The all-new Marin Alpine Path is an alloy enduro transformer. It’s a whole departure from the sooner period bike, completely adopting the simplest of latest enduro mountain bike tech, plus rather a lot adjustability to primarily dial in your good setup. And even to mean you can change the character of your bike, as a result of the you modify the place you expertise it.
With all that adjustability said, the model new Marin Alpine Path is already a killer bike out of the sector in its commonplace settings. So let the tinkers tinker, and let the rest of us merely hop on and hit the paths…
2024 Marin Alpine Path 160mm alloy enduro bike
Marin calls the model new 170mm entrance / 160mm rear Alpine Path their “boldest and most succesful” mountain bike ever. It’s solely truly 10mm further journey entrance and rear and a 1/2° slacker head angle, nonetheless this new bike completely embraces rowdy enduro driving in its new aluminum guise. Positive, that’s correct. The model new 2024 Marin Alpine Path is now aluminum solely base on delivering a high-value to the rider – there’s no carbon mannequin. And the way in which through which Marin described it, there’s not going any motive to make this bike carbon.
As a substitute, this new Alpine Path is constructed to be the burly bike you’ll be capable of take to the bike park, shuttle as a lot as shred your native hills, pedal up for some all-around all-mountain good situations, and even strap on a race amount and hit the enduro circuit with it.
So, what else is new?
Great Adjustable
Adjustability is the necessary factor buzzword proper right here. This new Marin Alpine Path was designed to adapt to the rider, terrain, and their kind of driving. They’re saying there are 12 geo combos you’ll be capable of set the bike up with.
Glorious for the tuner geeks amongst us.
Up entrance which implies the bike begins with a Zero-offset headset. Otherwise you’ll be capable of drop throughout the angle-adjust larger headset cup and alter the head angle by +/-0.75°.
In the middle of the bike, on the excessive of the seatstay the place they meet the rocker, a simple flip-chip lets you swap between the standard 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 once more the place the chainstay closes in on the rear axle, one different simple flip-chip lets you resolve a Extreme bottom bracket/Transient chainstay measurement for further agility or a Low/Prolonged place for further stability. BB prime varies 7.2mm and chainstay measurement changes 7mm. Every of which might be comparatively small changes that will tweak the bike’s coping with to your liking, with out doing one thing too drastic.
The suspension-tech-adverse don’t need to fret though.
It’s nonetheless super good throughout the out-of-the-box preset place, too.
Downtube storage
The Alpine Path’s downtube glovebox referred to as the Bear Subject. The huge opening throughout the hydroformed alloy downtube makes room for a custom-made waterproof bag to carry your spares contained within the physique. A TPU tube, instrument & inflator, for example. The Bear Subject door itself is “double-sealed” to take care of water out, nonetheless easy adequate to perform and nonetheless secure. And serves as a result of the mounting degree for the one bottle cage mount on the physique.
Nonetheless, there’s moreover a further set of bosses above the rocker hyperlink the place you’ll be capable of mount an exterior instrument supplier or gear strap.
Tech particulars
The model new 160mm Marin Alpine Path is now an accurate 4-bar suspension design due to shifting the rear end’s pivot onto the chainstay. They identify it MultiTrac 2 LT – gen 2 and Prolonged Journey. The exchange permits Marin designers to “in the reduction of anti-rise, allowing for larger chassis administration whereas braking, further mid-stroke help, and better actually really feel at bottom out” to coincide with the bump up in journey. A bonus throughout the suspension redesign was the selection in order so as to add the chainstay flip-chip.
The bike comprises a completely 6061 aluminum physique, and an accurate headbadge. All full bike builds come prepare with a mixed mullet 29″ entrance & 27.5″ rear wheel combo. Nonetheless all sizes and all builds can merely swap in a 29″ rear wheel and flip the chip to go full 29er.
The bike now comprises an even bigger diameter 34.9mm seatpost for bigger & smoother dropper journey, inside cable routing with self-sealing rubber gasket guides, and a model new UDH. Plus, there’s a 73mm threaded BSA bottom bracket, ISCG05 tabs, Improve thru-axles, and post-mount disc brakes.
