.best chinese light from ebay under 30 quid. I'm not gonna buy one of these 200 quid jobbies, I bought 2 cree lights from ebay and they're great. Or how about 'the best way to cable tie a cheapo light to your helmet' I can see why they include reviews of the expensive kit though, it's so they can encourage the makers to take out the advert on the opposite/next page. Fair enough the mag is a business and has to make profit but high end kit just doesn't interest me..Best pedals under 60 quid
.Best helmet under £100
.Best mech under £100
Haven't you just described MBR? That's where I would pigeon hole their mag.
Their 'demographic' is newbies to the world of MTB, who lap up marketing guff on how the new Enduro grips bring the trail alive.
To them, £60 is a lot to spend on pedals!
(To me, it's still quite a bit to spend on pedals, which is why 99% of my kit is second hand).
I like ST mag, or at least the idea of it, but in reality I rarely read it cover to cover, or get excited by it.
I like the occasional bikepacking/bivvy/adventure story, but on the whole dislike (along with the content of all other bike mags) all of the articles and features on bikes and kit that are way overpriced, and over spec. for what 90% of people want/need/use.
I get that it (thank god) doesn't want to be MBUK, but can come across as a bit poncey and contain a fair bit of bike snobbery.
[quote=core]I get that it (thank god) doesn't want to be MBUK, but can come across as a bit poncey and contain a fair bit of bike snobbery
Which goes hand in hand with their readers' reputation for Orange and Audi. [i]Somebody[/i] has to fill that niche.
MBUK = The Daily Star
ST = The Guardian/Times/Telegraph
That's all faster moving, active content short-term web stuff / forum fodder surely, not worth the paper costs?best chinese light from ebay under 30 quid. I'm not gonna buy one of these 200 quid jobbies, I bought 2 cree lights from ebay and they're great. Or how about 'the best way to cable tie a cheapo light to your helmet'
bought 2 cree lights from ebay and they're great. Or how about 'the best way to cable tie a cheapo light to your helmet'
Or "best way to put out a small electrical fire" 😉
I've subscribed from before day one, on the "5 issues for a tenner" offer*; occasionally the magazine goes through a patch where it's more relevant to my interests and sometimes it's less so, but it's still interesting and still well worth the money.
(I've ridden my MTB in a cx race round a muddy field and I've ridden my cx bike at a trail centre. I have a beard, but not an Audi. I like coffee, but don't own a grinder.)
*subscriber number 113 🙂
Thinking about it further the thing that appealed to me 10 odd years ago about ST was that it felt different from the competition at the time e.g. MBUK, MBR, Cycling Plus. But now Rouleur, Privateer*, Cyclist etc. have taken the model (i.e. nice pics, paper, proper articles, less dominant ads) and improved upon it. So whereas ST was once the market leader, to me it is now an also ran.
* I'm fully aware Privateer has now gone, which IMO should give ST an opportunity to take.
Wow, magazine can't please all of the people all of the time shock. If I didn't know better I'd tell you all to get out on your bikes.
I've just flown over to London and started reading my first STW delivered to my door just before Xmas......I am a mountain biker only and therefore have a prejudice obviously but is the clue not in the title.....sorry if I've repeated somebody else's views but I've only got 5 min of wifi and can't read full post.....if I had had MBR and WBM with me I would have probably finished em both on the 1 hour flight....as it was I read about 1/4 of STW and loved it......if it becomes "general biking world" I'll unsubscribe..... If anyone from STW is reading this ... Keep up the good work!!!!!....rant over
So something like and article on the Three Peaks would be out of place in STW? I think that would be ace. Its all riding bikes in circles in the mud (i think there was a great STW art on this theme once) but sadly STW seems to have become filler of late - the art on middle aged execs in their Audi trying to ride as many Welsh Trail Centre Red Routes in a weekend kinda nailed it - that is obviously STWs new demographic.
