Long, low and slack by Alex Leigh, on Flickr

First up, props to PedalABikeway in the Forest who let me queue jump, and then hid the bike from me as they performed BB shell surgery with a variety of tools. I’m sure at one point there were three of them leaning on a t-bar 😉

So how does it go? Well based on three hours in a very muddy forest, not quite as expected. Coming off 29er (FS and HT) for the last nine months I expected the Mega to be a pig on the climbs and a nutball on the descents, it’s about half that.

It’s actually a reasonable climber. The forest isn’t steep so 34T/36T is fine even in deep mud. It’s a bit wallow-y with the shock open, but stick it in the mid point and it sits up a bit and climbs like a goat. Quite a heavy goat I would admit. I didm’t really notice the weight until near the end where 33lbs (my guess) starts to makes itself felt.

Downhill it’s bonkers. Some of this has to be that fork. Buttery Smooth isn’t even close. But it doesn’t dive (and I have the high/low compression setting firmly dialled to ‘BOS Default’) yet seems to be awesome on small bumps and the big old holes on the DH run we did. I have to admit to feeling a bit tense hitting a line of scooped out holes, followed by massive breaking bumps interspersed with damp roots. Not a flicker of off-line behaviour. Think the DHF 2.5 helps as well.

The rear shock is very good indeed. As long as you remember to take the pro-pedal off (ahem). The whole bike is properly stiff, can’t feel any flex at all. Zee brakes are essentially like taking your own personal wall to the trail and the rest of the kit just worked. That thin/thick ring is clearly elven magic.

Going back to 26inch wheels was odd. It’s definitely different but not in a bad way. Forgot how quick you can change direction. Although I did spend the first 10 minutes asking ‘why is the front wheel so far away and how come it is so small?’

Clean! by Alex Leigh, on Flickr

Having cleaned it, I’ve found exactly where I missed with the Helitape. Still paint is over-rated eh?

Too early to tell much other than it rides like a very nice bike. It’s climbs way better than a 7/6 inch travel bike has any right too. It goes round corners with adequate briskness and descends – even with me on board – as if it’s as desperate for tea and cake as I was.

I didn’t expect to pedal this much in the UK. Hmm. Might have to reconsider that.

Or if all of that is too much TL;DR then basically

I thought I was getting one of those on the left, think I might have built one of those on the right 🙂

Bench needs a coat of something,
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Nice bike…

My OCD can’t handle the mis-matched wheels 😐

I stripped that bench a YEAR AGO on the understanding my wife was going to paint it. Apparently she’s waiting for a solar eclipse of something 😉

@legend – I’m not happy about it, but that’s because the one shipped to match the front had the wrong hub adaptors so I’ve had to order them from the US. Shipped today so we should be back to happy OCD land sometime in the next couple of weeks!

Lovely bike. My friend has one too and I have just got a new Stumpjumper FSR. When I had a go on his I was suprised to find I preferred the feel of the frame to the Stumpy and immediately had bike envy!

6 months

@nickc – as a man who has some inkling of my bike rental history I shall let this pass for now. But you may be surprised. Still so might I 😉

I tried my mate’s older one and it felt ‘right’ but very, very short. The AM’s have a decent length TT and a slack SA so the reach is okay for me.

’tis a nice bike fo’shure.

What size is that rotor on the front, BTW; 203? no wonder braking was impressive!

Yes 203. It’s for the alps really and even then you could argue it’s overkill. But in terms of taking ALL the speed you want to bleed in a blink of an eye so you’re ofd the brakes when you want to be, they’re superb.

Again you could probably argue with a bike like that, I should be braking less 😉

Looks a giggle. Must be a blast downhill.

Again you could probably argue with a bike like that, I should be braking less

Weirdly I’ve been trying very hard recently to do that very thing. Given that the limiting factor in most situations is me…I’ve taken recently to letting the bike sort itself out…after a few heart in mouth moments, it’s actually quite liberating and eye opening as to what it’s actually capable of.

At no point do I consider the bike the high water mark of the speed I am riding any trail 😉

Some nonsense here: http://pickled-hedgehog.com/?p=3081