Stumpjumper Expert Carbon EVO R 29: On Test- by Guitar Ted
When Grannygear went out to visit Specialized last year to see the launch of the 2013 big wheelers, one of the bikes he saw caught his attention, and he was excited to tell me about it. See, Grannygear has paid his dues on rigid forks years ago, and isn’t about to trade in his suspension devices for “a step backward” anytime soon. However; I have no such compunctions about riding rigid forks, which explains why he was excited to tell me about the bike he saw! 
Stumpjumper Expert Carbon EVO 29
The bike is the Stumpjumper Expert Carbon Evo 29. Whew! A long name there, so let’s just call this the “Stumpjumper EVO” from here on out. As mentioned, this bike has a rigid fork- a Specialized carbon rigid fork with a tapered steer tube. Corrected for 100mm sagged suspension, the fork is quite an impressive part of the bike. But the “EVO” in the name also means that the bike is optimized for fast paced riding and racing. To that end, weight, (or the lack of it), is important. That means this bike is a 1 X 10 design, and has a component spec which reflects the fast/racer intentions for this design.
I’ll have a complete breakdown of the tech and spec behind the Stumpy EVO in my Out Of The Box post soon.
Note: Specialized sent over the Stumpjumper Expert Carbon EVO 29 for test and review at no charge to Twenty Nine Inches. We are not being charge nor bribed for this review. We will strive to give our honest thoughts and opinions throughout.
Weird to see 27.2 seatposts making a comeback; it looks like a strand of pasta
It would be great to see a comparison to the Niner Air9 RDO set up the same.
just built a air 9 carbon w/ the RDO fork out front. Compared to my rip 9, it is almost 1/3 lighter and easily that in speed. Flies on packeted out snowmobile trails. I now get the addiction/attraction
Don’t forget the “HT” at the end of that name. ha
That black/lipstick red/fluorsecent yellow color scheme looks like a throwback to colors Specialized used many years ago on their clothing and shoe lines. I had a pair of their pre-SPD mountain bike shoes in similar colors. Looked like hell, but they were one of the few mountain bike specific shoes available at the time.