[Closed] 29 v 650b interesting stats/propaganda?

Interesting is stretching it a bit. Propaganda, more like.

Xc world champs men's and women's won on 650b this year - 29ers were a nice fad and I'm sure they have a future for a few but 650b is the future ^ that's just a bit of desperate propaganda from someone with a vested interest who seen the writing on the wall

Anyone seen the latest What Mountain Bike?
A couple of very interesting propoganda pieces re 650b in there too.

Interesting is stretching it a bit. Propaganda, more like.

Indeed. Must be really annoying to have staked your entire business plan, including the brand name, on last year's fad. 😀

I don't really get what the measurements are supposed to be - 12.[b]93[/b]? is that supposed to be 12 minutes 56 seconds? who on earth expresses seconds as a decimal like that? or is there another metric that its measuring?

Let alone number of runs/order of run/randomisation, variety of rider heights etc.

If one of the mags wanted to do a proper trial, then it would be brilliant, I'm sure we could write a decent protocol and make with a decent level of rigour - personally, I don't believe any of the 'testing' done so far would stand up as 'science'

chain-free challenge would answer it better for me (not so fussed about climbing but I bet you could shove an electric motor with fixed output onto a frame that' fit all 3 sizes)

Xc world champs men's and women's won on 650b this year - 29ers were a nice fad and I'm sure they have a future for a few but 650b is the future ^ that's just a bit of desperate propaganda from someone with a vested interest who seen the writing on the wall

Yeah and on the rough final World Cup 29" won the men and women's races... On and the vast majority of the field are on 29".

650bs is the future because manufacturers said so and gullible consumers sucked it up. The real world advantages over 26" are minimal unlike 29" with is a different experience altogether.

Tech waffle about wheel sizes from Niner or Giant.. it's like listening to pro-car transport solutions in 50s US, funded by GM.

and WGAC about 'faster'. I want 'fun' and 'comfortable'. Define that with numbers.. and it usually ends up as fast enough anyway.

Its largely pointless, as for 99% of riders who aren't racing a world cup, the most important thing is how the bike feels. I like my 29er because its nice to ride and puts a smile on my face, at no point in a ride do I worry if my big wheels are making me 2.2 seconds slower on a 1km stretch of trail.
If I worried about this stuff I would question why I'm riding mountain bikes in the first place.

I fell for the hype, sold my yeti asr 5c for a 29er and love it - thank all the hype makers and propaganda press, thank you!

Those might be statistics, but only just.

If I worried about this stuff I would question why I'm riding mountain bikes in the first place.

Never a truer word spoken.

I have only ridden one of each; a Bronson & a Ripley. The Ripley on a "loop" felt much quicker, at a guess it was slower downhill.

Niner

mashiehood - Member
I fell for the hype, sold my yeti asr 5c for a 29er and love it - thank all the hype makers and propaganda press, thank you!

Mountain biker in, buying themselves a new bike and loving it shocker...

I bought a Niner.
I'm stuffed. 😐

As has already been said it's a garbage test unless you put identical power inputs into each test.

Jerome Clementz is winning on 26, Graves is winning on 26, Minnaar won on 26. I'm in no hurry to switch to bigger wheels for AM/Enduro/DH.

That chart would appear to show that 150mm bikes were faster - in fac,t the more travel, the more speed.. Why no 150mm 650? Or a 160?

Jerome Clementz is winning on 26, Graves is winning on 26, Minnaar won on 26. I'm in no hurry to switch to bigger wheels for AM/Enduro/DH.

That doesn't really prove anything, other than the quickest person on the day won.

I'm sure if at the time Cannondale & Yeti had a suitable 27.5" bike they would be riding them, and probably still winning. Same for Minnaar.

Thanks RD can your next one be something about what bike Jesus would ride as we have not had a religious thread for a while and I reckon it needs a [s]troll[/s] thoughtful post from you
Yours in anticipation.

yep that SB95 i have is shit 😉

Jerome Clementz is winning on 26, Graves is winning on 26, Minnaar won on 26. I'm in no hurry to switch to bigger wheels for AM/Enduro/DH.

Tracy Moseley is winning on 29. I'd hazard a guess that her power and speed are a little closer to most of us than any of those you mention.

Junkyard - lazarus

Thanks RD can your next one be something about what bike Jesus would ride as we have not had a religious thread for a while and I reckon it needs a troll thoughtful post from you
Yours in anticipation.

the clue is in the thread title, I'm not twisting your arm to open the thread, I do think what i wrote was balanced, can a balanced view be a troll?
I'd stick to patrolling the chat forum if you want religious arguments, probably your forte, the rest of us will stick with the riding bikes thing

If 650B is the future and 650B isnt actually much different to 26" - what's the point?

