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Camping as a 15yr old at the UCI World Cup when it was in Plymerf with all my mates, awesome. Found my pass from it in the garage last night! (1995?). Where i remember:
1) Watching "The Martins" having a sidehop contest,
2) Seeing an angry Rob Warner pushing his hideous Giant full suss back up the hill after one of the DH rounds
3) Getting a free t-shirt saying "do the don'ts" on it from a young upstart clothing company called..."Howies"! still got that too.
TheFunkyMonkey - you mean Tioga Psychos! i alternated between them and Smoke/Darts, but also had some Panaracer Spikes for the horribly muddy wintery Dartmoor, those things were ludicrous.
Kirk revolution, was my second mountain bike (emmelle californian was first - bloody awful) I fitted some farmer john's nephew tyres and it was...well not that good to be honest but I loved it, got some lovely new wheels, LX parallax hubs with V.shiny campag rims, just before it got nicked. Grrr
Toe clips
Smoke/dart
enormous (for the time) ritchey Zmax 2.3"
DX spds
XT thumbies
Dia compe PC7s
rigid steel kona
then improvements, rapidfire+, V brakes, the first Z1 bombers and all those different GT _TS full sussers I lusted after.
My 97 Stumpy still rides really nicely (steel, fully rigid) - light, simple, clean and efficient.
My 94 British Eagle, my pride and joy at Uni, now rides like a hideous 20 tonne beast with 2" wide bars, no brakes (they were considered good at the time) and a terrible drivetrain. How I survived on it, I'll never know!
Listening to Utah Saints at 8am in Eastnor park at the Malvern Hills Classic.
Plastic disc wheel covers
Mountain LX on my first bike with U brakes.
21" wide bars as standard with my 23" bars being freaky.
Onza Porcupine up front (white of course) Panaracer Smoke out back...
24/34/50 chainrings (may have just been me) and a 12-28 7 speed cassette being fine for riding everything.
the need for XTR 8 speed being questioned.
crud claws.
lusting after a San Andreas. (nothing changed there)
Stupid, stupid colours.
Dia compe 986 and 987's with SS5 levers. yummy.
Grafton components
McMahon Titanium. extra yummy...
Eddie Fiola.
Andy Ruffell.
Having a crush on Caroline Alexander
Having a crush on Helen Mortimer....
er, quite fancying Adele Croxon.
Having a bit of a thing for those riders girlfriends who hung about straddling their boyfriends bikes. Although that may have been my hormones.
I need to go now...
Meeting Dave Hemming at one of the first national DH rounds at Innerleithan.
My 15yr old mate: "hey Dave, how many backhops can you do?"
Dave H: "dunno, I lost count about a 1000"
oh yeah and riding at Glentress before there was a trail centre there.
When you stored your bike in a cardboard box in t'middle t'road.
The Saracen 89/90 brochure that my first proper mtb (Traverse) came from aged 13, look at the hairstlyes:
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Cycling up and down the Kiztbulher Horn on one of these (without the racks!). Our guide was on a Klein which looked like it should have suspension, but didn't, but he did have a granny gear which allowed him to cycle all the way up while we had to push. Remember him saying to relax your grip on the way down to try and avoid arm pump (on what seemed like massive head sized rocks all the way down), and being told to pump the brakes as if you dragged them the pads would melt.
Back in the day when companies thought models could advertise bikes...
I have ridden a sort of reject bike based around one of those Saracen frames. Comedy slack head angle.
Thinking that mtb was a passing fad for poseurs
Vetta Corsalite helmet
Local Motion/Cosmic Trail
Walking socks + Ron Hill tracksters
Shimano 200GS
Jesus Jones
Malverns Classic Bula hat frenzy
Having [i]MBUK[/i] confiscated in class
Wanting a Chas Roberts White Spider, but making do with a 1990 Marin Muirwoods
Having FUN! 😀
Anyone mentioned `Daves Chain Device'....Still got one on my Saracen Limited Edition (circa 1993). Not sure it had any benefit to gears changes or chainsuck...but looked great (or did it!?)
