Yeti Cycles is reviving its hardtail legend and presenting the ARC 35th Anniversary Edition to mark the company's anniversary. Although its style in Yeti turquoise and yellow is classic, the brand-new ARC has little in common with the uncompromising race file of the nineties.
Flashback to 1990, when Juli Furtado won the first official World Championship title in mountain biking on a Yeti. At that time, most mountain bikes rolled through the terrain with relatively heavy chrome-molybdenum-steel frames. Yeti, together with Easton, developed the first revolutionary lightweight aluminium tubeset for MTBs with butted tubes, which was a good kilo lighter. Yeti's great years followed with countless racing successes on the Yeti ARC (for: Alloy Racing Composite), which established the brand's legendary reputation.
In the recent past, however, the ARC disappeared completely from the model range in favour of various fully models. Now the ARC is back with the mission of combining the simplicity of the hardtail with the joy of trail biking and presents itself as a modern all-round hardtail. 29er wheels with fat 2.6 mm tyres, 130 mm suspension fork, full carbon frame, telescopic seat post and the latest electronically shifted 1x12 drivetrain turn the former cross-country racer into a universal tool for trail lovers.
Philipp Rother, Marketing Manager for Yeti, comments: "The background to the whole thing is the return to the origins of the mountain bike with a hardtail with modern geometry. Accordingly, this is not a race bike, but a downcountry or trail bike, i.e. a bike for having fun on an after-work ride. Just like in the old days, when you only had one bike for everything. Of course, it's also intended to appeal to customers who had an ARC from later model years and have been waiting for a successor for some time."
The ARC 35 also shines with numerous tuning delicacies that simply belong on such a prestigious bike: The crown of the 130cc Fox 34 is powder-coated in the same yellow colour as the frame, while the downtubes, Sram-Level brake callipers, the Sram AXS Eagle chainring and the Chris King parts installed shine in exclusive turquoise. As with all Yeti bikes from model year 2019 onwards, buyers of the ARC 35 also enjoy a lifetime warranty on the frame.
If you don't have one yet but would like one, you'll have to be brave. The special Yeti ARC 35th Anniversary Edition model is limited to just 100 units and was sold out in all frame sizes on the European importer's website shortly after its launch. At a price of 8999 British pounds, which equates to just under ten thousand euros.
We can therefore speculate wildly as to when one of these goodies will come back onto the market and at what price. The same goes for whether and when a possible series offshoot of the new Yeti ARC trail hardtail will be available for everyone to buy. And how much it will cost. Stay tuned!
Sebastian Brust
Editor
