BikeYoke Divine SL Seatpost

Just a few short years ago, no serious XC racer would ever have considered a dropper post. They were too heavy for the weight weenies and few, if any courses required them anyway. Fast forward to today, and things are changing fast. The tracks are getting more and more challenging, and the posts are getting lighter at the same time. Are we at the tipping point? Will dropper posts be found on the majority of XC race bikes going forward? The purists may never convert, but with products like the new BikeYoke Divine popping up, they are going to be running out of arguments pretty soon. We slapped one on an XC rig to see how rowdy we could get, and if it would help with performance on race day.

BikeYoke DEVINE SL Dropper Post Highlights

• Ti bolts
• Tapered tubes
• “Tech-Climb” suspension function
• Drop: 80 mm
• Diameter: 30.9 or 31.6 mm
• Cable routing: internal only.
• Remote options:
• Triggy X: Left side under bar remote with leverage adjust.
• 2-by Remote: Left or right side "push-down"-style remote for 2-by or 3-by drivetrains.
• Weight: 385 grams (30.9, uncut, excluding remote)
• Warranty: 2 years
• MSRP: $425 USD (EUR 379) including Triggy X remote

Initial Impressions

They say “don’t judge a book by its cover” well, we couldn’t help but to be impressed with the packaging of our brand new post. It shows up packed like a fine bottle of wine with subtle black and gold colors. We dig it.

Out of the box you feel that some love went into what you get, everything looks and feels quality - from the post body to the shaft, from the double-bolted head with Ti hardware to the very nice shifter-like remote, the Divine definitely had our attention from the unboxing. The post body is heavily machined to save weight where possible, and the small remote has extra holes drilled into it to shave another gram or two. As for the famous “Revive” external bleed function that can be found on BikeYoke’s longer travel dropper posts (winner of Vital's Dropper Post Face Off), the company chose a different route for the Divine with a fully enclosed system that they say doesn’t require bleeding due to among other things a very compact design (and some more secretive tricks that they remained tight-lipped about when we asked them).

One of the benefits of having a small amount of travel is being able to use a short stanchion tube and make the whole internal mechanism more compact. BikeYoke takes advantage of that and give you to the option to trim the bottom of the post for additional weight reduction. In fact you can take off up to 117 mm and save a claimed 40 grams in the process, or you could just pass up that fine croissant next to your morning coffee. It’s up to you. For all you gram-counters out there asking how many grams we saved when we chopped the bottom off OUR post, well, we didn’t, because we plan to continue testing this post on another bike with different seat tube length, and yes, we get conservative like that sometimes.

On The Trail

Installing the post requires a bespoke tool to connect the cable head at the bottom of the post, it takes some patience and just a bit of touch, but once you connect the cable to the remote and tighten everything up, you’ll be able to take the post off the bike pretty easily. Important to mention that if you do take the post off for racing on non-technical courses, we recommend putting some soft rubber on the connector to prevent it from rattling, or, take everything out including the cable for full weight reduction.

BikeYoke’s new “Triggy X” lever (and evolution of their much-liked original Triggy) is worthy of a little extra attention. It has a neat, flexible clamp that doesn’t require you to take off your grips to install, and the lever body itself is SRAM MatchMaker compatible straight out of the box (Shimano I-SPEC adapters are also available to purchase). Furthermore, the lever can work with any cable configuration, either clamping the cable at the lever or running the cable nipple there - a neat touch. Finally, the lever length (or reach if you like) can be altered via a small bolt. It didn’t change the feel of the lever too much but helped us get it to the exact position we wanted. In action, the lever has a very plush feel and doesn’t require much force to operate.

To the important question then: is the short travel Divine useful? For sure, when the trail starts to point down and speeds go up, we’re always happy to have our saddle out of the way. On our hardtail test bike we immediately felt way more comfortable getting down and dirty on our technical home trails. We feel that the 80 mm of drop strikes a good balance of giving enough crotch clearance to move around more freely but still keeps the saddle in a place where you can use it to turn the bike or maybe take a second to pedal when seated. And while it might be hard to quantify the benefits without doing back-to-back timed runs, we certainly felt as though it allowed us to make up time on the descents and it also left us feeling less sketchy when the speeds really picked up. Over the course of 6 or 7 laps, we also feel that being able to relax a bit more in the technical sections really allows us to conserve energy - always a good thing with the next climb coming up quickly.

