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What products have you seen that you thought ‘that’s absolutely pointless and will be crap’, only to use it and work out they are great
my 2..
redshift suspension stem. Perhaps scarred by the use of a knock off flex stem in the 90’s, and coming off a set of modern day suspension forks this was always going to be utter rubbish. But remarkably it’s bloody brilliant..
also, (and perhaps obviously) my first dropper post. An utterly pointless extravagance, until I used one..
im not going to include disk brakes, as I always knew that they would be good..
Fatbikes. which i am pretty late at trying. looked at em years ago, and thought they looked silly, and slow and pointless, when infact, they are just bloody ace, and i recon i could have spent my whole cycling life using one rather than dozens and dozens of other bikes i have owned.
Togs.
Little plastic thumb doohickies... Pffft... Hang on... These are ace.
Varia rear radar lights. Hate heading out on the road bike without it. Scariest moment since having it was on the Fylde when travelling in a group at 25mph and a motorbike coming past without setting it off. It works by Doppler and has a 100mph differential meaning the motorbike was going over 100mph faster than us...
Mudhugger shorty front mudguard, you think that's tiny and never going to work! They're brilliant.
Arm warmers, knee warmers, gilets, cycling caps....
Turns out that being around for 100 years before mountain bikes came along gave roadies time to figure out how to make useful kit.
TyreKey
It looks like a useless piece of landfill. Until I dislocated my thumb trying to get a tight tyre on to my gravel bike. It works brilliantly, if only for small gravel or road tyres.
I second droppers.
Avid Thingamajig from years ago.
Definitely droppers.
Swore I'd never need one.
Yellow high definition lens glasses.
Win-wing, silly piece of flexible plastic on a loop with 2 zipties, has made riding in mud bearable, weighs nowt and swaps between bikes in seconds
Surprised at all the calls for dropper posts.
For me it was the most obvious need on a bike. I was first in line as soon as I first heard about the Crank Bros Joplin (which as I remember was a Maverick Speedball).
Get to top of hill. Stop. Put down saddle. Get to bottom of hill. Stop. Put saddle up. Ride on. Stop. Adjust saddle. Ride on. Still not right. Should I stop or keep going? **** it, almost at the top again. Is this hill worth putting the saddle down for? Get to top of hill. Stop. etc...
Or was that just me?
There’s a lot more to it than protecting your hands from trees.
Aero gains for fat bikes?
Arm warmers, knee warmers, gilets, cycling caps….
+1 (at least for the first three, less convinced by cycling caps...)
And another vote for dropper seatposts. And this is coming from me who almost never dropped the saddle for anything! A couple of rides on one and wow!
Have to say I've tried knee warmers, not that taken with them. Oh the shame of when they start falling down your legs🫣
Get to top of hill. Stop. etc…
Or was that just me?
Probably not. I did get quite adept at standing pedaling when my dropper was out of service at one point. Then raise it once legs dead!
Rea radars. Bought one on a whim not expecting much - so good on quiet lanes and alerts you way before you hear anything.
Droppers were obviousish I wasn't the first in my group to get one but the use case was clear as I stopped at the top of every trail to drop the seat.
Or was that just me?
100% me too
Surprised at all the calls for dropper posts...
Or was that just me?
No, I ordered a GravityDropper the moment I saw a review in Mountain Bike Action. They were so obviously better than having to stop to adjust your saddle height all the time. I could never understand the people who never tried them, but then declared they were a solution looking for a problem.
Same with disk brakes. Twenty years ago, forums were full of people declaring they were pointless and too heavy. Same with full-suspension and tubeless tyres.
I was skeptical of oversized bars, didn't really see the point if you weren't racing DH. Once I tried them, I realized how much 25.4 mm bars flexed.
The cycle community is, I think, generally quite a conservative bunch, anytime something comes along with things like dropper posts, riser bars, disc brakes, changes in bike design, wheels etc etc, it tends to follow more or less the same path;
1. A loss of collective shit
2. Invention of reasons why product/design isn't going to be any good/unnecessary; argue endlessly about it
3. Try product
4. Realisation that many of the arguments are in fact, horseshit
5. STFU about it
@nickc has it.
The gap between points 2 and 3 can also often be huge while all the time trotting out the same old shit.
All the 29" wheels will explode/don't steer quick/aren't rad enough for me folks were the worst of the lot.
1. A loss of collective shit
2. Invention of reasons why product/design isn’t going to be any good/unnecessary; argue endlessly about it
3. Try product
4. Realisation that many of the arguments are in fact, horseshit
5. STFU about it
For some that's the case.
For others, it depends on the product. Shit pointless products get through the first 3 steps and then return to step 1. Good products get bought up as soon as they're made available.
For others, they just just inhale the marketing bullshit and then regurgitate it at the first two people. Hence the endless arguments.
Toe covers for crappy shoes that have holes/vents/mesh in them. Who on earth thinks we need ventilation in shoes in the UK?
I'm embarrassed to say, I didn't even know that you were meant to lower the saddle for descents. Which meant that we used to get off and walk down the more technical stuff.
Who on earth thinks we need ventilation in shoes in the UK?
I need ventilation in shoes much of the year
I fitted a dropper when I bought my first new MTB for 15 years. Meh.
It took me long enough to realise 26" wheels are crap, never mind adopt 29
Well I was dismissive about long trousers for MTB for ages, because I expected them to be sweaty and what's wrong with a bit of mud on your shins anyway?
Now my pampered lower legs have got used to staying clean and dry-ish through the colder months.
And they seem to help with temperature management too.
Until I saw a dropper post - I had not thought about their existence. Before using my first one - a Crank Bros Joplin, I didn’t realise how much it would change my riding.
Waterproof socks. First tried the Porelle socks in the early 2000. They were a game changer and much better than the Gore-Tex socks in the late 1990’s which just felt artificial.
Toe covers for crappy shoes that have holes/vents/mesh in them. Who on earth thinks we need ventilation in shoes in the UK?
Soon as i get a new pair of shoes i'm straight out with the mastic gun or packet of Sugru filling in the vent holes in the soles..
Tubeless inflaty-tank things. For years I thought they were the preserve of the lazy and a waste of money, but pssht and straight up is just a much nicer experience
In-frame storage has been a bit of a game changer for me. Big days in the Alps without needing to carry a pack are brilliant.
In-frame storage has been a bit of a game changer for me.
Ooh, good point. I started doing it because I was cos-playing as an EWS racer but then I found not having a backpack was actually really nice.
And I also like to persuade myself I can feel the improvements with the sprung/unsprung mass ratio.
Vents in shoes. Loads of people seem to think they’re crap, but they’re actually brilliant. Just pop on suitable overshoes when you’re going to need extra weather protection.
Little cotton roadie caps. Seem to be just brilliant at regulating temperature most of the year and great at dealing with low angle sun - rather better than sunnies to be honest.
Dropper posts and tubeless aren't crap and aren't pointless (early tubeless 20+ years ago was a bit faffy but as soon as UST was a thing I've never looked back)