When riding as fast as possible on level, bumpy trails with full suss, the feeling is akin to ‘flying’ to me. A full suss allows full power pedalling sat down and the speed-sapping square-edged bumps are ‘dulled’ so I get this feeling of faster and faster acceleration.

Good job I love my HT coz that’s all I’ve got!

Oops double post!

The last full suspension bike I rode was a Proflex 857 back in 1998 and everything since has been fully rigid with a few hardtails thrown in.

I’ve just had a Scott Spark on loan for 2 days whilst in the Lakes and I was amazed at how much easier it made the steep rocky climbs.

The Spark certainly didn’t ‘dull the trail,’ and I felt a real benefit over long ride; particularly on the climbs and generally making me feel far fresher at the end of the ride.

I didn’t feel any quicker on the down bits though 😳

yunki – Member

For the reasons stated above, hardtails and rigid bikes should also be viewed generally as skills compensators..

I’m a old duffer, unfit, no bottle and little skill.. By riding a rigid bike it’s the perfect excuse for not riding certain lines, being slow on the descents, taking the chicken line and generally mincing about..

I see loads of people doing all of that shit on thier fresh out of the showroom MTBR recomended all singing all dancing full sussers too so i wouldn’t be too concerned about it. 🙂

Ht funner on smoother trails.

I try to ride my fs as fast as possible DH and when I get on my ht I rode at the same speed, this makes for a very loose and fun ride. That’s not to say my fs isn’t fun, it’s great. My fs is what eggs me on and make me try to ride faster than before.

By ht is a better bike for smoother trails that I ride with the family but it certainly isn’t limited to blue routes.

depends on where you regularly ride your bike?

my local trails (the ones I ride 90% of the time) are faster on my hardtail 29’er, than they ever were on my full suspension 26″

I timed many runs and rides on both wheel sizes as a proper comparison

And feel much more fun on the 29’er simply because I am riding faster and it feels more direct, a little more “body english” is required than the FS which just seemed like a lazy ride on those trails

its mainly fast rolling singletrack XC with steep climbs and steep descents, some tree roots, but no rocks, and fireroads linking the singletracks

For me personally, it’s a bit like the difference between driving a tractor and…. Well, riding a bike I suppose

Full suspension bikes can be skill compensators, but i would say mostly only on technical climbs, where you can get away with more it terms of lines and traction.

However i much, much prefer to ride my fuss sus over my hardtail, its just a nicer place to be especially on longer rides 🙂

I find my full suss tractor makes the trails come alive even when i’m towing half a ton of cow shit.

For me personally, it’s like the difference between eating a nice scotch egg and playing Yahtzee with your gran

Do you play Yahtzee through a medium?

My gran told me she died years ago so i’m a bit confused how you could be “playing with my gran”
😯

Oh gosh.. I’m terribly sorry, I didn’t realise that she was dead!! (although I don’t feel so bad about her cheating all the time now)

If you can only ride a section on a full suss but not a hardtail, you’re not riding it, the bike is 😉 Solution- get better at bikes.

I ride HT and FS and it all depends on the trails IMO

I’ve ridden stuff FAST on the FS that would smash me (important one) and the HT to bits.

On the other hand I did 30 miles this morning on the my 29er HT which was a mix of road, trail, field 😯 and it would have felt twice the distance on the FS

I found myself unable to pull off a decent bunnyhop on full suss, so went back to hardtail and happily bounce around like a spazzy frog, all day long. I fully realise that others can pull boom-gnarly hops on their bouncy bikes but it ain’t for me 🙂

Getting loose on my hardtail on trails that have become comfortable abd dull on the full is mega fun.

Theres stuff a hardtail a hardtail opens up over the full sus and vice versa. Therell be bits that are faster on a hardtail too.

At the end of the day, riding is more than just seeing how fast you can smash through rough stuff, thats all a fs buys you, you cant just stick to that all the time or else riding just gets dull. Expand youbhorizons in how you get your jollies.

Mtbing is just off road bmx to me, im trying to turn every trail i ride into a pump track, a fs nakes it possivle for me to turn rougher stuff into viable pump track, but hinders the pump on the smoother stuff. Pedalling is dull, fs on smooth stuff is dull, it creates more pedalling.

Remote lock out = three bikes for the price of one 😉

If you can only ride a section on a full suss but not a hardtail, you’re not riding it, the bike is Solution- get better at bikes.

Super rad to the power of 10.

Can’t say I’m not right, though 😉 There’s not that much stuff that I can ride, but won’t ride on my hardtail… And when it happens, it’s never the bike’s fault, it’s me not being good enough or brave enough.