BF
El_creedo,
Not psycho's, way before those. They looked like tractor tyres, proper v shaped. I never liked psycho's though.
That saracen catalogue, pic top left is the bike I had first. Can't remember the name but it had 500LX kit and was rubbish! Quickly swapped for the clockwork
Not psycho's, way before those. They looked like tractor tyres, proper v shaped. I never liked psycho's though.
Farmer John's Nephwers.
Only three suspension forks available, Rockshox, Manitou and Pace, and no model range, just three!
Alpinestars cro-mega DX (sold this year!)
Purple and green AXO hi-top boots
Onza porcipaws
Toe clips
Plymouth world cup (early 90s?)
I'm reliving the retro days at the moment. Just restored a 1992 Stumpy:
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Rusty Trowel...dude, I had a pair of the Axo's never saw anyone else with then before or since, and a mate still has his cro-mega tucked away in the garage. 😀
Muddy Fox Courier. The original. **** me, I'm old!
Then on to Shark Fins, Shark Teeth (remember them!), Profile Durango bars, Bula hats, and on and on and on.....
All of the above
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Yep, the Muddy Fox paw print. Lusting after a Kona Cindercone with splatter paintjob but only affording to put Project 2s on my Marin. Tioga Farmer Johns. Specialized Ground Controls. Mt Christophe toeclips.
Reckon the Kona would be a great ride 20 years later.
SS5 levers and 987 cantis.
Mt Zefal alloy pumps in fluoro yellow or fluoro pink.
My first bike (an indeterminate secondhand clunker) was heavier than I was. Didn't stop me trying to get the wheels off the ground, though the crash landings were always "solid"!
Then, years later, there was the excitment when first experiencing indexed gears (on the downtube, natch). And then V-brakes...
I remember having the first issue of MBUK.
Bright lycra
Jacquie Phelan in Muddy fox ads with paw prints on her back
Thumbies
Suntour powercam??? canti's
Pre microdrive Suntour
Wanting a Funk with estays & a Klein Attitude in Green, White and Pink.
Lots of purple
A Ti USE seatpost that bent easily! Hardly surprising given the diameter.
Watching John Tomac, Ned Overend and Thomas Frischnekt racing at Newnham Park.
Wanting stuff made by Specialised.
SRAM becoming popular.
150mm Flexstems with stupid narrow bars.
etc.
Hmm... The Raleigh Winner I got for xmas in 1985 and the Raleigh Grifter I lusted after but never got to own.
I was a late starter to off roading, however a trip to Danbury in 1997 riding an ancient (1992!) Kona Fire Mountain was my first "proper" off road ride. It took another six years before I became hooked, this time riding Edale and the Peaks on a Saracen Havoc trying to keep up with mates on brand new, s****y Specialized Enduros.
Stif adverts with all the weights of the components on...
I remember my first copy of MBUK - mountain bike parachuting and luminous yellow Marin Muirwoods.
And the pride when I strolled out of Halfords twenty years ago with my green and white 15 speed (Shimano Tourney) Apollo Blizzard after saving up a massive £150, replacing an aged and second hand yellow Raleigh Boxer.
I come from an era BMtb ( before mountainbikes) 🙁
I remember the first time I saw and rode a bike with a triple chainring and fat tyres offroad.
I remember when RS1's came out.
My bike cost me £400 and I couldn't believe they want £400 for a set of forks.
I also remember seeing a Pace RC100 for the first time and been blown away at how different it was 🙂
Me too TJ. I hired a mtb on my 21st birthday and spent the whole day thinking that this was the bike I always wished existed - fat tyres, low gears, strong enough for the woods. And it had great brakes (hell, it had brakes).
I've never subscribed to the MTB industry aspect of riding bicycles off road so I can't really play this game..
I had a Raleigh Mustang once... It had very basic technology
I once rode in the National Track Championships at Salford Park.
It's not there any more. They had to knock it down to build Spaghetti Junction on the M6.