industry nine in the frost

Now there’s only so much you can tell from one ride in deep, sloppy mud but since I finally dodged illness, work and self-destructing forks to actually get out on a ride with my Industry Nine wheels, I thought I should write a quick first ride review as lots of people have been asking about them.

In short, they feel amazing. Mine are the orange Enduro ones with Flow rims and while I’ve been using the Flows for some time built onto Hope Pro IIs, the Enduros are lighter still at 1775g the pair, and feel much stiffer. Not so much on the climbs, I don’t think I could notice much difference there but on the downhills there was an extra degree of precise handling and getting on exactly the right lines that wasn’t there with the old wheels.

The fast 3 degree take-up from freewheeling is nice too, maybe not as revolutionary as I had hoped for but it felt fast and ready for action. The main benefit for me was the lack of noise from the freewheel, it makes a gentle, relaxing even, buzzing noise rather than the eardrum-bursting CLACK-CLACK-CLACK of the Hope.

You also can’t get away from the fact that the i9 look amazing too, but a picture’s worth a thousand words (at least) so I won’t go on about that. Maybe there’s a bit of first-ride invincibility about my impressions so far but I think I’m going to like riding these wheels.

industry nine wheels

After much deliberation as to whether I can justify them I should finally get a chance to ride my new shiny orange Industry Nine Enduro wheelset this weekend. I think I ordered them back in May and have been too busy building other people’s wheels to put them together.

Let’s hope they turn out to be worth the wait.

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