Fellas at work are in an Irish band – they’re brilliant.

My eyes, my f*cking eyes!!! They’re burning, argh, the pain. My eyes……

Nah, we know somewhere good for the D&G centres (if anyone wants details, google Greenhead Lodge – 15 minutes to Mabie, 25 to Dalbeattie, 40 to Kirroughtree and probably about 10 or 15 to Ae and Drumlanrig – and with 8 of us staying there at the end of March, its costing us a whopping £15 each for TWO nights! And its MASSIVE and has a hot room!).

Get a trip to Tyred Out at Penmachno. Thats what you want in terms of facilities. Then just copy that within a SHORT ride of Glentress.

Done…

That looks a million times better than the ‘summer’ HTN was!

No idea on the weight of mine but it doesn’t feel much more than my pretty lightweight Cotic Soul weighed.

As for the Bottlerocket, yes, I think its designed to take much more of a beating tha the Blood but no idea on those estimated weights – they seem a hell of a lot!

Plus the Blood looks crap compared to a 4X!

Why would you buy a Blood when a Bottlerocket is a lot less (and the Blood was, apparently, first conceived when someone who works for Orange had a ride on a Bottlerocket and loved it and hey presto, Orange knock together a prototype)?

Anyway, I’ve owned my Blur 4X for about 3 or 4 months now and its excellent. Just echo’ing other peoples views really – fast as **** downhill, nice slack angles, and its no slouch on the climbs either. Again, there is pedal feedback in the granny ring but its not too bad – coming off a hardtail it bugged me to start with but I’m used to it now. Mines in bits at the moment as I’m going to nitromors and polish the frame up this weekend but the spec is (with planned upgrades):
– medium Blur 4X frame / 5th Element air shock
– Hope headset
– Hope Pro2s/Syncros DS28s/Kenda Blue Grooves or Maxxis Minions
– Race Face Atlas cranks (running double/bash with an E-Thirteen Supercharger)
– SRAM X7/X0 gearing (going to swap for Saint/XT I think)
– Thomson post / SDG seat
– Race Face Diablous bar/stem (going to swap for a Thomson and Easton EA70)
– XT SPDs/Crank Bros 50/50
– XT 203/180mm brakes
– Fox 36 RC2s (the older 150mm versions)

I can’t figure out how people are happy running their forks any lower than 140/150mm as the head angle + sag just got really scary for me. Just leave mine on 150mm all the time and its perfect.

Here’s mine in its early guise:

Oh, and if you’re quick, theres a medium one on Ebay at the moment in MINT condition. 2 days left and its at £400.

I think for commuting (which is what mine was for), there are better full build bikes from more mainstream manufacturers for a bit more than the ‘rat frame costs on its own. I admit it, I fell for the fact it looked nice, was steel and was a Cotic. On the lookout for a Santa Cruz Roadster now!

hora – yes. Wasn’t bad, just not as exciting to ride as my Soul was. Think I’d have been better off squeezing some 700c wheels into my Soul!

I thought my Roadrat was just ‘ok’. Nothing at all that seemed that special about it. Cheapo old Kona with some slicks on would do just as good a job for what I wanted.

2:20 for me yesterday, on my own with NO stops so taking it pretty steady. All 24 miles or whatever without stopping.

And thats with the bombholes closed halfway through so you have to take a longer route on the fire-road AND I took some sections of the old red from the visitor centre to the quarry but all in it probably evens out or is actually slightly longer!

Bike: Blur 4X with Fox 36s and super tacky tyres which aren’t half draggy on those fire-road sections!

Cheers all… might take it somewhere local and see what they reckon.

I ran a Cane Creek S2 on my Cotic for 3 years without a hint of a problem.