To relieve tension, Trek ran the chain over not one but two tensioner pulleys. The result looks a bit like a three-ring circus near the chainring, but that added idler pulley allows the derailleur to do what it’s supposed to do, which is keep the bike in good gear.
Love on the first trip
I loved this bike from the start because it felt agile and fast and gave me the confidence to navigate some steep lines that I normally avoid. On the trail, I never felt the need to go beyond level two power, even on climbs, which contributed to its acoustic feel. The only place I might have needed more boost was when I was driving home uphill on a city street with a 13 percent grade.
Photography: Stephanie Pearson
After multiple subsequent tests, I was equally happy with one caveat: there was a constant, annoying rattle that sounded like a loose wheel, but I was never able to isolate the source of the noise, probably indicating it was internal and perhaps coming from the battery. or a cable rattling in the down tube.
To give the Slash+ a more solid test, I passed it on to Samuel Hayden, a former college gravity cyclist at Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado. After a 20-mile ride in mostly turbo mode on Piedmont black doubles (things I never drive), Hayden returned with a big smile and more than 65 percent battery power in the tank.
Regarding its weight and handling, Hayden reported that the Slash+ fused substantial power with a surprisingly lightweight build, noting that it had a solid, reassuring connection to the trail and maintained stable flight during jumps.
Their only major complaint? The 9.7 lacks a SRAM drivetrain, which tends to be more reliable for e-MTBs. But that problem can be easily solved, if you have an extra $4,000 available, by upgrading to the Slash+ 9.9 XO AXS T-Type.