I think you’re missing the point with things like apps’ bikes not being commercially successful.

They’re not poorly performing, they may even be the perfect bike for what everybody does, but they’re the worst bike for what most people want to do.

When you do your air handlebars down a particularly twisty bit of path are you Atherton or ambling?

People don’t buy things because they’re good at what they do, or we’d all be driving a metalic blue 90s Volvo, people buy self image and that’s what manufactures have to sell to be commercially successful.

The comparison with “sportive” bikes says a lot, people who want to buy them will, by and large use them for riding they could likely do more comfortably and just as well on a sit up and beg shopper. They have an image of themselves doing fred wittons and the like but mostly they’ll commute a short distance or do a pub/cafe ride at the weekend.

People who will ride sportives [want to] buy a race bike because “that’s what wiggo rides” and they don’t envisage themselves riding in the wiggle ride, they envisage riding the giro.

The difference on road is sportive bikes tend to come in cheaper than race bikes because, well, weight, and people can’t bring themselves to spend 4k on the race bike they want. Likewise I’d wager price not practicality is the major factor for most hardtail sales (look at how many fs BSOs you see).

Of course the genuine enthusiast market, such as stw, is likely to know what suits what they do (even if we don’t buy that) but we make up a fraction of sales so, as long as the folks on tv keep riding pinarellos and the mags keep saying longer slacker wider, that’s what manufacturers will continue to make, even if it comes to the point of producing terrible product because they fulfill demand not create it.

There are of course pockets of people in all walks of life who are happy to be a bimbler, but for most of us it’s at least subconsciously the domain of our dad and not something we’d aspire to do.

Practical is what you buy when you can’t afford aspiration so expensive and practical don’t mix.

apps’ bikes not being commercially successful.

There’s a bit of complexity to why that is though isn’t there, a mix of historical circumstance, commercial constrains, some individual decisions and a lack of marketing, things could have been very different and off-road riding in the UK could have taken a very different path, it’s not that they couldn’t have been commercially successful, its that when standing at that particular fork in the trail in blustered MTBs with all the right noises, money, backing and a pre-existing coolness just at the right time and nobbled roughstuff and offroad trials right there and then.

so, as long as the folks on tv keep riding pinarellos and the mags keep saying longer slacker wider, that’s what manufacturers will continue to make, even if it comes to the point of producing terrible product because they fulfill demand not create it.

That’s the crux of it, and that’s where I hope we don’t ever end up, products being made simply because they will sell as it’s ‘the latest thing’ rather that actually being excellent at what they do. Fortunately right now most of the stuff that sells well is also really rather good, even it not 100% ideal for the riding people are actually doing.

Practical is what you buy when you can’t afford aspiration so expensive and practical don’t mix.

I would disagree with this a bit, there are some very expensive and very practical bikes out there that would never be used in a race, so aren’t in the aspirational copycat category. Proof of that is the fact you can buy numerous comfort/endurance/sportivey road bikes well below the UCI weight limit and with more di2, Ti and Carbon than you can shake a seatpost at, both practical and high performance and NOT copycat race replicas, nor trying to be a one, a category all alone, I think similarities with MTB ‘trail’ bikes are valid.

Not copycat at that end you’re right but I’d argue (wrongly probably) that those bikes sell exactly because they’re aspirational not practical. People buying a 3oz cannondale aren’t doing so because it’s comfy [they maybe but I’m assuming they’re horrible to ride] they’re buying it because it’s the best*. Equally they’re buying a full di2 with adaptive cruise control (which would be pretty useful) because it’s the dog’s danglies not because di2 is better suited to their riding, even though it might be. The practicality of these machines is distant a second in much the same way a Porsche macan might be an incredibly practical car but people buy them because they’re a Porsche.

@ dangeourbrain
“Practical is what you buy when you can’t afford aspiration so expensive and practical don’t mix”.

I believe that the very reason that mountain bikes were phenomenally successful in Britain in the 80s & 90s was because they challenged the earlier popular assumption that most people only cycled because they could not afford a car or motorbike.

Homemade ‘Tracker’ off-road bicycles had existed in Britain since the 1950s but they were cheap and broke easily. Attempts to produce manufactured versions of these bikes also focused on low price and quality, the most famous variant being the 1981 Raleigh Bomber. The first mountain bikes by comparison cost four to eight times the price and were well engineered and capable of withstanding a lot more abuse.

Mountain bikes also looked distinctive to existing bikes and once they became generally regarded as expensive and new, they also became desirable and fashionable. Like Range Rover drivers most mountain bike owners had little intention of riding seriously off-road, it was the potential for adventure that sold them.

I however with my shiny new 1984 F.W.Evans ATB had the indignity of struggling to keep up with the Clelands and the added humiliation of having to stop every few hundred yards in order to poke out the mud where it was jamming the wheels or run down the hills because mud covered cantilever rim brakes don’t work well.

As for the Clelands speeds I remember them as being relatively fast and not slow. Though as with MTBs in general you would get some riders who would like to ride fast and others that took their time.

If you do want to ride downhill quickly on a Cleland I recommend dropping the seat out of the way and then standing up ‘on the pegs’, knees slightly bent to absorb shocks and your weight to the back in the style of motor-cross rider.

I however with my shiny new 1984

I think in 1984 i may have been about old enough to have had a shinny new potty so i don’t think i can render an opinion 😉

@dangeourbrain

I like to think that the people you describe are a vanishingly small minority, but you might be quite close to the truth there for a lot of them 🙁

I believe that the very reason that mountain bikes were phenomenally successful in Britain in the 80s & 90s

I think it was because they had triple chainsets. Your average cheapo road bike that was seen as an ‘adult’ bike was made to look like racing bikes on the telly (we called them racers) and they had 39/25 for their lowest gear on 700c. So most hills round town were quite hard work. MTBs made them rather easier and were comfier to ride too 🙂