So some thieving scumbag stole my Felt off the roof of my car on Friday morning – almost unbelievable! I had been thinking about upgrading for a while but now my hand has been forced.

So here is my problem.
I mainly ride trail centres but want to do more general trail riding in the future. I used to have a meta 5.5 but sold it to pay for some baby stuff! I kind of had my heart set on a meta am3 but i missed out on one today after much deliberation over buying it.
I want a bike that will last me a few years and can ‘grow’ with me. i have around 2k to spend but really need to keep a bit back for a reverb and some dmrs.

Cheers!

Firstly don’t be surprised that your bike got nicked off the roof.

Need is also a but strong sometimes 150 is nice sometimes it’s a pain. More important is the ride and feel. See if you can catch some demo days or see what your lbs can do. Try a few bigger and smaller bikes out

It was a bit of a surprise. it was in a car park in the middle of town. I only left it for a few minutes. They even stood on the roof to get it off.

I was thinking about a 2012 or 2011 bike to get a bit more for my cash?

Travel is not somthing to get to hung up on.
I do use an enduro evo as my bike trail centre bike
It’s 160 rear 170 front coil spring beast and Iove it
But my old fsr is only 125 rear and 130 front and feels more fun day to day

I’m not slower on the old one just can’t get spare for a 10 year old bike so have to replace it
You just need to ride some and see what fits with you

Get onto Pauls cycles and have a look at last years or even 2011 giant trances. Brilliant bikes, great value at full prices and they always have a load of previous year stock massively reduced

http://www.paulscycles.co.uk/products.php?plid=m1b4s1p3507&tbv=GIANT_TRANCE_X1_Mountain_Bikes_Full_Suspension

Where else are you goin to get full xt and fox for 1800 quid. I have this exact bike and its fantastic

I bought a Canyon Nerve AL+ it has 150mm and feels great, it climbs well and already has a Reverb Stealth. I bought the AL+ 7 for about £1850.

I’ve a Pitch, it’s mind bendingly brilliant in some situations, in others it’s a dead albatross round my neck. Some tracks that much travel/slackness/weight just isn’t as much fun.

Did GT and Innerleithen and Spooky wood just didn’t live up to the hype and felt slow and clumsy (which is odd as the even smoother blue bits felt really fun). Either way I reckon it was the bike just being too much bike and something lighter and more efficient would have been faster and more fun.

Forget need. Just desire. You want 150. Doesn’t matter you could ride it all on a rigid.

Forget need

Well said. Sonce when has mountain biking been about need? You don’t need any travel at all.

mrmoonface – Member

So some thieving scumbag stole my Felt off the roof of my car on Friday morning – almost unbelievable! I had been thinking about upgrading for a while but now my hand has been forced.

So here is my problem.
I mainly ride trail centres but want to do more general trail riding in the future. I used to have a meta 5.5 but sold it to pay for some baby stuff! I kind of had my heart set on a meta am3 but i missed out on one today after much deliberation over buying it.
I want a bike that will last me a few years and can ‘grow’ with me. i have around 2k to spend but really need to keep a bit back for a reverb and some dmrs.

My two cents. The Meta AM is a very different animal from the meta 55 of old. It’s much longer, slacker. Generally a faster bike and certainly a modern AM/Enduro race bike as opposed to the old mountain goat/ long legged xc bike that the meta 55 was.

If you want to do some gravity enduro’s, some uplift days, a few trips abroad or just technical rough, fast trails then get one. They ride well.

But…

Bare in mind that current 120mm bikes are, in my humble opinion just as capable, competent and fast (although not as cushy) as your old meta 55 and will feel faster, be more involving and may actually be quicker on the clock on “typical trail centre stuff”.

deadkenny and wrecker got it right. It’s about desire. There isn’t a trail Center in England you need 150mm of travel. If you’re going up to Jacobs ladder every day you could possibly use a bit.

Where do you see your riding going in the next few years? Big rides, natural xc type stuff, maybe some races? Or developing your jumping skills, maybe the alps, uplifts, snowdon, lakes etc?

I wish I thought ahead when buying bikes, learn from my mistakes!

As above, want not need. A 120 will do you.

