Trust Chops $725 Off Their Linkage Fork
PRESS RELEASE: Trust Performance
Our multi-link front suspension design launched in 2018. Advances in product development, recently scaled production, as well as new partnerships formed after the Sea Otter Classic all enable us to reduce pricing on the Message, passing these savings directly to riders. Starting today, the Message will be available for USD $1,975 through authorized Trust Performance retailers and online at www.trustperformance.com.
“Like most teams or new businesses, we launched with a number of goals. One: get our first three shipments of the Message under riders before Sea Otter. While this seemed lofty and aggressive, we knew it was a challenge we could meet,” remarked Co-Founder and CEO, Hap Seliga. “We reached that first goal ahead of schedule, and with increased production efficiencies and new purchase commitments, we’ve been given the opportunity to achieve yet another goal: to offer the Message at a sub-$2,000 price point. We’re stoked to say we’re able to do that, today.”
In addition to offering the Message to customers at this updated price, we will provide its early adopters with significant cost savings on future purchases of Trust Performance suspension. Riders who purchased a Message at the original MSRP, and have it registered with Trust Performance before May 31, 2019, will receive a $1,000 credit toward their next Trust Performance suspension purchase. Dealers and distributors who brought in Messages under the previous pricing structure will receive a dealer credit, details of which have been provided to these partners by the Trust Performance sales team.
“At Trust, we do things a bit differently. Sure, many companies say that. But, the reality is: many fall short of living it,” said Seliga. “Since we started the company, we’ve said we’re focused solely on making things better for the ride and rider. Building the best possible suspension will always be a part of how we do that; passing along cost savings to the people who matter most - our riders - is yet another.”
In 2018, we launched our first multi-link front suspension design, the Message. By employing 130mm of contour travel, the Message allows the front of the mountain bike to realize the benefits that full suspension bikes have enjoyed for years. When encountering an obstacle, the Message allows the front wheel to move back and up simultaneously instead of only in line with the steering axis. This effect leads to noticeably improved traction, added stability, and more predictable handling in a wide variety of trail conditions.
Since launch, we've established direct partnerships with dozens of shops around the world and formed distribution partnerships with entities like QBP (USA), Upgrade Bikes (UK), Mohawk’s Cycles (France) and many others. They continue to expand their presence at consumer-facing events, most recently offering riders the opportunity to connect with the team and demo the Message at the Fruita Fat Tire Festival, Trail Head Cyclery Spring Demo Days, Soldier Hollow Bike Fest, Sea Otter Classic, and Hurricane Mountain Bike Festival. Additional demos are planned throughout the U.S. this summer and with distribution partners worldwide.
“We’re serious about turning things in the industry upside down. We’re out to start a movement,” said Trust Performance Founder and Technical Director, Dave Weagle. “It’s a movement that starts with high fives and ends with the best ride our friends have ever had.”
More information about Trust Performance can be found at www.trustperformance.com.
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I’m a day one buyer. In a few years when I sell my current bike and want a longer travel fork I’ll be getting another one. $1975-$1000=$975. Which is dope, because I really like this thing, and can’t wait for longer travel versions to come out. I think the advantages of this thing will be even more obvious with 160mm to play with. As it stands, the 130mm message is dope
People also hate how this thing looks, which is fair. But it is a good ride. 90% of people commenting here probably haven’t tried it
I swear, this thing could be the best fork and have no compromises whatsoever (I think it’s great, but it has compromises) and people would still say it sucks based on looks alone
As an owner of a Trust fork I can say it’s definitely worth every penny either way. Kinda took the claims with a grain of salt, but in that first ride I realized they greatly undersold how amazing it feels.
I'll show myself out.
@ckcost:
Ding DING DING DING DING
We have a WINNER
Surprising only one PB responder understands free market economics, but you don't have to be smart to post on the internet, do you
Kudos to the early adopters who helped fund this innovative company and have provided the $ to help a new company in its early stages. Kudos to Trust for rewarding their early backers with a discount on their next purchase.
Sucks that even when a company does something for the right reasons they still slagged. I don't own a Trust fork but am hoping to try one at Sea Otter in ON this year so that i can form my own opinion.
