I guess the question is man made or natural. I'll only have the 29er for the weekend and want to stretch it's legs a bit.

http://connect.garmin.com/activity/17967079

I'd rather ride the black mountains than afan on any bike.

Black Mountains!

blue mountains!*
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*of virginia

Black mountains it is!

Did people need this level of hand holding before the Internet?

Where do you normally ride ? Perhaps ride there and you might have a better reference point. FWIW my Tallboy is really quite excellent, very well balanced, lovely to ride and with 120mm forks would be a bit of a beast downhill, the 100mm on mine limits it a wee bit but I knew that when i put those forks on.

yes actually I would. I've never ridden a 29er, non-of my mates have ever ridden a 29er so I'm left thinking this forum which seems to have a lot of people who do ride 29er's would know which of the two venues would be best for testing the capabilities of the bike.

I'd second the ride somewhere you know idea if possible. Or take your normal bike with you and do a short loop on it then the demo bike to see the differences easily.

NZCol I've got time to ride ashton court and cwmcarn for reference … I wanted to do a longer ride to really get the feel for it. I'm worried about the 100mm forks too, and I thought W2 would give it generally more of a challange where as I suspect Black Moutains will be a joy! That's the hope anyway.

hmmm i'd say afan. its more of a challenge technically isn't it? you can enjoy the bike for the rest of the time you own it (if you buy it)

Yeah the 100mm is fine except for really really gnarly DH stuff, i got it down a DH track but not with a lot of finesse, otherwise it rides like its got a lot more travel and is very balanced. I'd say for general XC type stuff with a bit a gnar softcore jeyism its alright, anything ultra steep or rough you'd want something with more travel. I use mine for adventure races mainly but also ride it maybe 4/5 times a week on pretty technical rocky singletrack and its brilliant fun to ride on that. Fiddle with cockpit position though as this makes a big difference. I've recently flipped my stem as an experiment and its working quite well really.

Bike shop got the bike early. Bonus!

Agree with comments about playing with the cockpit (oh er) I found the Easton XC a bit narrow for my liking, and the 70mm stem if anything feels too short, but I'll try the flip … I just need a bit more weight forward to feel really planted.

All good so far …

good job it's sunny and dry with them tyres!

let us know how you get on, not that i would want to spend £2300 on a frame!

Damn lucky with the weather! Not sure what Santa Cruz are thinking.

Cost is a big concern, but I'll easily be doing 2,300 miles this year on a bike. So at a £1 per mile that's not so bad?? Hmmm … that is still a lot … if I keep it for 5 years, then it's only 20p a mile.

Which is roughly equivalent to running a small car (according to the AA).

http://www.theaa.com/allaboutcars/advice/advice_rcosts_petrol_table.jsp

Think I better just ride it and stop doing the sums.

dirtbiker100 – Member

hmmm i'd say afan. its more of a challenge technically isn't it?

I can think of quite a few black mountains descents/climbs that are a lot more challenging than anything at Afan.

Blimey I cut about 1.5cm off each end of my bars – maybe i am old skool or maybe we have more closely spaced trees !

My Small Block8's are hanging in the bike store unused, things look lethal and not good for a NZ summer that was for sure. Watch that front Chub hub as well, mine seized on first ride in the wet, its light but bearings were pish. Have replaced wheels with ZTR/Stans now anyway.

Let us know how you got on with it, i love mine.

gothandy – what shop did you get the demo bike from?

cheers_drive john's bikes in bath, had to order it in, took a couple of weeks to arrange and cost £50 (refundable if I buy it).

Did 44 miles on it today and mechanically much better than other demo bikes I've tried.

NZCol – I do like my wide bars! I did a couple of 2 hour rides on it today … the quality of the frame is amazing.

The tyres are making the rocky sections a little interesting, and I've already had a thorn puncture (and no 29 inch tubes on me either so old school patch up) so wouldn't keep them but there not as bad as a feared (but it is unusally hot and dry in the UK right now).

To NZCol (sorry to rest of you for such a self indulgent thread) thought I'd just let you know how I got on.

I did the Black Mountain killer loop in the end and it definitly pushed the bike (or was it me!) to the limit. With a big section where you've just got to push it up the hill, and some pretty rocky rutty downhills at times the big wheels felt well big! and the 100mm travel felt a bit short (I'm used to a 140mm lefty).

I'd be really interested to hear if anyone has put 120mm fork on a tallboy? For a bike this expensive it feels a bit wrong to start playing with the recommended spec.

You pushed it up hill?

FWIW to me it's too expensive a bike to not set it up just how you want.

Did people need this level of hand holding before the Internet?

Post of the day!