I'm not sure it's the future, but choice is good, no? who wants to be forced to only use one size? oh, wait

Jerome Clementz is winning on 26, Graves is winning on 26, Minnaar won on 26.

I cant afford to change my 26 inch wheel bike ,have no skill ,and dont do strava .So I dont care if other wheels are a bit quicker

niner bikes claim 29ers are faster! who'd have thunk it 🙄

Thanks RD can your next one be something about what bike Jesus would ride

It's quite obvious that he used a 650b when he rode over Lazarus.

It's all nonsense as far as my riding is concerned. Do I care if one is faster than another. Not at all. I don't race and don't care.I ride for fun. Do I think I'd prefer 26 inch over 27.5 - probably as I prefer my 20 inch bmx feel to my 26 inch fr bike, although on balance the bmx tends to get hard to ride on the same (fr type)stuff. So for me it's all of about feel and fun.

I like nibble handling mostly. If I raced XC or maybe rode serious xc trails on a light weight rigid xc bike then I'd maybe like to try a 29er as I can see how that makes sense and would work in the real world.

I can understand the pros choosing one over another though ,as every second counts.However this is probably not clear cut and will hopefully be considered as 27.5 or 29 for xc with dh and enduro being 27.5 or 26 as present. So hopefully all 3 wheels will have a place and be continued to be used.

Not sure Ive taken a single big wheel rider through my switchback trail (64 switchbacks in 4km of descending) without them saying their wheels dont fit well in tight spaces.... Never heard a 26er say their wheel size is holding them back... Even on the pedally vehicle track linky bits. Now THATS science. 8)

(Imo / may not have happened / just riding for fun y'know)

Bike Magazine Germany

a larger wheel climbs hils more [b]safely[/b]

That's hysterical ! I have never felt unsafe on a climb, clearly I'm all radical and living on the edge riding uphill on my 26" wheels

the thing is most of us probably reasonably experienced or maybe newer but more enlightened (due to stw no doubt) riders. What were you like when you first picked up an mtb mag in John Menzies and dreamt of owning your first mtb?

allmountainventure - Member

Not sure Ive taken a single big wheel rider through my switchback trail (64 switchbacks in 4km of descending) without them saying their wheels dont fit well in tight spaces.... Never heard a 26er say their wheel size is holding them back...

But I bet you've had plenty of 26 inch riders who would have used a convenient excuse like wheel size if they'd had one.

I can understand the pros choosing one over another though ,as every [s]second[/s] dollar counts

I'm really surprised that people are so upset about this wheel size business. It's not a new thing that the bike industry pushes products onto the waiting public. Suspension, disc brakes, 9speed, 10speed, ISIS, 6" travel bikes, 5" travel bikes, thru axles, kashima, rear bolt axles, tubeless... and the never ending list goes on.
Noone is being forced to buy into all, or any of these. Some will come and stay others will come and go.
Pick which makes a difference to your riding and enjoy it. Same goes for wheel size.

But I bet you've had plenty of 26 inch riders who would have used a convenient excuse like wheel size if they'd had one.

i ride a 29er and 99% of the time its faster than my 26" bike.

Why all this obsession with speed? Every discussion about wheel size, whether here or in magazines, just seems to talk about whether X is faster than Y. Is this some Strava-fuelled thing? Do people really judge their rides by how fast they were to the nearest second?

I'd rather pedal up a hill faster not slower and do you not like the sense of speed when travelling downhill?

Every development in MTBing and cycling is all about more speed. Suspension - ride over things faster, hydraulic disc brakes - if you have better brakes you have confidence to go faster, Carbon Fibre parts - lightness+stiffness = more speed, bright green baggy shorts - obviously faster etc. And so it is with wheel size. IF it can be proved that one wheel size is faster than another, then that will be the wheel size that wins out. The problem is with wheel sizes is that some sizes are better for some things, other sizes better for other things - there is no one size fits all.

Noone is being forced to buy into all, or any of these.

We are if we want to buy certain brands new. That's the problem. SC say it's BS and led by the customer, yet who grooms the customer? The bike mags via adverts from the bike companies.

If we had choice, it'd be fine - the lesser products would fade, like cantis and v brakes, or ISIS, or threaded steerers etc.

toons - Member

do you not like the sense of speed when travelling downhill?

Yup but speed =/ sense of speed... I was riding my 5 inch bike at innerleithen the other day, felt absolutely flat out and ragged, but had a look at times afterwards and I was a fair bit slower than I am on the big bike- just felt faster and had more fun on the little bike (and it lasted longer too 😉 )

I get the feeling there are folks on here that would love to shave tenths over the time it takes for them to shoot their load, just because faster is always better 🙂

who cares which is faster? whats more important is which is more fun. oh unless beating your mates on strava is important to you.

