The ML has a 15mm shorter reach / 15mm shorter ett according to geometry geeks. Same length head tube and same stack. So apart from the length and seat tube they’re actually very similar it seems. So the ML should feel similar but just a little bit more nimble perhaps.

Sums it up really 🙂

Been out in the close playing after turning bars back and i think it’s deffo better… but then the monsoons came, so i’m about to Zwift race instead now 😀

Weather in biblical here this afternoon – so much rain. Luckily 😳 I’ve obliterated my back so I can’t ride my bike anyway…..

As usual, today i thought “Hmmm i wonder”…. and i then ended up fitting the 40mm length stem, the standard one on the Trek EX9.8 is 50mm.

This is a different diameter too of 31.8mm diameter bars..

The only slight downside to this test is that my spare 31.8 bars are 740mm in width which isn’t exactly on-trend. But will be interesting tomorrow to give it a whirl for a few runs and then swap back to the other setup at lunchtime and try again.

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2nvxxXU]2022-07-01_02-49-51[/url] by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2nvr34a]2022-07-01_02-49-42[/url] by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

https://www.perpetualdisappointment.co.uk/what-handle-bar-widths-do-the-top-ews-enduro-and-world-cup-downhill-riders-use/

Enduro
NAME HEIGHT (CM) BAR WIDTH (MM) RATIO
Sam Hill 175 750 2.33
Florian Nicolai 183 780 2.35
Kevin Miquel 190 780 2.44
Richie Rude 182 750 2.43
Jesse Melamed 170 740 2.30
Eddie Masters 185 770 2.40
Adrien Dailly 172 780 2.21

I think bar width is down to personal preference as much as anything.

Shoulder width can be used as a rough guide but I don’t think it’s foolproof.

I’m 175cm tall and use a 780mm bar. 800 feels too wide to me (plus narrow gaps between trees on a lot of trails) but 760mm feels a bit narrow. I like a lot of up and back sweep on my bars that lots of other people don’t seem to like that much when they have a go on my bike.

Funnily my lad runs 800 on both. We’ve tried narrower and he dislikes it.

My big question for tomorrow will be whether I stick with the ALU bars in 31.8 or trim the carbon 35s down.

Down at Rogate yesterday i spent the morning on the 31.8@750mm bars followed by the afternoon on the 790mm@35s.

The difference isn’t as great as you’d honestly think at times, you could notice some difference, but not massively. I settled on the 35s though and carbon, which is the standard bike setup. I may whip 10mm off them, but doesn’t need anything too drastic.

I was concentrating yesterday on riding things a little outside of my comfort zone, so spent a tonne of time riding biking bottom and split richard trails. Bikini bottom was because of the 3 gaps at the bottom, they’re what i’ve been working on a bit lately. Sadly for me, in the video one of the lads took, it looks WAY less spectacular than i hoped it would ! But i was clearing all of them nicely onto the downside yesterday and that made me massively happy.

The world did get complex at one stage of the morning as my lads new Hope rear wouldn’t hold pressure and was leaking… I think it’s likely to be a taping issue rather than a wheel or tyre issue. We threw a tube in there and that sorted it for the day.
In the afternoon one of the lads killed his rear wheel, pranging it on landing and bending out an edge… That took a little more and a little less delicate work to resolve and was taken care of with brute force and a hard bit of hammering, but i got it 99% straight and it now holds air, he was soon back out on it 😀

The Fuel9.8 was again faultless though, it’s a lovely lovely thing. Well, i say faultless, it’s got a proper waggly dropper and lots and lots of play in it. Apparently there’s 2 bushes and 2 keyways that need sorting. So i’ve ordered a Brand X dropper for today from CRC and then i can get working on making that one better or i can simply swap for the Brand X. The dropper on the Fuel9.8 really does get slated in reviews and makes me think i may as well just throw the Brand X on and forget it, rather than chase my tail with the Bontrager one.

That all assumes i can actually move today, which it seems is quite hard !!!!

I was sort of nearly doing this pair today.

But I crashed 4 times, well, almost 5. Out of 10.

