5 Things about the Santa Cruz Hightower V3

I owned the Hightower V2 in 2000, and now my wife has a fresh V3 (the V4 was released late ’24). My current bike is an XL Megatower, but I’ve been able to set up my wife’s ’24 Large Hightower 3 for myself and take it for numerous rips around Burnaby Mountain and Thornhill. She’s also grudgingly agreed to let me race it in the Whistler Back 40 in June.

Here are 5 things about the SC Hightower 3 S Build:

1. Snappy! The anti-squat is MUCH higher than the Megatower. I noticed this on my very first pedal stroke. The bike went forward, not down into its travel.

2. GX cable is still amazing! GX AXS TType is wonderful, but analog is still really, really good. No worries about batteries or syncing issues, both of which I’ve had with my Megatower.

3. It's pretty light. Compared to my size XL enduro bike, at least, it's 5.5lbs lighter with a comparable build. I’ve helped this bike get a little lighter than stock with a OneUp carbon bar and some carbon wheels. We’ll be keeping Exo+ tires on there for weight as well.

4. The seat tube is a little short (170mm seat post is almost at minimum insertion). I’m 6’1” and well within SC’s size large range, but there isn’t much seat post left in there for me. If it were my bike, I’d invest in a longer dropper post. However, for my 5’9” wife the 170mm travel dropper it came with is almost fully inserted.

5. Mini plow. Even though it’s way more responsive than an enduro bike, it’ll bail you out of trouble if you need it. I still hammered through my “enduro lines” on Nicole’s and hit the stump jump. More trail and chunk were transferred to me, but that can be refreshing after riding a super plush bike.

I will be doing a 5 Things on bike sizes soon, where I’ll compare similar bikes of different sizes. What did I miss? What more would you want to know? Comment or message.