I am currently riding a 29er, yes it feels faster, yes my mates say I am faster on it but at the end of the day I think I would have just as much fun on a 26 or 650b.

I went for a 29 cos middle age is taking its toll on my body and I aint the rider I used to be 20 years ago and the bigger wheels might make for a more forgiving ride without resorting to handfuls of suspension travel.

at the end of the day wheel size is probablly largely irrelvant over the course of a days riding, just ride what you have and have fun and you will no matter what size wheel you have, who cares what others are riding.

That's the point! Wheel size probably is irrelevant, but the personal choice to stay with 26" is being eroded beacuse the bike companies say 29" or 27.5" (or 650B or whatever the hell it is) is better.

It's not - it's just different.

I knocked an hour off my time in this years Isle of Man end 2 end on a 29er. I know I'm a bit fitter, the course was slightly shorter, and it was not as windy, but still went from 5 hr 15 on a zesty, to 4 15 on a hardtail stumpy 29er.

I knocked an hour off my time in this years Isle of Man end 2 end on a 29er. I know [u]I'm a bit fitter[/u], the course was slightly [u]shorter[/u] and it was [u]not as windy[/u], but still went from 5 hr 15 on a zesty, to 4 15 on a [u]hardtail[/u] stumpy 29er.

I'd say the reasons would be more to do with the underlined.

Reasonably long travel full sus vs hardtail may be a small factor along with pretty different geometry and ride position too... 😀

I'd be very interested (and surprised) to see 29ers beating 26ers down the most tight and technical cheeky trails in places like the Lakes and Pennines. Sometimes even a 26" wheel feels too big.

Teethgrinder - if either 650B or 29" does completely take over and makes 26" obsolete you'll be long dead and buried i'm sure. 26" bikes make up probably 99% of all MTB's out there right now, so 26" will be supported for some time to come. It will only be an issue for those who want to change their bike every year and stick with 26".

I personally think we'll end up with all 3 wheel sizes each targetting specific branches of the sport.

I don't buy into the industry pushing us into somehting story. If that was true then the industry would be settling on one wheel size and pushing it down our throats - the industry is in just as much disarray about it as we are - last 2 years it was all 29ers, this year its 650B. They are experimenting for sure and hoping that a clear winner emerges - but it isn't because any benefits are marginal at best, so they're meandering about like a rudderless ship waiting for the first big manufactuer to make a move either way, but they all seem to be covering their arses to some extent.

I'd rather pedal up a hill faster not slower and do you not like the sense of speed when travelling downhill?

If you want to go uphill faster, just put more effort in. I know that sounds trite, but I've found it to be true. I have a 29er HT (FF29) and a 26" Full Suss (Five). If I take a large enough sample (say 10 rides on each bike) then I can indeed prove that the 29er HT is faster up a given (not too technical) hill. However, the difference is actually a lot smaller than I'd expect given how different the bikes are and also a lot smaller than the natural day to day variation. Basically, if I'm feeling strong I climb well and if I'm not I don't, whichever bike I'm on.

Going down, you are right to say that it's the sense of speed that matters and, as has been pointed out already" this is different to actual speed. The fastest bike often gives very little sense of speed, which is what makes it faster. Also, the time taken to ride a section of trail isn't even the same as speed, let alone sense of speed. For example, Strava may tell me that I was faster getting from A to B on my FF29 than I was on the Five, but that may be because I went straight from A to B on the FF29 while I weaved all over the trail on the Five, looking for rocks to bounce off and generally pratting about. I may even have been travelling at a higher speed on the Five, but because I took a more torturous route that won't show up in the stats.

But at the end of the day, it's all just riding so it's all good. I'm just surprised that the time taken to ride a trail (as in the article at the start of this thread) is seen as being a number that has any significance.

+1 as theethgrinder said...

I ride 26" and 29"....horses for courses...like both wheelsizes..just for different trails/tasks..
definitely don`t need or want 650B(ullsh...)..
but don`t care about even more wheelsizes..
as long as I have the choice..
(at least for a while..)
and thats the point..

I'd say the reasons would be more to do with the underlined.

But they're all extremely insignificant things - surely it's the wheel size which made all the difference?

Going down, you are right to say that it's the sense of speed that matters and, as has been pointed out already" this is different to actual speed. The fastest bike often gives very little sense of speed, which is what makes it faster.

So what you're telling us here is that the slower bike/wheel size is actually better.

My 26er is brilliant at some things and my 29er is brilliant at others.
I really don't want to pay for a bike that is never going to be the best at anything.

So what you're telling us here is that the slower bike/wheel size is actually better.

