Replacing the brand’s old guard, the Yeti SB165 is a 27.5 wheel bike that will make you feel like a kid again.
Downhill-focused Yeti fans rejoice! Today, Yeti unveiled the bike that will replace its low and slack SB6.
If you’re on the spectrum between gravity-committed and gravity-curious, Yeti’s new SB165 might just be the most fun you can have on two wheels.
In short: We tested the Yeti SB165 on two continents through a variety of trails and environments — monster climbs, bomber descents, singletrack, rocks, roots, mud, and more. The SB165 knocked our socks off. The bike scampered over rock gardens like they didn’t exist and stepped down chunky rocks with the same finesse that it swooped through tight corners, tail whipped, and launched and landed off anything we could find. We took A-lines we’d previously passed up and nailed every single one.
Yeti SB165 MTB Testing
We tested the SB165 in Bovec, Slovenia, on a 3-hour climb up jeep track and single track to a mountain hut. We continued the test with an hour-long descent though rock rubble, steep-sloped off-camber root lattices, and rutted, switchbacking mountain meadow.
Back home in Vermont, our testing continued. A wet spring gave us the opportunity to test this bike on mossy, slick rock fins and mud, through networks that require your biggest bike (suffering on the climb), on a 4-hour adventure ride (really meant for an XC bike), and throughout the local web of cross-country and enduro trails.
Yeti SB165 MTB Review
We’ve been mostly riding long-travel 29er bikes for the past year and loving them. When Yeti told us what it was launching, we were skeptical and found it hard to imagine going back to a 27.5” wheel bike after experiencing the speed and smoothness of the SB130 and SB150.