especially the new one, and pics if you have them

When I demoed one at Afan I was giddy with excitement about it, really confidence inspiring on fast flowing trails. Unfortunately I’ve been using my 2010 version as a mini downhill bike on the mostly technical downhills at Aston Hill and frankly after some very big crashes I’m scared witless of it. It’s completely irrational but I just can’t get on with it, probably more to do my lack of skill/balls than it being a bad bike.

It’s now sitting unused leering at me in the corner of the shed waiting to be stripped down and the frame sold on.

So to recap it’s a great bike but I’m rubbish at riding it. 🙁

Huws, is that Neon Green? Mine’s getting resprayed next week, and I can’t decide on a colour.

Neon green with plasma blue wheels.

It’s very bright and not for the faint hearted.

I have had one for nearly a year. Ridden it tonight taking the dog for a walk and have had a lovely time with lovely sunset etc and so a biased view. Winch up hill, which the bike can do and fine if you are not in a hurry. Then a couple of cheeky downhills on tracks that were built this winter and have really come good in this dry spell, not too fast but can now carry enough speed to keep it flowing. Bike is well balanced and as such seems good in the air. Short back end seems to mean much less tendency to nosedive of jumps and dropsetc
Traded down from a 224 when I stopped racing. Really easy bike to like and very reliable. For my riding I don’t need too much travel at the back but wanted some burly forks and like the low bb that results because really good on corners which in the woods is pretty much favourite thing.
Can’t see where Orange are going with slimming it down this year. 140mm 32s and a triple just seems wrong to me for a bike with such a downhill and airbourne bias. I know we all like to justify our bikes but if it was rubbish I would have sold it and moved on.
It depends what you want. As an only bike that needs to do a bit of XC then wrong. As a downhill race bike then wrong. For high speed rocky alpine riding then wrong but for ragging about in the woods in the UK then pretty spot on.

Thanks hues, thought it was neon green which I quite fancy.

I’d pretty much echo ed’s comments above. Mine is my do-everything-except-DH bike and it sometimes a bit of a chore on all day outings, especially as it’s 1×9 but it’s a price worth paying IMO. It’s so fast, planted and chuckable once things get a bit more interesting.

Do you think its too heavy for XC? or just not nimble enough?

I agree with edoverheels, as i use mine (2010) for everything and yeah its a bit of hard work for climbing the uphills for sure, but i wanted a bike that was more biased for a few jumps and pointing downhill and genreal thrashing around wood :D. it sure loves that and im very pleased with it!.

i tried one as a replacement for the bottlerocket. nice but prefered the brocket

Do you think its too heavy for XC? or just not nimble enough?

It really depends on what you’re already used to. E.g. If you’re coming from some uber slinky carbon xc whippet, then it’ll feel like it’s way over weight, but if you’ve ridden middle of road trail type bikes I think you’ll quickly adapt.

I demoed one for a couple of weeks and was unfortunate enough to get one with a shagged shock, which really upset the rear end: over-damped, wouldn’t settle into sag point, bounced feet off pedals. Having owned a couple of rp23 shocks I would ditch that from the off and get one with the CCDB option. It is a bike that I think you need to demo to get your head around.

Yep i demoed mine along with a 5, and an alpine and settled on the blood as was just more fun for me and my riding.

I would echo much of what has been written here regarding the Blood. It’s a great bike that’s guaranteed to put a big grin on your face. It’s definitely a ‘winch-up’ kindof bike and I’ve done the Glentress Black and Innerleithen Red XC routes on it a few times and the downhill bits were a proper giggle.

[For me] the Blood probably is at it’s best though mucking around in the woods. My 2009 model has gone the opposite way to this years spec from Orange: Shorter stem, 160mm Lyriks, double-ring & bash and I swapped the RP23 for the 5th Element Coil from my old Patriot [as I can’t afford the CCDB yet]. It certainly isn’t an ‘all day, all-round do everything bike’, but it’s great fun and I love it.

The cable routing is perhaps not the best and you need to keep an eye out for rubbing especially with the rear mech gear cable hose when riding in gritty mud etc. Some careful heli tape and zip tie placement solves the issue though.