Ride1Up TrailRush Review

Ride1Up does it again, releasing a compelling e-bike with an impressive build kit for what appears to be a typo in the price. The TrailRush uses a German-engineered Brose TF mid-drive motor that delivers 90Nm of torque, giving this impressive hard-tail e-bike the punch to tackle hills or take the work out of exploring trails.

At first glance, it's hard to believe Ride1Up figured out a way to build the bike for this price. The Brose mid-drive motor is typically found on bikes that cost at least twice as much. A Shimano Deore 10-speed drivetrain, Tektro Quad-piston brakes, and a RockShox Judy Silver fork give the bike solid performance, while the Maxxis Minion tires provide the traction for you to make the most of it.

Downhill Performance

The TrailRush is an aluminum hardtail with 29" wheels and front suspension. Aluminum hardtail bikes are notoriously stiff and unforgiving, and the TrailRush is no exception. Ride1Up chose particularly large volume (2.6") tires to wrap the big wheels in, so the amount of rubber and air between you and the trail does a pretty good job of smoothing out the smaller bumps. The air-sprung Judy fork provides almost 5 inches of travel and provides quite a bit of comfort in the front end. We rode this bike in all the same places we tested the 5-figure electric mountain bikes, and while its design imposes limitations, we were generally impressed by its downhill prowess.

The headtube angle measures 66.5 degrees, pushing the front wheel out in front of you and giving the bike a slower steering response and a relatively calm feeling at speed. The front end still feels adequately sporty and agile, but no twitchiness or nervousness creeps in at speeds under 25mph. A large stem, oversized handlebars, and a thru-axle fork give the front end a solid feel and accurate steering response. The fork stanchions measure a scant 30mm, which gives them a bit more flex than we'd prefer, but overall, the adjustable suspension fork is a positive attribute that felt best to riders weighing less than 200 pounds.

A seat dropper with a handlebar remote lets you quickly lower the seat when the terrain gets technical or you just want to put your foot down on the trail in comfort. Riding downhill, a lower saddle height lets you lower your center of gravity and feel less precarious. The Exaform KSP900 post that Ride1Up chose lets you drop the saddle by up to 150mm and stops at any point along the way. It's much easier to get your weight back with the saddle low, and this helps you feel more confident and in control while descending.

At 57.3 pounds, the bike is far from lightweight, but that mass can be an attribute on the way down, giving you a planted feel that hugs the corners and maintains excellent traction. Getting the bike off the ground is possible, but jumping isn't the bike's strong suit. As a heavy, rigid bike with a flexier fork, it prefers life on the ground. The Tektro Orion brakes use four pistons per caliper to deliver the additional stopping force a fast, heavy bike needs. Heavier or more aggressive riders may want to increase the size of the front brake rotor for additional stopping force; the bike comes with 180mm rotors front and rear.

If you're an aggressive trail shredder, there's probably a better bike for you than the TrailRush. While the bike is a hoot to ride, we took it far from its comfort zone (and ours), and it excels on smoother trails and less technical terrain. Exploring fire roads, XC trails, and getting you off the beaten path are where the bike excels. In technical situations and places that require a lot of upper-body work, the bike's weight negatively affects its agility. Our medium-sized test bike has a wheelbase of 1216mm, which is on the shorter side, despite having long-ish 470mm chainstays. The bottom bracket measures 323mm from the ground, which may look low compared to other electric mountain bikes in our test, but without rear suspension, the bottom bracket height changes only minimally during a ride.

Climbing Performance

When we talk about climbing performance, we're considering the bike's geometry, power transfer, and how well the motor assists you. An effective seat tube angle of 74.5 degrees keeps your hips relatively far forward and your weight over the top of the pedals. This allows you to easily put your weight into the bike and use all of your quadriceps to generate power. The bike uses 170mm crank arms, giving you the leverage to generate a fair bit of your own power. A 38-tooth chainring connects with a 10-speed 11-36 cassette in the rear. This isn't ideal mountain bike gearing, with first gear giving you a ratio close to 1:1 instead of the more common 1:1.6, but the motor fills in the gaps, and this only becomes an issue in steep terrain.