I used that word 2 (3?) too many times lol.
It's actually a very good sign that they are cutting the price. This isn't a "Going out of Business" sale.
Before I get into that, some background about me so you can try to judge what my opinion is worth. To give you an idea of where I stand in terms of ability, I was proud of doing the drop in to horsethief bench on my hardtail when I visited fruita 9 months ago, and rode all the features on the main trail clockwise. (I’ve progressed since then, but I think that’s the best known technical trail segment I’ve done that you can find good videos of on YouTube ). I’m good at technical stuff, up and down. I’m good at drops. I’m a relatively shit jumper (low consequence 8-10 foot gaps are where I top out, and I don’t do them often or with style).
Alright, obvious stuff first:
It doesn’t react to body inputs, especially on climbs. This is because the initial axle path is very rearwards. Which means when you push down on it, you aren’t pushing along the axis of travel. If you’re climbing something reasonably steep, this effect is even more noticeable. The easiest way to explain this is to imagine that you were climbing a 45 degree slope with a bike that has a 45 degree head angle. The fork’s direction of travel would be forwards/backwards and your up and down bobbing wouldn’t affect it. This is a huge exaggeration of what’s happening in the trust forks initial travel. It’s a little more subtle on the trust, but it still feels like cheating on climbs. It doesn’t bob, but when a bump comes from in front, it pushes the wheel back and then up into its travel. It absorbs bumps on climbs but is super efficient, and it feels so so good. also because the trail is lower when it’s near the top of the travel, it feels nimble.
Now for the opposite end of the spectrum: steep slow technical rocky steep descents. In this orientation (bike pointed down) the fork sags more, because of the direction of travel. But because the direction of travel changes through the stroke (to be more vertical deeper in the travel), it doesn’t sag insanely far. And because there is a lot less brake dive, you end up riding higher in the travel than with a conventional fork. Or at least I think that’s what’s going on. In any case it feels amazing here too. Super composed, super stable. The trail being higher when you’re deeper in the travel certainly plays a role and makes it feel even more confidence inspiring. I never noticed the wheelbase getting shorter as a downside.
Now for the in between, more rolling trails. If it’s flowy, this thing is great, it’s so easy to pump through rollers. If it’s chunky but relatively flat (or high speed steeper stuff where you don’t really have to think and you just plow) I don’t think it’s better or worse than a normal fork. A little different, but I don’t really have a strong opinion. I think this is where the damper plays a bigger role than the axle path, and where I think I’d need to do more back to back testing with other forks. But when you’re just plowing I think the total displacement (120 mm linear, 130 contour) and damper are way more important than axle path. The trust doesn’t blow any minds here. Or at least not mine.
Now for airtime:
The biggest advantage of the fork is also the biggest disadvantage. The fact that the fork is so immune to rider movement means the fork isn’t poppy. You can’t preload the fork for a jump like you can with a normal fork. It’ll still take off fine, but it’s noticeably (even to me) harder to boost jumps. You can’t push down into it and expect it to push back. It’s like bunnyhopping on a rigid fork. Landings are also a lot harsher. Because landing the bike flat is essentially the same thing as pushing the bike down into the ground at high speeds, it’s harsh. The direction of travel for the first 30mm is all wrong - it still absorbs the landings fine because it gets past that part of the travel on big enough hits, but it spikes really hard when you first hit the ground, especially if you land rear wheel first and the front slaps down onto the ground. The workaround here is to land nose heavy. If you land nose heavy you can get some buttery smooth landings.
Also it feels really good in berms, probably the trail increasing. Idk but it’s a lot of fun.
TLDR:
Pros:
Steeps up or down
Pumping
Carving corners
Neutrals:
Flatter rock gardens/ general chunky stuff that you kind of just plow through
Cons:
Jumps and drops
Weight
Price
Looks
All of this being said, I’m really excited about longer travel versions.
Also something I should mention about landings jumps/drops is that it spikes but it never feels crazy bad. It doesn’t feel like something is going to snap, it’s just jarring, especially next to the super supple initial travel of the evil following’s rear suspension.
