Trail vs Enduro What should I purchase?

Trail bike, you need. Lots of pedaling I see in your future.

More laps lead to progression. Progression leads to speed. Speed leads to.... racing results.

There are a few manufactures now who a making one frame with multiple links/stays so you can choose what style of riding you want to do. Guerilla Gravity and Last both make frames you can swap the linkages/stays, so you can have 2 bikes for the price of one.

If your goal is to race/go fast get an enduro bike. The current gen is dialed to go fast. If you want to just have a good time but not necessarily push for speed get a trail bike. They are plenty rowdy to progress on and will be a lot more fun at average speeds.

I agree with BulletBass.Without knowing the terrain in your area, I think day-to-day a trail bike is the way to go. It is more fun and likely faster on most terrain save for the true super gnar. It’s pretty insane how hard you can ride a 140mm trail bike these days

I am of the opinion that it's more fun to push a trail bike to its limit and have to finesse through some super-gnar compared to hauling around a huge, long, and sluggish enduro bike.

I'm also a +1 for the trail bike. If you like to pop, manual and play you will hate the enduro bike on the majority of your rides, a super long, slack and squishy enduro bike on average trails is boring. On the other hand, a poppy and agile trail bike on rowdy trail is a hoot! I would suggest getting a trail bike with more modern geo like the Norco Optic to get the best of both worlds.

You could get something like the Ripmo that pedals well and still can handle some enduro races. A 37lbs enduro beast sounds like it would suck for the amount of pedaling you do and an overly pedal oriented short/mid travel bike might not cut it on the downs.

I'm starting to think a bike like the Stumpjumper Evo is optimal for most enduro series, as so many races have major pedally sections and at least one slow, junky stage. The bit of time gained by a big bike on a high-speed chunky section can be lost in a few tight turns.

Another vote for a trail bike. I personally own an enduro for my "do-it-all" bike, but I don't do much of the poppy, playful stuff. I prefer to smash the steep descents and have travel to soak up the gnar. I don't really care if my bike pedals with hyper efficiency. It sounds like you would prefer better efficiency and more playfulness. Most "trail" bikes still have enough travel to ride pretty fast on downhills now, anyway.

I don’t agree with the thought line of increasing travel in spurts. Find the bike that makes sense to you. Especially if you are keeping what is probably a very capable xc bike for pedaling days. That doesn’t mean more travel is right for ya, but if your goal is to ride really fast all the time you will be disappointed at some point with the trail bike. My local trails can be easily ridden on a rigid xc bike and all my friends only ride their enduro bikes there.

Consider buying used (with right inspection), you should.

Buy used, and sell for little to no loss if it's not what you had in mind or you progress beyond it. OR demo a few bikes before buying.

Not sure how the used market in Greece is, in Italy there is a good used market through shops, websites, social forums.

My $0.02 (coming from an American)

1) Don't buy used unless you are a mechanic and know exactly what you are looking at. By the time you price in wear parts (chain, pads, chain ring, suspension refresh etc) and the lack of warranty you likely are going to be upside down. Look at Nukeproof, the new Specialized Status, Marin (not sure if you can get them), Transition etc.

2) If you are asking this question, go for the bigger bike. There are a lot of reasons I say that but the biggest one is you can always ride a big bike in small bike terrain. Going the other way simply isn't as fun.

3) Most enduro bikes pedal super well these days. I often time myself going uphill on my Specialized Enduro. Compared to my Spur, I'm slower, but its not nearly as much as you'd think, especially if my ride is under 90 minutes.

4) The biggest reason to go trail bike over enduro bike is you want a more lively ride, and want to have a more dynamic experience on mellower trails. The efficiency component is notable too, don't get me wrong, but don't underestimate the upgrade in efficiency a lighter/faster rolling tire will bring to an enduro bike.

5) Enduro bikes are more forgiving. Crashing sucks. So does breaking parts.

Not to sound too silly but I'd recommend something in between, a classic "all mountain" bike... Something on the burlier side of the trail bike spectrum such as a Santa Cruz Hightower V2, Trek Remedy, Norco Sight, Canyon Spectral etc. with around 150 mm of travel but intended for more than just descending.

I'd say a bike like the Hightower (my current bike just to be clear) probably out-enduros a lot of enduro bikes from just a few years ago while still keeping up pretty well with the 130-140 mm trail bikes on the climbs. If you want more downhill performance you can also get a CC link (I have not tried it though). I'd probably +1 on the Ripmo if I hadn't seen so many broken Ibis frames over the last few years from riding that is far below EWS level....

I've run my last few trail/all mountain bikes a lot in bike parks and on WC DH tracks and while you DO find the limits at some point, with a set of DH tires and big brakes they are more capable than people give them credit for.