Pyga’s new Stage brings gravity-biased geometry to the marathon market.
Its 29in wheels, carbon frame and 95mm of rear travel are matched to a relaxed (for XC, anyway) head angle (68.5 degrees), 120mm fork, longer top tubes and shorter stems (sound familiar?). There’s also a Stage MAX (natch), which increases rear travel to 126mm, fork to 140mm and aims at the trail market.
Both bikes also feature a tweak (don’t call it a standard) Pyga calls “Plus 5“, which shifts the rearward end of the drivetrain (axle and cassette) outwards by 5mm while leaving the chainring where it is, and the overall rear end width at a standard 142mm. This means that there’s less cross-chaining (a Plus 5 system puts the 11th sprocket in line with the 9th sprocket on a regular-spaced frame), and therefore there should be less wear and tear to drivetrain components, as well as more even spoke tension across left and right-side spokes.
Pyga founder Pat Morewood says: “Longer travel bikes have seen a big change in geometry, driven by the Downhill scene. These changes have trickled down into the enduro and trail market, but marathon and XC bikes have been relatively stagnant in this regard. We felt that the marathon category could really benefit from this new way of thinking.”
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Pyga isn’t the first brand to mix light weight and short travel with playful geometry – Whyte, for example, has long made a success of it – and so far we’ve loved every bike we’ve tried that’s been built to an ethos like this. Pyga hopes to unveil the Stage and Stage MAX at Eurobike in August, so stay tuned.
pygaindustries.com
UK importers R53
“a Plus 5 system puts the 11th sprocket in line with the 9th sprocket on a regular-spaced frame”
I’m reading it as the other way around?
Or are you calling the biggest sprocket number 11? (contrary to how shifter windows are numbered)
The biggest sprocket is number 11. That’s the way it always has been 😉
I like the idea of the +5, I was toying with boost (or probably 150mm) axles without a boost crankset to give the same effect. For anyone wondering the principle is that you move the whole wheel 5mm across towards the drive side. By doing this you reduce the angle of the chain from the front to the biggest (11) sprocket, which is where most of the noise/wear is coming from. The side effect of this is also that you need to redish your wheel by 5mm towards the disc side, which happens to improve your wheel strength!
The downside of this particular approach though would be (as far as I can tell) that you’d need a specially dished wheel to work in the frame, as opposed to a 148/150 option which would have the same effect but using a somewhat standard solution.
A 29er version of an ST4? Playful and strong, but shorter travel and puppy like? Im game for a test, just post it me now…
matt – There may be a queue… 😉
Where does the queue start?
well I love my Pyga oneTen with a 140mm Pike so this could be even betterer (and more expensiver…..) but not as green…..
Looks like a Niner, dunnit?