Step in most bike shops with $400 to spend, and the hired help will size you up: not terribly serious, pretty gentle on the machinery, wears plaid pants, wants a comfort bike.

But inexpensive bikes for serious mountain bike riding do exist for people saving their money, and the Cross Country 2.0 is high on the list for one compelling reason: it's the least expensive 27-speed bike on the market.

Those of you still wondering why a bike needs 10 speeds are probably even more baffled at the thought of 27, so here's the reason why: You know how your car runs happiest if you don't rev the engine in first gear, nor lug the engine in fourth gear? Your legs are the same way, and as you become a performance-oriented rider, you get increasingly picky about how fast they're spinning. The 27-speed drivetrain accommodates this need just a little better than a "mere" 24-speed or 21-speed drivetrain. The drivetrain components come from SR and SRAM, two well-regarded companies with good-value products.

You'll hear this bike called a "hardtail." That means it has a front suspension fork but no rear suspension. While rear suspension is available in all price ranges, many riders prefer hardtail because of its mechanical simplicity and because there is no possibility of the rear suspension moving when you don't want it to.

The SR suspension fork has a full 75 mm of travel, meaning it's designed to take some pretty big bumps at speed. That's the nature of rough trail riding on a mountain bike, and this one is made for the job.

There are other clues to this mountain bike's purposeful nature. The threadless headset can be adjusted for bearing tightness in seconds--something you'll appreciate when a three-hour trail ride vibrates it loose. A gusset underneath the down tube/head tube junction is there to keep the frame from bending when you pound the stuffing out of the bike on big bumps. The frame comes in sizes down to 12 inches because dedicated mountain bike riders like a small frame with a fully extended seat post (for weight savings, stiffness, and standover clearance). And by the way, the frame is triple gauge aluminum tubing--an honorable design by anyone's measure.

If you're on the fence between this bike and a similarly priced comfort bike, here's how it breaks down: buy the Cross Country and you give up extra cush in the saddle. Buy the comfort bike and you give up the trail-chewing ruggedness and knobby tires. It's a choice only you can make.