20 years later… I got my OG bike back.

TL;DR… I bought this new in 2006, raced it for a few years, bought an “upgrade” and sold it to a buddy that wanted to get into MTB. Fast forward 20 years and he reaches out that he’s moving to the coast and doesn’t want to take this with. I bought it back, removed every component, upgraded the 9 speed to XT of the period, put on a 1x GRX crank, ceramic BB, dropper, and raised it from 26” to 27.5 with GravelKing tires. The sliding dropouts really helped with the upsizing. I rebuilt the original Fox Float 100 fork with new seals and fluids. It’s stiff… but still worked a charm in AZ chunk.