Q: How much to start mountain biking? A: £605.00

My first MTB (back in the mid 90’s) was a Saracen Sahara Elite (the Elite meant it had an “upgrade” over the standard Sahara of a set of MaxShox suspension forks with a whole 1″ of undamped elastomer travel…)

I took that on rides all round the Lake District – on family holidays up there, I’d get up at 7am and be out on the hills for 3hrs, returning just as the rest of the family were getting up and deciding what to do.
No mobile, no GPS, precious few tools, one water bottle… And yes, I was an absolute beginner.

The one nod to safety was that I would leave a route description on the table and generally stick to what I’d written (bar genuinely getting lost!) so if I wasn’t back my Mum could at least phone Mountain Rescue and say “he said he’d be heading over here”.

Admittedly, I look back on that now and my rides aged 16/17 and wonder how the hell I survived going around Lonscale Fell and Skiddaw but basically it was just me and a helmet out in the wilds!

I never understood the Halfords Hate.

As a former Halfords employee, I can say that (at least in our branch) the BikeHut tends to be staffed by enthusiasts. We all rode bikes, talked bikes, spent money on bikes, and chatted bikes to anybody who would listen. We’d always try to sell people the right bike for the application. The same can be said for a few other bike dispensaries, Like Decathlon and Go Outdoors.

The current Voodoo, Carrera, Caliber and Rockrider bikes are pretty good value bikes, and the staff seemed to care. I just bought my lad a Two3 Caliber and it is amazing value.

I just hope that the service offered in my bike shop is as good. I will always struggle with the instant availability of “new bike” stock against the bigger stores, but I always try to have the “needed” items in stock, and we have shifted our hours to suit the average working hours. I know my market, and if they want to call in with their Halfords bike for a repair, spare or upgrade, I will happily work on it and advise all day long. And when they decide that this bike thing is awesome, I’ll advise them on a great bike to move up to. You have to start somewhere, and like me, my riding buddies and the lad, nobody starts anything new by going all in at a £1K.

I think the point about the local bike shop is: support the shop because it supports the scene. The better LBSs put on races, fix adaptive gear, loan tools, run a bike drive for kids who can’t afford them at Xmas, handle special orders with appreciation, show up at a meeting about access and build trails. That stuff can be hard for a Halfords to develop because much of it takes trust, local knowledge and long-term commitment, something you commonly find in a good LBS owner or manager. If your LBS isn’t doing these (and other) customer service and bike community building activities take your business to one that does. I will plug Happy Days in Sowerby Bridge because some of you all may be tempted to enjoy the fabulous riding of Calderfornia.

One of my (CIC) LBS owners tells his less well off customers, who just want to get their bike running safely, to ‘**** off to Halfords, I sell pedals worth more than your **** bike’.

All the stuff you mention @fazure, it’s all expensive, and that’s what putting off new customers from LBS, to Halfords. Why would they spend ~1k on a bike in a bike shop, when they could spend £600 in Halfords for, what to them is the same bike. They don’t care about trail advocacy, getting kids on bikes, the local race scene, they just want a bike, and if Halfords seem to offer better value at the outset, that’s where they’ll go.

Another LBS I know tried to do what you mention. They’re no longer in business.

This ^^.

It’s only later, once you’re properly into MTBing and reading about issues such as trail access that you begin to think “oh yes, I should support [local advocacy group]”

When Halfords started selling Boardman bikes, they suddenly started turning up in large numbers at corporate events – the big charity Sportives, London Triathlon and so on. The main driver was CEO-types giving their PA £5000 and telling them to go and buy them a bike for [event] and the PA going “where sells bikes – oh yes, Halfords”. Literally the only bike shop they knew.

Mine sponsors the local cycle club. I know of quite a few that do that, it’s a guaranteed source of revenue if you offer 10% off to club members and there’s a decent sized club most of who will be riding decent bikes and will want to look after them, upgrade them and so on.

It strikes me as a little dangerous to imply to an absolute beginner they could ride up (and down) helvellyn armed with nothing more than a bike and helmet.

Change Helvellyn to Sugar Loaf and that’s exactly what i did. Not only that it was stupidly hot (in wales, who’d have thought) I didn’t have enough water and I didn’t have a map, as it quote “looked like a easy to follow loop”

Anyway, like a lot of long time MTBers, as I’ve got more experienced and as my finances allow, I’ve bought nicer, more longer lasting and more expensive stuff, very few bits of it are very high end XTR or XX1 level, but still; my “nice bike” is pretty nice.  I don’t particularly feel the need to apologise, or feel bad about it. I think very few people think you need to spend £1000’s on a bike to start off MTB, I think that’s just a badly loaded internet argument

It’s absolutely that right thing for STW to promote how cost effect entry to an otherwise expensive sport can be, they’ve done lots of great articles previously about it as well. But there’s also no reason why they also can’t run a article about titanium e-wings cranks. It’s no different to all us pressing our noses against the glass cabinet of “Shiny Things” in the shop.

Just read the “other stuff” list again and noticed the dropper post on it! Everything else you can pick up very cheaply in the centre aisles at Aldi or Lidl. But a dropper post is expensive and although I have never messed with mine (had no reason to) I imagine that they are a bugger to install and that’s if your bike is already compatible. Don’t get me wrong I wouldn’t buy a bike now without one, but as an immediate upgrade for a newbie, probably not.

Also while the bike maybe capable of doing Helvellyn I very much doubt a newbie’s legs would be. Perhaps a few months (at least) riding local low level trails might by an idea before tackling a big ride out in the lakes at which point adding maps, Garmin device, first aid kit, etc to your other stuff kit list might be an idea.