I didn’t actually fully complete it. On the left of the 2nd one there’s a bit ledge, I kept landing left and catching it.
Weirdly, jump 2 is 2′ shorter than jump1 which I was landing, but I do seem to jump left every time.
After 4 crashes, plenty of bruises to come and shredding my left shin of skin, I called it a day.

Disappointed as I actually made the distance on jump 2 twice, but crashed

Brand X dropper fitted in 5 minutes, the Brand X has no play/wiggle and certainly no horrible noise of clunk when it’s flapping about

The Bontrager will stay in the spares box after the service kit arrives and it’s made nicer.

but I do seem to jump left every time

I’m not a good jumper but I find I veer slightly off to one side when I try pulling up on the bars to jump, rather then pushing away from the ramp to get the air

@joebristol

I often wonder if i have any technique at all when jumping, but on the wider jumps like at Rogate it’s OK as there’s no downside… but i don’t think i was jumping left there. If you look on the right there’s a sharp fall off in terrain, so i wonder if i was sub-consciously trying to jump away from that. I guess the problem is that both of these are outside of my comfort zone so i was having to think and try rather than just pop and enjoy.

I was going to go back today, but i am battered and bruised lol.

I was going to go back today, but i am battered and bruised lol.

I wish I was just like that – my back is in a bit of a bad way. Hoping it improves over the next few weeks – think I’m off the mtb for a while sadly. Just doing gentle zone 2 on the turbo / swimming and following physio exercises for now. Hoping a sports massage this week frees things up 😞

GUtted for you mate as i know how much you love the riding. It’s hard as heck when you’re off the bike. I’m trying to be semi-sensible as it’s 4 weeks today until we’re on the way to Morzine… but that really irritated me last night, espeically as i feel i had the length, just not the line.

GWS fella.

Cheers – keeping fingers crossed it improves over the next few weeks if I do as I’m told m.

Yeah stay well in the run up to Morzine – you don’t want to mash yourself before a trip like that – should be epic!

I know the Trek doesn’t get much in the way of posting/love by me… but it’s still a cracking bike.

One thing i would like though is a bit slacker… So with that in mind i looked into the options and they were, limited… Due to the Trek knock-block system which stops the forks hitting the frame in an accident.

This however is a solution that enables you to either/both get a little bit slacker and if you wished, get rid of the upper knockblock as it increases clearance.

https://www.bikester.co.uk/reverse-angle-spacer-for-tapered-forks-M791918.html

It’s only 0.5deg… but hey, it’s 0.5 deg… so we’ll give it a whirl.

So with the weird and wonderful world the Trek is still here and the 0.5 spacer finally arrives from Bikester today after a little bit of shipping/DHL delay. So i’m going to chuck it in before heading out for some local woods stuff with the lad today and then Rogate tomorrow.

There’s another few bits of bike changes coming up in the near future, but that’s a whole different discussion and can’t really go into details at the moment 🙂

There’s another few bits of bike changes coming up in the near future, but that’s a whole different discussion and can’t really go into details at the moment 🙂

please do, its a slow day in the office for me.

please do, its a slow day in the office for me.

Check your private messages 😀

Daft question time… surely the headset spacer thing is directional ? It doesn’t have anything on it to show direction

Or am i being totally daft ?

Daft question time… surely the headset spacer thing is directional ? It doesn’t have anything on it to show direction

purely from looking at the other photos on that product listing it goes on the fork below the headtube. Achieves about the same thing as upping your fork travel in that the frame angles will slacken and BB raise slightly.

different to the standard method of a headset that actually slackens the fork relative to the headtube but I think that is where you were hitting problems with the trek proprietary nonsense.

Yup, it’s just lifting the headtube a bit (5mm I’d imagine) so you just need to line up the logo where you want it

Thanks kids 🙂

Not a clue but you’d think it would have to be.

Did you not find the slack-r for trek bikes?

https://www.shore-lines.co.uk/9point8-slack-r-headset-angle-adjuster

Wasn’t aware of that, but it MAY work, may not… The knock block on the Trek is not just an aesthetic/thing, it actually is needed to stop the top of works hitting the carbon frame.

