SPECIALIZED GIVES THE TURBO LEVO SL THE GENIE TREATMENT

Released in May of 2023, the Specialized Turbo Levo SL made waves with its lightweight feel, redefined geometry, and all-new SL 1.2 drive system. Now, the lightweight trail bike gets the GENIE shock treatment, first seen on the Stumpjumper 15 that was released in July of this year.

The Turbo Levo SL e-bikes are now offered with the GENIE air shock, which was developed between the Specialized Ride Dynamics team and engineers at Fox Suspension. It uses both a small and large-volume air chamber to give the shock more sensitivity and a flatter spring curve through the first 70% of the shock’s stroke and a more progressive spring curve in the last 30% of the travel, giving the rider both small-bump sensitivity without being too soft and bottom-out resistance without being too harsh.

How is this done? Essentially, the GENIE shock uses two interconnected air chambers that dynamically adjust as the bike moves through its travel. In the first 70% of the shock’s stroke, both the inner and outer air chambers are active. This gives it a softer and more linear spring curve that soaks up small to medium-sized bumps like a coil shock, yet you can fine-tune it like a traditional air shock with volume spacers. As the GENIE shock compresses into the last 30% of its travel, the GENIE band closes off the air-ports and reduces the air volume to just the inner chamber, significantly increasing the spring rate. This creates a much more progressive spring curve and lets the shock handle big drops, impacts, and steep descents without a harsh bottom-out.

Other than the addition of GENIE-equipped models, the rest of the bike remains the same with 160mm/150mm of suspension travel, adjustable geometry, mixed-wheel compatibility, and 50Nm of torque from the SL 1.2 drive system. Reach numbers still sit between 405mm and 525mm, and the wheelbase ranges from 1158mm to 1301mm with 432mm chainstays.

There are five complete builds of the Turbo Levo SL with the GENIE shock, in addition to a coil-sprung Öhlins-equipped platform that comes with a RXF 38 fork, TTX coil shock, and burly TRP DHR-Evo brakes paired with 220mm rotors. There is also a GENIE-equipped Levo SL frameset, priced at $8,000. Complete builds range in price from $7,000 for the Comp Alloy spec up to $14,000 for the top-of-the-line S-Works build, equipped with SRAM’s XX T-Type Transmission and a RockShox Reverb AXS seatpost.

For all of the details on the new GENIE-equipped Turbo Levo SL, head on over to the Specialized website.

To see the MBA wrecking crew’s thoughts on the Specialized Turbo Levo SL, check out our long term review here.