Bike Build: Niner AIR9 Carbon

This one was fun, well more fun than the others. What a beautiful frame, glossy licorice black colour, bright red accents and understated Niner logo on the down tube.

 We didn't want to go all out with this build, we managed to restrain ourselves from building a sub 10kg bike just for the sake of it. The brief was to build a light race weapon that can still be ridden on the trails weekend after weekend. We also wanted to keep the budget under $6k for this medium frame.

Jump after the break for more details

You want tough? You want Shimano XT. The new XT Shadow + to be exact. We gave the SLX Shadow + rear derailleur a pretty tough baptism at the muddy 3 hour put on at Dunsborough last weekend. It performed far beyond our expectations. We've gone for a full XT build kit (no sneaky SLX shifters or front mechs here) from derailleurs to brakes.

Are these the best brakes on the market? You can bet your ass they are. Naturally we went for the all black build kit to keep things stealth. And these brakes are so good we went with 160mm rotors front and back to save a few grams.

Top to bottom - Niner Flat Top carbon handle bar, wide and straight! Sunline 90mm stem 6 degree angle. XT brakes and shift levers (note the internal cable routing through the head badge). Top of the line Fox F29 RLC (Kashima) 100mm forks with QR15mm axle. Schwalbe Racing Ralph for a little grip in the gravel but fast rolling on the straights. They are wrapped around Stan's No Tubes Crest wheels for light weight tempered with a little durability, oh and they're black.

Such sweet lines and that finish is just amazing.

So now for the major stats:

Yep, although we didn't set out to go sub 10kg we almost got there (and with the spending of a little cash I think it would be easy to get there). We've priced this baby up and came to a figure of $5,864.95. The wheels are not set up tubeless but they are easily converted at no extra cost (we just couldn't be arsed doing it just to have someone tell us they wanted tubes when they pick it up).

This bike is a medium but small, large and extra-large frames are available as a special order for the same price. We are also more than happy to customize any parts of the build. Your imagination is the only limitation. (and availability from suppliers)