The Brose TF Sprinter motor puts out a maximum of 90 Nm of torque. Until recently, this was near the top of the torque numbers you'd find in an electric mountain bike. On a sustained climb, the motor tricks you into thinking you're riding a bike that is much lighter than it actually is. The way the power integrates with yours is very smooth, and if it were not for the whhrrrrr of the motor, you could mistake it for a strong tail wind. The bike's most gentle assist is called ECO, and it provides the most subtle boost that feels like it negates the bike's weight. Riding in ECO feels like riding a normal, non-powered mountain bike. Kicking the assist up to TOUR mode gives you a bit more pep; the bike feels noticeably faster to accelerate. SPORT mode is.. well, sporty. The bike has a lively feel in this mode that eases the demand on your legs and elicits smiles. Sport mode was my favorite during testing; the assist feels natural, and the ride is almost effortless.

In BOOST mode, the full power of the Brose TF motor delivers punchy performance that is up for most anything. You can conquer a sandy 10% grade without raising your heart rate or cruise at faster speeds than you thought possible over single-track terrain. The bike uses a torque sensor, which measures the strain you're putting on the drivetrain and multiplies it by the level of assist you chose. This gives the bike's electric part a natural feel; it doesn't accelerate unexpectedly or feel like it's acting autonomously. If you're cross-shopping this bike with the Aventon Ramblas, the Aventon's powerful motor is what sets it apart. Both bikes climb well and have very similar geometry, but the Ramblas has noticeably more hill-climbing power.

Off-road technical riding is made easier by the motor's assist, but the bike's mass makes it challenging to navigate some of the harder lines. In Boost mode, there is no shortage of power or traction, so you can plow through roots, rocks, and smaller obstacles that might defeat you on a non-electrified bike. You can also ride with the motor turned off, but it's less than enjoyable. We all attempted to climb a moderate hill without power, and it felt like we were on a planet with significantly more gravity. Given the bike's smaller battery, it will be important to plan accordingly and avoid getting yourself into a situation where you have to gain elevation to return to your starting point.

Range

A 504Wh (36V 14Ah) battery, using Samsung cells, nestles into the bottom of the dowtube and locks in place. This isn't the smallest battery we've encountered in testing, but it's a compact pack for the bike's power output. The Specialized Levo SL uses a 320Wh battery, but its low-output motor sips power and produces 50Nm of torque. The TrailRush weighs 17 pounds more and puts out 90Nm of torque so it will take a larger toll on the battery.

We rode the TrialRush for 18.9 miles, while climbing 3811 feet of before the battery was completely exhausted. While this has a shorter range than any other electric mountain bike we've tested, it still covered a lot of ground. We aim to give you the worst-case scenario in these range tests, which is why we put the bike in its most powerful setting and ride steep inclines. The bike gave us its full power until the final 10% of the charge was reached, at which time, its power degraded, and we limped along until there was nothing left. Since you need to pedal this bike for the pedal assist to activate, we had our 180-pound test rider pedal at as close to 100 watts as possible, which is minimal effort on the rider's part.

It's reasonable to say that if you were actually exerting yourself and didn't have the bike in its most powerful setting the entire time, you could cover significantly more ground. If you refrained from riding steep mountain trails, we could see this range double or even triple, depending on how much you choose to pedal.

Power Output

The German-engineered Brose motor delivers 90Nm of torque, placing the TrailRush firmly in the full-power mountain bike category. While most electric mountain bikes are sold as Class 1 e-bikes, Ride1Up equipped this bike with Class 3 capability, allowing it to be programmed with a top speed of 28mph. The controller offers four levels of assist to fine-tune the amount of effort you want to put in. At the highest assist level, you only need to feign pedaling; even though the bike uses a torque sensor, it's sensitive enough to deliver ample power when you're generating a meager 100 watts with your legs.

The TrailRush uses a 36V system to power the motor. With four levels of pedal assist (no throttle), you can choose from Eco, Tour, Sport, and Boost modes. Each assist level uses the motor's built-in torque sensor to gauge your input and add proportional power. Our testers rode extensively in each mode and found our favorites generally correlated to our fitness levels and tolerance for adrenaline. In Boost mode, the bike is quick and zippy, easily pushing you to the top speed of 20mph, or 28mph if you have the bike set to Class 3 mode.

The motor isn't loud, but it isn't silent in any mode. A fairly gentle WRRRR sound accompanies Eco mode, and as the motor's assist level increases, so do the sounds of the tires and wind rushing past. Notably, according to our testers, the motor's sound is low-pitched enough that it doesn't come across as whiny or annoying.