Lastly, thick rubber protectors on the chainstay & seatstay protect any rattling chain noise to a minimal. And an enormous downtube protector retains rocks from messing up your paintjob. Plus, a little bit of mini-mudflap on the chainstay yoke retains rocks & particles from chewing up the swingarm or messing with the first pivot bearings. Plus, all of these rubber protectors are a nice canvas for Marin to level out off their California forest inspiration.
Preliminary Setup
Whereas I just like the flashy pink & blue of the top-tier bike, I was joyful to get some moist path time on the second-tier Alpine Path XR (eXtra Rad!) earlier this 12 months. I kind of actually really feel like that’s the correct assemble for an aluminum enduro bike. It mixes the simplest big journey suspension RockShox has on provide, with the lower-cost dependability & effectivity of a mid-tier mechanical drivetrain and the pleasantly-powerful DB8 brakes. You’ll on no account concern about bashing this assemble through gnarly rock gardens, or hucking it off some sketchy drops. And that’s precisely what the model new Marin Alpine Path wants you to do.
I rode the massive bike in its stock Mullet wheel combo setup, Low bottom bracket / Prolonged chainstay flip-chip setting, and middle place zero-offset headset cups.
That means 63° head angle, 78.3° seat angle, 442mm chainstays, and a 345mm bottom bracket prime (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 good. A powerful begin line. Great succesful when points obtained steep and slippery (the paths and rocks had been additional greasy for my check out rides). Nonetheless nonetheless hundreds agile for climbing technical trails too. This is usually a pretty burly (study: heavy) bike, so it doesn’t zip up the climbs. The model new alloy physique is alleged to be 200g heavier than the shorter journey/older Alpine Path Carbon physique. However it certainly was composed and slowly nonetheless steadily saved going once more up the hill so I would bomb down as soon as extra. It feels lighter than it truly is.
Marin describes this further regular setting mode as “Fast” and it appeared good for the bermy trails interspersed with big chunky rocks.
I would take into consideration swapping to the higher BB/shorter chainstay place on my steeper, further technical native trails. And would positively want to try a full 29er setup. (Which manages to take care of geo the an identical, solely barely slacking the seat angle.) These two changes are super simple (assuming you will have a spare 29″ rear wheel). And may very well be pleasurable to play with. Headset adjustment is a bit messier. I’m happy with the 0°, and altering means swapping larger cups which takes a bit further time. Nonetheless the routing is all old-school inside through the frames, so cup swaps are pretty easy too.
2024 Marin Alpine Path – Pricing, availability & selections
The model new Marin Alpine Path is obtainable in three full bike builds spec’d spherical effectivity suspension, and in a single frameset. All perform the an identical Assortment 4 Aluminum MultiTrac 2 LT physique, all in 4 extraordinarily adjustable stock sizes (S-XL).
The alloy physique tools sells for $1850 / 1900€ with a custom-tuned RockShox Great Deluxe Closing coil shock (size-specific spring weights). And it actually can be the beginning line for primarily probably the most {{custom}} builds.
If you happen to want ready-to-shred out-of-the-box, the $3200 / 3500€ Alpine Path 1 is a powerful enduro begin line. This brown & blue bikes will get a Fox 36 Rhythm fork & {{custom}} tune Fox Float Effectivity air shock, plus a Shimano Deore 12sp drivetrain and TRP Slate EVO 4-piston brakes with mega 203mm rotors.
Step it as a lot because the $4600 / 5060€ Marin Alpine Path XR that I test-rode in bushed aluminum silver and black for a barely further gnarly assemble. Proper right here you get the killer RockShox Zeb Closing fork paired to a Great Deluxe Closing coil shock out once more. A no-nonsense SRAM GX Eagle mechanical groupset rounds out the bullet-proof assemble with SRAM DB8 Stealth 4-piston brakes & 200mm rotors.
Or go full enduro race in Marin group pink & blue on the $5400 / 5945€ Alpine Path XR AXS. Which has an precise weight of 37.14lb/16.88kg. Proper right here you get the an identical RockShox Zeb & Great Deluxe Coil Closing suspension, nonetheless upgraded to a SRAM GX T-Type AXS Eagle digital drivetrain and Code Bronze 4-piston brakes.
All three bikes and the frameset may be discovered starting proper this second through your native Marin vendor bikeshop. Although speedy availability is a bit restricted on some sizes.