In the latest episode of our Dissected Series, we build and take a detailed look at the new 2022 Trek Session downhill bike. The Trek Session is a bike we have been very familiar with over the last decade or so as we have personally bought and owned them, tested them, and even won a few DH races aboard them. There is no denying we like the Session and have reviewed them on this site in the past, but this new Dissected feature is intended to share the new features and design elements of this new bike in a factual and unbiased manner.
Back in 2005 aggressive mountain bikers were witness to the first Trek Session, a long travel freeride bike that could pedal gnarly stuff on the shore or shred a bike park. At the time the Trek Session seemed to be the evolution from Trek’s early high pivot, idler pulley-equipped Diesel DH bike. As bikes, freeriding and downhill racing progressed, the Session evolved into a more downhill race machine and departed from being a dedicated freeride hucker to what we know it as today. The high pivot, idler design returned and made some waves under professional racers as the bike continued to evolve under Tracey Mosely and then coming into its glory years under Aaron Gwin, Rachel Atherton, and a few other Trek Factory Racing athletes. One may think with so many World Cup wins, the Trek Session is a one-trick pony, but several top-step showings from the Trek C3 team have shown the Session is equally at home winning gold medals at the Red Bull Rampage as it is on the world racing stage.
HIGH PIVOT 101
As you move the pivot that the wheel moves around higher, it allows the wheel to move rearward and upward as it encounters obstacles. By letting the wheel move in a larger arc, it gives the rear end more time to react and get out of the way. In a sense it is cushioning that impact or obstacle more than just relying on a straight vertical path and shock damping. The goal is to keep the bike feeling smoother, reduce deceleration from square-edge impacts and reduce fatigue to the rider on extended sections of rough terrain.
Now, if you are a realist, you will know that nothing comes for free, and moving a pivot to a location that allows for better impact absorption is certainly going to have a drawback. To combat the chain growth from the lengthening wheelbase of a high pivot bike the idler pulley becomes a crucial component. As the rear wheel moves up and back it moves further away from the bottom bracket. Since a chain cannot stretch, that energy gets transferred to the next weakest link. Those weak links are your feet/legs and the suspension. What that translates to on the trail is pedal kickback and decreased sensitivity of the rear shock. The cranks want to back-pedal as the wheel moves through the travel, which forces your leg muscles and feet to push back against the pedals to keep them even while standing on the pedals. This wears the rider out and stiffens up the rear end because of counteracting forces. The 2018 Trek Session had 15-27 degrees of pedal kickback depending on the scenario, and the 2022 Trek Session reduces that to 5-8 degrees. The idler pulley isolates the chain growth and by reducing pedal kickback, the rider can be stronger, longer and enjoy a more sensitive and composed bike that rolls over obstacles faster.
After our brief riding sessions to collect footage for this feature, it is very apparent that Trek has created a solid downhill bike. We are very excited to put this bike to the test against some of the best we have ridden and are counting down the days until the chairlifts start spinning. The versatility to run the new Trek Session in three different wheel configurations is a definite strength, and we hope to try out the Mullet setup this summer.
In terms of performance, it is still much too early, and we have not yet put the bike through enough scenarios to learn it inside and out but there are some readily apparent improvements. We really like the suppleness off the top and feel that it is going to do a good job for riders who like to charge full speed. The added length will take a little getting used to on some of our tighter, slower DH trails with switchbacks as the longer reach, lengthening wheelbase and 29-inch rear wheel had us feeling a bit slower in the tightest stuff. Certainly, there is a learning curve to each bike and with some more tuning and practice we are confident the Session will get even better.
Stay tuned for a long-term review to see if we can work out the little kinks and get this bike to do exactly what we want.
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