Tested: Specialized's New Women's Camber Comp Carbon 650b

A well-rounded short-travel women’s trail bike that will be fun to ride for plenty of seasons

The Specialized Women’s Camber is a women’s trail bike with 130mm (5.1 inches) of rear wheel travel and 650b (27.5-inch) wheels, and a good-value mix of parts that gives you a bike with a carbon fiber front triangle (with an alloy rear), dropper post, and SRAM 1x drivetrain for under $4,000.

Specialized released a major update to the Camber platform last summer, giving the bike a slacker head angle, shorter stays, lower bottom bracket, and longer front center. The women’s Camber is new for 2017, and replaces the Specialized Rumor, previously a 27.5-inch, 120mm-travel trail bike with women’s geometry.

RELATED: The Redesigned Specialized Camber Hits a Sweet Spot

Here’s how it compares to a standard Camber:

It shares the same frame with the standard version. Similar to its approach with a long-travel Stumpjumper/Rhyme platform, Specialized gave the women’s Camber the same frame as the standard version. With Specialized, women’s trail geometry had typically meant a shorter reach and more standover. The Camber already had enough standover, so there was no need for a different women’s frame, says Specialized.

Like the standard 27.5-inch Camber, this one has a relatively relaxed 68-degree head angle; a steeper 75-degree seat tube angle designed to put the rider further forward over the bottom bracket (for more efficient pedaling); and relatively short 16.5-inch chainstays intended to make for a more nimble bike. This frame also has the SWAT compartment, meaning the bottle cage doubles as a removable door to the down tube, allowing you to store items like a light jacket or vest, tubes, or food inside.

It’s available in an XS size, which extends the platform down to riders 4’10” tall.

The suspension is tuned for women. The fork and shock on the women’s Camber is tuned for a lighter rider, so that the women’s Camber can exhibit the same same suspension characteristics as the standard version—namely, that lighter riders can get the full amount of travel out of the bike.

The women’s Camber only comes in a 27.5-inch option, unlike the standard Camber, which comes in 29er and 27.5 options. For women who want a 29er trail bike, Specialized points them toward the 130mm-travel 29er Rhyme (also available as a 27.5 and 27.5+ bike).

RELATED: First Ride: Specialized Rhyme Expert Carbon 6Fattie

It has women’s touch points and specifications. The Camber gets a women’s saddle (in this case, a Specialized Body Geometry women’s Myth Sport), slightly narrower handlebar (720mm instead of the 750mm spec’d on the standard bike), shorter cranks, and smaller chainring (a 28t instead of a 30t).

It’s got the parts you need. No need for an upgrade—the $3,800 Comp Carbon build we tested has all the parts a modern trail bike should have. A 1x drivetrain? Check: The Comp Carbon mixes SRAM’s most affordable 1x NX group with its reliable GX rear derailleur and a RaceFace crankset. Dropper post? Check: You get Specialized’s cable-actuated Command Post. Wide rims to allow you to run lower tire pressure for better traction and control? Check: The Roval Traverse alloy rims have an internal width of 29mm (compared to 21 to 24mm for traditional width rims).

I tested a size small women’s Camber on New England singletrack that had a good mix of terrain: smooth and rolling flow trail; some big berms; tight, twisty, and rooty singletrack with some small root drops; and a couple of steep rock sections.

Though the Camber has gotten a longer front center from the previous version, on the spectrum of modern trail bikes, I’d say the reach on this bike is still on the shorter side. For reference, I’m 5’6” and generally between a size small and medium. I tested a small, but if I were to buy this bike, I’d size up to a medium to get the longer and lower riding position I prefer. But for a lot of riders, particularly those who may have felt most comfortable on bikes with women’s specific geometries in the past, this position will probably feel comfortable both immediately and over longer rides, and does put you in a good position for pushing power to the pedals.

Some bikes take a couple of rides to get used to. But the Camber handled predictably and felt easy to ride from the get-go. A 68-degree head tube angle with a shorter wheelbase seemed to strike a sweet spot for me between a geometry that was relaxed enough to make descending fun, yet still enabled crisp handling. The Camber felt very easy to maneuver and hit my desired line through root-laden switchbacks and the occasional rock garden.

The FSR suspension provides a very firm pedaling platform, so that I could leave the shock wide open throughout my ride with no perceptible bobbing when I was climbing or on flats. But it still does a good job at smoothing out small bumps to provide good traction when I was muscling up rockier or rootier climbs. And at 28.1 pounds, my size small tester is on the lighter side for its price and travel.

The suspension also stood up well in the middle of the stroke, making for a bike that didn’t sink too quickly into the bottom part of its travel when I was picking my way through obstacles on the flats. The bike picked up speed through big berms and G-outs very well.

The Camber surprised me on descents. Having gotten accustomed to riding a slack, 6-inch-travel trail bike at home, I expected to have to pick lines a bit more carefully on this 130mm-travel model. But the Camber felt surprisingly composed hotfooting it down root-laden descents, still giving me the luxury of mostly being able to point and shoot. And on the few steep, gnarlier sections I encountered on Burke Ski Mountain in Vermont, the Camber felt stable and held its line faithfully (even when my foot came out of a pedal halfway down). I think the wide rims and the tires help the bike to be a bit more capable too—a few times, being more used to riding a bigger bike, some combination of less-than-ideal lines and poor timing made me wail hard on the back wheel, and the 2.3-inch-wide Specialized Ground Control tire held up to the abuse with no flats or burps over four days on feature-rich East Coast trails.

The NX/GX combination shifted reliably, and the Shimano hydraulic disc brakes were solid stoppers. The Specialized Command Post dropper also worked smoothly, and I hardly noticed that it doesn’t actually have infinite travel (it has 12 positions). The 720mm bar is wide enough to feel modern, but not so ridiculously wide as to give me pause through tighter trees in the woods.

The Camber is a solid pick for most everyday trails: It’s fun and easy to ride for any of lever rider, but can also hold its own when terrain gets into more advanced territory. It wouldn’t be my pick for any kind of racing—it’s not quite snappy enough to race XC seriously, and not built for gnar-harvesting at high speeds as you might do in enduro, but it’s well suited for the straight-up trail riding that most riders do, most of the time. With its shorter reach, relatively light weight for its price, and good climbing abilities, it’d be a great bike for riders looking to get a well-rounded, quality trail bike that won’t make climbing harder than it has to be. But it also has enough capability and the level of parts (dropper, 1x, wide bar, wide rims) to grow with you as your skills progress.

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Gloria Liu is a writer-at-large, and formerly the features and gear editor at Bicycling. Gloria’s love for cycling spans disciplines from road to gravel to ’cross to mountain. She’s written popular features for Bicycling about a wide range of subjects, from the (at times hilarious) self-discovery gained by going #FullEnduro, to the intersection of #MeToo and cycling.

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