The 2015 Mondraker Foxy has a lot to live up to, particularly here at BikeRadar given that our sister publication What Mountain Bike crowned the 2014 Foxy with its coveted Trail Bike of the Year award.
Arriving at our workshop last week was this 2015 Foxy XR – retailing at £3,199/€3,599, it's the top spec alloy framed Foxy. It's a big old bike, but that's the point – the Foxy still features Mondraker's much talked about Forward Geometry, which, in a a nutshell, puts super short stems up front and adjusts top tube lengths to suit (read all about the concept here). Mondraker's own 30mm stem is fitted as standard, while its unique super short 10mm and 20mm options can be retrofitted.
If you're talking geometry or sizing then the Mondraker is still pretty radical. Our XL size arrived with an extra lanky 680mm (26.77in) top tube measurement and a wheelbase just shy of 49in, at 1240mm.
For your cash you get a mixed splattering of kit. At a glance it might not appear the best value, but on looking harder at the spec sheet we concluded that Mondraker has been pretty clever. Suspension is a mix of Fox and Rockshox kit, and is a staggered setup with the rear delivering 140mm of travel and the Pike RC up front offering 160mm. This slackens the head angle off by a full degree (to 66.5 degrees) from the cheaper Foxy and Foxy R builds, which feature a 140mm fork.
The nifty yet minimal shock guard should help to prevent premature wear or damage to the Fox Float CTD unit
The Zero Link suspension linkage and hardware remains unchanged from this year's bike, but the frame's rear triangle has seen structural revisions for 2015. The standard fit Fox Float CTD rear shock sits with plenty of room to spare; in fact there's enough room to fit the latest-generation piggyback shocks, which is something you won't be able to do with the new Foxy carbon.
The Foxy rolls on Mavic's 650b Crossroc XL wheelset, with 21mm wide rims and 24 bladed spokes at each end. Each wheel is wrapped in 2.4 inches of Maxxis' tubeless ready Ardent rubber, a solid all-round choice.
No internal cable routing here and we certainly aren't complaining
The transmission is a rather dated looking double affair using bits from Race Face and SRAM 's X9 line. It isn't flash, but it should do the job well enough. The good news is that converting to a 1x setup should be a cheap and clean job thanks to a nifty removable front derailleur mount.
Braking is provided by Italian firm Formula's 180mm CR1 stoppers. Finishing kit is all from Mondraker's own brand OnOff, and is well colour co-ordinated and looks good quality.
Getting off to adjust your saddle height will be a thing of the past thanks to a stealth routed dropper post. Our extra large example, complete with a hefty set of test pedals, tipped the BikeRadar scales at 31.8lbs (14.42kg).
This Foxy will be sticking with BikeRadar so stay tuned for a full review in the future.
