Most observers agree that the 2004 RockShox range is a bit, well, unexciting. There was always a suspicion that the company was saving itself for something a bit special in 2005 and it looks like that was indeed the case…

Sundry product managers and a handful of test riders have had a go on RS’s forthcoming fork platforms and RockShox has released these pictures and some initial details of the new forks. The black one is the Reba, a 100mm travel, 3.5lb air fork. Sounds like a winning combination already, but Reba also contains RockShox’s all new Motion Control damping system. Motion Control is a new compression damping assembly that, as far as we can gather, separates low and high-speed compression damping adjustments using an extremely simple and reliable mechanism.

This should open up a whole new wave of tuning possibilities, letting you, for example, easily set the fork up for reduced brake dive without sacrificing suppleness. The official release says that “all Reba forks use Air spring technology with external or internal adjustment options” which sounds rather like some sort of “Air U-Turn” TALAS-style travel adjustment.

So that’s the lightweight, mid-travel platform. The other fork, Pike, is something completely different, being along similar lines to Manitou’s recently-announced Nixon fork. Pike is a 140mm single-crown fork. It’s heavier than Nixon at 4.75lb but still light for its travel. Some of the extra heft over Manitou’s offering comes from Pike’s use of coil springs (with U-Turn travel adjustment from 95 to 140mm) rather than air. Again, Pike has Motion Control damping and also features a new 20mm through-axle system called the Maxle.

We expect that both forks will be available in the usual selection of “trim levels” (SL, Race etc), with some models having PopLoc remote Motion Control adjusters.

RockShox has a promotional website for the new forks at www.the-red-pill.com. More information as we get it…