Mo is doing a big trail bike shootout and saw some discussion about this in one of the videos: https://youtu.be/_m4V3sEDLHM
To me this is trail riding. I take my trail bike out on similar type of technical features, degrees of steepness, optional jumps, etc. I'm am definitely not complaining at all, I am genuinely curious what Redditors think this type of trail would entail as far as bikes go. I could be wrong if this is what XC is now, I saw another video saying World Cup XC is getting more technical but it still looked easier than this. I started mountain biking in the days of 15 cm stems, Judy, baby blue Sid forks, etc and being stretched out like a balloon and I am very thankful for current 140-150 trail bikes being absolutely awesome for climbing and descending. Obviously modern XC bikes aren't like my old XC bike but I still can not imagine riding those trails on a modern XC bike. A modern slack hardtail maybe, but I'm too used to the traction I get from my FS bike.
by directheated