Following V3 Frame

The Evil Following is a 120mm travel 29er that keeps weight to a minimum and fun on full blast. It’ll climb all day and beg for more, it’ll high five its way through berms, gaps, rock gardens and eye-watering speed on the way down. It’s Evil’s version of an XC bike—the crusher of all things crusher, the rally car of two wheels, and every bit as unclassifiable as its inception—XC Rage, Shred-Country, Trail Annihilation, All Mountain, nothing does it justice.

Too many bikes are chasing the same Reach numbers, leaving everything approaching aircraft-carrier lengths. Add to this what seems to be a ubiquitous 65-degree headtube angle — from XC to Enduro+, hardtails — and you might as well just pick by color. Not the Following.

In updating the Following, Evil kept what makes it so special: lightning handling, exceptional pop, and that uncanny ability to be there before you’ve even decided to go there. They added in a die-hard XC determination with an over-the-pedals 77-degree seat tube angle. It’ll climb, and climb, and climb. And just like the Following we love, it’s first to the beer cooler. Always.

To do this, Evil kept the wheelbase somewhat reasonable—1,177mm for a size medium. But they still needed to add to the Following’s bounce-off-the-walls enthusiasm so they’re spec’ing inline rear shocks. Fear not, you can run piggyback shocks, but inlines are full of un-ending pop. The RockShox Deluxe Ultimate RC Debonairs and Fox Float DPS Factory EVOLs spec’ed on this bike maintain an irresistible ramp-up—dig deep, engage boost, gap farther.

Designing around SuperBoost+ is not just about a stiffer wheel. It allowed Evil to enlarge each piece of hardware within the suspension pivots.  This bike is not just stiffer and more composed speed, but it is more durable and fatigue resistant. With everything bigger, and Evil’s renowned time and weather defying dual row, Klüberplex filled, angular contact bearings, it’s a sustainable ecosystem designed to withstand the rainforest. It also kept the feverishly snappy 430mm chainstays and strengthened the rear wheel’s bracing angle.

Evil went for fully internal, tube-in-tube cable routing for tidy housing and seamless set up. They also shrank the carbon chainguide into a svelte modern design. Those who want lighter still—yep, you can take it off.

This puts it in full in Strava-seek-and-destroy, overly fit pedaler territory, but this is a Following we’re talking about, and Evil made sure the Following is every bit the skateboard of the loam, slasher of the hidden line, defier of categorization that it ever was. It’s the king of pop, more so than ever with an inline rear shock, now just with an additional 18mm of wheelbase and 25mm reach stability. It lost weight and gained strength—who doesn’t want that? And just like the original Following, it can’t be compared to anything, it’s too far ahead—not even in sight—up and down.