Transition Smuggler - It’s Return And Specifications
After a brief time taken away from the market, in 2023 the Smuggler is returning to the Transition range of mountain bikes. The Smuggler, which has long been a popular choice with mountain bikers, returns with a new frame and an increase in travel from 120mm to 130mm.
The new model is designed to provide the perfect go between of the cross country Transition Spur and the all mountain Sentinel. It’s a bike which has been designed to go anywhere, a true all mountain machine - which has been developed in the backcountry of the Pacific Northwest, where there’s plenty of technichal trails and singletrack for this bike to be developed on.
As with most premium mountain bikes now, there are alloy and carbon fibre models available - and the new suspension setup boasts a 140mm fork and 130mm of rear wheel travel. There’s a slack 65 degree angle, and there’s also 485mm of reach. Each different size of the Smuggler has different chainstays and seat angles, to ensure the correct geometry for each frame size. The bike is equipped with a 180mm travel dropper post, and the bike also has clearance for 2.6 inch wide tyres.
The bike arrives ready to accessorise too - with accessory mounts under the top tube. It also has a new head tube design, which integrates the headset and means amongst other things, there is no tidier internal cabling. The head tube also now uses drop in bearings, unlike the rest of the transition range which use drop in bearings.
There will be four different versions of the Smuggler available:
- Transition Smuggler Alloy NX
- Transition Smuggler Carbon NX
- Transition Smuggler Carbon GX AXS
- Transition Smuggler Carbon XO1 AXS