M8 of mine bought an e-bike cause he could a while back, and he loves it.. I’ve tried it and have to admit, hills and mud are a complete laugh on it, though downhill is just ok. Another friend of his joined us, and being a complete novice cyclist, with friends in the trade he bought an e-bike too. So this weekend they bring out another friend, who after trying their e-bike’s is basically going to buy one too. So now I’m leading/guiding a group of three e-bikes, on a ‘dumb’ one (as they call it), and am obviously struggling to stay in touch with them on hills.

What do you do? Buy an e-bike, or wait for them to get bored and abandon me…

TBH they’re not going to abandon me and I’m not quite ready for an e-bike, as
I don’t find their handling inspiring but also love how my current bike rides when the trails point down.. & I do pull away from them, once you get past that 15/16mph limit. BUT the important part here is that if you read reviews, they all say, on a regular 2/3hr route they knock an hour off that route… an hour, that a lot of time that we could use to ride further afield

…the likes of the rather lovely Mondraker eCrafty RR+ does turn my head and make my wallet hide in the corner

Wait until they leave you on the climb then turn off and go another way.

I’ve done it leading a social ride.
Mr Sprinty and his mates rang me about 20 minutes later, completely lost.
So we worked out where they were and picked them up 20 odd minutes later.

So all that their sprinting got them was half an hour stood next to a park bench on a fire road. While we did 7 or en 8 km of really good single track that wasn’t on the originally planned route.

Get your 3 mates on e-bikes to tow you up the hills?

I don’t know anything much about e-bikes – is it reasonable to think that a traditional bike and an e-bike would ever be compatible trail bikes. If I had a rowing boat and my mate had the same boat with an outboard, I wouldn’t even try to travel the same trails with him. Or is that a spurious comparison.

It’s like going on a motorbike ride with 1000cc bikes and 500cc bikes. Some styles are better than others, some riders are better than others, but when it comes down to it, power makes a difference

Doesn’t stop group rides happening though, you just regroup in different ways, or on a bigger route use the cornerman system

I do get towed/pushed or even borrow a bike on later parts of the ride, so it’s hardly an end of the world situation, just that ‘you could ride an hour longer’ (distance wise) is very tempting..
GDF: if you m8’s outboard was limited to a just above average rowing speeD.. Is the situation, fine going down stream, an advantage going up..

GDF: if you m8’s outboard was limited to a just above average rowing speeD.. Is the situation, fine going down stream, an advantage going up..

cheers – that’s a helpful analogy.

I like the fitness side that riding regularly provides, I enjoy clearing tricky uphill sections even if I mainly ride for the downhills but……..I’d still love an ebike as well as my normal bikes. Something like that mondraker or the specialized turbo levo. Two small kids and subsequent time constraints mean that I could ride 30% more downhill (at a guess) in the same riding time. I like the doubles with c.10ft gap but I’m not fussed about pushing for bigger stuff and I’m not whipping the bike or doing any other fandangery in the air so I can’t see the weight making a huge amount of difference there and at 95kg the added weight of the bike over a normal bike seems like something you’d get used to on the trails, just a bit more body english required. Brilliant things, had a go when a mate hired a basic hardtail, don’t want to test a decent full suspension as it might get expensive!

plan a 2-3 day ride with camping and no where to charge their bikes. Make sure there is plenty of climbing on the first day to run them down. 😀

I can see no point in these unless age and or health problems make them viable. To me the whole point of biking is to push yourself and improve fitness etc as well as have a laugh of course. Their sheer weight and cost puts me off and means I will never own one until the above needs arise.

fd3chris – Member
I can see no point in these unless age and or health problems make them viable. To me the whole point of biking is to push yourself and improve fitness etc as well as have a laugh of course. Their sheer weight and cost puts me off and means I will never own one until the above needs arise.

Nail – Head.

z1ppy – Member

…the likes of the rather lovely Mondraker eCrafty RR+ does turn my head and make my wallet hide in the corner

It’s 48.5lbs FFS!

