Listen up downhillers, looking for a bike to get the miles in on, but don’t want to spend your racing budget on a second bike? Do you want something that will propel you to the top of the hill but not remind you you’re not on your downhill bike on the way back down?

If like me, your cycling persuasion entails riding a heavy, overbuilt and possibly over sprung bike, which for anything other than tearing down steep off camber trails littered with braking bumps and large jumps, is a bit limiting. Especially limiting when you’ve started to notice there is more to mountain biking than uplifts and sectioning your favorite track.

Downhill bikes are awesome, but their design and purpose doesn’t lend them well to other areas of mountain biking. With the growth in challenging and extremely enjoyable trail centre’s dotting up around our areas of elevation, more and more riders are looking for a bike that will reflect their riding bias but get them up as well as down.

The Pitch

The Pitch has been around for over three years now, and although its presence and true potential took a while to manifest itself into the bike buyer’s psyche, it is very much a common sight on the trails. Within the Specialized inventory the Pitch has always been in the Enduro’s shadow, as an entry-level bike into their successful FSR suspension linkage on an ‘All Mountain’/ Trail bike platform, but at £500 below the Enduro Comp, the Pitch Pro deserves more than just a look.

From its inception those with an eye to what an affordable package backed up with the right numbers would result in, knew that this was going to be an affordable and incredibly fun bike to ride.

So, here we are testing the 2011 offering from Specialized. For this review we chose the Pro model over the comp, this decision came down to two factors, the forks and the shock.  At £250 cheaper, the Comp still poses as a great package, but apart from the usual upgrades in components and finishing kit, the Pro boasts the incredibly capable Fox RP2 shock and the Motion Control Damped Rock Shox Sektor forks.  What sets the RP2 from the Rock Shox Arior on the Comp is the Pro Pedal function, a real game changer when considering the potential of this bike. The forks on the Comp are also significantly less inspiring, with no Motion Control and being coil sprung, these will only limit both the forks potential and more importantly the ride feel.

The Stats

So what makes the 2011 Pitch Pro stand out from the crowd or indeed from previous incantations? Well, for a start you just have to look at it, it screams fun. With a heavily lacquered paint job of an almost florescent green with gloss black transfers and matching ascents, this beauty looks like it was made for someone at Pro Circuit to ride, but lets not forget a certain fizzy drinks company who sponsor their factory race team.

This bike turns heads, and lets not forget, we are looking at this from a downhiller’s perspective, I’m not the only one with a penchant for anything Monster Energy!

So what else is it about this particular Pitch that’s makes it so fun? Compared to previous years bikes, the 2011 Pitch sports some changes to the bikes already loved geometry. Specialized have shortened the chainstay by two millimeters, raised the bottom bracket by eleven, increased the wheelbase by twenty-four, increased the standover by four and decreased the headtube by twenty! What does all this mean and why did Specialized mess with an already proven numbers list?

Well, the big thing to get in straight away with the 2011 bike over the 2010 bike is the travel increase in the front fork. The Pike fork was an amazing bit of kit, but like everything, it ran its course and out pops the Sektor, this particular Rock Shox number boasts 150mm of travel, that’s an extra ten over the 2010 Pike equipped model and explains why the jigs were re-jigged to accommodate a bigger fork without sacrificing the bikes agility.

With a sixty seven degree head angle, a 1159mm wheelbase with a 423mm chainstay, 108mm headtube and with a bottombracket height of 345mm all adding up to a bike that likes to be ridden fast and aggressively. The overall weight comes in at just over thirty pounds depending on tyres and personal preference gear, this low weight and dialed geometry coupled with a platform boasting six inches of travel front and rear means one thing. This bike begs to be thrown about.

For technical spec and geometry click here

Out on the trails

Set Up

Rather than running this bike straight out the box we decided to change a few things that would make any new bike feel more like an old one. We decided to do this so we could focus on the bike as we really wanted to test it, as well as what we feel someone may do to the bike upon getting it home.

Contact points are probably overlooked sometimes but I know what I like, which is mostly what I’m used to, and getting these little things right from the start will help get a better idea of what is really being tested here. What we did to achieve this was to run some Funn Fatboy bars at 750mm, these are the same width as the ones on my DH bike with a similar sweep, the stock 720mm Specialized bars would be more than ample for someone not used to wider bars but after the advantage they offer. Secondly I fitted some Lizard Skins Lock On grips in colour matching green, I’ve had these for a while and have become pretty attached to them. With the wider bar and grips we also had two stems by Truvativ, one in 60mm and the other in 40mm, one for long loops and the other for playing.

The other two things were tyres and pedals, opting for a pair of Maxxis Ignitor’s for XC/ AM duty and some single ply High Rollers with sticky rubber for general mucking about down the woods.

Pedals wise, the bike comes with the usual throw away plastic efforts that are only good for getting from your LBS to your car, and not much else! For long rides we ran Shimano SPD’s and for everything else Crank Brothers platforms. The stock parts we removed are more than capable, but with this review our focus on this was as a second bike for a downhill rider, and like most downhiller’s they’ve got their chosen gear and they tend to stick with it. When you push a bike hard its nice to know where its going to slip and slide, rip and grip, and when you know these limits coming to a conclusion on a bike test, we feel, is far easier.

