Trek Slash+ (Plus) e-MTB - iconic enduro bike goes electric with massive range and lightweight motor

After years of the Trek Slash topping enduro race podiums, Trek has finally decided to electrify its most revered mountain bike, but it has gone an almost entirely different route than its nearest e-enduro competition, like the DJI Amflow PL. The new Trek Slash Plus aims to keep the same riding dynamics, handling, and suspension performance as the original Slash that has earned it fame on the enduro race circuit, and Trek achieves this feat with a motor usually reserved for lightweight road and cross-country e-bikes. 

The Trek Slash+ pairs the TQ HPR50 motor with a 580 Wh removable battery for a claimed riding time of 2–6 hours of ride time. Trek also offers a 160 Wh range extender that fits into the bottle cage towards the top of the down tube and can extend the ride time to as much as 7.5 hours. It seems as though part of Trek's reasoning behind using the 50 Nm motor in a year full of 100+ Nm enduro e-bikes has to do with the riding experience, rather than all-out power and hill conquering. Trek claims the TQ motor on the Slash+ is “barely perceivable” and can still provide pedal assist up to 20 mph (ca. 32 km/h). 

With that philosophy in mind, it's worth noting that the Trek Slash+ isn't particularly light, at a hefty 20.88 kg in a size medium. That isn't particularly heavy by e-bike standards, but it is still heavier than the 19.2 kg DJI Amflow e-bike that was launched just last month and features an 850 W, 120 Nm motor. At least part of that weight comes from the high-pivot design and idler, which adds more material to the carbon frame and more components to the drivetrain. 

That weight sacrifice, however, comes with some positive results in terms of geometry and suspension performance. The high-pivot design of the Slash+ is inherited directly from the regular Trek Slash and enables the rear wheel to have a rearward travel path, making it more stable going over technical terrain. The high-pivot design is also known to improve small-bump sensitivity and traction. 

The carbon fibre frame and aggressive geometry of the Trek Slash+ are arguably its headline features, thanks to its incredibly slack 63.4°, which can be further slackened to around 62.4° with an angle-adjust headset. 

The Trek Slash+ comes in two different variants. The Slash+ 9.7 SLX/XT comes in at an eye-watering $7,999.99 and features a Fox Rhythm 38 fork with 170 mm of travel and a Fox Float X rear shock that matches the front wheel's 170 mm travel. Step up to the Trek Slash+ 9.9 X0 AXS T-Type, and you get a RockShox ZEB Ultimate Deluxe fork with DebonAir spring and Charger 3.1 damper, paired with a RockShox Vivid Ultimate rear shock, again set to 170 mm of travel on both wheels. 

Both versions of the Trek Slash+ ship with 12-speed drivetrains, but only the Slash+ 9.9 has electronic shifting via an SRAM X0 Eagle AXS T-Type derailleur