Due primarily to an imbalance in numbers, women’s-specific mountain bikes are quite a niche market. As such, there are very few options for women that desire a women’s-specific mountain bike that is very aggressive and technically capable. Santa Cruz is one of the few brands that have taken a forward stance by supporting an entirely separate brand for women’s-specific mountain bikes: Juliana. While the Juliana line has been around for many years, Santa Cruz has recently revamped this line of bikes and has turned Juliana into a standalone brand. Though targeted specifically for women, the frames are admittedly standard Santa Cruz frames, with comparable or better components than the Santa Cruz equivalent, as well as a few feminine touches.
The Juliana Roubion is, in essence, the Santa Cruz Bronson. It boasts 6″ of travel and 27.5″ wheels. The “base” model comes built with a mix SRAM 1×11 and Shimano XT components, a RockShock Pike RCT3 fork, and Fox Float CTD Kashima shock, for a mere $6,599. The Roubion offers several customizations, such as an upgrade to the Cane Creek Double Barrel Air CS shock (highly recommended, especially for the price). The top offering boasts SRAM XX1 and Shimano XTR components for $8,299. Though the prices are somewhat high (ahem, quite high), make no mistakes that this is a top of the line bike, with a full-carbon frame for both of these build kits. When Santa Cruz and Juliana paired together to offer a demo day in Albuquerque, NM, I jumped at the opportunity to test ride the Roubion.
Though the demo bikes didn’t boast all of the standard options that come stock with the Roubion, such as the 1×11 system, I was able to take the Roubion out for a spin in the foothills of Albuquerque to get a feel for its capability.
Climbing
As a 6″ travel bike I fully anticipated it to bob as I climbed up steep, rocky ascents. However, this bike seemed almost as efficient as my 4″ and 5″ travel bikes that I ride on a regular basis, if not more efficient. Santa Cruz’s patented Virtual Pivot Point (VPP) suspension is the workhorse behind this capability. Their patented suspension design relies on two separate small linkages that create a “virtual” pivot point. In essence, the entire rear triangle is ultimately isolated from the rest of the bike, therefore providing higher pedaling efficiency without sacrificing suspension when you need it most on large drops.
I wanted to give the VPP a run for its money, so for half of the ride I set the fork and shock settings to the fully open, or the “descend” mode. The pedaling efficiency was only minimally hampered, and I honestly forgot during most of the climbs that the suspension was in descend mode. For the second half of the ride, which still offered a fair amount of technical climbing, I switched both fork and shock to the “climb” mode. There was minimal difference between the two settings, except for out of the saddle climbing. With 27.5″ wheels and great geometry, tight switchbacks were easy to maneuver.
Descending
With the nose of the bike pointed down, it was hard to wipe the smile off of my face. Small to medium jumps felt like spreading butter on warm toast. Honestly, while descending the only word that really came to mind was “supple.” Though not typically a word used to describe a mountain bike, the geometry, coupled with the suspension on this bike, results in extremely supple landings.
The geometry of the bike felt agressive, but stable. I felt much more confident and relaxed on technical sections with this bike then I have ever felt–quite the compliment for the Roubion given the number of times I have ridden the same trails with many other bikes. This held true regardless of the settings on the fork and shock, as I tackled rocky descents with both the “climb” and “descend” settings. This result speaks to the design of the geometry and suspension of the bike and not just a function of good components. The bike was nimble in corners, allowing me to take turns at much faster speeds than I typically do.
Feminine Touches
While I only had a couple of hours to test this bike, the Juliana Roubion left me salivating for more time to ride. Juliana has implemented some changes to the Roubion build kit in order to give the Bronson bones a more feminine touch, such as a gorgeous evergreen paint job and an extremely comfortable women’s-specific saddle. In addition, the bars measure in at a comfortable width of 720mm, the same as I run on my personal bike, with thinner grips to accommodate the smaller hands of women.
Though in essence Santa Cruz has founded a new line of women’s specific mountain bikes by merely implementing a “shrink and pink” brand, it’s a step in the right direction. Initially, I was quite perturbed by the mere thought that a bike company could appease the masses of women with a pretty paint job. While the number of women mountain biking may lag behind the men, it’s quite clear that there are enough women in the sport for money to be made. It won’t be long before the design and engineering goes beyond pretty paint schemes and fancy saddles. In the mean time, the Juliana Roubion is more than capable of allowing any woman the ability to show the boys how trails are supposed to be ridden, all while looking good.
More information
Share This:
“Shrink and Pink” LOL
I’d never heard that before.
I would think there are genuinely specific things one could do to make a true women’s bike. For instance, women tend to carry relatively more of their height in their legs and less in their torso. Theoretically, a bike with a relatively long seat tube and short top tube would be a better fit than most standard bikes.
However, Santa Cruz generally runs relatively short top tubes relative to sizing so, if any company can get away with standard geometry having a good chance to fit women, then it would probably be SC.
You are completely right about the geometry for women’s bike. In fact, this is what companies such as Specialized do for their women’s road bikes. They also take careful consideration for standover height as well.
