so, after this happened to my snap-and-fail

Snapped Cannondale by 5lab, on Flickr

I built up a nice shiney new Banshee\Mythic Wildcard.

Somewhere along the way, someone has measured their geometry a bit off, or I’ve cocked up and not taken seat angles into effect (I’ll be getting my tape measure out later on to figure out who) and instead of the Wildcard being 1.7cm longer in the ‘effective top tube’ than the gemini, its about 5 or 6.

Now, the Wildcard is actually the right size for me, wheras the Gemini was rather short – so I’m going to try and adapt my riding to cope. A good run down some tracks on Sunday seemed to make me feel that the thing I’m missing most is my ability to loft the front wheel – resulting in my nosediving in a comedy way into big holes a few times

so – what can I do to get better? is it just a case of a few more days out and it’ll be fine, or are there some techniques I can use to help with things? I’m already running a 50mm stem on a onepointfive headtube, so there’s really not much hope in shortening things there..

Hugh

Try some higher rise bars or raise your stem a bit?

Or roll your bars back slightly.

Get used to it.

If that doesn’t work, narrower bars? A lay forward post?

http://www.singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/layback-post-usable-in-reverse

Seatpost wouldnt make much difference as you’ll be stood up on the pedals when performing these “lofting the bars” moves

Are you sure its the correct size frame you ordered? 6cm is a fair difference.

longer chain stays making lifting hte front harder? different damping settings on fork/shock required?

could be the chainstays as well – I hadn’t thought about that – thanks.

The wildcard I’ve got is a large, unless they have a secret ‘superlarge’ i’m unaware of, I think its the right size. I’ve not measured anything manually yet, but when I was out riding yesterday, on the Gemini I had to be careful not to knock my knee on the stem, but on the Wildcard there’s tonnes of clearance – looks by eye to be a good 2″.

I quite like the wide bars I have on there at the moment, so more looking to change me, rather than change the bike..

Could be the chainstays or the BB height (higher usually seems easier to me)