BikeYoke is a company that is very dedicated to asking the hard questions and coming up with innovative new solutions. On the Divine, they thought about ways they could help XC riders get up technical climbs with a bit more comfort and ease, and they came up what they call “Tech-Climb”. If you drop the post into any position in the middle of its travel, it actually provides about 1cm of “suspension” action, which is intended to make getting up and over roots and rocks during seated climbs a bit less punishing. In the top or bottom position, the post is fully locked out. We think this is pretty cool. The company also said it wanted to mimic the slightly more "flexy" feel of traditional 27.2mm posts found on many XC hardtails, so they deliberately engineered a bit of compliance into the post structure. We noted this in the both the "Strengths" and "Weaknesses" section a the start of this article, pick your poison.

So who is this post good for? At this point we need to talk about two different riders, the weekend warrior and the diehard racer. The weekend warrior probably has just one bike, and it’s set up in “training” mode most of the season. This type of rider will benefit immensely from the ability to drop the saddle in technical sections, and they will probably leave the post on the bike for the whole season - possibly removing it for a non-technical course to save a few grams. As for the diehard racer with two bikes and three pairs of wheels, 350 grams is still considered a lot of weight so they will most likely only run this post if they feel the track is technical enough. We think that the gain in control and comfort down any descent will outweigh the penalty of the extra weight around the racetrack, well, on almost any track.

For us, there is no doubt that as tracks continue to get more challenging we will see more and more dropper posts in XC, and the BikeYoke Divine is certainly one of the most interesting options available. It offers all the right functionality, a low weight, and it is easy to remove on a non-technical track (like the upcoming Albstadt race for example).

Things That Could Be Improved

Many of us XC racers use carbon seats with oval carbon rails, in our case the head bolts were just a bit too short to give us the seat angle we wanted on our bike, especially the rear bolt. We ended up fitting a normal saddle with 7 mil rails and had no problems after that. UPDATE: BikeYoke has now updated the bolts supplied with the Divine, this should no longer be an issue going forward.

Our test pilot also experienced some creaks during heavy seated pedaling, once we cleaned and greased everything around the head and bolts it got a lot quieter, although the occasional squeak can still be heard if you really give it a hard time.

Long Term Durability

We haven't put the real long hours on the post but for now, after three months on the trail it is free of any sponginess and stays true and at the same height throughout the entire ride. There was minimal side to side movement out of the box, this has not gotten any worse over time so far. Based on our experiences with the longer travel BikeYoke posts, we expect the company to have done its homework and that their posts will continue to provide many happy hours of use. BikeYoke makes a number of spare parts available for those who wish to perform more advanced maintenance themselves (which requires a reasonable amount of skill), or you can drop the post off where you bought it or at an authorized service center.

What’s The Bottom Line?

If you're OK with a fine of 200-300 grams to make your XC bike more capable and your riding more comfortable over technical terrain, you'll get a premium product that is light, works well, looks neat and offers exactly the right dimensions for its purpose. As XC race tracks are getting more and more technical, we feel that this kind of accessory will soon be indispensable for anybody aspiring to post up a good result - we are certainly in no hurry to remove ours...

For more information, head on over to www.bikeyoke.de.

About The Reviewer

Yonatan Yatom - Age: 24 // Years Riding MTB: 13 // Height :6'0" (1.83m) // Weight: 161 pounds (73kg)

Yonatan is a born racer and a bike addict. As a true competitor the only thing on his mind when lining up in the start gate is the finish line. With a background in local enduro and DH races and even the occasional appearance in an Enduro World Series on his resume, Yonatan has more recently applied himself to building bigger legs and trying his luck racing XC. Throughout the week he’ll be manning the spanners at the bike shop, reading about new stuff on the internet, and thinking about how to improve everything he rides. Yonatan’s riding style is fully pinned, smooth, and quiet but he can be nasty to his bike when needed.

Photos by Johan Hjord