Well. First weekend on the Voima.
Done about 6 hours 1300m of natural tech hike a bike and a super fast hour and a half ripping the bike park.
The steep natural tech is really really technical riding. if it was in a big park it would be the red or double black. It's not for the feint hearted. There's this one jackey section (for about 200m vert) that is just a matt of roots and bomb holes. its on the verge on not being ridable, some of it isn't ridable to be fair. If you can ride 50% down that section you are doing good. It requires full commitment to send it through the roots and bomb holes. Often its a roll of the dice to as to whether you can make it through. I managed about 90% on the Voima. A stellar effort for the first attempt of the jank.
Oh yeah, The bike makes perfect sense in the steep tech. Its stupid capable up and down. I did earn my turns on the hike a bike as there was about 2 hours of pushing and carrying. It gets so steep you cant ride, then so steep you cant even push, you have to carry. Carrying and pushing a Voima up is a work out to say the least. Its weighs almost twice as much as my enduro bike. BUT, on balance the effort expended is still less than the pedal bike as you can ride up 30-40% more of the hike a bike track.
I'll be honest. On the first hike a bike track I had to back off the power levels and I powered myself into a few tree's underestimating the power delivery. (I'm used to a orbea rise).
To the dudes that recommended a high stack and riser bar on the Voima.... What the hell are you on? the high stack made climbing worse. The bike would loop out sooner and I needed to get more weight over the front. On the down higher rise isn't needed either as it's already high. On the flat the higher stack shortened the bike even more. It was a lose lose lose. I swapped the height stack over mid ride and immediately had better steep tech climbing ability and zero disadvantage.
So no high stack for me. Low stack is the way and the light.
The bb height feels good to me. No problems at all with pedal strike. BUT, I did get multiple motor strikes on the pe slider. The motor hangs low! I'll need to adapt technique to limit slider strikes.
K1 geo for the down was spot on with the exception of the stupid long chain stays. I'll be honest I don't like them. I would prefer a shorter chain stay. But i'll deal with it. It only becomes a real issue when i want to manual. Manualing this bike sucks.
I'm getting pretty close on with suspension set up now with 29% sag and 400lb spring on the arma, 62.5 psi and 2 tokens in the zeb. Its feeling pretty balanced. Next up I need to hit some big drops and jumps to see how bottom out feels. Its been too wet to hit those features.
The bike is close to my dh bike in dh performance but is a far superior pedalling platform. The rig is still a bit better, but its not far off. Probably if I ran a dh fork on the front it would be there. Running down the fast rooty sections was a breeze. The bike just tracks and ploughs. But at the same I could throw it around the tight stuff on the down not to badly. I was worried that the extra weight would make super steep tech harder. But I think the extra suspension travel and big 220,200 rotor set up made easy work of the super tech.
I give the Voima 5 starts for stupid o'clock riding.
Now on to the bike park session. I went for a high speed lap on the greens and blue tracks (ok there were a couple of blacks thrown in for good measure). He has been E-biking for several years at a high level and schooled me to begin with as I was still feeling the bike out. Voima on the flat, undulating makes less sense. Though I once I calibrated to the bike I could keep up with my mate. He races e- enduro, so keeping up is an accomplishment in its own. Any way, on the flatter tracks the slacker geo was not an advantage particularly sweeping powered uphill corners. I found the front was too light and wandered too much, I did still have full stack height at the stage so lower stack might be better. My make was ripping around on his wives size extra small giant liv. All I rally could do was hold on. There was no point on the green and blue tracks where I felt I had the advantage.
Don't get me wrong, the session fun factor was off the charts. But If all you do is blue's and greens and dont ride super tech, black, double black diamond stuff I dont think the Voima is for you. In this regard I disagree with Rob. Its not one bike to rule them all. I Think you would be better off with a lower travel more standard geo bike.
Luckily I am not a blue/green track rider... well i ride those tracks to get to the hard/fun tracks.
Lastly seat position for K1 is to short for my liking, I can live with it but its not ideal. As i said before i started i would prefer 78° seat angle and slightly longer TT. I guess in that regard I like what I like. I've been riding for a long time and know what geo suits me best.
If Pole ever decide to offer different geo options then I'd be in for a 440mm chain stay and 78°. I'd give away a some technical climbing ability and high speed stability, but i would have a more playful bike.
Right oh, there's still day left and i'm not yet burnt out so. I'm off for another ride.