I'm still bereft at the loss of Privateer and there is nothing outtheir to replace it, perhaps ST could give Tym M a job?
seem to recall you being on a peaks pootle, I was on a 6" travel bike you on your CX I would call you brave but TBH "mental" is the word I was thinking as I pinged down roman road.And for what it's worth, I ride my CX bike in forests, hills and mountains.
Some of the kit tests do seem to be a bit pricey, I don't mind that, aspirational stuff etc, but the notion of budget/entry level seem to be getting skewed.
GrahamS - MemberWhat's better suited to him then: an Orange 5 or a CX bike?
Both equally ill-suited. If only there were some other types of bike! 😉
Nipper99 - MemberSo something like and article on the Three Peaks would be out of place in STW?
Depends on how it's written really. "Mountainbikers- here's something that's a bit like what we do, which is quite interesting"- most folks won't have a problem with that I think. "Cyclocrossers- here's an inward-looking cx-lover's report of the race", not so much.
Basically, consider the audience. I suppose what matters to me isn't that the article is about mountain biking, as long as it's for mountain bikers.
Spot on...Basically, consider the audience. I suppose what matters to me isn't that the article is about mountain biking, as long as it's for mountain bikers.
what matters to me isn't that the article is about mountain biking, as long as it's for mountain bikers.
^ Now you're talking sense Northwind 😀
I read mags to inspire me to ride my bike. Cyclist does this tremendously well for my road bike. Singletrack does it reasonably well, but not as well as it used to. I actually find MBR much improved recently and more inspiring, since it addresses the type of riding I aspire to do.
Northwind has a habit of talking a lot of sense recently and his comment about considering the audience is bang on. Maybe I'm not quite the Singletrack demographic I once was.
Normal service will resume shortly.
Thanks for all the comments, folks. We do read them all and take them to heart. I'll see what we can do as we go through 2014 to keep the magazine fresh and exciting for you. Obviously we won't please all of the people all of the time, but I'm confident we can keep things interesting and current as we go through the year.
As always, our email addresses are in the magazine and in the site's contact details so hopefully you'll get in touch via email or on the forum if you've got any complaints or suggestions. As for the 'cross bike review - Upgrade came to see us with three bikes - [url= http://singletrackworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/pivot-shows-us-the-mach6-les-27-5-and-vault-cx-bikes/ ]http://singletrackworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/pivot-shows-us-the-mach6-les-27-5-and-vault-cx-bikes/ [/url] and could only spare the 'cross bike to review, so I rode it at the Three Peaks and reviewed it. Had they left the Mach6, we'd have reviewed that instead. Interestingly, four of the five comments on that story were about how great the 'cross bike looked...
Anyway, I'm of the 'all bikes are great' school of thought and occasionally a 'cross bike has snuck in over the years - the same as the odd pure downhill bike has. Our main focus, though, will always be on everyday trail bikes; some cheaper, some less so - written for mountain bikers of all ages/styles/budgets/beardiness.
As for £30 Chinese lights, nobody has actually ever sent us any to test, whereas we regularly get more expensive lights on loan for review, so that's what appears in the magazine.
Hope that helps.
Chipps
I actually find MBR much improved recently
Since the last change in editor imo, went through a bad patch under the previous fella, much, much better of late.
Incidently, they did just do a test on sub-£50 lighting set-ups (solarstorms and the like).
OrangeOrganic - Member
..........the articles seem to be aimed at people with huge amounts of disposable cash. Why not review more stuff that is within the average rider's range of affordability?
This.
It excludes and disenfranchises a huge number of people, a move which appears to directly contradict the ethos of the magazine.
Chipps I'm a big supporter of the magazine. But find this line disappointing
As for £30 Chinese lights, nobody has actually ever sent us any to test, whereas we regularly get more expensive lights on loan for review, so that's what appears in the magazine.
It seems obvious to me that you will lent, for free, items from manufacturers and suppliers with good marketing.
