There's a lot to be said for a simple, dependable, single pivot suspension design. Give it almost 6 inches of rear wheel travel, and craft the frame out of stout, but not overbuilt, 6069 aluminium alloy. Choose between a lightweight air shock or bomber duty coil spring.

Tune the geometry to handle anything the mountain might have in mind, upward or down, riding far and long all day, or riding lifts until your fingers cramp. Do that, and you have a pretty sweet jack-of-all-trades. Now, machine a bottle opener into one of the beefy rear dropouts, and you're looking at a real winner, baby!