E-Bike Controls

The TrailRush uses a clever Brose Allround 1.5" color all-in-one display located next to the left handlebar grip. To turn the bike on or off, you use a front-facing button that you can't see while riding. The backside of the display has four buttons that are easy to reach with your left thumb. An up/down toggle adjusts your pedal assist settings, while two buttons at the top let you cycle through ride data. There is a vast amount of ride data in these fields. The central section of the screen shows your current speed and remaining battery charge depicted as five cells.

• "Maximum speed" shows the fastest speed the bike has travelled.

• "Average cadence" shows the average speed your legs have been cycling per ride.

• "Maximum cadence" shows how fast your legs spin at their fastest.

• "Power" shows the amount of power you're putting into the drivetrain with your legs.

• "Average Power" shows the amount of power you exerted over the ride as an average.

• "Maximum Power" shows the peak power your legs were able to generate over one ride.

• "Range" shows your remaining range, and this figure changes as you cycle through pedal assist settings.

There is also a clock, a trip timer, and an average speed field that you can see in the lower field.

The display is also your access point to adjusting the bike's preferred units from metric to imperial and switching class modes. The bike ships as a Class 1 ebike with a 20mph top (assisted) speed, but can be switched to Class 3, giving the bike a 28mph top speed.

The 504Wh battery on the TrailRush is housed in the bike's downtube and can be removed for charging off the bike. When the battery is installed in the downtube, you'll use the charge port on the lower section of the bike's seattube. When removed, there is a port at the bottom of the pack. Ride1Up includes a 1.8-amp charger, which has a fairly slow charge time, so even with the smaller-than-average pack, a full charge takes about 8 hours. The battery and motor have an IPX4 water-resistance rating, which allows you to ride in the rain, but you need to be cautious so they don't get submerged.

Build

Ride1Up set out to pack a lot of value into the TrailRush, and they succeeded. One of the first things we noticed about the bike is the tubeless-compatible Maxxis tires. The 2.6" Minions provide not only serious traction but a substantial buffer between you and the trail. These tires help take the edge off the rigidity of the Aluminum frame. The Shimano Deore 10-speed drivetrain doesn't offer the impressive gear range of the more ubiquitous SRAM Eagle drivetrain, but the motor's power makes you less reliant on low gearing when the trail turns steep. Tektro Orion HD brakes were a great choice for the bike, providing a powerful stopping force for a bike that is faster and heavier than a typical mountain bike. Up front, the bike uses a RockShox Judy Silver fork with lockout and adjustable rebound, and perhaps most importantly, it's adjustable for riders of different weights. This lets you tailor the ride to your size and riding style, a feature that has been elusive on lower-priced electric mountain bikes. An ergonomic saddle, dropper post, and oversized handlebar and stem round out the offerings, making a pretty compelling package.

Since Ride1Up sells directly to you, the bike is delivered in a large cardboard box, and many consumers find this intimidating. While bikes, particularly electric mountain bikes, are complex machines, Ride1Up has done a great job with pre-assembly and packaging. This means that building the TrailRush by yourself is a pretty simple task. We recorded the assembly process, and you can see below that we removed the bike from packaging and assembled it in just about 20 minutes. The owner's manual lists the assembly steps, and the required tools and grease are included in the box. If you find the process mildly daunting, Ride1Up has an assembly video with step-by-step instructions. If you find it majorly daunting, your local bicycle shop can make quick work of the job.

Should You Buy the Ride1Up TrailRush?

The TrailRush is a spectacular value, but that doesn't mean it's the ideal bike for you. While the TrailRush is a mountain bike, we suspect many users will want to use it for more than just riding trails. With rack and fender mounts and space for two water bottles, the bike can be pretty versatile and might even make a comfortable (and capable) commuter. The 66-degree headtube angle gives the bike neutral handling off-road and a slow, measured steering response on the road. Your position on the bike isn't aggressive, but the front end is fairly low. This puts more of your weight on the front end, which is great for off-road traction, but doesn't lend itself to comfort riding or urban visibility. It's worth noting that Ride1Up left the cables long enough to accommodate a higher-rise handlebar, something that riders with less flexibility or a desire for better visibility may appreciate.

What Other Electric Mountain Bike Should You Consider?

We'd absolutely shop this bike against the Aventon Ramblas, which our testers loved. The Ramblas has a more powerful motor and larger battery, giving it more grunt on the hills and a bit more range. It is also more expensive, but it's available in 4 sizes, while the TrailRush is only available in two, so if you're at the taller or shorter end of the spectrum, you might find a better fit on the Ramblas.