 Hey what's up guys welcome to another video my name is Dylan and I'm a cycling coach at Car Michael training systems and a pro marathon and ultra endurance mountain bike racer and today I'm going to be giving a review of my training bike slash trail bike slash all-around workhorse the Niner Jet 9 RDO. I've been riding this thing for about a year in the Pisca National Forest in western North Carolina which is known to have some of the gnarliest trails on the east coast. This bike has accompanied me on countless all-day training rides in all kinds of conditions and has had its fair share of abuse. Yeah that's me getting a little bit too rad for the camera but the point is this bike has been through a lot. I'll give my thoughts on the bike whether or not I made any upgrades and at the end I'll talk about the importance of having a training bike so be sure to stick around for that. If you're new to this channel I make weekly training topic videos going over tips and tricks that I've learned in my 12 years of racing experience that have got me to the top of the ultra endurance mountain bike game in the U.S. and as a coach at CTS. I also go into the science on your training questions so if you want to learn how to get fitter and faster or you want to see more bike checks slash gear reviews like this one be sure to subscribe to this channel and if you have a training question or a question about my bike be sure to leave it in the comments section down below and I'll either answer it down there or I'll do some more research and make a whole video about it. Let me start off by describing what the jet 9 is to me and that is a training bike. I do my racing on the RKT9 RDO which is a 4-inch travel XC race bike. We're unlocated in Brevard North Carolina. You don't see very many locals hitting the trails on anything that would be considered an XC race bike and for good reason. Pisca tends to eat bikes alive and the long rocky Rudy descents warrant a bike with more travel hence the jet 9. The jet 9 is a carbon frame bike with 120 millimeters of travel in the rear and comes stock with 130 millimeter travel fork. This is exactly what I needed because it's enough travel to handle the demands of pisca descending without compromising all day pedaling ability. It's not uncommon for me to do 50, 60 or even 70 mile training rides on this thing so a longer travel bike would have started to weigh me down. My jet 9 is the four star build which comes with a Fox 34 factory fork and Fox float factory shock and the suspension feels like an absolute dream. I've always said that my race bike the RKT9 RDO with Fox front and rear is one of the best descending XC bikes that I've ever ridden and the jet 9 feels a lot like that except more. The drivetrain is SRAM's X01 Eagle 12 speed and I've got to say I've come to love the wide range. I was skeptical when it first came out and I was on 11 speed but now I would never go back. With a 32 tooth ring on the front I'm definitely using that 50 tooth easy gear in the back on some of the harder steeper climbs in pisca and I ride my bike from my house to the trailhead on the road so none of that cassette is being wasted. The wheels are Stan's flow which have been trouble free all year in fact in a whole year of riding these wheels I didn't put a spoke wrench to them once and they're still true. Another cool feature about this bike is that it's compatible with 27.5 plus wheels if you want to go that route. The brakes are the SRAM guide RSCs which I've been on since they came out and I've gotten really used to the feel. They've got a ton of power and are really low maintenance. The bike also comes with a ks left dropper post, a 35 mil race face bar and stem combo and Niners own saddle and grips. As far as upgrades go I didn't make any. When I first got the bike I thought I would make some modifications here and there but I actually wrote the stock setup all year including the Niners saddle and grips. The bike was pretty much ready to go right out of the box. The only modification that I did make was that I cut the bars down from 800 millimeters down to 780 millimeters. Climbing on this bike felt really good and in fact most of the time I had no need to lock it out or even put it in trail mode. If it was a really long paved or gravel climb I would but most of the time I just left the suspension wide open when climbing. This is what I found with all the full suspension Niners that I've ridden. The CVA suspension doesn't feel like it's robbing you of power even when it's fully open. Even on my RKT race bike I don't run a remote lockout and I usually leave the suspension open when climbing. I was very pleased that the Jet 9 felt very similar when climbing and the fully active suspension actually does a really nice job of maintaining traction when it gets steep or technical. The Jet comes in at around 28 pounds but truth be told I don't care a whole lot about the weight of my training bike but it was nice to not have to drag around a 30 plus pound bike on long training rides. Descending is where this bike really shines. Pisca has some very long descents at least by East Coast standards that can be extremely high speed and rough at times. The bike is a good balance between nimble and stable and I found it really easy to stay in control even when speeds picked up to a level that was a little bit over my ability. Maneuvering this bike around