Back in the day when I had my brand new suntour equipped Zaskar, and GT made the RTS, LTS, Xizang (sp)

triple triangles, adjustable trail, groove tube cable routing, u brakes etc etc Onza porcupines etc etc

etc GT's where cool as.. and loads of people had them

helped by Hans Ray etc..

I know GT when bust sometime ago, but what else caused them to be uncool, less popular.. is it a Uk thing?

GT haven't really moved designs on much for 15 years for most of their range (new downhill bike seems ok though).

They let Halfords stick the GT name on their own-brand bikes. That can't have helped!

I was going to cite Halfords. Same effect on Kona and Voodoo as well.

halfords for sure although the halfords range is better specced for the cash…..same with voodoo.

I never liked the triple triangle thing
and always thought of them as a mass-market american brand, and confused them with Giant 😕

When they stopped making any good bikes I expect 😛

It was about the time they went bust and were taken over by Pacific(?)

Their iDrive bikes have never really taken the market by storm. Having said that they've got the same basic (average) suspension design from 10years ago(ish).
Bikes seem to be a bit boring. Shame as i had '96 Zaskar which i loved.

Thought you meant Glentress there for a sec. Guess that's a different thread 🙂

Anyhow, GT are just a badge now – part of the dorel empire. Used to be pioneers but something must have gone wrong on the business side late 90s to force mergers then bankruptcy on them.

The year they bought out the first prod i-drive bike (xcr?).

Shame as the LTS was a great platform.

Yer LTS worked well..

I just thought it odd as was away from biking for many years – and some brands still around, some not (tioga, onza) some not cool anymore…

As aP said, when they went bust, must be 2003-4, something like that. The name was bought out but the range was cut to base/budget models only. Again, IIRC the dearest model they had at the time was a £300 HT.

They started picking up again with the i-Drive design but it hasn't been universally accepted.

Stocking them in Halfords probably hasn't helped but it went wrong long before that. Shame really, when I first started riding the Zaskar was THE bike to aspire to having.

I just thought it odd as was away from biking for many years – and some brands still around, some not (tioga, onza) some not cool anymore…

Dude. how long were you away for??

Saying this, The coolest thing about GT bikes is now there older stuff, the Zaskar and xizang LE are looked upon as cool retro, things to find, buy and build up into race replicas. If i was loaded then first thing i would do would be search ebay or retrobikes for an xizang LE, mag21SL's and build a nice retrotastic bike

The high end bikes launched in 2007 are actually pretty good. I was lucky enough to go to the press camp in Engelberg and tested the Force, Sanction and Zaskar.

Unfortunately these aren't available in your average Halfords, they have the old, tired designs that GT ditched.

Alaric.

the halfords thing is strange. they have bikes which are sold in halfords and IBDs, with the same name, smae paint job, same build but a cheaper frame underneath.

obviously halfords sell it cheaper, cutting the IDBs market and profit.

very odd business model imo.

actually, halfords sell designs based on the avalanche frame which GT didn't ditch, but halfords sell it at a higher price point (with better kit) than GT

I used to have a xizang LE. Work of art.

I wondered the same when I saw the ad for the Carbon Zaskar in ST this month, when was the last time you saw a racer on a GT though?

Well, at the risk of confirming myself as 'not cool' I have an 08 GT Sanction and I really like it. I bought it for £1550 from Paul's Cycles to replace my Giant Reign when it was nicked. The original rrp was £2500 but I don't know if anyone actually paid that!

While the price was a strong attraction given the spec, I also did a fair bit of research – there are some pretty positive reviews on the internet. Having ridden it for a while now, I think it's great fun and I honestly can't tell much difference in the suspension feel from the supposedly more advanced maestro system of the reign.

The frame is stiff, nicely made and has good do-it-all geometry. The suspension runs on headset type angular bearings that are easy to service and replace yourself.

GT don't make the sanction anymore but still make the force, which is very similar but has more XC geometry – which I've never really understood. I also like the fact that you don't see many others about on the trails although I probably hadn't noticed that this is because everyone thinks they're rubbish….

The Avalanche range is actually pretty good. VFM compares to/beats all the big brands. They don't particularly have an 'air of quality' about them though.

And the first thing 90% of customers say when viewing one is 'Oh yeah, I saw that in Halfords', which puts off a lot of IBDs from stocking, I believe.

actually, halfords sell designs based on the avalanche frame which GT didn't ditch, but halfords sell it at a higher price point (with better kit) than GT

i stand corrected. i'm sure what i stated used to be the case. which imo was the beginning of the demise for GT in the uk at least.