120 bike – ie trail bike. trail centres, natural riding, occasional DH tracks, a bit of jumping. More than capable of any trail riding the uk has to offer. if you’re learning, not so much suspension you’re removed from what is going on, hence never cottoning on to what is cottoning on. Better for learning skills such as jumping, manualing, pumping etc. There’s no “growing” out of it, just getting faster on it. Then you have capable 120 bikes that are as capable as some 150 bikes.

Trail riders in the uk seem to eager to write off uplifts and dh tracks on the uk, a trail bike won’t stop you doing it, a bigger bike will only allow you to cover the rough bits faster.

150 bike – big mountain riding, alps, suffer up to bomb down. Enduro racing, plenty of uplift days and DH riding. Capable of a good bit of frreriding and senders too. Unless you need the mini dh bike capability, it’s pointless carrying it around for general trail riding. Ideal if you really should have a DH and a trail bike, but can’t afford it. Again you have really capable 150 bikes like a mega, then less capable such as a pivot mach 5.7.

One thing i found when i went from 120mm to 150mm of travel, is that my riding style changed, and i went from someone who just cycles around (and often around obsticles) to someone who “rides” and looks tio try new things that push my limits. A 150mm bike does give you confidence to try new things (much of that is a purely mental confidence boost rather than a real tangable capability boost)

If you are just going to keep riding the trails you currently ride, then a 120mm bike will be fine, if you want to progress to something harder/steeper/rougher, then a 150mm bike will give you a natural push to help you make that step 😉

150mm bike is hardly ‘suffer up to bomb down’, the majority are specced as trail bikes and weigh in at we’ll under 30lbs. A long way removed from a mini DH bike.

Get a bike with 120mm rear and 140mm front and add a set of talas’ like I’m planning to do with my ex8…best of both. Rear that feels like 140mm and the ability to go small or big at the front depending on the situation.

I used to have a 2007 meta 5.5.2 (150mm), and my trek is just as capable.

But if you’re intent on buying a Zesty 214/314…couldn’t blame you!

150mm bike is hardly ‘suffer up to bomb down’, the majority are specced as trail bikes and weigh in at we’ll under 30lbs. A long way removed from a mini DH bike

Now we’re in the times where a DH race bike can come in below 36lbs, 30lbs for a mini dh bike isn’t that far of a stretch of the imagination, especially considering xc bikes at sub 22lbs and trail bikes at sub 26lbs without trying hard. It’s all relative.

Disagree 100%. Its usually the users that end up using the 150mm bikes as a trail bike.

Its not difficult to understand the market. Though some bikes do complicate things, it is pretty much as simple as –

4″ – XC – pretty obvious, off road, road riding
5″ – Trail – MTBing (including getting air/dh track dabbling)
6″ – BIG mountain trail riding/light freeride
7″ – Freeride – monoverable DH bike
8″ – DH – Race Bike

Anything there that stands out as wildly off the mark?

Have you considered the Meta SL with 120mm travel?

I’m a bit like you i’m looking at the Meta AM for holidays abroad and generally **** about on but thinking the Meta SL will be more pratical for over here. Commencal call the the SL a light all mountain bike.

I would say that in the first instance it is not the amount of travel but the quality…….
Most suspension systems are sorted but the travel can feel vastly different so I would think of this on this.
Some 100mm travel bikes are really brilliant….anthem springs to mind or a turner flux
At the 150 end there are some that are compromised but others that are tremendous…I have become a yeti fan so the 575 and. Replacement are great. I have a asr 7 and it is the best do it all bike I have owned.
Do not discount Trance frame rocky mountain on sale somenice 140mm bikes.

I’ve had two Zesty’s (one alu and one carbon) and between those a Titus FTMc. 140mm and 135mm travel.

All of those felt like they pedalled better than the Fuel Ex I had before them and also better going down hill.

What about a Canyon Nerve AM, don’t know if there are any around the £2k mark but would have thought so?

deanfbm – Member
Its not difficult to understand the market. Though some bikes do complicate things, it is pretty much as simple as –

4″ – XC – pretty obvious, off road, road riding
5″ – Trail – MTBing (including getting air/dh track dabbling)
6″ – BIG mountain trail riding/light freeride
7″ – Freeride – monoverable DH bike
8″ – DH – Race Bike

Swing back a decade or so and you can knock off some inches off each of those, aside from merging the categories (it once used to be just Mountain Biking). Same stuff was ridden, less travel.