No TWO of my bikes combined would be 48.5lbs!

Agree unless you have health issues surely they go against everything mtb stands for, being lazy shouldn’t validate these contraptions, buy a motorbike.

if you can, earn those descents!

we have just borrowed a demo for the SO to try She gave up biking a few years ago due to a bad knee ,
she was all smiles after and during a 10 mile ride we did yesterday .
so a purchase is on the cards which will mean we can both go riding again together without her thinking she will be holding me up .

in fact it will be me trying to catch her up on the climbs .

I also did 15 miles on it and it was great fun the E only kicked in on the climbs and if I dropped below 16 mph so yes I can see it knocking a heap of time off a long ride

To me the whole point of biking is to push yourself and improve fitness etc as well as have a laugh of course.

That’s a fair point, but have you ridden one? They are an absolute hoot so they squarely hit the have a laugh bit, which means all you are left with is fitness, which is a fine goal but not everyone’s motivation.

Can’t see me buying one any time soon. As mentioned in the OP they are great going up but a little compromised going down. If someone came out with a much smaller motor/battery that just gave an occasional little boost on the ups and the price and weight was OK I might be tempted 😈 Make every day an uplift day

Hang onto their back packs for a tow when you get tired..

I will have my new e bike delivered tomorrow.

Still keeping my conventional mtb, but want to get out riding more often.

Not the oldest person riding at 61, but I do suffer a bit with pain in my left leg in particular, also very little strength to ride two days on the trot.

Looking forward to it. I have ridden a e bike on the road, so I know the sort of assistance it can give.

You still have to pedal, it’ll just be like being 20 years younger, and I can enjoy the climbs again.

Once they start slagging you off for getting dropped, find a route too big for their batteries. Problem solved (for you).

As a self confessed weight weenie who rides XC only they will never be for me but I can see the appeal for less fit/aged etc,. riders who can get out, go further, not struggle on hills etc,.

Father in law in in that camp and he has brought all the enjoyment of getting out on a bike back to him whereas he was thinking of giving it up as he can’t handle hill any more and couldn’t go out for long.
I had a quick go on it and it does feel good uphill but just felt like a moped to me in the way that it was heavy and not that nice to move around on.

They can wait at the top. You can wait at the bottom.

Get his e-bike :

here – £3500

Whilst I understand e-bikes etc, personally if the time came when I felt like I should buy one because my mates were all shooting up hills with the assistance of a battery and motor hidden in their hideously ugly and heavy bikes, I’d either be riding on my own (even more than I do already) and/or retiring to my garage to increase the amount of time I spend tinkering with vehicles with proper motors. And they don’t pretend to be push bikes.

Nickjb +1
These aren’t the only ppl I ride with, so I’m never going e-bike only (yet) but

fd3chris – Member
I can see no point in these unless age and or health problems make them viable. To me the whole point of biking is to push yourself and improve fitness etc as well as have a laugh of course

As Nick says, you and & others have obviously not ridden one, if you had, you’d realise your still putting effort in and still getting fitness out (though to be fair you can ride them without putting loads of effort in too).

48lbs for the e-Crafty, damn I never saw that.

What this has done is made me think.. I posted about getting a motorbike a couple of months back (after a 20 year gap), but realised I’d never use it, it’d be an expensive ornament in my garage.. but an E-bike I would use and I’d use a lot TBH.

if you read reviews, they all say, on a regular 2/3hr route they knock an hour off that route… an hour, that a lot of time that we could use to ride further afield

Why not just plan in 1/2hr rides or just start further afield.

Or buy a motorbike and you could get many, many miles away in the same time.

someone overtakes me in cardiac hill (cannock chase) last saturday in his bloody e-bike.. and he looks very proud of it with his smug face looking at me struggling at the top of the hill .. I dont even understand why he stops there for a break . wtf 😕

Or buy a motorbike and you could get many, many miles away in the same time.

woosh… that was this thread, or e-bikes in general going over your head… please try to keep up

So much hate coming thru, I was hoping for discussion, not just the normal (jealous undertones) responses

Find new people to ride with would be my choice (or just ride on my own).

