The Santa Cruz Highball 29 A D Mountain Bike is unapologetically fast, surprisingly fun, and every bit a Santa Cruz mountain bike. Despite Santa Cruz's commitment to carbon fiber engineering and manufacturing, they know the allure of a metal bike. Perfect welds, proper heft, and a certain tangible quality makes metal an attractive material. It's also more amenable to the placement of bolts and other hardware than carbon is, which is why Santa Cruz offers a single-speed dropout kit in the alloy version of the Highball, but not the carbon. If you want to get your hammerhead on, this is the best way to do it. In addition, the seat post size was reduced to 27.2mm, which adds some compliance you'll appreciate when you're 80 miles in to a 100-mile race.

The chainstays were shortened by almost a half-inch, and stretched out the front end of the bike by about the same. This allows you to run a more modern stem/bar combo and makes the bike a little quicker in the corners. A lot of folks want to talk about head tube angle when they talk about hardtails, but after riding a lot of different options, Santa Cruz decided the 70.5-degree angle used on the first Highball was spot-on. It strikes the right balance of quick handling and stability, and won't wander on you when you're climbing.

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