The I-drive in ist second generation was good (when it was a 4" XC bike as opposed to the older clunky design). It all went downhill when they tried to put it in longer travel frames, essentialy it robs you of 2" of the travel when your stood up so youve got a bike that bobs like an 8" bike but absorbs bumps like a 6" bike out of the saddle.

Dude. how long were you away for??

bck in to cycling for commuting for the past 4 year, but only 1.5 for offroad with my Swift..

last bikes before that were Cannondale m2000 with mk1 answer manitou elastomer forks (40mm travel get in) and a trek 8700 carbon with mag21's that never kept their air… those were the days.. panaracer smoke lite tyres, ringle, topline cranks, self energising cantilever brakes..

Yup it's puzzled me for a while. I bought a GT Avalanche 1.0 last year to replace my 90s Marin Palisade Trail. The specification seemed really strong at the price point (£440) – I had decided that I'd really like hydraulic discs and front suspension.

However since subscribing to Singletrack I find that I should have singlespeeded my old Marin and put some huuuge suspension forks on it – or if I have to use my GT I should probably transfer all the bits over to an On-One frame so it's cooler. Although can't see any of these things happening as I don't have the disposable income and really enjoy riding the GT as it is….

wondered the same when I saw the ad for the Carbon Zaskar in ST this month, when was the last time you saw a racer on a GT though?

[/b]

Ive just built up a 94 zaskar Ill be racing this year….

Mick Hannah and Marc Beaumont?

I still love GT. Love my moto. Great bike. Gt have in the last few years had some great decent jump type bikes and also some quality lower end ones.In this area thier designs do change.I love their dh bikes.Biggest problem is seeing them. Do not know any bike shops that stock them other than halfords.

trek 8700 carbon with mag21's

Awesome. How many purple bits did it have?

I raced my GT road bikes quite a bit 😉

Old GTs were nice because they were designed for performance. Current ones (at least, most of them – the carbon one does look nice) just seem to be designed to a price and to hang bits off – a kind of colouring in by numbers bike IMO.

My current bike is a Gt Aggressor XCR And has been great , I bought it through C2W scheme so came from Halfords. At the time my options were GT, Boardman or go for a Spesh to be ordered in by Halfords. Looking at the price of £750 you are still getting XT gears, Zocci 44 shocks and Juicy brakes. Compare this to others which are giving you RS dart forks and Tektro auriga brakes and an inferior gear set.
Some bike snobs will look at GT's and immediately mutter under there breath "Halfords" but it dosen't mean they are any quicker than me down the hills in there budget breaking bikes.
Look at the spec on the current entry level Konas or Cannondales and you will see that GT's are well specked and IF you can find a Halfords with decent bike mechanics you could do a lot worse.

I was going to cite Halfords. Same effect on Kona and Voodoo as well.

I'm proud that my Voodoo is one of the original imports into the UK, before Halfords got their mitts on them.

AND

Voodoo in US are so good, that when I emailed to ask questions about the frame and components that would work with it, the designer and legend himself Joe Murray took the time to respond to me.

in the 90's

It's that damn minny triangle by the seat post on all their frames. Maybe it's some magical geometry feature that makes the frames super strong or something, but come on, it looks total cack!!

For me it's mainly just they seem to have fairly backwards ideas about geometry. Frinstance the Idrive 5 I had, lovely bike albeit a very heavy frame but it worked brilliantly. But it was a 5 inch trail bike with the head angle of a 4 inch XC bike. Slack it off by, oh, 2 degrees, see what happens… Same applies for the Force etc as far as I'm aware. But instead it was the biggest heaviest XC bike in the world. Still kind of cool though.

Obviously a lot of snobs are put off by the Halfords connection but I think most grown ups can see past that, after all Halfords sell a lot of very nice bikes and sell most of the best contenders up to £1000.

GT lost its way with the movement away from rigid bikes. My 1999 fully rigid palomar is a classic, the frame works perfectly, but their lower end bikes are now toilet.
GT was also cool back in the day because america was cool, (I always like the american flag on the frame).

I've got a 1997/8 or thereabouts Avalanche. I was my first MTB and I loved it, the geometry simply made it perfect for me. Well built, well specced bikes. Still running the original front wheel and the hub will spin unaided for about 5 mins, never changed the bearings. Rear wheel exploded and one day I'll re-use the hub.

Now it still gets regular use as a ss commuter using as many of the original parts as I could.

I guess the problem was that they went mass and slightly down market.

They're not all bad…. FWIW I'd rather be uncool on this

Than cool on a bike that handled like a sack of shit. Just saying.
😉

………..when they were no longer made in Huntington Beach