But i think the attitude that you only review whats free isn't ideal and the lights thing hits the nail on the head. one of the reason £30 Chinese lights aren't marketed is that you'll never get the lowest price if you have a marketing department. So i would like you to buy and some review some cheap lights. like many people I'm not a regular night rider so knowing whats possible for under £30 is of interest to me an i would imagine other readers as well. You can always sell the lights afterwards. If its the case that reviewing cheap options like this will hurt advertising revenue please say so and i'll understand.
If you really can't buy things to review could you borrow them, like Photozone.de
Or just ask on the forum - I'm sure there are enough folk on here with kit like that who would be happy to lend it to you for a bit if you asked.
Graham S the forum is an excellent place for advice. But not every mag reader is a forum reader. Editorial reviews are also good for direct comparison across a wide range of products
But I still think that the attitude that we only review what comes in for free is poor
I find ST a great read especially when I'm constipated, and the pics are great to look at when I'm not.
But I still think that the attitude that we only review what comes in for free is poor
Why??
No-one is going to go out and spend thousands of pounds on loads of lights, review them all and then sell them on. Not enough time for one but also the psychological aspect of reviewing something that you technically own. Affects the review, it's now biased.
There's also the timeline thing. Mags get kit before it's available in the shops so that customers can find out about it while its new, not 6 months after it's come out.
Manufacturers have demo kit for that very reason. Sometimes mags tell distributors what tests they have coming, sometimes they'll just get sent stuff on spec.
I had no idea what a CX bike was until I read this thread so I've learnt something new! Wouldn't particularly want to read about one in an mtb mag, personally.
Wouldn't particularly want to read about one in an mtb mag, personally.
One has one's CX magazine for that...
🙄
It's all bikes. Something a bit different every once in a while is good. Who knows, you might even like it.
Stick to the same narrow path and you'll never discover anything new!
Reply to Crazy-legs
Firstly I don't want to make to big a deal out of this. I do get the normal processes here. I understand that many reviews are about new products that are just being released and they can't be bought. I'm not saying its all biased and the magazine says nice things about things because they got them for free
However I expressed an opinion and you've asked me why
In my opinion at least some of the time (10%) a magazine has to be a bit more pro active. Otherwise the magazines start to become an extensions of the companies. For example we find that we have a Cylcocross bike review not because the editorial team wanted it but was the bike that the manufacturer chose for them to review. That seems wrong to me. I'm not suggesting that all the lights in a review should be bought but surely one £30 light in the review wouldn't be that hard to run to
The forum presents a very different version of MTB purchasing to the magazine. Yes the forum debates the high end and the new. But it also debates buying direct from China (cheap carbon frames and lights), builds using used parts from ebay, build from a cheap doner bikes. I think the mag should some times reflect these other ways of being an MTB consumer. Not all magazine readers are forum users.
Graham S the forum is an excellent place for advice. But not every mag reader is a forum reader. Editorial reviews are also good for direct comparison across a wide range of products
But I still think that the attitude that we only review what comes in for free is poor
Yeah what I meant was, if Chipps doesn't want to spend cash on buying things like cheapo Chinese lights and such like to review then maybe he should ask on here if folk will lend him some!
I'm sure there are a few on here with enough gear hanging about to spare some 😀
It needs Ferrentino back.
For example we find that we have a Cylcocross bike review not because the editorial team wanted it but was the bike that the manufacturer chose for them to review
It seems wrong to me too - why not just decline the review? The company looses out (from a marketing perspective), as they won't get the columns on their new [mountain] bike. I'm surprised companies don't bend over backwards to source a suitable review bike for a well known UK publication!
Unless the company was a bit more pushy, and [i]insisted[/i] their CX bike was reviewed instead. There are many ways they could insist, depending on your level of cynicism.....
It's all bikes. Something a bit different every once in a while is good. Who knows, you might even like it.
Stick to the same narrow path and you'll never discover anything new!
Well said
It needs Ferrentino back.
He ran out of ideas & was rehashing old articles, it needs new, fresher writers who are more relevant to 2014 than oldsters like ferrentino & Worland who just reminisce for 3 pages
What I love is the MBUKs value award.
