The people I see pushing these days are unfit people on slightly-too-heavy “all mountain” bikes. Sort of acceptable if they’re stupidly fast on the descents, but they never are.
I’m chubby and ride a slightly too heavy all mountain bike like a bit of a pansy, want to make something of it skinny boy?
On a serious note, AM bikes are (generaly) faster downhill than XC bikes, a slow rider would be even slower downhill on an XC bike, so why shouldn’t they ride AM bikes and get the same downhill buzz as everyone else?
If Mr Armstrong was out on an MTB ride and overtook a group of STWers, should they be relegated to turbo training as they clearly aren’t fast enough to deserve to ride MTB’s, or road bikes anywhere where they might be seen by the public? No matter how lie surf-mat you are, there will always be someone faster.