Just gone from 150 to 130mm forks, 150 just felt too much, 130 will just just about everything 150 will but you don’t feel detatched

I’m planning on getting a 120mm full sus in the near future (Commie Meta SL).
This will be going from my Cove 160mm thing.
The cove is an amazing bike, climbs well and decends like a demon, however I want a lower travel bike as it takes a lot of the challenge out of the riding. Yeah its fun but fun and technical is even better.
Point and shoot just gets a bit samey after a while.
The big bike is being kept for jumping off things and downhilling though

I don’t feel detached on my Pitch, you just have to ride stuff that justifies it. Take the Peaks, it feels massively over biked, on the smoother stuff. Take a track like Bradwell edge, it feels ‘easy’ (if very fast) for the most part on the early section, it’s the section over the wall, then the right/left with the drop off further down when it comes into it’s own and you ride out wondering what to do next as suddenly you’ve got somewhere were on smaller bikes you’d lost all the speed.

It’s probably more to do with the design of the bike than it’s travel as muddyfunster said. 120mm bikes generally seemed to be big XC bikes, fast and efficient with enough travel to keep you out of trouble on the downs. 150mm seems to be designed into something a bit different, it’s a different way or riding, less about helping the bike over rocks and roots, more about line choice and confidence while letting the bike deal with the detail underneath you.

My Pitch is a crap bike for XC, but it’s effing brilliant if you let it rip somewhere more adventurous. The problem is (IMO) MBR sold us a lie 8 years ago that over time more travel would be better. Where in reality the 2005 Spesh Enduro was probably the last throw of the dice for suspension development. I’d struggle to pick out a bike since then that’s a huge leap foreward. Even the newest Enduro only has 15mm more travel. Newer bikes might be better and more developed, but they’re not really making a new genre of bike/riding.

I think there is a misconception that longer travel makes things easier, but I haven’t really found this to be the case. If you have the courage and confidence to hammer though steep rough stuff or launch off big drops then more travel does give you a bigger margin for error. But a longer fork is (usually) heavier, less stiff, goes up and down more and well, it’s just longer. All of which make it harder to control.

I think there is a misconception that longer travel makes things easier, but I haven’t really found this to be the case. If you have the courage and confidence to hammer though steep rough stuff or launch off big drops then more travel does give you a bigger margin for error. But a longer fork is (usually) heavier, less stiff, goes up and down more and well, it’s just longer. All of which make it harder to control.

Wise words.

I think there is a misconception that longer travel makes things easier,

Easier no forgiving yes.

Well, as an opposite opinion, i think the latest crop of long travel FS bikes (say 140 to 160mm less than 2 years old) have really moved the bar, in terms of both quality of the travel and control of their suspension under the wildly disperate requirements of climbing / descendng. Something like a current Spicy, or Stumpy Evo for example is now a better bike under all riding conditions that bikes of similar travel used to be imo!

If you’re learning how to ride harder terrain, then having that cushion of longer more controlled travel is a great reassurence!

harder terrain? like diamonds? or tungsten perhaps?

No skills coach could teach that shit!

Moar better controlled travel is the definitely the only answer

I have just changed my pitch with lyrics on for a Whyte t120s 2012 which I got for £1600. Early days but so far it’s really good in particular going down the twisty stuff and up. It is alot lighter and with the dropper, big bar, short stem it feels nice and stable. Actually think I may be quicker for the majority of downhills I do in the peak. Not sure about cavedale/beast but for the amount of times I ride them I decided less maybe more.

I’ve switched between FS and HT over the years, currently riding a HT. But one of the most fun bikes i’ve ever owned was an S works Enduro 150mm both ends and just a blast to ride. Rode a 24hr race on it did a trip to Canada on it and used it from messing about downhill to all day xc and I found it climbed pretty easy as well.

It was one of those bikes that as soon as I sold it I was kicking myself for letting it go.

There’s a lot more to a bike than just travel. Angles, weight, stiffness pedaling platform.
Loads of 150/160 bikes are light and efficient, it was only a few years ago we were riding 32lb single pivot monsters with 80mm of travel. A modern 150/160 bike will climb a lot better than those. The lines are blurred.
I’m happy with 140mm rear travel and have lowered my 36s to 150mm, although that’s more for the geometry than the travel. I’d probably be just a happy on an aggro 120/130mm bike (TRc or ASR5).
Just test ride a few and buy what you like most. Don’t get too hung up about the amount of bounce it has.