Trek 6000 Review

‍If you’re looking for an affordable mountain bike, there are dozens of options to choose from. This review will help you decide if the Trek 6000 is for you.

Overall, the Trek 6000 mountain bike is a solid, affordable choice if you need a general-use bike for casual riding or commuting. It has a lot of features you’ll find in higher-end mountain bikes like disc brakes and a suspension fork. It definitely isn’t designed for hardcore riding though.

I’ve ridden hardtail mountain bikes my entire life, and my first bike was a budget model from Trek. For this review I’ve dug into all the specs, components, and details on this bike to give you the information you need.

‍Trek 6000 Performance

If you’re looking for a capable all-around bike that’s equally happy on your commute, neighborhood bike paths, and flowy singletrack trails, the Trek 6000 is a great choice.

This isn’t an all-out trail shredding machine by any means, but it is plenty capable for most recreational riders wanting to get out on some singletrack and have fun. And it still maintains plenty of practicality for everyday use.

Descending

If you are planning to tackle highly technical, rocky descents, you’ll probably be better served by a more aggressive bike. With it’s fairly traditional geometry, 26 inch wheels, and limited suspension travel, the Trek 6000 just isn’t cut out for hardcore riding.

On steep, rough trails, you’ll pretty quickly find yourself out of your element and clinging on for dear life.

Where this bike shines, though, is on gentler, flowy singletrack. The cross-country-oriented geometry, small wheels, and hardtail handling make this bike feel very playful and responsive on smoother trails.

Climbing

The Shimano 3x10 drivetrain gets you plenty of low gear range, especially when you take the 26” wheels into consideration. The lowest gear gives you a 24-tooth chainring in the front to a 36-tooth cog in the back, which is great for winching your way up steep hills.

This bike is also fairly lightweight for an entry-level bike, and it’s cross-country geometry puts you in a very efficient climbing position.

The smaller 26-inch wheels on the Trek 6000 may not roll over obstacles as well as bigger 29-inch wheels, but they do make this bike feel very maneuverable when climbing.

Commuting

If you’re looking for an older entry-level mountain bike like this, you probably are wanting something versatile that can be your only bike for everything. I commute to work every day on my hardtail mountain bike, so I’ll be the first to tell you that you can definitely use a mountain bike for more than trails.

The Trek 6000 is a perfectly capable bike for commuting or just cruising around town. It has built-in fender mounts and mounting points for a rack to carry your gear.

Trek 6000 Frame and Geometry

The Trek 6000 mountain bike is built around a fairly basic, but well-made alluminum frame.

This frame has plenty of modern features built-in like a formed top tube, monostay seatstay, forged dropouts w/ rack mounts, a threaded bottom bracket shell, and disc brake post mounts.

Specs and Components

Drivetrain

The Trek 6000 comes equipped with a Shimano Deore drivetrain with a triple chainring up front and a 10-speed cassette in the back. This drivetrain has plenty of range for everything from cruising on the road to winching your way up technical climbs.

The Shimano Deore XT m780 Shadow rear derailleur offers very smooth and crisp shifting performance. This is a reliable drivetrain that you can rely on to get your power to the ground no matter the conditions.

Suspension

As a hardtail, the Trek 6000 has no rear suspension. This makes it much more efficient for pedaling uphill or on flat sections, but also means you’ll feel more trail chatter than a full suspension bike.

In the front you get a Suntour XCR-RL coil spring suspension fork with a remote lockout. The 100mm of travel isn’t a ton, but for the type of riding you’ll do with this bike, it’s more than enough.

This fork isn’t the lightest weight on the market, but it offers surprisingly good performance for a budget fork. It is smooth throughout it’s travel and does a good job at smoothing out rocks and roots in the trail.

The remote lockout is an awesome feature that lets you quickly switch between modes for variable riding.

Brakes

This bike comes equipped with Shimano m446 hydraulic disc brakes that provide ample stopping power and decent modulation. It’s really awesome to see Trek packing in performance-oriented components like this at an entry-level price.

Brakes are definitely an undervalued component of any bicycle, but they are massively important for riding, especially on trails. Having powerful brakes will give you more confidence and control to ride faster on the descents.