Usually on a £120 bicycle jacket or £80 shorts.
That screams value to me.
hora - Member
What I love is the MBUKs value award.Usually on a £120 bicycle jacket or £80 shorts.
That screams value to me.
I have lots of pairs of £80 shorts that have lasted 6+ years, screams value to me.
Best 0.1% of my salary I spend.
Spend 30% of spare time on a bike/fettling/planning a ride.
Spend 50% of work time wishing I was out riding with buddies.
What makes this mag great is hat it seems to be written by people who just love bikes.
I'm not that any other bike mag gives that sort of feeling, things are not reflect each month but the staff have my full support. Also they allow many twit on the forum which makes even better.
Keep plugging away and our household will continue to as we have done since day.
Got any stickers?
Prompted by this thread I have just read issue 85 (so as not to pin this to one issue) online, which I very rarely do.
I get the mag delivered but seldom read all the articles as I have been finding it hard to read the print ( I don't find this with MBR)
Anyway..... issue 85. I laughed, I cried, I emailed a mate to go out riding with him again, considered some new places to visit.
and I really want to go riding NOW.... That's what I am after in mag.
Its still a great Mag. Who mentioned Worland?
Steve Worland writing for ST is one of the reasons I still subscribe.
I remember an article he wrote years ago about the importance of making a bike really, properly comfortable to ride - a great article on a subject that's rarely discussed.
Ferrentino was fine. but it's nice to have a change.
Interesting thread......I've had a niggling feeling the last year or so that I just haven't found ST as engaging as it used to be. That could very well be me and my interests changing, but I do seem to find less and less of the articles to be relevent or speaking to me. It did used to seem less gear focused (again, that could be me) and less downhilly.
Having said that, it's still head and shoulders above the uk competition, especially with the demise of Privateer and Bunyanvelo being online only.
Did it come with a free bottle of vodka? Damn, missed that )Anyway..... issue 85. I laughed, I cried, I emailed a mate to go out riding with him again
For the mag- if you want to review the popular cheap lights but can't get a sample, why not put out a call to readers?
I liked some old Ferrentino articles but by the end it was just drivel... A page article which was entirely about the toilets at interbike, and the fact that he was struggling to write a full page article...
hora - MemberWhat I love is the MBUKs value award.
Usually on a £120 bicycle jacket or £80 shorts.
That screams value to me.
£120 for a really bike bike jacket can be great value. My old one, just retired, cost about that much and was worth its weight in gold, the number of rides where it turned misery into fun made it one of the better buys I've ever made.
I wonder if wider-ranging reviews is something that could go on the website? Becoming the [url= http://thewirecutter.com/ ]Wirecutter[/url] of MTB kit must have some value? If not for here, it must be a niche that is waiting to be filled?
[i] ST are often later than the other sites with new kit and worse just print the press release as a review. I mean they can't even be arsed updating it from US marketing bullsh*t to English.[/i]
Lets clear this one up. You're confusing 'news' with 'reviews'. We've never posted a press release as a review. We post press releases word for word as news items usually with a short intro, marketing bullshit an all. Usually because we haven't seen the product to form an opinion at that point so why dress it up as something other than a press release?
Reviews are our opinion of a product, and they are published [i][b]after[/b] [/i]we've had enough time with it to form an opinion.
Try it for yourself...
http://singletrackworld.com/category/news/
http://singletrackworld.com/reviews/
For the mag- if you want to review the popular cheap lights but can't get a sample, why not put out a call to readers?
Oh that'd work... 🙄
8 sets of lights from 8 different readers. All various ages, all been treated in various different ways. Someone then needs to keep track of who sent what, ensure that the product is returned in a certain timeframe in the same condition...
Whereas what actually happens is that the lights get swapped from bike to bike, bits get lost or broken or the review gets delayed for some reason and they need to keep the lights for another month.
Also, I'd hate to be the reader who's gone to all that length to supply a set of lights and the review comes back saying they're shit!
