Oh how far we have come in those two decades. Certain members of the Singletrack team probably still have their tie-dyed racing tights kicking around in the back of some old drawer unit – We’ll leave you to speculate exactly who. In the meantime, check out how narrow these bars are and marvel at how much safer riding downhill on a modern mountain bike is these days.
The video quality isn’t great but then back in those days each frame had to be hand painted.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-32KVUU3OU
Seem to be missing 3 things… suspension, brakes & common sense 🙂
RACER, how i laughed……..
I remember crashing my marin pine mountain at a downhill race (plymouth?) in 92, I got up and grabbed the bike but when i lifted it up the only thing holding the forks on was the brake cable as i had snapped the manitou forks clean off at the steerer/crown – i ripped the arse out of my fav Axo shorts as well.
Those days were ace fun though 🙂
Good grief somafunk I was in crowd watching the race & can still remember someone breaking his Marin, did it happen on the pipeline?!
Those were indeed the days, great fun.
when downhillers were real men (apart from the ladies, of course). None of that new fangled suspension & brakes, they were for sissies ;o)
Looking at it now, even just a simple change of geometry would make those bikes faster/easier to ride, never mind the technology.
I forgot how prevelant body armour was back then, just as well really!
Body armour with Lycra
Amazed how many taco’d wheels. Wheels have obviously really improved without me noticing.