http://www.pinkbike.com/news/jared-graves-specialized-enduro-bike-check.html

Love his attitude.

Carbon wheels Jared? No thanks.

Fancy trying B-plus? Don’t be silly.

🙂

And came second on the national dh at the weekend on that bike… Racing him in enduro next weekend…

Best of luck

More worried about any after party with Gracia more…

mikewsmith – Member

And came second on the national dh at the weekend on that bike… Racing him in enduro next weekend…

I think he beat me by about 240 places 😆 But I could’ve had him!

Thanks for posting, really good read.

Carbon wheels Jared? No thanks.

Fancy trying B-plus? Don’t be silly.

Extrapolating his comments to fit with your own mindset much? If you could guarantee him the exact same durability and weight from carbon wheels and plus tyres Id guess he’d give them a try. Don’t know about the carbon but I suspect the latter would be impossible so his comments make a lot of sense.

Yeah, very honest and down to earth article.
Said what loads of us think and usually get shouted down for:

Carbon wheels?….no thanks, not strong enough for racing at the top level.

Plus sized tyres?….again no thanks, the sidewalls would need so much reinforcing to take EWS type abuse they’d end up weighing close to 2 kgs per tyre (his words not mine!).

Errrr, he used carbon DT Swiss wheels for years.

Extrapolating his comments to fit with your own mindset much?

Just a tiny bit of artistic license taken with B-plus, bet it was what he was thinking though.

I’m not anti B-plus anyway, I just suspect I’d get too many holes in the tyres due to riding rocky trails.

Errrr, he used carbon DT Swiss wheels for years.

Wonder if he had a race-ending incident with one?

Needs fatter tyres 😛

Errrr, he used carbon DT Swiss wheels for years.

These all look alloy to me

2013
http://www.silverfish-uk.com/NewsDetail/112371/Bike-Check-Jared-Graves-EWS-Winning-Yeti

2014
http://www.pinkbike.com/news/yeti-sb6c-jared-graves-whistler.html

2015
http://www.pinkbike.com/news/pinkbikes-ews-pro-rides-jared-graves-and-his-yeti-sb5c.html

It certainly doesn’t sound like we’ll be seeing any chain stay-gate stories involving Graves in 2016

what’s a chain stay-gate story?

I come back and put an extra 10 psi in the fork, and then see how that feels. Then let out 20 psi out and see how that feels, and then come back to somewhere in the middle.

so back to pressure it started at then? 🙂

what’s a chain stay-gate story?

I might be wrong but I think it’s a reference to Aaron Gwin moving to Specialized and his results dropping off a cliff, apparently because of the short chainstays on the old Demo.

These all look alloy to me

Yeah they do, but these don’t…

http://yetifan.com/Bike_check-/bike_check-.html

Yeah, but is that actually his bike, or one made to look like it…

Either way, he’s changed his mind on the matter now.

Be good to have him back in EWS action this year.

The reason for using alloy wheels over carbon in Enduro is you have to finish with the wheels you started with other wise a time penalty, hence you can bend a alloy rim after a big dent and finish on the same wheels, carbon is not so forgiving.
Nico runs a Alloy rear wheel for this reason.

looks like a beast

My mate is currently building up a bike for Graves… And Hannah Barnes… And the thick jawed septic, Curtis something…

He’s the new Specialized mechanic.

Lucky sod. It has meant that I’ve suddenly become much fonder of Specialized bikes in the hope that there is a top end enduro knocking about….

His preference for alloy wheels is probably because he doesn’t have access to a set of carbon wheels that he has ultimate faith in. Specialized don’t make a DH ready carbon wheelset.

If he had moved to a team that was sponsored by ENVE, then he would be singing the praises of carbon wheels…

His preference for alloy wheels is probably because he doesn’t have access to a set of carbon wheels that he has ultimate faith in. Specialized don’t make a DH ready carbon wheelset.

If he had moved to a team that was sponsored by ENVE, then he would be singing the praises of carbon wheels…

But a carbon DH rim will weigh similar to an alu enduro rim – and it’s still more likely to shatter than bend, no?

It’s certainly more likely to shatter than bend- but that’s not the question, the question is will it do either.

Course, he’s more than qualified to make the right choice for him, and he’s also smart enough to make it clear the same choice might not be right for others. He’d not last 5 minutes here…

But a carbon DH rim will weigh similar to an alu enduro rim – and it’s still more likely to shatter than bend, no?

have the syndicate guys shattered any enve rims?

Always like Jared, one of the most talented riders out there. Bet if he turned his hand to Road he would do pretty well.

Nice to see an honest pro and also interesting to see Specialized letting him choose his own kit. You can trust that he chooses kit that is right for the job, no marketing bull.

Surprised he’s on rockshox and not flying the Ohlins flag but I guess rockshox probably offer more support and sponsorship on the blackbox programme. But then he may prefer rs.

have the syndicate guys shattered any enve rims?

I don’t think thats a fair comparison. We have no idea how many rims the syndicate guys get through in a race weekend, let alone a season. Also their rims, whilst taking a beating only have to last 5 minutes and weight is less of a consideration when you don’t have to ride it uphill

have the syndicate guys shattered any enve rims?

You’d be best asking them.

From what I’ve heard still a reasonable amount.

We also don’t know what Enve rims the Syndicate team use.
Enve might be producing extra heavy duty rims for the team to avoid any embarrassing carbon failure on Live stream. As Graves says, hitting a rock with a square edge at 60mph put huge forces through wheels. Us mortals don’t even approach the forces the WC riders exert.

I remember reading this a while ago on bike radar about the syndicate team on envy rims.

During the 2010 season, the Syndicate’s first on the carbon rims, they replaced 53 wheels, which was down from a reported 180 wheels per season when the team was on alloy. In 2011, the team had to replace just 11 wheels.

Over both seasons, ENVE say there wasn’t a single catastrophic failure. “It was only eight up until the world champs,” Jason Schiers, ENVE’s founder told BikeRadar. “We were hoping to keep it under double digits for the year, which would have been huge. Steve Peat raced the same set of wheels all year long, which was unheard of [he used a separate set of practice wheels].”

Steve Peat rode the same race wheels over the course of the entire World Cup series in 2011

Of last season’s 11 broken wheels, not one lost air pressure or warranted their rider to slow before the finish line. “They were cracking hook beads,” said Schiers of the failures. “We made some more tweaks over the off-season, again, and the ones we’re releasing are even stronger than the ones they raced on last year. We’re excited to see if we can get through a year without a broken rim on the DH circuit, which would be huge.”

So is Jared just saying the roval carbons are shit?

Having followed him for a while on social media what he seems to be saying is this is my bike.
A supreme talent on any kind of bike, I remember when he was getting podium places at national weekends in xc and dh…