Furtado Carbon 27.5 S Mountain Bike

Focusing on all-around versatility and nimble handling over the brute strength of a long-travel enduro beast, the Juliana Furtado Carbon 27.5 S Mountain Bike strikes that perfect balance for a lot of trail riders. The Furtado boasts 130-millimeters of responsive VPP travel that craves fast and flowing trails with massive berms, tight switchbacks, and long climbs to the top of the forest. It retains the dialed geometry inspired by the iconic Santa Cruz 5010, but the shock is tuned specifically for the needs of lighter female riders for a more sensitive feel when you're pedaling over rocks and roots.

This is the third generation of the Furtado, which saw updates last year to make it longer and slacker for better composure at high speeds—all without compromising its sharp handling characteristics that make it carve up tight trails with near-telepathic precision, seeing it retains a low bottom bracket just over 13 inches. New for this generation is the addition of a flip-chip, which gives you the ability to fine-tune its geometry to your particular riding style and local terrain at hand, as as increased tire clearance that lets you run up to 2.8in wide rubber, if you like.

In the high setting you'll find the geometry has slackened a touch, from the previous bike's 67-degree head tube angle down to 66.5 degrees. If you desire an even slacker geometry for steep descents with intimidating rocks and roots posing a threat, you can slacken it even further down to 66.2 degrees. These slacker figures make it all the more capable on terrain that used to be a bit overwhelming for the Furtado, allowing this trail bike to drop into terrain where you'd normally want an all-mountain bike. Besides being slacker, the Furtado has a 15 millimeter longer reach for a better overall fit on a trail bike of this pedigree. And to compensate for the slacker, longer geometry, the seat tube angle is steeper by one full degree for an optimal pedaling position where you can really lay down power on long climbs.

As you'd expect from a Juliana, the Furtado retains the high degree of bump compliance, pedaling efficiency, and bottom-out resistance of its VPP suspension platform. While others in the Juliana line have moved to a lower-link mounted shock, the Furtado retains its upper link-style VPP platform, seeing it's not as gravity-oriented as the Roubion or Strega. This particular Carbon CC 27.5 XO1 Eagle build benefits greatly from a FOX Float DPX2 Performance Elite Shock, which gives you a more supple feel with heightened traction while pedaling over bumpy sections of trail.

Juliana's Carbon C frame makes the Furtado impressively stiff, meaning rider energy is better directed into forward motion with every turn of the cranks. This particular S build kit comes with a Fox 34 Float Performance fork, which provides stiff tracking and precise handling with its 34-millimeter stanchions and 130-millimeters of plush travel. It's finished off with the SRAM Eagle GX drivetrain, which gives you a massive range of usable gears without having to deal with a pesky front derailleur. Moreover, it's outfitted with size-specific dropper posts, so you can get the most out of every trail ride.

One thing that hasn't changed for 2019 is Juliana's commitment to delivering an optimal fit and riding feel for female riders with a lighter shock tune that's developed exclusively for females, seeing they're on average 30 pounds lighter. There's an extra-small available for even the shortest of females, meaning you'll finally have a bike that's custom tailored to your shorter stature without having to ride a larger bike and make major compromises. What they haven't done is water down their dialed geometry with a swooping top tube, higher front end, and shorter reach like much of the competition, which only leads to major compromises in ride quality and handling when you're actually riding hard and fast on the trail.

• Trail riding gets a fun, lively upgrade with this bike
• Slacker, longer geometry increases confidence at high speeds
• Retains low bottom bracket and short chainstays for agility
• Flip-chip switches between 66.5° and 66.1° head tube angles
• Increased clearance lets you run up to 2.8in tires
• 5in of VPP travel balances efficiency with bottom-out resistance
• Carbon C frame for exceptional strength and stiffness
• GX Eagle 1x12 drivetrain with massive range of usable gears