The new Lyrik may have stolen all the headlines for RockShox last year, but it also released an equally significant new fork in the Yari.

The RockShox Yari shares a lot of features with the Lyrik such as the 35 mm stanchions, the oversized lowers and the deep crown, but there’s one significant difference, it’s £250 cheaper.

The key difference between the two is the Motion Control damper. The Lyrik and the Pike run the Charger damper, whereas the Yari shares its internals with the Revelation. Our main problem with the Revelation has been that its 32mm stanchions can feel a bit out of their depth, so combining its impressive damping with the stiffness of a Lyrik has to be a good thing.

It’s not just the damper that sets the RockShox Yari apart from the Lyrik. The Yari comes with a humongous range of travel options to suit almost every ride with 120-180mm options in 650b and 120-160mm in 29er.

One of the big stories for RockShox this year is the Torque Cap compatibility. This allows you to run a 31mm end cap on your hub that increases contact and boosts stiffness. The Yari also benefits from an increased volume in the negative spring (just like the Lyrik), SKF wiper seals and the option of a Dual Position air version (that can now take Bottomless Tokens).

We see this bike being perfect for trail bikes that come in around the £2,000 mark. In the past we’ve always thought these bikes would benefit from a Pike but, of course, that would push the price of the bike up. This fork could really improve the performance of these bikes despite the obvious weight penalty.

In fact we’ve alreay tested a bike with a RockShoxYari – the Whyte T130 S Yari– and it scored a perfect 10/10, not a bad debut!