This front/rear imbalance also comes up when pumping through rollers. The rear blows through travel when pumping but the front doesn’t. But it’s not a fault of the fork - I wish my rear suspension was stiffer when pumping. But it does feel odd at first, on this bike. This effect will depend on the bike of course
Something else I want to mention is that for trials stuff and endos/whatever else it’s mostly fine. I thought it would make everything feel way different/harder because of the anti brake-dive effect, but you adjust super easily and I’ve never had a problem with endo 180’s or whatever else. The one downside is that bunny hopping is harder, as mentioned above. (Due to lack of preloading)
Evil + Push 11/6 + ENVEs + Trust fork.
Did they run out of money for the EEWings crankset? Or have they just run short of pockets to pillage.
www.instagram.com/steezygiese765/p/BsJBODcFobQ/?utm_source=ig_share_sheet&igshid=8aurf8135y3d
You've ridden with the majority of Evil owners?
Dentist...
twitter.com/annikalangvad
So this is the scenario/analogy? The masses asked for simple $1k-ish alloy telescoping forks and Trust said "Let them ride $2k ish carbon linked forks!", then the masses revolted.
I just don't see it.
People here have a comfort zone that just has such little tolerance. It seems most discussions are more about being critical of a product rather than actually seeing the merit in anything. The post the other day on the DT hubs is a great example, with people constantly sounding off on the price of a top of the line product they have no intentions of buying.
The lack of self awareness in the comment section here is second only to youtube. Our pun threads are better though.
As a 180 pound rider I’ve gotten the trust fork to a good spot. My lsc is lower than trusts recommendation, as is my pressure. I’ve also added a couple tokens. But it’s in a good spot now.
Over the past few months, reading some of the reviews I started wondering if I just had some variant of Stockholm syndrome - I liked it even though it was awful because I got used to it (and riding bikes is always fun). This weekend I went to a demo day, and got to ride some awesome bikes with telescoping forks, everything from a yeti sb100 to a stumpy evo. My conclusion after going back and forth is that I’m sticking to my trust fork.
(Side note: I agree trust didn’t handle this particular interaction in the blog post well - but I’ve had a couple issues/questions about mine and they’ve always been handled really well.)
"Preloading with your body weight, it seems to taketh the energy… and not giveth back. This was confirmed by several other testers. Because of all this, pump sections could feel pretty good, but the rollers and tabletops were harder work than usual, nose heavy and not so playful. "
"At Trust’s own recommended settings, flying down a knobbly grass trail on a steep Welsh mountainside, my ulnar nerves felt like they were being liquefied. "
"From fire roads to minus thirty percent grade plummets, the Trust Message seems to do almost nothing to filter out high frequency noise. The vibrations felt like an ultrasonic meat tenderiser. "
"Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they should."
To your point though, I hope those boutique shop display pieces are gathering trail dust being used by the employees, not shelf dust. (wishful thinking, I know)
high-end car/bike Penske dampers are 2K+ a corner.
let's put that $2K toward F1-level damping tech and materials.
If they can knock another $750 off in 6 months, I might truly be interested in this design. It’s still double the cost of a truly great telescopic fork. Nonetheless, I applaud the effort to bring a new implementation of the linkage fork to market... and I understand the need for higher prices to cover the R&D. I hope enough people buy in to push the cost down even further.
I think the advantages of the trust fork will be even more noticeable on a ~160mm fork. This thing really does feel stiff to body movement and supple over rocks and bumps. On a 160 fork it’s going to be awesome
Planning on going to Trailhead cyclery and demoing one for a few days to make sure before I do any big purchases, but really curious if anyone here has seen that on this kind of enduro hardtail?
Despite that I'm planning on trying my spare 160 pike and 27.5 wheels at first to see how it rides, with the expectation of doing 29 wheels and a 140 fork on it later on. Or possibly this trust fork. I want it to work well on long XC style rides but still descend well so I think finding that balance will be key. But if this fork is about the travel range I want, and all the benefits they speak to would probably help a lot of the issues that hardtails have with suspension dynamics. I even love that people say it feels stiff when you stand up and pedal. Theoretically this fork would be awesome on a hardtail like the one I'm building.
But either way I'm only here asking if people have heard of anyone using this specific fork on a hardtail like the one I'm building, and since I'll be demoing one on this bike I can find out if it works or not.
