Tested – Rocky Mountain Altitude Carbon 70

Getting High on Singletrack

As Rocky Mountain team rider Wade Simmons put it, “Just like this old freerider, the Altitude gets better with age!” The Rocky Mountain Altitude has been in the Canadian company’s lineup for many years and has been through several iterations, all of which have survived many miles under Wade. You see, for any Rocky bike to make the cut, it has to not only survive some time under the “Godfather of Freeride” but also get his nod of approval. Well, after years of waiting for the new version of the Altitude to grace the trails, it’s finally here. We imported one of these Canadian machines to see if it could hold its own on the wrecking crew’s home trails.

WHO IS IT MADE FOR?

The Altitude offers a lightweight platform with solid pedaling efficiency and a quick feel. It’s designed to handle the technical trails of the North Shore in British Columbia, as well as the clapped-out enduro tracks of the Enduro World Series. That’s no small feat if you’re a bike engineer. Rocky Mountain’s design team was basically tasked with building a bike that could handle it all, and the Altitude is what they delivered.

WHAT IS IT MADE FROM?

Rocky Mountain builds the Altitude from carbon fiber, top to bottom, with Smoothwall carbon technology. This build process uses rigid internal molds instead of the typical air-bladder system to make the inside of the tubes remarkably smooth, which makes the tubes both stronger and lighter.

The Altitude also uses Rocky Mountain’s Smoothlink suspension design, which is essentially a four-bar link setup that has 150 millimeters of rear-wheel travel. The geometry is controlled with the Ride-9 shock mount system, which allows riders to change both the bottom bracket height and head and seat angles to any of nine variations with the movement of a single shock-mount bolt position.

Rocky Mountain builds this frame with its burly and oversized BC2 pivot points for durability, a PressFit bottom bracket, internal cable routing, ISCG05 tabs, and grease ports on all the pivots. This bike is truly built to handle the North Shore.

WHICH COMPONENTS STAND OUT?

The Altitude 70 offers a value-oriented build kit with workhorse components that are dialed right out of the box. Sure, there may be some components you will want to swap out, but you certainly don’t have to change anything.

The Shimano XT parts worked flawlessly, as usual. The Fox suspension felt dialed after only minimal setup time, and the Fox Transfer post is quickly becoming our favorite dropper with its reliable performance and very ergonomic lever.

HOW DOES IT PERFORM?

Moving Out: It’s easy to set up the Altitude with its air-sprung suspension, front and rear. Rocky Mountain designed this bike with a long front center and a relatively slack geometry that’s ready to tackle anything, including tough and technical enduro-style trails. The bike is built with Rocky Mountain’s Ride-9 geometry adjustment, which allows the rider to tweak the geometry slightly by simply moving the position of the rear shock-mount bolt. We found ourselves starting right in the middle position but gradually moved to slacker settings as we got used to the bike.

Pedaling: While the Smoothlink suspension is plush, it isn’t so plush that it inhibits pedaling efficiency. The Altitude is a relatively efficient pedaler, especially with the shock’s pedaling platform engaged for smooth trail or paved riding sections. Thankfully, the adjustment on the shock is easy to reach, which encourages the rider to use it to maximize that efficiency.

Climbing: Thanks to its lightweight build and pedaling efficiency, the Altitude floats uphill quite well. While we wouldn’t recommend it for riders who prefer climbing over descending, it certainly doesn’t need a shuttle or chairlift to get to the top of the hill. Rocky Mountain hit the mark with this one, as the Altitude was capable of handling all the climbs we could throw at it.

Cornering: With the Ride-9 system, riders can custom-tune their Altitude to feel either quicker or more stable. As a result, the Altitude has several different cornering personalities; however, this is a fine-tuning adjustment and won’t change the overall feel too much in either direction. We spent most of our time with the bike set low and slack, which made it very confidence-inspiring on high-speed turns but not too sluggish to handle even very tight switchbacks. The chainstays are tight, and the long front center allows the bike to be pushed through any corner.

Descending: The Altitude comes alive when the trail points down and delivers plenty of confidence. It makes good use of its 6 inches of travel and keeps the rider relatively high in the travel until he needs to use it on a big hit or drop. The shock we tested has a fairly firm feel, although it still does relatively well on small bumps and chatter.

TRICKS, UPGRADES OR TIPS?

After a few weeks of testing, we had to remove the rear wheel and found the axle had seized to the point where we needed to break it to remove it. The designers told us that if the metal insert that the axle threads into is not properly tightened at the factory, it will gradually seize, even if the threads are greased. The insert is reverse-threaded and should be checked periodically to prevent this. Once we got a new axle, we had no more issues with this during the test.

BUYING ADVICE

The Altitude is a very balanced bike that’s as capable as a trailbike as it would be an aggressive enduro sled. It’s lightweight and snappy with a suspension system that’s both plush and relatively efficient. The bike also handles rougher trails well with enough suspension to keep the rider feeling confident and in control.

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