in the air and through corners is super easy. There are no excuses now modern 29ers are just as playful as their smaller wheel counterparts and if you haven't ridden a 29er in a number of years then you owe it to yourself to give it another shot. Cornering on this bike feels super balanced and my weight always feels dead center not too far forward or back. In rock gardens and technical sections the bike is super planted when I want it to be but it's also easy to hop in and out of rough terrain. Some mid-travel 29ers I've ridden can kind of feel like they're stuck to the ground on the trail which can be a good thing at times but the Jet 9 has no problem getting airborne and gaping small root and rock sections. The KS Lev dropper worked flawlessly and if you aren't already in the dropper camp then what are you waiting for? This is like 10 years ago when that dude would show up to the trailhead with rim brakes and claim that he didn't need any more braking power. Don't be that dude. I even use a dropper on my XC bike for racing but whether or not a dropper is faster for XC racing is a topic for a whole another video that I'll definitely be making in the future so stay tuned for that. I really like the 35mm race face next bar and turbine stem combo and it was noticeably stiffer which could be both a good and a bad thing. I know a few riders who have complained that a 35mm bar is stiff enough to cause more hand and arm fatigue on long descents but I didn't find this to be the case at all. In fact I felt significantly less fatigue when descending on this bike than I have with other trail bikes which probably came down more to the suspension and handling characteristics than it did bar stiffness. The 9 or saddle was actually very comfortable even after spending all day on it so I never felt the need to switch it out which was a surprise to me and the same goes for the 9 or grips. This brings me to my next point about this bike which is comfort. The bike just fits me really well and I can do an all day ride with numerous rugged blow your arm out descents and still feel great. I had the stem slam because that's what I'm used to on my race bike but the position was still more upright than I'm used to and as much as I hate to admit it it actually felt really good. Basically like wearing XC nerds like myself love to make fun of big riser bars and excessive use of spacers and it's hard for us to admit that a slacker more upright bike could ever be more comfortable. On a long day out my legs may have been tired from pedaling but my upper body was still fresh which is something I can't say for most of the bikes that I've ridden for a long period of time in Pisca upright position or not. After a year of abuse crashes riding in less than optimal conditions and just day in and day out thrashing this bike is still going strong with very minimal maintenance and dependability is one of the key attributes to a training bike. Again for me this bike was a training bike a bike that I could trash without worrying about it while keeping my race bike in good condition for race day. If you train on the same bike that you race on you may want to consider getting a training bike and here's why. Those lightweight parts on your race bike are expensive to replace and maintain and riding them all the time increases the likelihood that something will go wrong on race day. I know for me personally that if I rode my race bike with lightweight wheels and other race specific parts in Pisca for training all the time my race bike would be completely trashed on the starting line of each race. Growing up I had a training partner who I won't name here who used to train on his race bike. Now admittedly this guy was a huge weight weenie and he had a ton of boutique lightweight parts on his bike but it seems that come race day he had a lot of mechanicals from broken seat posts to bent pedal spindles to cracked carbon rims and even cracked carbon soles on his shoes. This is an extreme example but it highlights the importance of having a separate bike with reliable parts to save the bike that you race on and potentially a sturdier pair of trail shoes. Oftentimes the cheaper version of your race bike is a great option for a training bike or maybe a longer travel version of your race bike like the Jet and the RKT. I recommend that your training bike fit the trails that you spend most of your time on. Being that I spend a lot of time in Pisca I needed a burlier bike than just a straight up XC bike and there's certainly an argument that an even longer travel enduro bike would be the right choice here. However if you live in an area where an XC bike is a better fit then have an XC bike as your training bike and make sure you build it up with more dependable less weight weenie parts. Thanks for watching and I hope you guys found this information helpful. If you like this video be sure to give it a thumbs up, share it with a friend and subscribe for more gear reviews and training tips. If you want to learn more about the Jet 9 I'll leave the link for the bike in the description below. If you want more racing training and coaching content be sure to follow me on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook and if you want to follow my training leading into this season be sure to check me out on Strava. Finally if you're looking for a coach shoot me an email at djohnsonatrainright.com