be the thing they would do to blow the roof off of the XC 29″er ranks. Nope! They come out with a middle priced aluminum rig. Huh. Well, it looks really great as Scott managed to pull together a nice graphics package right down to the color matching decals on the Rock Shox Reba fork.

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The bike fit me great and off I went. First thing I noticed was that this pony wants to run! The harder I pedaled it the better it felt, and the faster I went. Solid. Yeah, that’s another thing I felt. The front end of this bike resists twisting and flexing really well which translated into a precise steering feel. I don’t know what Scott is using for a head angle, but this bike is a fast steering machine. Very racy feeling.

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The slightly bent seat tube and shorter rear end translated into great climbing and the wheelies were easy to pop on this rig. Climbing didn’t show any negative effects as I could easily keep the front end pinned right where I needed it. The only weird thing about the Scott was that it was shod with ExiWolf tires, which I haven’t seen much of for a couple of years now.

The Scott guys told me that dealers snapped up all the Scott Scale 29″er units available and I am betting that after a few folks get these out on the trail, the bikes will become very popular with riders as well. It is a great riding, good looking piece that will do someone well as an XC racer on the weekends and as a fun trail bike too.