Is 100mm enough suspension for me?

id be more concerned about the ridiculous price.

Depends king of terrain you are riding with the bike. I am riding a Top Fuel this season and I find that 100mm is fine for climbing and rolling terrain, but when the descents get a bit steeper I find the head angle of the bike makes things a bit twitchy/sketchy. I'm mostly riding steepish single track in the Canadian rockies.

I ended up putting a Talas 32 on the bike which is probably not the best idea from a headtube stress standpoint but I love being able to bump up to 140mm for descents and knocking it back down to 100mm for the climbs. Trying to ride it uphill with it set at 140mm just doesn't feel right, it really messes with my balance when climbing. Also, I think it only added a 1/2 pound to the bike which I could really care less about.

Hard to say. More about riding style, if you like slamming into things then I'd go with 120. If your a smooth rider, 100 will probably be great.

I started riding on rigids, then hardtails, then moved into fullys. For a while my primary bike was 6"+ of travel at both ends. I got a xc fully ( Giant Anthem so roughly 3 and 3) and I found it far more preferable to the long travel. Felt alot more connected to the trail and it wasnt even close in terms of responsiveness.
I am in NE and most of what I ride is rocky, rooty and quick up and down bursts. With the exception of hucks, I havent found anything I havent been able to ride on my XC bike that I could on the longer travel rig. It requires a bit more attention because there is far less margin of error. I think my line selection and technique has improved alot because I am not just pounding through whatever line, knowing the extra travel would get me out of trouble.

You might want to think of it in a different way.

What is the difference in geometry between the Top Fuel and a Stumpjumper?

The one inch is not a big difference especially if you consider fork tuning, different axle-to-crown measures, etc.

But the geometries between a pure XC and a trail bike can be surprising. I did a quick look and the Top Fuel has a 70 head tube angle and the Stumpjumper 68.5.

The Trek is going to feel a lot sketcher on the descents with a tighter HA, but if you were to put on a 120mm fork, it would almost be the same as the SJ.

mcoomer said:

I ended up buying another Stumpy. It's got the same 120mm fork and Brain shock that my old S-Works Stumpy had so I'm happy with that. Looking forward to getting it dirty.

Mike

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At the FTF I was climbing an asphalt hill in town with 3 dudes on Niners and a Dude on a Pivot. Was watching all of their bikes move about an inch every pedal stroke... had them look at mine... nothing, not even a twitch.

Brain FTW.