SHIMANO XT M8100
From £911.91 (complete drivetrain and brakes) / Freewheel.co.uk
In the mountain bike market, Shimano has been off the pace of late. For a brand used to dominating the scene, it has recently found itself in second place behind SRAM and its all-conquering Eagle single-ring wide-range drivetrains.
Even though Shimano has a strong fanbase among long-serving mountain bikers, there’s no escaping the fact that its drivetrains were basically dumped by the bike industry at OEM level when Eagle came out. Of the bikes that crossed path for test in 2018, around three-quarters of them had SRAM drivetrains. Ten years ago, Shimano would have held sway, albeit not to the same startling degree as SRAM’s