I f*cking love it on steeps. It’s cheating climbing (no bob, absorbs bumps) and carving is fun. I’m not as psyched about the straight line rock garden performance as he is (it feels different but not necessarily much better). I also like the lack of brake dive. I think that’s what makes it so good on steep shit - it stays higher in the travel.
A recent Careers page posting on trust was for "Cycle Frame Structural Engineer"...
Heard it here first folks.
This thing just adds such a level of control and speed it’s noticeable right out of the gate.
I'm guessing they are able to put the price down this much because they've sold enough volume and anticipate more to come so that they have covered their overhead?
If so... I think I missed that one.
If someone said: Hey Ben, I got a demo/used Trust that comes with a warranty for $1250, do you want it?
YES!
However, when I’m up north or riding in some remote town I want something easy to fix post mechanical. I love to show up at a LBS with this thing needing a repair in the middle of BFN.
Fox, RS, and DVO are more we’ll known.. and this will likely have parts that are easier to acquire.
+ I love my 36 with a luftkappe ...
No thanks for me!
They're claiming this is groundbreaking that they cut TRIPLE that price, OFF the price of a fork that still costs 2k?!
Actual lol.
I'll be going to the Park City Bike Demos reopening tomorrow evening, hopefully I can talk to their reps about their forks there.
That said, I just bought a NEW 2019 Fox 36 Fit4 for $600, so I find it really hard to stomach $2000 for a fork even if it is the best damn fork ever.
To be competitive, this fork needs to be $1500 or less, $1000 used, otherwise folks will buy the next best fork.
So yeah, a brand new 2019 36 Fit 4 is worth $600, a deal really, and the Grip 2 is NOT worth that much more. Would I pay much more for a truly innovative fork? Yes, but I would not pay hundreds more for this marginal improvement crap that all the fork mfgs are offering.
bikeco.com/trust-message-fork-review-geometry
#fugly
I've been reading a lot of articles and reviews of the Message from riders on MTBR and whatever else I can find and I am gathering that the largest hurdles are set up and expectations. People who just base the fork on looks alone have no idea what they are talking about outside of personal aesthetics and armchair engineering (and neither hold any water).
Both of these actual “issues” are just two sides of the same coin as I see it. Everyone is coming at the Message from a telescopic fork and therefore bringing telescopic knowledge to their set up and expectations. whether or not it is an "expert" or not using the Message, everyone is coming at it with the expectation it will ride like their telescopic fork. I saw somewhere DW saying you need to take every bit of knowledge you have about suspension forks and remove it completely from memory when working with a Message. That will be hard for some as the muscle memory of most is deep-rooted in telescopic products.
Along with that, every review I read mentioned that they all followed the Trust setup guides exactly and all felt the spring was to firm and thus made the damper feel as it was underperforming while riding. Now again, this could be simply perception and muscle memory getting in the way and the rider going back to what they know about a telescopic fork: lower air pressure and open the damper up as they are listening to their body, not their bike.
I am sure the collected intelligence at Trust Performance (and that knowledge base is DEEP) can all come together to think of some copy to write and maybe some videos that help simplify the Trust Effect and dumb it down just a little. Not that the MTB community is dumb, I totally get it (what the Trust Effect is); you learn to trust the bike and your input to the bike as it becomes a true extension of your own body as you ride. Traction issues go away, speed comes more naturally as does control. But this all comes at a price as you need to fully open your mind to the different and learn to relax your body into the bike and trust that it has all of your best interest and will reward you.
I hope that all makes sense. I have been a bit obsessed with Trust since I first heard Hap, Jason and DW were working on a "suspension thing" together back in 2016 (or 2015, I can't remember when it was now) at Ft. William. Once I saw the fork I immediately saw the Lauf and AMP and Girvin and Lawwill and it just made sense to me what Trust was doing: making bikes better by adding traction to it, which is what suspension is supposed to do.
The suspension is less about comfort and more about traction and this is also a very large public misconception. Most shop employees and long-time riders know but this is another one of those concepts that don't always translate well off paper as it is considered a subjective feeling, even though it can be quantifiably measured.