The assistance cuts out at 15mph, make sure you ride lots of trails that are faster than that. 😀

As someone approaching the age when one of these may be an option I would need to buy a new vehicle to carry it in or on.
Same applies to a fatbike that I quite fancy.
So maybe not for a while yet.
However for someone who is injured or perhaps partly disabled I really can see the relevance.
There was a demo at Forest of Dean recently but by the time I got there for a ride all the batteries were flat!

Tried my brother’s folding e bike. in full power mode you hardly had to pedal.
What your 3 amigos are doing certainly isn’t cycling.

Tried one twas nice up dem hills!

Not so sure I’d like to lead a ride of e-bikers from the back with just me pedalling up all the time though.

@ zippy why do you think there are jealous undertones ? You’ve asked a load of mtbers what they would do in your position and you haven’t liked the replies. As said above its not cycling , so you’ve asked the wrong group of people if you want likes.

I kinda see e-bikes as a way for the unfit or occasional rider to get out and enjoy mtb’ing, where otherwise the climbing aspect would put them off and they’d end up stuck on the sofa watching EastEnders with the Mrs. For this purpose, i think they are great and should be encouraged.

However for someone with the fitness to ride a proper bike, i can’t really think of any situation where i’d think of an e-bike as an appropriate choice.

I’d get fitter ;-). If your friends a re riding them because they need them, and you don’t, just put in the training. If they don’t really need them, then it’s not really the same thing, so join them.

There will come a time when everyone here will need to consider whether an E-bike will be appropriate. I rather like them, personally. They kept my mother riding. The fact that there are creditable off-road machines is just a bonus.

Fifeandy ^^^ what about if you’re as physically knackered after 3 hours on the ebike as you are after 3 hours on the normal bike but you’ve ridden 30% more trails and assuming you get the fun element of mtb from riding trails wouldn’t you theoretically have had more fun on a ride that lasts the same amount of time as a traditional bike? What’s not to like about that?

Fd3chris, might have been trolling a little hard with that comment, apologies. Though the point stands that you can ride e-bikes with effort like a normal bike & it’s like you have bionic legs, you laugh at uphill trail. So you can still keep/build fitness as long as you put the effort in imo. You can also do the minimum of effort (spin) & be basically powered along for nothing. My interest is as much about being able to ride further from home but within the same time frame, & making winter riding (slogging through endless mud/muddy hills) enjoyable. No likes required, just want think about them, rather than repeat the same endless disparagement without discussing the points both good & bad

Gotama has it..

Would love an ebike, riding to the top is dull and tedious, it’s all about the down for me. None of this ‘earn your decent’ nonsense. They just need to be a little lighter.

I’m relatively fit, young(enough), reasonable at riding bikes – e-mtbs are a right old laugh.

On a normal bike I can comfortably do around 6 laps of the woods in 2-3 hours. with an e-mtb i can do 10.

I couldn’t care less if you don’t like them, think they’re cheating, or aren’t ‘proper’ mountain bikes. I’m out adding an extra 4 runs to my ride 8)

I ride normal bikes too, BTW, it’s just another option for the right time and place. If I’m out with mates on normal bikes, I’ll ride normal. If I’m on my own, i mix and match depending on my mood. If (like tomorrow) I’m out with a mate on an e-mtb, I’ll bloody well take mine!

+1 for hungry monkey

Sums up my view point, most / nearly all my rides are from my house and up and around Afan.

Lots of climbing, can be a struggle at times for me.
Looking forward to enjoying the Singletrack climbs now.

Not for me but there’s defiantly a market for them. Last Easter I happened to pass an elderly lady (well +60) going the other way on the trails at Rothiemurchus. She was loving it. If it gets folks her age out on the trails or helps folk with injuries to ride then what’s the issue.

In fact this month’s MBR (boo hiss) has 2 readers letters about the issue. One guy riding them has MS while the other has heart issues, neither wished to stop riding.