Going Up

I’m not a massive fan of riding bikes up hills, but there’s a certain amount of accomplishment to be had with getting yourself there with pedal power, not to mention giving the lungs and heart a good work out on the way, which is only going to make you faster on the DH bike!

So climbing on the Pitch, well it’s certainly no slouch, even with the heavy built nature of the bike and the amount of travel its sporting front and rear. The Rock Shox Sektor fork and the Fox RP2 shock track the ground perfectly when sitting down and grinding, helping to propel you to the top.

On the long fire road climbs such as Glentress, making use of the low speed compression and lock out function on the forks as well as the pro pedal feature on the RP2 are welcomed benefits and there to be used.

I found that away from fire road ascents I very rarely used the pro pedal lever on the shock along with fully locking the fork out. The sitting down and grinding for traction approach to riding these bikes up hill is definitely the way to go. The only issue was riding over rough terrain where I needed constant power through the drivetrain to get me up and over obstacles such as large exposed roots, stumps and general bumps, plus being seated I found that I had to carefully place my pedal strokes to avoid hitting anything below as the BB is only 13.6 inches off the ground! With the pro pedal feature you can limit these interactions between pedals and trail, but its something you’ll become accustomed to and probably familiar with on the DH bike and you’ll forget about this on the way down.

Another unique feature on the Pitch is its front derailleur, which mounts directly to the chainstay, rotating as the linkage moves up and down maintaining a good chainline over the rough stuff. This comes in useful climbing and going from the 36 to the 24 tooth ring. I’m not a massive fan of front derailleurs but there have been no issues with the SLX front mech and awesome chain guide combo.

Singletrack and Forest Loops

A lot of the riding I do away from my DH bike is short two-hour rides through singletrack and gentle forest loops. I can interpret the trail any way I see fit, popping of rocks and roots, and generally picking my lines having fun. This kind of riding is what got me into mountain biking in the first place and its nice to get away from the weekend trail centre traffic.

Being a downhill rider having a second bike for cross country, trail riding, all mountain or what ever you want to call it, we’ll call it mountain biking for now, it is important that the bike is fun to ride everywhere. The Pitch’s versatility here shines with its adaptability to different trails and riding conditions.

Earlier I mentioned the advantages of the Pro over the Comp being mostly down to the suspension units specked on it. I have played with the air volume on both units and have found that running as much as ten PSI either way can alter the bikes riding habits but not so much as too negatively affect the sag or the bikes riding characteristics. For faster trails akin to a mini DH track, a little less PSI was the way to go and the bike came alive. The cheaper Comp model coming with a coil sprung fork lacks this adjustability not to mention the extra cost incurred if the stocked spring weight is not right for you.

Riding trail bikes with in excess of five inches of travel, there is always a certain penalty with weight and rider induced bob, especially at this price point. The FSR linkage does a good job of isolating the worst of any bob but with a good posture and riding style you soon forget your riding a bike with six inches of travel. Overall the bike is balanced and easy to control over a variety of differing terrain, and at this price point, you’re laughing!

Going Down

Point this bike down and off it goes! With such a low centre of gravity, balanced suspension, six inches of travel, 67 degree head angle, short stays coupled with some wide bars all contribute to one wild little ride. The Pitch excels down the twisty tight stuff, floats over the jumps and manuals through the dips. A trail centre machine! The bikes main attributes with its descending credentials are definitely the low bottom bracket and slack head angle, the ride feel these induce are what you want from a bike that looks as fun as this one does! If you’re new to Specialized and bikes with similar geometry, you really need to try them and see what the fuss is about. The numbers do add up when on the trail! But there’s more!

The stiff Truvativ GXP 2 piece cranks, faultless Avid Elixr brakes with organic pads and the Specialized chainguide fitted as standard all lead to a bike that will put a massive smile on your face. When the trails get really rough the Pitch will remind you your not on your downhill bike and on high speed descents it doesn’t feel as stable as some of its pricier counterparts. But lets not forget this bike is £1750!

Conclusion

One of the ideas behind this article was about finding and testing a bike from the viewpoint of a downhill rider looking for a second bike they could use to get some miles in under their belt and to be not too frustrated with the performance going up and especially down without spending a chunk of their race budget on a that second bike. A lot to ask maybe? After taking the Pitch to a few riding locations you will definitely get some admiring looks, Specialized make great looking bikes with beautiful welding and neat lines, but they often miss the style boat on colour choices, not with the Pitch. It is not a faultless ride, many will not take to the low bottom bracket and lively feel and many may find it too heavy and colours too loud for their pallets but this is Downhillers cross-country bike if ever there was one!  Is there room for improvement? I think overall the angles and spec at this price point are pretty much on the money if not spot on, and compared to bikes almost a thousand pounds more it most definitely holds its own. Future upgrades? Probably an ‘up and down’ adjustable seat post, maybe get the forks and shock tuned, a ten speed block on the rear and loosing the front mech, but this is a bike that requires little over tweaking in its current guise other than to suite your tastes and style. As far as the spec we found it all really good, highlights have to be the forks and shock; the chainguide is also especially good for a bike at this price.

At £1750 with a lifetime guarantee on the main frame, five years on the swingarm and two years on the components, it’s a package not to be sniffed at. With its slack, low angles and race bike colours this is a bike I’ve really enjoyed riding and couldn’t recommend it more, and not just to the downhill rider, the Pitch has versatility written all over it and its up to you to determine what you do with it. That’s what makes this little green ripper so much fun!

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