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I'm sure someone involved away back then must have written a book about it. Could anyone recommend one?
Has repack changed from claiming he invented mountain bikes to a more accurate one of the first to codify dh mtb racing?
A claim I am careful not to make and have denied making now for a long time. But still there are those who believe they have read something I never wrote, and I still have to hear from people who must now be in their 80s who did it before I did.
The video speaks for itself. It is the FIRST video of this sport, and it is an anniversary, so I put it up here. Nobody in it had any idea that this goofy sport would take off like it did.
A claim I am careful not to make and have denied making now for a long time
[i]We[/i] know that, [i]you[/i] know that... but every time you start a thread... [i]someone[/i] gets a bee in their helmet.
Great vid, thanks for sharing. Love seeing this old stuff 😁
Can you still ride that track or is it fettered with gates and other obstacles?
didn't someone try it on a modernish bike a few years back?
I’m sure someone involved away back then must have written a book about it. Could anyone recommend one?
cant tell oif sarcastic or not being interwebs..
Can you still ride that track or is it fettered with gates and other obstacles?
actually reading Charlies (excellent) Fat Tyre Flyer book right now.. was on my christmas list but had to buy it for myself im the end. so glad i did, even though I knew a bunch of stuff from being old-ish and seeing Klunkerz a few years back. book has nice short chapters for a sleep deprived, time poor parent of a youngun like myself 🙂
Great vid, thanks for sharing! 🙂
cant tell oif sarcastic or not being interwebs..
He's a born Big Hitter.
But still there are those who believe they have read something I never wrote, and I still have to hear from people who must now be in their 80s who did it before I did.
Dude. Roll back a couple of decades. You turned up and claimed to have invented mountainbiking on many forums and heard from many folk (me included) around the world who told you of others who were doing similar riding before you guys "pioneer'd and coined the name "mountainbiking".. Most of those forums have since died and you've changed your tune somewhat since then but please don't deny what was said. Hippies should be cooler than that 😉
^ it'd be in waybackmachine.. data rarely dies
He’s a born Big Hitter.
heh.. anyways.. seems from posts online its still rideable which the talk of gates in the book is obvs out of date?
there's a strava segment with a few well known names if you scroll through
https://www.strava.com/segments/1129111 : fastest is 4:19 with a top speed north of 42mph..
gary fishers time i 4:22 timed from maybe another place, and during an official race so not sure how well the comparison goes.
A claim I am careful not to make and have denied making now for a long time. But still there are those who believe they have read something I never wrote...
I presume Google is slower than usual at the moment because Tj is furiously searching everything ever written on the internet currently?
While Marin County gets considerable credit for introducing mountain biking to the world, it is far from correct to suggest that the mountain bike was invented here. People rode bikes on dirt as soon as there were bikes, and no doubt a few of them raced downhill, but left no record of their competition. Many others had already come up with the idea of putting derailleur gears onto balloon-tyre bicycles long before anyone in Marin County did.
Whatever is going on here?
I find it hilarious that anyone can claim that the Repack guys didn't start up mountain biking as we know it today.
The fact that a few beardy British/French/insert nationality types rode touring bikes or other weird creations off road before the Repack days is utterly irrelevant; there are very few links between these bikes and the sport of mountain biking that took off in the mid-80s. When Specialized copied a bike to produce the first production MTB, it wasn't something made by Geoff Apps, was it?
JP
^ yup.
my dad was arsing about in the quantocks (since taunton, somerset is at the foot of the southern end) on whatever passed for a youths/non road bike in the 60s, but no racing, no innovation just teenagers going where they could on bikes and getting lost. i did the same but mountains bikes were a thing over here by then. i'm sure the story is the same the world over.
a few years later they'd have land rovers with winches on, get themeslves stuck and have fun pulling themeslves out. they just used what transport they had in the environment they were in.
great video. Repack your a legend. They may or may not have invented mountain biking, but that is still some video.
For me, the Repack races and the scene around it are most representative of mountain biking, not some tourer types on basically an off road club ride/audax thing. Look at the bikes, the mindset, the ethos - it's recognisably MTB. Would I say the RSF stuff is? No. More like gravel/audax/touring.
Fair play Charlie - great video and keep them coming......
40yrs ago I was riding an old track bike hundreds of road miles a day for my kicks, I'd like to thank Repack and his mates for saving me from myself 😉
You only need to look at his posting history to see his hyperbolic claims
yeah but how many people got to ride with Gary Fisher who made some of the first mtbs as I understand.
Santa Cruz full of hippies and people still dodging the draft in the early noughties. Probably the same now.
Thanks for posting the vid @repack-rider
I got your Fat Tire Flyer book for xmas - absolutely love it, captures the whole DIY vibe of the early development of mountain biking as it evolved into what we have today. A damn good read 🙂
For the haters - Charlie addresses in the book exactly where the Repack timed downhill race scene, organised by himself, Gary Fisher, Joe Breeze, Tom Ritchey et al fit into the evolution of what we now know as mountain biking, and specifically that people were already cycling off road from the day bicycles were invented.
You only need to look at his posting history to see his hyperbolic claims
It's hard, I find, to strike the right balance between bitter and resentful, but I think you've nailed it.
Two young mountainbikers in the 60s
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Thanks to the Repack gang we don't have to ride bikes like that on single track anymore. The British industry was never going to do anything of its own initiative,