No, I'm just saying that the bike that feels the fastest isn't always the bike that is the fastest. Often quite the reverse. The bike that feels stable at speed allows you to go faster precisely because it doesn't feel as fast. I'm certainly not saying anything about "better" though, that's totally subjective. As is fun. Plenty of folk seem to prefer to ride their hardtails down trails even though they know they will be slower than a full suss, for example.

Mostly Balanced - Member
My 26er is brilliant at some things and my 29er is brilliant at others.
I really don't want to pay for a bike that is never going to be the best at anything

I really agree with this.

...just ride what you have and have fun and you will no matter what size wheel you have, who cares what others are riding.

Just think, without different wheel sizes this forum would only have half the threads and journo,s nowt to write about! 😆

Meh, All that I know is than in an XC race I go a lot faster for longer on my 29er than I ever did on my 26er.

But my 26er is also hilarious fun at trail centres and descending. You pays your money, you log onto stw and get all judgemental. Just ride your friggin bike and smile.

Northwind - But I bet you've had plenty of 26 inch riders who would have used a convenient excuse like wheel size if they'd had one.POSTED 21 HOURS AG

They could easily blame the bike (wheelbase, tires or head angle for example) but do not. The only bike blaming I ever see goes onto 29in wheels, which definitely have handling/manuverability limitations in small spaces and tight corners. Why would you put up with that just so you can go a bit faster on the flats/climbs????

onto 29in [s]wheels,[/s] [b]frames with poor geometry[/b] which definitely have handling/manuverability limitations in small spaces and tight corners.

But I bet you've had plenty of 26 inch riders who would have used a convenient excuse like wheel size if they'd had one.

[url= http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2843/9790591746_9625678fd5.jp g" target="_blank">http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2843/9790591746_9625678fd5.jp g"/> [/img][/url]

I knocked an hour off my time in this years Isle of Man end 2 end on a 29er. I know I'm a bit fitter, the course was slightly shorter, and it was not as windy, but still went from 5 hr 15 on a zesty, to 4 15 on a hardtail stumpy 29er.

I knocked an hour off my time in this years Isle of Man E2E too - on the same bike I rode last year!

Well done on the 4 hr 15 @thomasgeorge, credit where it's due!

They could easily blame the bike (wheelbase, tires or head angle for example) but do not. The only bike blaming I ever see goes onto 29in wheels, which definitely have handling/manuverability limitations in small spaces and tight corners. Why would you put up with that just so you can go a bit faster on the flats/climbs????

Funny because on our trails I see a lot of riders struggling on the climbs on 26" AM bikes or having issues on the descents on 26" trail bikes. If you have to climb and descend on one bike a good 29" is in another world.

Is there the same evangelical fawning going on about 650b by the brown-nosing journo's in WMB and MBR as they did when 29'ers came along? I no longer read either because I found their sycophantic BS on the bigger wheel's irritating to the extreme and found myself becoming anti 29'r because of it.

So I do kinda get why some people are anti 650, it being perceived that someone else, this time the 'industry' is telling them what to ride.

As for my own belligerence regarding 29, I have eased up on that with adopting a 'don't knock it until I try it' approach. Hasn't made me any more inclined to try one though, just more accepting 🙂

Gah. Cumon now- surely ths most important factor is bike design (after the rider, ofc!) , regardlsss of what crappy wheelsize your running

It used to be said that 29 inch wheels would explode and kill you.
With 650B being a bit smaller do they just go 'poof' and .................

Argh, stop it. I'm building myself my first new bike for a long time - I've got the tubing laid out, the dropouts and braze ons, the design mostly sorted, and I was going to make it 26" because that's what I've always ridden. Then people convinced me it had to be 29" - you'll never look back, I was told, it's so much better.

Now, apparently, this new size which is almost 26" is the answer.

If someone invents a new wheel size next week, when I'm half-way through building this frame, I'm going to be very, very cross.

ben, just carry lots and plug int he one that's currently in vogue/suitable for the terrain as the need arises?

[img] [/img]

Everyone laughed at my 29" rear / 26" front idea - might just build that and sod the lot of you...

http://www.bikerumor.com/2012/09/13/2013-liteville-mountain-bikes-updates-frames-w-scaled-sizing-mix-n-match-wheel-combos/

http://www.pinkbike.com/photo/10048957/

I think people are getting so wound up about this simply because for most of us a couple of grand on a mountain bike is a very big investment. It takes a very strong will to genuinely not care that the industry is now telling us the bikes we have invested so much in over the past few years are a bit crapper than the new wonder sizes. And im sure people are also nervous about buying a new bike and getting it wrong.

I rode a 29er for the first time last week and its ability to roll down tech decents and nail rooty climbs was outstanding compared to my 26 cotic, but at the same time it felt a lot less lively and less fun.

I'm sticking with 26 for a while till all this settles down...