And yes, you are spot on about Santa Cruz… Maybe they’re really designed for women???… 😉
I use to have the same theory about women’s body proportions as you do, however it’s actually the opposite. The idea that women are more “leggy” than men is actually incorrect. Since women need the extra space to carry a child inside them, their torsos on average are actually a higher percentage of their total height compared to men. The reason a shorter toptube is more comfortable for women is that by shortening the reach, they can have a more verticle angle of lean and less strain on the lower back from having the longer torso bent over. Did some research a couple months ago for my girl and if you get to legitimate sources you can find this correct info. Plenty of incorrect info on this out there though. Cheers
According to this womens cycling site, for a woman and man of equal height, the woman will have longer legs and a shorter torso:
http://www.womenscycling.ca/blog/georgena-terry/womens-body-proportions-different-mens/
This study of US military personnel also shows a greater proportion of leg height in women than men:
http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a074807.pdf
Yet another women’s specific site making a claim of shorter torsos on women:
http://www.teamestrogen.com/content/wsdBikes
I also found numerous sources which claim that, while men are on average taller, that there is no significant difference in proportions with regard to height.
There were also some sources which make the claim of longer torsos as you state.
I could detect no greater “legitimacy” in one batch of sources vs. another.
I know I have greater leg proportionality than most men (longer inseam compared to other men my height) yet my wife, who is 5″ shorter has almost the same inseam I do. Just one data point I know, but if women have longer torsos, My wife and I are a couple of freaks.
I did look at the military document, and one problem is they are measuring “buttock” height from the floor. You cannot measure to soft tissue, i.e. the butt because it is comprised of muscle and fat that is variable with age and genetics. You must measure tibia and femur length if you go about it this way. Measuring to the greater trochanter of the femur from the floor should be adequate. But, to avoid the extra hassle, sitting height/standing height (sitting height ratio) is a good reproducible method.
I didn’t just look at the buttock measurement. I also looked at the weight measurement. In both cases, the proportions were similar. Since there was no specific leg measurement, I took the combination of these two to be a reasonable approximation. They were consistent with each other and led to the same conclusion. The difference in proportion between the two genders was significant enough to overcome any associated variability in soft tissue.
This topic is clearly more complex than most people, including some supposed experts, think.
It would be interesting to see if women who have extensive experience on traditional bikes and bikes with female specific geometry show a clear preference. It seems like road bikes are well ahead of mountain bikes in this regard.
You need to look at peer reviewed articles, not websites. These are good sources.
http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_11/sr11_126.pdf
-go to figure 13. on page 12. Same thing, even from ages 12-18yo when growth is complete, women have greater sitting height/standing height ratio.
http://krepublishers.com/06-Special%20Volume-Journal/JHE-00-Special%20Volumes/JHE-15-Hum-Body-Comp-Web/JHE-SI-15-01-001-008-Bogin-B/JHE-SI-15-01-001-008-Bogin-B-Tt.pdf
-scroll to the top of the third page and look at the table. Females have a higher SHR (sitting height ratio = sitting height/standing height). This is the ratio of the top of the head to the ischial tuberosities versus total body height. i.e. females torsos are a larger proportion of the total height.
Popular media has led people to think women have longer legs for their height compared to men, but this is incorrect. You can keep believing this false information if you want, but its inaccurate.
Just to clarify, Sitting Height is measured just from the surface of the chair you’re sitting on to the top of the head. This doesn’t include your distance form the floor or anything else. Wanted to make sure that was apparent otherwise probably wouldn’t make sense.
Please don’t take this a “junk in the trunk” joke, it’s not intended that way, but if it’s measuring from the top of the chair, wouldn’t that measurement include soft tissue?
I realize that sitting on the saddle would include the same soft tissue, but I didn’t know if they sat differently on the saddle compared to a chair.
And should arm length be included? If you had a longer torso but shorter arms, I think it would feel more stretched out on a bike than if you had a shorter torso and longer arms. Kind of like how you get lower on a bike the wider your arms are on the handlebars (effectively shortening your arm length.)
Thanks for that link.
It was interesting to note that, depending on ethnicity, the female SHR was greater than the man’s in all cases, but only very slightly. In the case of white subjects, it was about 1/10 of one standard deviation.
Which takes me back to my earlier question. Do we really need different geometries by gender? It would be interesting to hear from women who have extensive experience riding a variety of traditional and women’s specific geometry bikes.
Yeah, you always wonder about things like that. Is a whole different frame necessary vs some simple stem, bar, and seat changes? Not sure. I use to think the same thing that women had longer legs than men, but someone that was doing a fit on my girlfriend at a specialized dealer told me what I know now as correct. Like you said, does knowing this change anything? We’ll see I guess.
Ps – she got the small Bronson and loves it. I have the new Nomad and I am continually impressing myself with its capability. Perfect bike for riding in the cascades. Way to go Santa Cruz
Santa Cruz makes awesome bikes. I recently purchased a Santa Cruz Bronson with a X01 package, Cranecreek suspension, Fox 36 fork and Enve wheels. Before this bike, I rode a non Santa Cruz women specific bike and loved it. Prior to the purchase, I had the same brand, but high end model women specific bike on order. My husband got the Bronson for his new bike. Since my bike was delayed, I used his bike. It was a size too big, but I didn’t care. After a couple rides, I fell completely in love with his bike in every way. I cancelled my order and ordered his exact bike, but in the sleek flat black and hot pink color. I am 5’4″ and have a small build and I can climb hills I have never been able to get up before. I can also go over logs and rocks that I would have hiked over in the past. I analyzed the dimensions of women specific bikes to the Bronson and there were minimal difference with the exception of a women’s specific seat, handle bar width and a smaller chain ring so I modified them when I got the bike. Color is a big deal to me and I’m just happy Bronson made a color bike that I loved.