We first reviewed the Moda Presto in sister mag What Mountain Bike last year, and the company's UK design team took our review on board. The result is a traditional-handling but outstandingly light cross-country trail bike for money.
THE RIDE - The low weight is the most obvious aspect of the ride straight away. As soon as you step on the pedals, the light wheels and low overall weight leave the other bikes here standing in acceleration terms. The clear gap in speed is ever clearer on climbs where the decent cockpit stretch and long stem keep it heading skyward with real enthusiasm. Initial sickness in the shock also works in the bike's favour by stopping suspension bounce under pedalling loads. You lose some fine control and grip as a result but there's definitely more traction than hardtail, and without much of a weight penalty. The Presto's low weight and agility also help offset the fact that it's got the shortest travel, because a skilled rider can hop and pop it about with ease. ~If you have to tackle stuff head on it still does ok though. The Recon fork uses the same TK damping as the others here, so multiple hits like rock gardens or rough steps will push it beyond its control limits, but it's ok on tamer trails. Moda have obviously spent a while with RockShox dialling the performance of the often dreadful Ario rear shock to an acceptable level of control over mid-size and bigger hits. Like the suspension the handling it's definitely biased towards tamer trails and longer mileages. The 90mm stem gives ample breathing room, but combined with the steep head angle it can leave the Presto feeling flustered if you try and turn or brake hard. It's not very happy more vertical descents either, where it can start to tuck under and jack-knife if you're heavy on the brakes. The Kore bar they've fitted is a decent width though, so there's enough leverage to keep most trail trouble at bay even if the basic angles aren't always on your side. The only thing we can't really comment on is the longevity of the pivots and other frame parts - we've only spent a few weeks on the bike. The guys at Moda are certainly very enthusiastically behind their brand and the sport though, with a high level cross-country team under their sponsorship and big distributor back-up. Hopefully their support to customers will be as good.
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Moda Presto 2011