If you are coming from mechanical disc brakes or rim brakes, you’ll be blown away by how much better these hydraulic brakes are.

Wheelset

The Trek 6000 rides on a pair of Bontrager hubs laced to Shimano M435 alloy hubs. Overall this wheelset is about what you’d expect in an older budget bike. These wheels are plenty sturdy, but a bit on the heavy side.

The biggest thing to note here is that you’re stuck with old-school 26-inch wheels. The mountain bike industry as a whole has shifted to 29-inch or 27.5-inch wheels, so this bicycle is definitely showing it’s age here.

For casual riding, the smaller wheels won’t be a problem, but 29-inch wheels definitely are smoother and faster on the trail.

Tires

Those 26-inch wheels are wrapped with some pretty basic Bontrager XR1 wire bead tires in a 2.2-inch width. These should be adequate for most casual trail riding, but you may find yourself short on grip through loose sections of trail.

Other Components

Other component highlights include the Bontrager race lite step and grips, the surprisingly comfortable saddle, and the low rise handlebar that puts you in a great balanced position.

Overall, this is a quite comfortable bike for all sorts of riding.

Competition for the Trek 6000

The Trek 6000 is no longer in production, so you may be interested in looking at some more modern alternatives that are still available on the market. Here are a few bikes that are pretty comparable to the Trek 6000.

Trek 6000 vs Trek Marlin 4

The Trek Marlin 4 is probably the most similar ride you’ll be able to find to the Trek 6000. It has a Shimano 3x drivetrain, a Suntour suspension fork, and a basic but fairly lightweight aluminum frame

The Trek 6000 actually has some advantages over the Marlin 4, which only has a 7-speed cassette and mechanical disc brakes.

Where the Marlin 4 shows it’s advantage is in the more modern wheel size choices. You can get either 27.5 or 29-inch wheels, which makes for a much smoother more capable ride overall.

With the Marlin 4, Trek has started following the trend of matching wheel size to frame size. On the smaller sizes you get 27.5-inch wheels, while larger sizes are equipped with 29ers.

Trek 6000 vs Canyon Grand Canyon

Canyon is a modern direct-to-consumer manufacturer that uses their business model to offer capable bikes at impressively low prices. The Grand Canyon is their entry-level mountain bike model that packs in an impressive range of performance and features at a low price.

If you’re looking for a capable modern mountain bike on a budget, the Canyon Grand Canyon may offer the best price-to-performance ratio on the market. Seriously, it’s incredible that they were able to deliver so much at this price.

The Grand Canyon has fairly aggressive modern geometry with a slack head tube angle and steep seat tube angle. It will definitely feel much more confident on trails than the Trek 6000.

You also get a very well-spec’d component selection. You get Shimano MT200 hydraulic disc brakes for fantastic stopping power, a smooth-shifting Shimano 12-speed drivetrain, a Suntour XCR coil suspension fork, and larger wheel sizes for smooth-rolling performance.

Trek 6000 vs Specialized Rockhopper Sport 29

The Rockhopper is Specialized’s entry-level hardtail mountain bike, and it’s one of the most popular mountain bikes out there.

The Specialized Rockhopper Sport 29 is the second lowest bike in the Rockhopper range. It has a Microshift 2 by 9 speed drivetrain, a Suntour XCM coil suspension fork, Shimano MT200 hydraulic disc brakes, and an aluminum frame with cross-country-inspired geometry.

Overall, you can expect fairly similar performance from the Specialized Rockhopper Sport 29 and the Trek 6000. The big difference again is going to be in wheel size. There is a reason you don’t see modern mountain bikes with 26-inch wheels.

Just having the larger wheels makes the Specialized Rockhopper feel more fun and capable on most trail riding. It rolls faster and smoother and is easier to keep in control.

Where to Buy the Trek 6000

Unfortunately, the Trek 6000 went out of production in 2012, so it is no longer available from Trek. You can still find a good used one near you or online. BikeExchange is a great online marketplace where you can shop for used bikes.

Bicycle Blue Book lists the fair value of the 2012 model of the Trek 6000 at around $300, so there are definitely good deals to be had. If you can find one used, you’ll be getting a lot of bike for your money.