The frame has a frame protector so i can’t actually be 100% that mine would not actually clear it. I’m not sure the lower on that headset is any thicker than this one, so still wouldn’t like to say and it’s a much more expensive way of finding out the answer.

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2nR7oS2]2022-10-06_01-57-18[/url] by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2nRbr1E]2022-10-06_01-57-11[/url] by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

I’ll give it a whirl tomorrow and see 🙂 Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like i dislike the Trek at all… i just ‘wonder’ a few things at a few different times.

Could I tell the 0.5 Deg difference, nah, not me, that’s outside of mt skills. But I’ll admit, the bike was ace at Rogate today, both me and it were very much friends together.

My lad took some chest cam footage, mostly of his knees lol.

But his mate who we took was apparently impressed by my riding.

I’m not debating whether I’ll race on Sunday at Stile Cop. Odds are, it’s crazy and I won’t, but the thought is slightly tickling away in the back recesses of my little brain.

New pressfit DUB bottom bracket needed so that’s getting thrown in asap, but no massive rush as I’m not out on it this weekend. It was stuck! So a bit of wiggling, gt85 and then a refill with grease has got it ok again, but obviously that’s not a full fix.

I got the new BB installed and it’s running sweetly again.

As you’ll have seen, the Fuel has been in the danger zone several times lately, but the today once again it showed me just how awesome a bike it is.

It wasn’t hard tech stuff today at FoD as a mate on his ebike was giving his dogs a workout too, but plenty of up and a decent bit of down too. The fuel just lapped it up though as always and me and it are very much friends.

Still can’t say the SLX brakes are my best friends, they’re ok but not spectacular, but some of that may be from rain contamination from being sprayed on the back of car on the rack.
Other that that, it’s great.

I may throw a 210*55 shock in there to make it from 130mm to 138mm on the back. But also to throw a better shock on as well. Nothing wrong with the Thru Shaft shock but it’s not exactly the best one ever made.

Just need to work out what shock.

Was interesting chatting with Katy Curd today after she’d finished coaching my lad, I had a go on her Privateer 161 and she runs her bars way turned back. I thought it may be because her bike was too big, but apparently not and a discussion ensued as to why etc, so I’ve set mine back to try and see how it feels. Nothing to lose anyway.

Lesson for today. Don’t try and chase ebikes uphill, it’s destined to fail

What was the privateer like, did you get much of a go? A mate is toying with getting one.

What was the privateer like, did you get much of a go?

Not much at all sorry, just a car park try.

Bar sweep and angles are very personal but certainly nothing to lose to see how you like it and if it makes a difference.

Yeah i went out on a 25 miler on Sat morning locally, the legs were a bit tired after FoD on Thurs, but i was certainly happy on the Trek. What was really pleasing was that being out with average riding mate, i was not only quicker on the Uppy bits, but also on the Down bits too, which is somewhat unique for me these days lol. Usually i’m the slowest, but usually i’m with the Teen crazies of course. So being the one being held up is a unique thing.

However i still have been sitting here thinking about ‘more’ and put in place something i saw somewhere else which is a DHX2 rear shock. The standard unit gets frowned upon by some critics with the Thru-shaft and i did have a warranty issue early on which was admittedly quickly replaced. But the other factor was, i really like coil, plus fitting a 210*55 instead of a 210*52.5 gives me 8mm more travel apparently, taking the rear from 130mm to 138mm. Which can’t hurt things.

I’ve still got the thoughts on Slayer running round my head but spending a big chunk on some new Boxxers for the lads DH bike may well mean that’s off the cards completely now and we stick with the Trek.

[url=https://flic.kr/p/2nWnR3a]2022-10-31_12-50-41[/url] by Steve Weeks, on Flickr

Tried moving the bars back even more yesterday, but felt way too far.. So they’re back ‘some’ from where i had them, but not quite as far as i think the discussion thought they may.

Sadly, due to monsoon after monsoon after more monsoons, it’s not actually been ridden since. Every time i think about heading out it’s walloping down… the weather currently doesn’t look like it’s going to improve.

I may just bite the bullet and head to Parkend this weekend and get sloppy…