Anyone race XC fully rigid?

I’m considering it as money/weight saving exercise. I only race about ten short XC events all year, and hardly ride an MTB otherwise apart from a weekly night ride.
I usually start my first lap locked out, and often keep it that way.
I was thinking of swapping my old XT stuff from my aging frame and tired SIDs to a Scandal with carbon forks.

See a bloke at most of the races in the Home Counties racing a rigid Niner. Doesn’t seem to slow him down. Well,he’s faster than me anyway!

Not sure if I could do it, but don’t let that stop you!

Do it. Been racing rigid for 26 years!

Yep

Absolutement:

Al Fairbarn, plus Aidan and Gee of this parish have won plenty of races on rigid bikes. You’ll be fine.

4 hours around the circuit at the Thetford Winter series on my Swift ain’t so bad. 😀

Definitely 🙂

I don’t race but ride xc rigid a lot, I like to ride pretty fast and all day and a carbon fork is perfect. It’s not for the am trail style of riding though, but you’ll be amazed how fast and movable the bike is uphill.

Ride what you like and maybe f/r might suit you amd your circumstances. But you will be a bit slower than with a properly working suspension fork. That might not matter to you, but I’m slow enough already and don’t want to go any slower, even a few seconds a lap. It is a race after all.

Singular team (myself included) often race rigid and we usually do OK.

It depends a bit on the course, though. If you’re doing laps like a proper XC race, then you learn on your practice lap or your first lap and then you can go fast in the real thing. If it’s single loops like the Dyfi Enduro, I always keep a bit more in reseve on a rigid bike because I’ve done the “skipping over rough ground towards certain doom, wishing I had enough grip to brake” thing and it isn’t much fun.

Depends on the course? Look at the Olympic course (or most WC courses) and they’re still on hardtails, on the average local/regional XC race course of muddy singletrack and fireroads would front suspension be faster?

I don’t race but the only bits of Swinely I wish for suspension is the Labyrinth braking bumps where you can pump the bermed corners on suspension on the rigid forks you’re a passenger until the trail smooths out again.

What you’ve done there is make the classic internet mistake of reading 4 words and ignoring the rest of what I actually said, It mostly depends on whether you’re doing one loop or laps.

If it’s basically XC, and you’re good, and you know what’s coming, having a rigid fork won’t slow you down much.

Where it makes a big difference for me is on unseen trails where that insurance clause of suspension can save you when it all goes wrong. If you’re cavalier, even that might not slow you down.

I don’t know everything, but I’ve ridden > 6ft drops and won races on rigid bikes, so I do base this on some experience.

Yes we are talking laps, and actually XC races are mostly sub one hour. Well the ones I do are. Think I’ll do that.
Nice and cheap and nippy.
Now then Ergons or not?

Now then Ergons or not?

Ritchey foams, lighter and more comfortable to me.

What you’ve done there is make the classic internet mistake of reading 4 words and ignoring the rest of what I actually said, It mostly depends on whether you’re doing one loop or laps.

We crossed posts. I agree with you about riding unsighted, but there’s still a point where you can go faster with a suspension fork then without whether you know it’s coming or not. My point was that on a lot of courses there aren’t or are very few of those points on the trail.

I am a crap racer, so maybe this wouldn’t apply to a better one… Found it a wee bit slower in places as you’d expect, though not drastically. I remember some of the climbs feeling harder just due to the lumpiness. (were they actually slower? No idea, but they felt it). So not sure if there was actually much advantage to be had to tradeoff the disadvantages.

Main difference was I found it harder to overtake- never had any probs on the main lines but the off-lines could be a fair bit slower than they would be normally.

I love my rigid bike but I’m not keen to race it again.

There was a guy riding rigid in one or two of the World Cup XC races a couple of years, maybe 4, ago.

“skipping over rough ground towards certain doom, wishing I had enough grip to brake” thing and it isn’t much fun.

Me too! 😯

I’ve been experimenting with rigid recently and find it’s totally fine except for long bumpy sections where it can be really hard on the body. Also there is less grip on bumpy rocky stuff. I think XC races will be fine, in fact I’m planning to do my next XC race rigid and SS…

It’s great for building skills and smooth riding. Also nice in the winter as forks cost so much to maintain.

Racing? Front sus is faster, but you won’t be killed if you race a rigid bike. I won AYTE this ‘summer’, which is a 4hr XC enduro, on my rigid Salsa Selma singlespeed, which I chose as the conditions were so awful I didn’t want to ruin my nice bike and the competition wasn’t really there so I won. Had other quick riders entered I wouldn’t have won.

GB

Hoping it’ll feel like I’m racing cross.

I used to. Hardly do any XC racing these days – moved into Enduro style stuff and did all the Mountian Mayhems and a few SITS up to about 4 years ago and always had the full rigid there as a back-up bike if needed.

Traditional XC, I raced some of the Gorricks and an old venue called Ash Ranges on the rigid. Couple of the old NEXT Welsh Series events back in about 1999-2000.

I’ve swapped between rigid, HT and FS a few times in racing. FS is definitely more comfortable for the longer events but I still remember doing MM in horrendous conditions one year and using the full rigid for the whole thing. Everyone on FS was reduced to pushing 60lb mud-caked bikes round, my full rigid with it’s 1.6″ mud tyres cut through everything. 🙂