I had to do a double take, then an other double take today, I saw a guy on a mountain bike make that I’d not seen for over 25 years and even now, I’ve forgotten the make already, I think the name started with A but wasn’t Avanti, but the best thing, was the butterscotch coloured tyres. I had a few minutes chatting to the guy and I mentioned the tyres, he told me he’d bought 10 pairs back in 1995 and thought they would see him through his cycling days. It did look odd though, after all this time.

Alpinestars and Tioga Psychos?

Psychos were grey? Michelin wild grippers are a kinda beige colour

Butterscotch Tioga Psycho – they were a thing!

Kona Scratch and Sniff were butterscotch.

Black with splatter paint job? Raleigh Avanti. Was a 531 high end frame with a full XT groupset including thumb levers

looks like it has been ridden through countless dog eggs all day 😉

Onza porcupine tyres? Didn’t those come in a cream/off white colour? 

The wild grippers I had were green.

Panaracer Smoke/Dart were available in that colour iirc.

DiamondBack did a range of bikes called Axis / Apex / Ascent.

I have a DB Ascent – came with gum walled “Farmer Johns”, but black tread.  Still have the bike, but got it resprayed dark blue as the ‘marbled grey’ was boring !

Yeah I had the Smoke/Dart combo in that colour back in the early nineties. I kind of miss them.

You can never take retro too far, it’s just another way of arsing about on bikes. Retro = ace.

You can ride a retro bike too far though.  About 500m off road will do and then you realise they are pants.

About 500m off road will do and then you realise you are pants.

Fixed that for you.

You can ride a retro bike too far though.  About 500m off road will do and then you realise they are pants.

See article in the latest Singletrack magazine. (Yes, there’s a magazine.)